The Evaluation of International Postgraduate Degrees in the European Union. Good practice examples of European programmes

Abstract

Since 1999, the European Commission has promoted many cooperation programmes for higher education institutions which have contributed to push forward European higher education area reforms. While there are many different education programmes, Erasmus Mundus is among those that have had the most impact on European higher education. Since 2004, this programme has promoted and provided funding for implementing international Master's organised by at least 3 institutions from three different EU countries. The main aim is to promote high quality Master's, as well as to generate a European added value. This requires major coordination and planning effort between universities, not only in academic but also in organisational aspects. Nowadays the creation of transnational double or joint degrees is being especially promoted. However, ENQA and its European evaluation agencies have not yet proposed specific criteria for evaluating their added complexity. In this context, both ENQA and higher education ministries see the Erasmus Mundus programme as a valuable demonstration of good (and bad) practices, from which relevant conclusions can be drawn to properly evaluate inter-university degrees, both national and international. This paper reviews the most relevant criteria of Erasmus Mundus as well as the evaluation procedure, and the most relevant conclusions after five years of calls for proposals on this programme.