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16 October 2003
ACA Newsletter n° 32
Academic Cooperation Association Rue d'Egmontstraat 15, B-1000 Brussels, Belgium CONTENTS
1. News from the ACA Secretariat and ACA MembersNovember 24-25: ACA members gather in New YorkOn the invitation of the IIE, this year’s ACA autumn meetings will be held in New York, on 24 and 25 November. The meeting will start on Monday 24th with a CEO forum on the theme “International student and scholar mobility: issues and challenges”, organised jointly by IIE and ACA. The seminar will be addressed by several renowned academic leaders and specialists in international education, and it will explore mobility issues in and beyond trans-Atlantic exchange. Participation in the seminar is limited and concentrated on the exclusive group of leaders from national and international agencies and associations engaged in international education, as well as representatives of international and supra-national organisations, researchers and specialists in the field. The autumn meetings will be concluded by the ACA Executive Committee, Administrative Council and General Assembly meetings on Tuesday 25th November.
IIE: 2003-04 Global Fellowships for Threatened ScholarsThe IIE Scholar Rescue Fund provides fellowships for scholars whose lives and work are threatened in their home countries. Partnering with IIE in the work of the fund are the Scholars at Risk Network and the Open Society Institute. Henry G. Jarecki, one of the IIE board members and George Soros, the founder of the Open Society Institute, contributed $2 million to start the project. These fellowships permit scholars to find temporary refuge at universities and colleges anywhere in the world, enabling them to pursue their academic work. When conditions improve, these scholars will return home to help rebuild universities and societies. Academics, researchers and independent scholars from any country, field or discipline may qualify. Preference is given to scholars with a Ph.D. who have been employed in scholarly activities at an institution of higher learning during the last four years, who demonstrate superior academic accomplishment or promise, and whose selection is likely to benefit the academic community in the home and/or host country or region. Universities, colleges and research centers in any country may apply to serve as hosts. Fellowship recipients are expected to continue their work in safety at the host institution. Fellowships from 3 months to one calendar year will be considered with up to 25 fellowships awarded annually. The maximum award is US $20,000. Applications are accepted at any time. While emergency applications receive urgent consideration, non-emergency applications will be considered three times a year, next in February 2004 for applications received by January 1, 2004. For more information: http://www.iie.org/ScholarRescueFund 2. European PolicyBerlin 2003 – Bologna homework to be done by 2005?On 19 June 1999 Ministers responsible for higher education from 29 European countries signed the ‘Bologna Declaration’. They agreed on important joint objectives for the development of a coherent and cohesive European Higher Education Area by 2010. In the first follow-up conference held in Prague on 19 May 2001, the Ministers increased the number of the objectives and reaffirmed their commitment to establish the Higher Education Area by 2010. On 19 September 2003, the Education Ministers from 33 European countries met in Berlin in order to review the progress achieved, and to set priorities and new objectives for the coming years, with a view to speeding up the realisation of the European Higher Education Area. The Ministers emphasised the importance of all elements of the ‘Bologna Process’ for establishing the European Higher Education Area and stressed the need to intensify the efforts at institutional, national and European level. However, to give the Process further momentum, they committed themselves to three intermediate priorities for the next two years: to promote effective quality assurance systems, to step up effective use of the higher education system based on two cycles, and to improve the recognition system of degrees and periods of studies by 2005. The Ministers also agreed to:
Ministers welcomed the interest shown by other regions of the world in the development of the European Higher Education Area, in particular the presence of representatives from European countries not yet party to the Bologna Process as well as from the Follow-up Committee of the European Union, Latin America and Caribbean (EULAC) Common Space for Higher Education as guests at this conference. Further to the 33 countries currently part of the Bologna Process, seven countries decided to join in: Albania, Andorra, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Vatican, Serbia and Montenegro, “the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia”, and Russia. With Russia coming on board, the European higher education area will be doubling in size. With a view to the goals set for 2010, it is expected that measures will be introduced to take stock of progress achieved in the Bologna Process. A mid-term stocktaking exercise would provide reliable information on how the Process is actually advancing and would offer the possibility to take corrective measures, if appropriate. Ministers charged the Follow-up Group with organising a stocktaking process in time for their summit in May 2005 (Bergen, Norway), and undertaking to prepare detailed reports on the progress and implementation of the intermediate priorities set for the next two years. The Berlin Communiqué of the Ministers: http://www.bologna-berlin2003.de/pdf/Communique1.pdf
