SPEECH/06/398
Ján Figel’
Member of the European Commission responsible for Education, Culture, Training and Multilingualism My Vision for European Student Mobility in the next Decade
“The future of European student mobility”—Conference organised by the UK Erasmus Student Committee Brussels, 22 June 2006
Distinguished guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
First of all, I would like to convey my thanks and congratulation to the organizers of this event that has allowed a fruitful exchange of views on important topics for the future of Europe. And this is not an overstatement.
Some people may say that today we have been talking about just student mobility. I would not agree with the qualification, because Erasmus and the other European exchange programmes have far–reaching implications.
For a proof of that, let us just go through the issues touched upon by the speakers before me: promoting European ideals, responding to Euroscepticism, paving the way for institutional reforms...
It should be clear to everyone why Erasmus is regarded as the flagship programme of the European Commission. Of all the reasons that may explain its popularity, I particularly like its ability to promote both institutional convergence and people–to–people contacts.
This mix was designed into the programme since its very beginning. When Erasmus was first conceived, in the 1980s, it supported a drive that was already present in our societies.
Young people - always the first to embrace new opportunities - were already eager to explore what Europe was like beyond their national borders.
The creation of Erasmus is a good example of how political action can give the decisive push to grass-root movements and set them in motion.
When the Commission proposed the Erasmus programme, several large countries opposed it on legal grounds. They insisted that education fell outside the scope of the treaties.
Much of the argument hinged on the distinction between education and vocational training. We could cooperate on training because of the principle of free movement of labour. But education was taboo once we called it education.
Perhaps the times were not ripe then; educational systems were perceived as core features of national sovereignty, together with defence and tax collection.
Much progress has been made since. The first pioneer Erasmus students travelled in 1987; since then, almost 1.4 million young people have done so.
Today, nine out of ten universities across Europe are participating in Erasmus with European projects, networks, and mobility actions.
Over time, this movement has created an environment of mutual trust that has made other developments possible. Trust is crucial. No reform can work without it. No institutional arrangement, however clever and well designed, can substitute it.
Ladies and gentlemen,
This is what the past looks like, but how about the future?
After months of discussion, the final agreement on the budget of the Union for the years 2007-2013 was reached last April. We can now have a clear idea of the resources available over the next seven years.
The key question regarding Erasmus in a ten year time–frame therefore seems to be how to optimise its development as part of the Lifelong Learning Programme while at the same time preparing the ground for the things we hope to achieve in the second part of the decade.
Before I go on, I should mention that the current programme includes three actions:
Intensive Programmes and Curriculum Development Projects; Student and Teacher mobility; and Thematic Networks.
Today, I shall confine my remarks to mobility and to student mobility in particular.
What are the key challenges facing Erasmus student mobility in the next decade? How should we respond to them?
My opening remarks already made it clear that Erasmus can contribute enormously to forging and to promoting a European identity.
It does this in many ways, but in particular by breaking down social and cultural barriers among Europeans.
Thanks to it, students can have first–hand experience of the great social, cultural and political reality that the EU of 25 countries is.
I also see Erasmus as a great opportunity to prepare for working life both at home and abroad. Many students have formed their view of Europe as a place to work and develop their careers during an Erasmus exchange. Our need for an open, flexible, mobile and linguistically fluent workforce will, given what we know about the future work of work, be ever greater in the years ahead. The main challenge for Erasmus therefore is to help form this workforce.
Lisbon
Let me address another major challenge: the role of universities for Europe’s economic and social objectives—the so–called Lisbon Strategy.
The modernisation of Europe’s universities has been acknowledged as a core condition for its success. To be quite clear, higher education must make an increased concrete and practical contribution to Europe’s future as a knowledge based economy.
But this is nothing new. Universities and centres of learning have been crucial for the social and economic development of Europe for over nine centuries.
Nevertheless, we are turning to them again in new ways now that the ‘wealth of nations’ consists of human capital: the knowledge and skills possessed by the people. And if you read the Commission’s recent communication on a modernisation agenda for Universities and University-based research, you will see that it is our view that universities need substantial change if their potential contribution is to be maximised. Changes in the way they are managed, in the way they are funded and in the very content of what they deliver to whom.
Erasmus has a role to play in this context.
Student and staff mobility allow for a knowledge transfer, for ambitious institutions to emulate the best and for the establishment of informal networks which can over time become more substantial partnerships for friends.
