In January 2022, the European Commission unveiled the European strategy for universities, with the purpose of providing support to higher education institutions in reimagining and revitalizing themselves while tackling the contemporary challenges we face. This strategy, in conjunction with the Council Recommendations on building bridges for effecting European higher education cooperation, aims to unlock the full potential of the higher education sector as a catalyst for skills, knowledge, innovation, and addressing societal issues.
To achieve this objective, one of the key pillars is the Joint European Degree and sstablishing a framework for the issuance of a single diploma by multiple higher education institutions. This joint degree, awarded at the national level, would acknowledge the learning outcomes attained through transnational cooperation among several institutions. It would be based on a shared set of criteria and easily verifiable, authenticatable, and recognized across the European Union (EU).
The ED AFFICHE Project specifically addresses this key pillar, which focuses on the creation of a European joint degree. A joint degree refers to a singular diploma awarded by at least two higher education institutions. The aim of a joint European degree, issued at the national level, is to validate the learning outcomes achieved through transnational cooperation within European Universities alliances, based on a common set of criteria. It is envisioned that a European degree should be easily issued, stored, shared, verified, authenticated, and universally recognized within the EU.
As an initial step, the Commission, in collaboration with member states and European universities, is actively working towards developing and refining European criteria for the conferment of a European Degree label. Ideally, this label would serve as an additional certification accompanying the qualifications of students graduating from joint programs delivered through transnational cooperation among multiple higher education institutions.
The specific objectives of the ED-AFFICHE project are:
- To provide a comprehensive overview of the state of play of joint programmes across the six participating European University Alliances. These joint programmes will be used in the mapping exercise, which will be carried out through a combination of targeted interviews and large-scale surveys, ensuring a broad analysis across countries, universities, levels of higher education as well as academic fields and disciplines involved.
- To make recommendations for the design of a European Degree label with a view to maximize its attractiveness and potential impact through consultation meetings with national accreditation agencies and other stakeholders (students and employers) across Europe.
- To contribute to the development of a more inclusive, accessible and transparent framework for the development of joint programmes by developing an overview of existing legal barriers in participating countries and a toolkit of possible solutions and good practices to overcome such barriers in the future development of programmes.
- To ensure synergies and promote Bologna tools and greater flexibility with the leverage of Bologna tools synergies and encourage their full implementation, to also explore possible adaptations and simplifications to procedures and promote more flexible national legislation and room for experimentation in high-quality transnational collaboration.
- To promote innovative learning experiences that drive the visibility, attractiveness and competitiveness of European higher education at large, thereby attracting the best global talent and promoting European values on the global stage.