MEPs Vote to Raise Erasmus Mundus BudgetErasmus Mundus is a European Community programme with the aim of opening up Europe's universities to students throughout the world. The programme is expected to be operational from October 2004, and to run until December 2008. During this period it will provide grants for more than 4000 postgraduate students and 1000 scholars from non-EU countries. In addition, it will sustain the creation of Joint European Union Masters Degrees, which would become a recognised and prestigious qualification for such study programmes in Europe. Also mobility between the EU and non-EU countries, the acquisition of language skills, and intercultural dialogue are supported by the programme. The Commissioner for Education and Culture Viviane Reding said that the scheme will hopefully make Europe a “centre of excellence in world-wide education”. The European Parliament's Culture Committee unanimously voted on September 30 for a budget of € 230 million for the Erasmus Mundus programme. This amounts to € 50 million more than the budget proposed by the EU Education Ministers at their Council in May 2003. The European Commission had originally suggested a budget of € 200 million, while Parliament was at first pushing for € 300 million. The Council's suggestion of €180 million was a disappointment for the MEPs and the Commission. The rapporteur, Marielle de Sarnez's (EPP-ED/F), came to the new figure after lengthy talks with the Council. The Culture Committee is hoping to get this higher amount voted through at the report's second reading in plenary session on October 21 in Strasbourg.
Launch of The European Job Mobility PortalOn 19 September 2003 the Commissioner for Employment and Social Affairs Anna Diamantopoulou launched officially the European Job Mobility Portal and The European Commission's mobility information campaign 2003/2004. The new European Job Mobility Portal is based around the EURES network and web site. It aims to provide a user-friendly means of accessing the information needed for those contemplating a move for career or for learning purposes. As well as providing information on available jobs throughout the EEA and the possibility for job seekers to post their CVs online, the Portal will have information on living and working conditions, labour market developments, and on education and training opportunities (via the PLOTEUS site run by the Commission's DG for Education and Culture). The Employment Guidelines, adopted by the Council in July 2003, specify that by 2005 jobseekers throughout the EU should be able to consult all job vacancies advertised through Member States' employment services. It can therefore be expected that the Job Mobility Portal will become the essential supporting mechanism to underpin labour mobility throughout the EU. The European Commission's mobility information campaign 2003/2004, whose purpose is to target employers and workers on the key dimensions, opportunities and possibilities provided by the Internal Market and the European labour markets for skills, was launched on the same date. http://europa.eu.int/eures/home.jsp
The Asia-Link Programme -17 projects to get grant supportThe Asia-Link Programme is dedicated to the promotion of regional and multilateral networking between higher education institutions in European Union Member States and South Asia, South- East Asia and China. Of the 78 project proposals submitted under the first deadline of the second Call for Proposals, the evaluation committee has recommended 17 projects (involving 81 higher education institutions) for grant support, with a European Commission contribution of around € 5 million. The projects fall in the area of human resource development (7 projects), curriculum development (8 projects) and institutional and systems development (2 projects); and cover a variety of subject areas relevant to EU-Asia economic co-operation, such as environment/sustainable development, information technology, design, business/economics, medical science and EU-Asia studies. The successful and unsuccessful applicants have been officially notified, and grant contracts are under preparation for signature by successful lead applicants at approximately end October. A list of recommended projects and project summary sheets will be published on the Asia-Link website following the signature of contracts. The second deadline for the second call for proposals was on 25 September 2003. http://europa.eu.int/comm/europeaid/projects/asia-link/index_en.htm
