Students of the world
With nearly 10 years of cooperation behind them, it isn't just the current debate on the Bologna Process and its impact on the export market for higher-education that spurs discussions between Australia and the EU - but it certainly helps.
In 1999, the education ministers from around 30 European countries met in Bologna to establish a European area of higher education by 2010 with the aim of making the higher education systems in Europe converge towards a common framework based on three cycles - Degree/Bachelor, Master and Doctorate. The numbers have now swelled to 45 countries.
In response, the Australian Minister for Education Science and Training, Julie Bishop, issued a departmental discussion paper last month on what the Bologna process might mean for Australia, and Australia is not alone in its interest.
Bologna will be up for discussion when the OECD Ministers for Education meet in Athens next month and the Greek government has organised an official Bologna Seminar. Stakeholders and representatives from all 45 countries of the Bologna Process, representatives from OECD and OECD countries, other organizations, as well as European and international experts are expected to attend.
But is not the starting point for education cooperation between Australia and the EU, which began in earnest with the first round table in 1997, and continues to be a key plank of the Joint Agenda for Cooperation.
In June, the European Commission and Australian Government announced another four exchange projects have been approved that will allow an additional 160 Australian students to study in Europe and a similar number to come to Australia. This time the focus is on undergraduates, with the four successful proposals covering global citizenship, ethics, governance and security as well as an interdisciplinary collaborative programme in business, environment, science and technology.
Far from ignoring the plight of Master's level students, it was actually the success of another programme, Erasmus Mundus, which has allowed for a greater push for undergraduates. There are now 57 European Masters courses on offer under the Erasmus Mundus scheme in which students and academics from third countries (i.e. non EU Countries) can apply for a scholarship.
The scholarships are very generous at €21,000 per student for a one year course and academics receive €13,000 for a 3 month stay. Eight Australians are already studying Erasmus Mundus courses and a further 10 have been selected in the latest round which will see them flying to Europe in July for the start of the 2006-2007 academic year.
Australian universities have also jumped on board the Erasmus Mundus programme, under a separate partnership arrangement that sees local universities team up with their European counterparts to offer a European Masters course entitled PAGEM: Partnership for Geo-Information Science and Earth Observation for Environmental Modelling and Management. The University of NSW and the University of Sydney are working with the ITC (Netherlands) University of Southampton (UK), Lunds Universitet (Sweden) and Uniwersytet Warszawski (Poland) Boston University (USA) and Tsinghua University ( China ) to provide EU-GEM students with an opportunity to apply the knowledge gained in the curricular part of the course in on-going research projects relevant to GEM.
This is the fifth such partnership, the others involving the University of Queensland (EMMAPA, Adapted Physical Activity); the University of New England (Higher Education Studies); MacQuarie University (Global Studies) and Monash University (NOHA - International Humanitarian Aid).
The success of the National Europe Centre (NEC) at the Australian National University also prompted an evaluation of similar Centres around the world with the result that the European Commission has recently selected three proposals for Europe Centres in Australia. The NEC was successful again as was Monash University and the proposal from the Innovative Research Universities Network encompassing La Trobe (VIC) Macquarie University (NSW) Newcastle (NSW), Flinders (SA), Murdoch (WA) and Griffith in QLD. The goal of these Centres is to promote the study of the EU, to increase the understanding of the EU project in Australia, to highlight the EU-Australia relationship and to encourage and stimulate greater interest in EU affairs across all sectors, schools, government, industry, academe, media and the public at large.
The Delegation also presents EU Awards to several academic institutions across Australia to promote excellence in European studies. These awards are usually for essays on various aspects of European Integration.
see also media release 8 June 2006
