THE CONDITIONS TO BUILD A PALACE

In 2012, UTAD - the University of Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro, became a privileged partner of INESC TEC. This University is living in a situation where context lacks density: the population of Vila Real is lower than in the Island of Madeira. When referring to costs, let us please remember the needs.

The cluster of INESC TEC at UTAD is more than an extension of Porto: this old coastal town becomes embraced by an intelligent countryside, in the understanding that it is much more important to unite that to remain proudly alone.

INESC TEC is larger than the sum of its parts. That which Universities struggle to do alone, as INESC TEC they can do it naturally and easily. No institutional partner would ever accept a regulation of power that would subordinate it to others: but building something in common is easy and productive.

This is the way the North of Portugal does things: we strengthen transversal institutional instruments. We don’t imitate the South, don’t follow recipes, don’t force mergers imposed from the top. We are as we are.

As in 2011 with the University of Minho, and as in 2005 with the Polytechnic Institute of Porto, the University of Porto is now sharing a dreamy sovereignty with UTAD and others, in this space where they are free to create and build, a space that INESC TEC so perfectly embodies.

Audere est facere*: we have been different just by daring. We perceive the urge to grow, to move forward, to consolidate. We need to make dreams real, to persist in a successful model, to improve – and triumph. Over the coming years, several Universities will choose new leading teams, new Rectors, certainly ready to strengthen and build on values and value. May they understand the worth of the foundations that INESC TEC is offering.

So, back to work. For the poet Fernando Pessoa is looking at us right around the corner of time:

Success is succeeding, and not in being able to succeed. Any piece of land offers the conditions to build a palace, but where will the palace be if it is not built there?

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(*) to dare is to do