Nobel laureates call for EU research bodyA group of Nobel laureates met the EU commissioner for research in Brussels on October 8, 2003 to make their case for a new European research council. The six European scientists represented 45 Nobel laureates who made their case in writing to the commissioner Phillip Busquin earlier this year. In the letter the scientists called for a single body to fund basic science across the continent in a bid to tackle the growing gap between European and American research. "It is about stopping the brain drain and making EU researchers stay in Europe, and it's also about better structuring in European research and pooling resources. But procedures and missions are still to be discussed. This is one of the first steps towards the ERC,” the spokesperson for the commissioner said. He added that the commission were keen to see a research council running alongside their framework programmes, which give some €18bn in grants every five years. The Education Guardian: http://education.guardian.co.uk/higher/research/story/0,9865,1058660,00.html
3. Public Tenders and Calls for Proposals in the EUPublic open tender EAC 69/03: Maintenance, hosting, enhancement and design of the second phase of PLOTEUS (the European portal on learning opportunities).PLOTEUS (www.ploteus.net) is the European portal on learning opportunities, whose development had been demanded by the conclusions of the Lisbon European Council. Its aim is to facilitate the access to information on learning opportunities with a special view to supporting mobility throughout Europe for education and training purposes. The present call for tenders aims on the one hand at ensuring the continuity, maintenance and enhancement of the current version of the PLOTEUS portal and on the other hand at starting, in an experimental way, the second phase of the project (PLOTEUS II - that is, the interoperability phase for the “learning opportunities” part of the portal). The present call for tender covers three separate lots: Lot 1. The hosting of the current portal (Ploteus I) on an external server Lot 2. The maintenance and upgrading of the current portal (Ploteus I) Lot 3. The analysis, design and prototyping of Ploteus II, including the common protocol for the interoperability of national databases on learning opportunities. The contracting authority: European Commission, DG
Education and Culture
Sixth Framework programme ‘science and society’ activity: Call for proposals for European platform of women scientistsThe European platform of women scientists will bring together networks of women scientists and other organisations committed to promoting gender equality in science, in order to improve the participation of women in scientific research and make their voice heard in the policy process at regional, national and European level. The areas covered by this call are the coordination and activities of the platform during the launch phase from 2004 to 2006. Community support will, in principle, be limited to this launch phase. Proposals must therefore present a convincing strategy for the long-term sustainability of the platform after this period. In specifying the instruments to be used in these areas, the call requests the use of specific support actions (SSA). The contracting authority: European
Commission 4. News from other sourcesGermany: a new Master’s on EU central banking and finance lawThe Institute for Law and Finance at Frankfurt's Goethe University offers a new one-year post-graduate program leading to a Master of Law degree (LL.M., Finance). The course program, entirely in English, emphasizes law of central banking, international finance law, comparative financial regulatory law, and EU legal procedures. Theory of contemporary central banking, involving active seminar participation by leading members of the European Central Bank, Bundesbank and other institutions, provides an exceptional interplay between theory and practice. Class size is deliberately small (max. 35 students) to allow maximum teacher-student dialogue. This course is the only one of its kind in Continental Europe. The program has been developed to take advantage of the institutional resources in the City of Frankfurt. The ILF program provides direct engagement with the European Central Bank (ECB), as well as major international financial institutions of the Continent’s leading banking centre. Internships with leading institutions also form an integral part of the program. For more information: www.ilf-frankfurt.de
