The Economist describes the Bologna process that has transformed European higher education:
When European education ministers met in Bologna in 1999 and promised within a decade to forge a common market for universities, it seemed mere Euro-rhetoric. Big obstacles stopped students nipping abroad for a term, or getting degrees recognised. Many countries offered no degree below Masters level. Some examined course modules separately, others all in one go. Under the Erasmus programme many students travelled to other European countries for between a term and a year — but they often found their universities reluctant to give them credit for it.Yet on April 28th no fewer than 46 European education ministers — from the European Union and 19 other countries, including Russia and Turkey — will gather in another ancient university city, Leuven, to declare the “Bologna process” a triumph. A “European credit-transfer system” is on its way; next year will bring a “European higher education area”. There will be a standardised “diploma supplement” giving details of what students have learnt. And three-year Bachelors degrees followed by two-year Masters are now the general rule, with few exceptions.
“The big surprise was that the Bologna process worked at all,” says Jean-Marc Rapp, president of the European University Association. Bologna is neither an inter-governmental treaty nor an EU law. He credits the eastern European countries that joined Bologna in 1999 for some of the success. Their governments were itching to reform communist-era universities and delighted to have a template for it — and their students were wild to travel.
Another reason why some governments embraced Bologna was to give cover for reforms they wanted anyway. Shorter, more work-related degrees appealed to the Germans, keen to stop students hanging on for years at taxpayers’ expense. In France, changes to university financing have been called “Bologna”. In Spain “Bologna” is the excuse for introducing fees for Masters degrees.
Many students now anathematise “Bologna” as a capitalist plot. They plan protests in Leuven; already, students have taken to the streets in France, Italy, Spain and Greece. The resemblance to the Anglo-American system, plus Bologna’s emphasis on graduate employability, are big grievances. Some academics fret that the secret aim is to privatise universities. Bologna’s endorsement of more autonomy could lead (horrors!) to more freedom for universities in hiring, promotion and pay.
Horrors!
One key element of the American system will still be lacking though: significant funds from student tuition fees.