Some changes become most visible when we look at the place certain issues have come to occupy within institutions. For Joaquim Mourato, President of the Governing Board of the Instituto para a Educação Superior, the fact that pedagogical innovation now has a place of its own on the Portuguese higher education agenda is already a significant change, especially compared with a time when teaching was clearly subordinate to other aspects of academic work.
Speaking at the opening session of the 2026 Internal Conference on Pedagogical Innovation, Joaquim Mourato began by acknowledging the progress made. For a long time, he recalled, pedagogy was far from central to how institutions thought about their development or how academics built their careers. Scientific research benefited from decades of investment, recognition and support structures, while the quality of teaching has only more recently begun to gain a similar place in institutions’ strategic thinking.
In this context, he returned to a phrase from European guidance that he considers particularly meaningful: the need to give "equal esteem" to teaching and research. This does not mean diminishing the importance of research. Rather, it means recognising that a higher education institution fulfils its mission when the quality of its scientific output and the quality of the learning experiences it offers students receive comparable attention, rigour and recognition.
This change in perspective has also begun to reshape how pedagogical innovation is organised. Joaquim Mourato highlighted the value of a systemic approach, developed through collaboration between institutions, as one of the most important contributions of recent years. Working in consortia has connected institutions with different experiences, encouraged the sharing of practices and knowledge, and, above all, enabled those starting from different positions to move forward together.
That is precisely the strength of this model. When innovation depends solely on the initiative of a few teachers or particular departments, progress tends to remain localised. When networks, structures and opportunities for collaboration are created, what one institution learns can become a resource for others. What works in one setting can also prompt new questions, adaptations or experiments elsewhere. Joaquim Mourato linked this ability to work together to the strength of the higher education system itself and to the possibility of ensuring that innovation leaves no one behind.
Students remain at the centre of this effort. Inclusion, integration, academic success, well-being and reducing dropout were all aspects that, in his view, pedagogical change should address. Innovation has real meaning only when it improves the conditions in which people learn and participate in academic life.
Artificial intelligence has made this discussion even more urgent. For Joaquim Mourato, the technology is already present in institutions, and trying to keep it out is unlikely to be the answer. The challenge, instead, is to learn to work with it critically while preserving, and ideally strengthening, academic rigour. Its presence also calls for a reassessment of assessment models that focus heavily on the final product, giving greater weight to the process, critical thinking, creativity and what each student demonstrates they can develop over the course of their studies.
Perhaps one of the most important questions in his address arose when Joaquim Mourato looked beyond the present moment. Much of the acceleration in pedagogical innovation in recent years was made possible by exceptional funding associated with the PRR and by projects that enabled institutions to build teams, develop resources, test solutions and establish new collaborative networks. That funding cycle is approaching its end, raising an unavoidable question: how can what has been built be preserved when substantially fewer resources are available?
The principle behind his answer was clear, even if putting it into practice will be demanding. Institutions need to start thinking now about pedagogical innovation beyond the PRR. The aim should not be to maintain indefinitely a scale of activity made possible by exceptional circumstances, but to identify what should be consolidated, which capabilities must remain and what forms of cooperation can sustain the progress already made. Teams have been created, institutions have learned new ways of working, and many of these activities have become part of academic life. The next challenge is to turn that investment into a lasting institutional asset.
This focus on continuity also helps explain the broader significance of giving equal value to research and teaching. If pedagogy is recognised as a structural part of the academic mission, it cannot depend exclusively on the duration of individual projects or funding cycles. It must take the form of lasting capacity, functioning networks, shared knowledge and an institutional culture that keeps student learning a permanent priority.
That was the direction Joaquim Mourato set out at JIIP'26: the progress made in recent years deserves to be consolidated, not by simply preserving everything that has been created, but by turning projects, experiences and investment into sustainable structures and practices that continue to improve the quality of higher education.