World Teachers’ Day 2003In 1994 UNESCO inaugurated 5 October as World Teachers’ Day to commemorate the signing of the Recommendation Concerning the Status of Teachers on 5 October 1966. Over 100 countries observe World Teachers' Day, and teachers’ organisations worldwide mobilise to ensure that the needs of future generations are taken into consideration in this increasingly complex, multicultural and technological world. The efforts of Education International and its 311 member organisations have contributed to this widespread event. Indeed, every year EI has launched a public awareness campaign to highlight the contributions of the teaching profession. The theme of this year’s Teachers’ Day ‘Teachers - Opening doors to a better world’ highlights the key role of teachers both in the classroom and in the community at large. http://www.ei-ie.org/camp/english/wtd/
France: Sciences Po plans to abolish fees for poor studentsIn the cause of equal opportunity, one of the most prestigious of the French “Grandes Ecoles”, the Institut d'Etudes Politiques (Sciences Po), intends to abolish fees for students from disadvantaged families and, in return, to quadruple them for the richest. Families earning less than €4,166 a month would pay nothing, while those on more than €10,400 - which corresponds to 29 per cent of Sciences Po families, though only to 2.5 per cent of the French population - would pay the full fee. The introduction of this new financial scheme would be foreseen for the academic year 2004/2005. Plans to introduce means-tested fees in October 2004 result from a commission set up under economist Jean-Paul Fitoussi in May 2003. The measures will increase the school's annual budget of €61 million by €5 million, to be ploughed back into student grants and services. Four-fifths of Sciences Po's nearly 6,000 students pay annual fees of €1,050, while the rest are exempted because of low parental income. Under the new system, students would pay up to €4,000. The move has been condemned by majority student union Union Nationale des Etudiants de France as a "renunciation of public-service education and of democratising higher education". UNEF, whose members withdrew from the commission at the end of May, said it was "scandalous" that the institute had unilaterally announced completion of the inquiry's work. http://www.sciences-po.fr/presse/contribution/presse/pdf/aef230903.pdf Times Higher Education Supplement, 03 October 2003
Italy: Rectors call for 10 bn euros to save the university from collapseIn the "state of the universities" report the president of the Italian Rectors’ Conference (CRUI) Piero Tosi asks the Italian Government for 10 billion euros over the next few years to save the Italian university from a collapse. He says that this amount is needed to raise Italy's university funding from 0.8 per cent of the GDP to the European average of 1.2 per cent. The report stems from a long-running funding controversy. In December, rectors threatened to go on strike because of the 2003 cuts. University minister Letizia Moratti promised then more funds, but the situation has only become worse. "We are back to the 2002 figure," Professor Tosi said. "But costs have risen enormously." Earlier this month, Ms Moratti presented the rectors' conference with a "draft decree" that would have transferred key decisions on course design, research strategy, budget management and personnel decisions to the university and treasury ministries, after a decade of increasing autonomy of universities. When the rectors threatened to fight the proposals, Ms Moratti backed down, explaining that the "draft decree" was only a "technical note", that she was open to discussion and that she would "ask for 1 billion euro for higher education in the 2004 budget", admitting, however, that getting them might be very difficult. Even if granted, these resources would probably not be sufficient to meet the needs of the Italian universities. La Repubblica: http://www.repubblica.it/2003/i/sezioni/universita/retret/retret/retret.html Times Higher Education Supplement, 03 October 20035. PublicationsEducation at a Glance: OECD Indicators - 2003 Edition, 456 p. / ISBN 9264102337, paperback € 49.00, also available in FrenchThe focus of the 2003 edition of Education at a Glance is on the quality of learning outcomes, the policy levers and contextual factors that shape these outcomes, and the broader private and social returns that accrue to investments in education. This includes a comparative picture of student performance near the beginning and end of compulsory education that extends to knowledge and skills in important subject areas as well as patterns of learning strategies and engagement in learning. The picture is not limited to aggregate country performance, but also incorporates variations within countries. This allows for an examination of issues of equity in the provision and outcomes of education, on dimensions such as gender, age, socio-economic background, type of institution, or field of education. This report also includes new information on student learning conditions, which provides a better understanding of some of the determinants of educational success. This information elaborates on the integration of information and communication technologies in the instructional process, as well as on teacher qualifications, teacher working conditions and other factors affecting teacher demand and supply.
