Monday 3 October 2011

Go East, Erasmus!

‘Thanks to their mobility, young Europeans are increasing their chances of employment, developing a multicultural awareness’ emphasised minister Kudrycka while opening the ‘Go East, Erasmus!’ conference.
Professor Kudrycka recalled that in 2009 the states participating in the Bologna Process pledged that by 2020 at least 20 percent of students from the European Higher Education Area should take part in a student exchange or training session abroad. The Eastern countries can fulfil that requirement as soon as we set up an Erasmus programme for them.

‘Erasmus has become not only an academic but also a cultural phenomenon, and sociologists are talking about an Erasmus generation of young people who study with equal ease in their own country and throughout Europe. However, 14 countries, five of them from the Eastern Partnership, continue to remain outside that framework,’ the minister emphasised. ‘I am convinced the time has come to launch a discussion on the more extensive inclusion of the Eastern Partnership countries in the European Union’s mobility programmes,’ Professor Kudrycka noted.


That demand won the support of Eastern countries ministers. ‘Moldova’s participation in that programme would be an inspiration for universities and other educational institutions to develop and reform, and our educational system would become far more open,’ said Loretta Handrabura, the Moldovan Deputy Education Minister.

‘European educational programmes should continue to be developed beyond the EU’s boundaries. We need new platforms of discussion on including the states of the Eastern Partnership in common Europe,’ added the Armenian Education Minister Armen Ashotyan.
‘Student exchanges strengthen inter-state cooperation. We should all admit that contacts established amongst students influence the implementation of our policies,’ noted Jan Truszczyński from the European Commission. He added that the European Commission envisages 500 additional spots in the Erasmus-Mundus programme for students from the Eastern Partnership. ‘In 2012-2013 there will also be more resources available to educational institutions from Partnership countries,’ Truszczyński added.
The demand of the Polish Presidency has been unanimously supported by students from all over Europe. ‘The Erasmus revolution is still under way. It is the embodiment of freedom of learning and freedom of access to knowledge. We would be greatly concerned if Europe did not accept the proposal of the Polish Presidency,’

Allan Päll, chairman of the European Students' Union, told the ministers.

The Białystok conference under the auspices of the Polish Presidency has attracted representatives of educational institutions from such countries as Austria, the Czech Republic, Lithuania, Latvia, Denmark, Ireland, Holland, Armenia, Georgia and Moldova. ‘Go East, Erasmus!’ precedes the Warsaw’s Eastern Partnership Summit.


Article from: http://pl2011.science.gov.pl/news/read/Polish-Presidency_-Go-East_-Erasmus_.html

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