One - and three - million targets
Ladies and Gentlemen:
In October 2002 the programme celebrated its one–million mark. Then we set ourselves the target of reaching three million Erasmus students in the following ten years.
Before we come to the matter of what to do when we get there, we must try to be clear about the extent of the challenge.
Since Erasmus began in 1987, the number of students participating has increased every year with the exception of 1996/7.
The number of students participating in 2004/5 was over 144,000.
The overall percentage increase last year was 6.2%. However, in the new member states plus the three candidate countries the average increase was as high as 28.2%.
We estimate that if we are to reach our three million target in 2012, Erasmus student mobility in that year will need to exceed 250,000.
That represents an increase of about 70% on the present figure—an annual growth rate of some 8% per year.
This remains a feasible goal, and perhaps we may reach it even earlier if the funds become available.
Current trends and developments
However, there may be some trends that could slow down progress.
First, despite the overall increase, mobility varies a lot between countries. In some countries (Ireland, Italy, Finland, Iceland, UK, Romania) the numbers of students participating in Erasmus fell in 2004/05.
In the UK - as everyone here now knows well - participation has declined by 20% over the past five years. I call on Britain and the other countries to make extra efforts to promote student mobility.
Another challenge is the imbalance between incoming and outgoing students in a number of countries.
In the UK and Ireland, for example, there were more than twice as many incoming as outgoing students. Spain—which is the most popular destination—had about 4,000 more incoming than outgoing students. In Eastern Europe, on the other hand, the number of incoming students still remains a fraction of the outgoing students.
Again, I believe that these imbalances will have to be redressed.
Solutions
Part of the solution lies in the increase of the grant level.
After a long and steady decline, the average Erasmus grant rose for the first time to 140 Euros [£ 95 approx.] per month of Community funding in 2004/5. And there will be further increases this year.
This is good news, especially in the light of a recent survey that found that about half the Erasmus students considered the grant to be insufficient.
Indeed, it will be an objective of Erasmus in the new lifelong learning programme to try to maintain the average grant at approximately 200 Euros [£ 136 approx.].
Also, Erasmus must remain a vehicle for quality mobility. A number of formal criteria must be met, including recognition, proper mobility agreements, and proper documentation. Additional criteria should also include language support, social and cultural support, and the various subsidiary programmes currently on offer.
Given that more countries will participate in the coming decade, knowledge of the less spoken languages will also become an important issue.
Erasmus Intensive Language Courses give students an opportunity to study the new language in the host country for one month on average.
Over 3,000 Erasmus students took these courses in 2004 and I believe that their offer should expand in the future. Ten years from now Intensive Language Courses may have become a standard Erasmus feature.
The survey of Erasmus students drew attention to one further critical issue: 27.7% of students reported that they did not receive full recognition for their period of study abroad.
That is unacceptable. Erasmus should mean full recognition. This is the point of the exercise and I do not expect to wait a decade to have this problem solved. I intend to deal with the issue as a top priority and to help universities solve the problem.
Fortunately, there are signs that things may soon get better. Many countries are committed to implementing the European Credit Transfer System - or ECTS - as part of the Bologna process.
To sustain this process, the Commission is introducing the promotion of ECTS on a Department by Department basis within universities.
In the past, an ECTS Label was awarded to a university only after the system was fully operational in all its subject areas.
In the future, we will make sure that individual Departments are properly implementing ECTS, especially those involved in Erasmus.
By the end of the decade I hope that ECTS will have become not just a standard system for Erasmus mobility, but also a system for all institutions participating in EU higher– education programmes.
Conclusion
Thanks to the reforms brought about by the Erasmus programme, by the ECTS and by the parallel Bologna process, national higher-education systems are working increasingly together.
It is becoming much easier to think of individual centres of learning as part of larger, Europe - wide communities.
What will Europe’s higher education look like 15 or 20 years from now? In many ways, I think that the future will look a lot more like the past, when the best scholars would move from one centre of learning to another.
Let us think of the historical Erasmus, the humanist from Rotterdam, who worked and studied in Paris, Oxford, Padua, Cambridge, Leuven, and Basel.
Today travel is easy and the capacity for long–distance communication is spectacular. The conditions are perfect for the birth of knowledge communities that know no other frontier than the frontier of knowledge.
I am sure Erasmus would be happy to see what we are doing in his name.
Thank you.