Learners for Life: Student Approaches to Learning: Results from PISA 2000, 136 p. / ISBN 9264103902, paperback € 21.00The OECD Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), which surveys 15-year-olds in OECD countries on a three-yearly basis, provides a unique opportunity to look at how students approach learning and how well they perform in terms of reading literacy. This report analyses the results, focusing on students’ motivation, self-beliefs and use of various learning strategies. In particular, it looks at those characteristics that together make it more likely that a student will become a confident and self-managed learner. The report offers policy makers a fine-grained analysis of which particular learner characteristics are prevalent in different countries. It also identifies differences between the approaches to learning of various groups, including male and female students, and those from more and less advantaged social backgrounds. The results point to ways in which education systems can focus efforts to help different groups of students become more effective learners.
African Higher Education – An International Reference Handbook, Damtew Teferra and Philip G. Altbach (eds.), Indiana University Press, 2003. 864 p. / ISBN 0253341868, hardback $89.95Since their founding, African colleges and universities have faced numerous challenges. While most are legacies of colonialism, these institutions are affected by particular conditions and realities in their home countries. This book is a comprehensive survey of all aspects and dimensions of higher education in Africa. It includes a historical overview of higher educational resources in Africa; descriptions of the size, scope, and nature of higher education in each African nation; and analyses of current and timely topics, such as the state of private higher education in Africa, the financing and economics of higher education, gender issues, distance education, ICT, and university/state relations. A limited number of copies are available without cost to scholars based in Africa and others who are involved with higher education.
Recognition Issues in the Bologna Process, Bergan, Sjur (ed.), Council of Europe Publishing, 2003, 292 p. / ISBN 9287151504, 292 p., € 28The Bologna Process, aiming to establish a European Higher Education Area by 2010, is the most important higher education reform process in Europe since the immediate aftermath of 1968. Making it easier for students and holders of higher education qualifications to move around Europe is one of the key goals of this process, and Facilitating the recognition of qualifications is one of the preconditions for this goal to be realised. This book sets out to take stock of the recognition of qualifications in Europe, and to highlight policies that will help make the European Higher Education Area a reality. The authors are recognition specialists and higher education policy makers from several countries in Europe and worldwide.
The Enterprising University: Reform, Excellence and Equity. Williams, Gareth, ed., Buckingham: Open University Press, 2003. 193 p. / ISBN 033521072-4, hardback $102.The overall focus of this edited volume is on the permutations of the "enterprise university"--the impact of markets and marked-oriented thinking on higher education. Chapters explore the impact of this concept on academic institutions, the professoriate, the relationship between the university and the workplace, approaches to the generation of income. While most of the chapters focus on the United Kingdom, there are considerations of American, South African, and Commonwealth experiences.
Lifelong Learning in the Global Knowledge Economy. The World Bank Washington, DC, 2003. 141 p. / ISBN 0-8213-5475-2, paperback $25While not necessarily postsecondary education, lifelong learning is
very much part of the broader education agenda of most societies. This
World Bank report discusses the role of lifelong learning in the knowledge
economy. An increasingly complex labour market and demands on the
workforce makes lifelong learning a growing emphasis. The report discusses
financing lifelong learning as well as the development of systems to
ensure that lifelong learning is appropriately governed. 6. Upcoming ConferencesOctober 20 - 24
October 23 - 25
October 30 - 31
November 03 - 04
November 06 - 07
November 07 - 10
November 09 - 12
November 12 – 15
November 14 - 16
November 23 - 25
November 24 - 26
November 27 - 28
December 3 - 5
Internet: www.aca-secretariat.be, Phone +32 2 513 2241, Fax +32 2 513 1776 Questions and replies to info@aca-secretariat.be
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