Withing the activities prepared for the Setmana de Dona (Women's Week), the Principal of the Universitat de València, Mª Vicenta Mestre, has read at the Cloister of La Nau the manifest of CRUE Spanish Universities for the full equality of men and women.

Principal Mª Vicenta Mestre was accompanied by part of the Board of Directors, the director of the Equality Unit, Amparo Mañés, the president of the Legal Advisory Council, Margarita Soler, and several members of the university community.  

Mestre has reminded the attendees the role of universities in the transmission of values ‘in order to build a society which only gets more and more tolerant, fair and equal’. However, she claimed ‘this hasn’t still been achieved. Now is the time to face the closing stage.’

‘Although we’ve obtained a balance between men and women in our classrooms and faculties, we shall not forget there’s still a glass ceiling stopping access to high-level positions, as in scientific or academic careers or how it is quite difficult to attract women into technological degrees’ claimed the Principal.

The Principal has stressed the inequality women suffer ‘is not only unfair and intolerable, sometimes even illegal, but it also spoils talent. Without the full involvement of women in all fields, we are losing an irreplaceable vision in science and we deprive society of new standpoints which could drive us towards more sustainable and efficient values.’

Finally, Mª Vicenta Mestre has claimed that the ‘study of gender inequalities has contributed to a rigorous theoretical corpus, scientifically supported, which does not deserve to be questioned with arguments that are exclusively ideological, as it has happened during the last months. From the universities we want to express our concern for the debates that question the actual existence of equality policies and fights against gender violence under the mistaken belief that they discriminate men. For that reason, we ask the political parties to handle equality policiesrigorously and responsibly.’