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Increasing Mobility - Finnish Perspectives on Academic Mobility and Erasmus

Juha Ketolainen, Assistant Director Maija Airas, Head of Unit

CIMO, Helsinki

Zagreb, October 2007

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Contents of Presentation

• Current situation & trends

• National level elements

• Institutional elements

• Challenges

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Erasmus activities

• Student mobility (study / work placement abroad)• Staff mobility (Teaching staff exchanges, other staff

exchanges, university-enterprise exchange)• Intensive programmes (courses)• EILC (Erasmus Intensive Language Courses)• Organisation of Mobility Support

• European Projects (Curriculum Development, University-Enterprise Cooperation, Modernisation of HE, Virtual Campus projects)

• European Thematic Networks• Support for the Bologna process

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Administration of Erasmus

• Central level: European Commission & Executive Agency (+ European Parliament, Programme Committee, Working groups)

• National level: National Authority (Ministry), National Agency, Expert committee, Individual Experts

• Institutional level: Erasmus Coordinator, bilateral agreements between HEIs etc.

• Individual grantholders

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Current level of student mobility

• Universities: 1/5 mobile in relation to annual intake (not only Erasmus)

• Polytechnics(Universities of Applied Scinces): 1/8 • Erasmus main channel (outgoing mobility: 45 %,

incoming 72 %) but also an increasing number of other possibilities

• Almost 1/10 participate in Erasmus • figures based on CIMO’s national data collection

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Features of Mobility from Finland

• Strongly centered to Europe

• 65 % of mobile students are female

• All Finnish HEIs are active, no dramatic differencies

• Engineering, NatSci, Teacher Training, Medicine could be better represented

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0

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

92 - 93 93 - 94 94 -95

95 - 96 96 -97

97 - 98 98 - 99 99 - 00 00 - 01 01 - 02 02 - 03 03 - 04 04 - 05

ERASMUS STUDENT EXCHANGE IN FINLAND 1992-2005

OUTGOING INCOMING

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Erasmus students as proportion of the student population: EUR31

0,0

1,0

2,0

3,0

4,0

5,0

6,0

% in 2005/06

Average in 2005/06

% in 2005/06 1,3 1,5 0,8 1,0 0,8 0,5 1,2 1,0 0,8 0,8 0,6 0,5 1,0 4,9 0,6 1,9 0,8 1,7 0,5 1,1 0,8 0,7 1,3 0,6 0,3 1,3 5,6 0,7 0,4 0,5 0,1

Average in 2005/06 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8 0,8

BE CZ DK DE EE GR ES FR IE IT CY LV LT LU HU MT NL AT PL PT SI SK FI SE UK IS LI NO BG RO TR

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Most popular countries in Erasmus student mobility• Outgoing mobility: most popular host

countries DE, ES, UK, F and NL• Share of UK is going down• Mobility to new member states growing

annually• Incoming mobility: DE, F, ES, PL, IT

• NB. Nordplus for Nordic exchange

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Some Erasmus experiences

• Very few PhD students use Erasmus• Academic recognition improved over time, but

still not without problems• Language preparation important; very positive

experiences on EILC courses • Cooperation with student organizations important• Social integration of exchange students• Challenge: Erasmus work placements (trainee

exchange, new element in Erasmus)

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INSTITUTIONAL EXAMPLES (University of Oulu)

• Incoming Student Services• Kummi programme:

• Kummi (in Finnish: godparent) is a student tutor who helps the exchange student during the first days in Oulu. Each exchange student receives a Kummi

• 45 Kummis work for the International Relations during the year, each Kummi has 8-10 students

• Practical matters: registration to University, getting to know University and the City of Oulu, meeting Finnish students etc.

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INSTITUTIONAL EXAMPLES continued (University of Oulu)

• Incoming Student Services• Kummi Family Programme:

• Friend family programme, Finnish families from the Oulu Area take part

• 150 families, about 60% of students have a Kummi Family

• Family and student meet during free time: getting to know Finnish family life, Finnish sports, customs, traditions etc. Students do not live with the families

• City of Oulu supports the programme: organises the first meeting with the family

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• INSTITUTIONAL EXAMPLES continued (Univ of Oulu)

• Incoming Student Services• Language preparation

• several levels of Finnish courses

• Tandem-project (“Each one teach one”)• student pairs (e.g. a Finn and an Italian) learn each others’

language

• supervised by a Language Centre teacher

• Café Lingua• Multi-language get-together with open programme and

presentations

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Erasmus teaching staff mobility• FIN one of the most active countries• 1000 teachers annually out, 1200 in• Mobile teachers => Mobile students• Host countries: Eastern Europe more popular than

in student mobility• EU funding not sufficient so far• Polytechnics more active• Challenge: New possibilities for other staff, and

staff exchange between HEIs and enterprises

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Other forms of Erasmus cooperation• Intensive courses managed by National Agencies:

over 20 coordinated by Finnish HEIs annually• Curriculum development projects• Other ”centralised” projects

- university-enterprise cooperation, modernisation of HE, virtual campuses…

• Thematic Networks

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Why – National Factors

• National policies of the MinE• performance based management and funding of HE,

internationalisation one indicator • Europe as a positive “chance”

• National study aid – available to all mobile students

• Module based study system, easy switch to ECTS• Creation of study programmes in English

(currently over 400)• Well developed student services

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Some Institutional Elements

• engagement of the leadership, international strategies

• internal funding arrangements• special measures for ”passive departments”• quality assurance • information and marketing work• international cooperation as part of a teacher’s

annual work load (especially Universities of Applied Sciences)

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Challenges

• Policy level:

cooperation => competition

exchange students => degree students

• Shorter study times, less mobility?

• Labour market changes, smaller generations

• Joint degrees and mobility within joint degrees

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Challenges (continued)

• How to get more male students moving? How to get engineers moving?

• How to take advantage of the new possibilities offered by Erasmus, especially trainee exchanges?

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Some words on impactIndividual- New competencies- ”Erasmus generations” Institutional - Quality in HE improved- Professionalism in international cooperation- Erasmus as vehicle for international coop => networks,

contacts, projects….National- Finnish HE known in Europe- National output in HE better- Other programmes similar to Erasmus

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Thank you!!

juha.ketolainen@cimo.fi

maija.airas@cimo.fi

www.cimo.fi