Higher Education Institutions as Partners in Growing Innovation of Local Economy

Abstract

Higher education institutions (HEIs) are constantly evolving how they operate and their areas of academic interest. What remains unchanged is the fact that the raison d’être of a university is to fulfill the role of a citadel of knowledge to its environment. The aim of this paper is to show the relationship between HEIs and entities that have an impact on the growth of the local economy, in particular the possibilities of shaping local partnerships for innovation. The paper thus outlines the nature of individual sectors, the special role played by local governments, and the activities of universities related to innovation in the economy, based on the results of two collaborative studies co-sponsored by the Ministry of Science and Higher Education and teams of researchers at the WSB University in Dąbrowa Górnicza. One of the projects was under the framework of the DIALOG program of 2019–2020 and the other used the framework of the Regional Excellence Initiative program of 2019–2022. The main part of this study was based on a survey of representatives of local governments; the survey was oriented towards identifying the opinions of local managers on the current and postulated roles of universities in the development of the local economy. The results presented in this study indicate, among other things, a significant differentiation of expectations concerning the cooperation of entities in the process of local development based on innovation and changes in the areas of this cooperation.