📋 Tender Overview
The Education Commission (CE) approved a project that creates a special employment contract to stimulate the hiring of researchers. The also regulates the accumulation of masters, doctoral and postdoctoral scholarships with paid activity.
Presented by Senator Weverton (PDT-MA), the bill received a favorable opinion in the form of a substitute of Senator Cid Gomes (PSB-CE) and will therefore undergo supplementary shift vote at a next CE meeting.
The text states that the contracted researcher should work in the area where he is conducting his studies. And you will be able to participate in the scientific or technological research team, under supervision of holder or equivalent researcher. The objective is to stimulate the hiring of masters students and doctoral students and the integration between gym and productive sector.
Contract
By the approved text, Stricto Sensu Postgraduate Students-Masters and Doctorate-and Postdoctorate will be able to enter special work contracts, in writing and with a determined term. The positions will be called Postgraduate Researcher Hired and Postdoctoral researcher hired. The duration of the contract will be equivalent to the researchers period of bond with the postgraduate or postdoctoral program in Brazil.
According to the text, the contractors will be entitled to a scholarship equal to or greater than that paid by public development institutions, such as the Higher Education Personnel Improvement Coordination (CAPES) and the National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq).
Bag accumulation
In addition, it will be allowed to accumulate the scholarship with aid received by public or private research promotion institutions.
Only in exceptional, duly justified situations can postponement agencies or postgraduate programs may provide the impossibility of accumulation of both remuneration. Still, the researchers employment relationship cannot be used as the sole criterion for the negative granting of the scholarship.
Workload
The project rapporteur, Senator Cid Gomes (PDT-CE), is favorable to the proposal, but presents modifications to improve the regulation. Among the main adjustments are the weekly workload of up to 20 hours for postgraduate students (Master and Doctorate) and up to 30 hours for postdoctoral students.
It also guarantees, through amendment, the right to remove the researchers for one week per semester for activities such as seminars and congresses. This dismissal will have to be formally notified to the employer at least 30 days in advance.
Labor laws
Apart from these exceptional rules on working hours and exempts to activities related to training, the same labor laws that govern the other workers will be applied. Researchers will be included, for example, in the FGTS and as Social Security insured.
Knowledge market
In justifying the proposal, Weverton argued that graduate students, at a crucial moment of their education, suffer from the lack of social protection, the result of the low articulation between the academy and the job market. Therefore, the project seeks to ensure a minimum social security and labor coverage for this group, including through the creation of incentives for hiring by employers.
Cid Gomes expressed support for the project, noting that the measure benefits companies and researchers.
-On the one hand, postgraduates gain a concrete opportunity to demonstrate their ability to add value to the research activities to which they are incorporated. At the other end, contracting companies and entities, with relatively low costs, can engender new products and services and strengthen genuinely Brazilian research solutions, eventually crucial factor for competitive repositioning in the market in which they operate. Thus, the educational and social merit of the project is unquestionable-said the rapporteur.
Senate Agency (reproduction authorized by citation of the Senate Agency)
