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RECOGNITION ISSUES IN THE BOLOGNA PROCESS
Sjur Bergan, Andrejs Rauhvargers and Jindra Divis1
The ACE opening session at the Leipzig Conference focused on the challenges the
Bologna Process raises for credential evaluators and for policy makers in the
recognition field. The ACE session was based on the preliminary outcome of an
ENIC2 Working Party addressing these issues, for which the Council of Europe
provides the secretariat. In this article, the presenters of the session provide a
summary.
Even if much has been achieved in improving the recognition of qualifications over
the past 10 or 15 years, new challenges must be met if we are going to live up to the
expectations the Bologna Declaration raises in the area of recognition. It may be
worth recapitulating five points in the Declaration that are particularly relevant to
recognition:
(i)
the concern for the “adoption of a system of easily readable and
comparable degrees;
(ii)
the reform of higher education systems, especially the adoption of “a
system essentially based on two main cycles” [i.e. prior to doctoral
studies];
(iii)
the role of higher education in preparing students for the labor market;
(iv)
the establishment of a credit system;
(v)
“promotion of European co-operation in quality assurance”;
The Working Party on Recognition Issues in the Bologna Process has identified 11
hypotheses for the further development of recognition policy. A detailed discussion
of each hypothesis is clearly impossible within an article of this scope. However, the
hypotheses may be summarized in a few main points.
The first development concerns a shift in attention. At least at European level, the
necessary legal framework is now mainly in place, with the Council of
Europe/UNESCO Convention and the EU Directives, and attention should now focus
on implementing this framework. This implies that institutional agreements and
contacts as well as the development of good practice will become increasingly
important for academic recognition. However, these should be developed within the
1
Sjur Bergan is Head of the Higher Education and Research Division of the Council of Europe,
Secretary to the Higher Education and Research Committee (CC-HER) and Co-Secretary of the ENIC
Network.
Andrejs Rauhvargers, of the Latvian ENIC, is President of the ENIC Network and Chair of the ACE
Board
Jindra Divis is Head of the Department for International Credential Evaluation (Dutch ENIC/NARIC)
of NUFFIC and Chair of the ENIC Working Party on Recognition Issues in the Bologna Process
2
European Network of National Information Centres on academic recognition and mobility, served
jointly by the Council of Europe and UNESCO/CEPES.
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European framework for recognition and use instruments such as the Diploma
Supplement and the ECTS. It will also be necessary to develop further European
standards (not legally binding standards, but internationally accepted rules, not
complying with which may lead to non-recognition) and codes of good practice, such
as the draft UNESCO/Council of Europe Code of good practice concerning the
provision of transnational education or the draft Recommendation on Criteria and
Procedures for the Assessment of Foreign Qualifications (Council of Europe).
Good and reliable information on educational systems, qualifications and the
quality of institutions/programs will be even more important in the years to come.
This is not just a question of more information – although in some areas this is clearly
needed – but above all of relevant and reliable information. At first sight, the two
major levels of qualifications – undergraduate and graduate – foreseen by the Bologna
Declaration, would seem to simplify European higher education, especially as the
Declaration also stipulates a minimum period of study for each level. However, there
is also a tendency today to design increasingly specialized programs and
qualifications – almost to tailor make study programs according to students’ needs within the overall framework of the degree structure of the country in question. We
therefore believe that European higher education will still be characterized by a high
degree of diversity, which is likely to icnrease rather than diminsh. We therefore need
to provide a systematized framework for information on this diversity and individual
features of the European systems of higher education, to meet the Declaration’s
requirement for transparency, readability and comparability. The Diploma
Supplement and the ECTS are already very valuable steps on the way, but a more
comprehensive framework may be needed.
The perhaps most important challenge in the coming years will be a much stronger
emphasis on recognition of qualifications for the non-regulated part of the labor
market, which will result from the further Europeanization of the labor market.
Credential evaluators will have to help employers navigate through the wide variety
of European qualifications. Assessment for the labor market will need to take
account not only of formal higher education qualifications, but also of competence
gained through relevant work experience.
This points to another important development: the way education is delivered will be
modified. Less will be delivered in the classroom – or at least in the classroom alone
– and more will be delivered through the Internet, through transnational
arrangements, through a combination of traditional and non-traditional learning
and on a different time scale. Lifelong learning will become an integrated part of the
mission of higher education, and we will need to rethink the way qualifications are
earned and recognized. In addition, the demand for recognition of prior learning is
likely to increase. All of these developments point in one direction: recognition has to
develop ways of assessing qualifications on the strength of the skills and
competencies they convey rather than on the way in which the qualifications were
earned.
This may sound relatively straightforward, but credential evaluators will increasingly
need to move from assessing well documented qualifications emanating from clearly
defined education systems whose major institutions and programs are well known to
them to assessing a wide array of qualifications, many of which will be earned in new
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ways and through less well known providers. We have already mentioned the need
for improved information, but new assessment methods will also be required,
especially with regard to non-traditional qualifications. These developments are a
major challenge, because fair recognition does not mean “anything goes”. In the
future, there will also be good qualifications that should be recognized and less good
ones that cannot be. Distinguishing the first category from the second will be even
more difficult, and the distinction can no longer be made only by applying only old
methods. All in all, credential evaluators will have to adapt to these developments
and change both their work approach and methodologies.
The increasing diversity of education providers underlines the need for a closer
cooperation between recognition experts and quality assurance agencies, i.e.
between those who assess individual qualifications and those who assess the
institutions and programs delivering those qualifications. Students and employers
have a wider choice, but they should also have the right and possibility to make an
informed choice. This also implies at least a tacit promise of recognition if certain
conditions are fulfilled: students who follow study programs belonging to a national
education system, delivered under arrangements conforming to international good
practice or otherwise validated through a quality assessment should also have a right
to expect that their qualifications will be fairly recognized.
A final point concerns recognition of qualifications between countries participating in
the Bologna Process and those beyond the “Bologna zone”. In part, this means that
some efforts are needed to assist with the development of both higher education
reform and the development of recognition policies and practice in certain areas of
Europe, not least South East Europe, which is specifically mentioned in the
Declaration. In large part, however, this point concerns meeting the stated aim of the
Bologna Process of making European higher education more competitive in other
parts of the world. Improving recognition policies and procedures and providing a
more transparent description of European education systems and qualifications will
help strengthen the international position of European higher education. At the same
time, these policies are in some ways models for other regions of the world.
As can be seen, the challenge to recognition specialists is a formidable one, and rising
to it is not a matter of choice. It concerns every credential evaluator and recognition
policy maker at every level: institutional, national, regional and pan-European. The
ENIC Network, which we represent in various capacities, as well as the NARIC
Network plays an important role in developing recognition policy and practice at panEuropean level. The Networks will intensify their efforts to improve recognition in
the spirit of the Bologna Declaration, which has already moved recognition issues
from the domain of “technical specialists” to the core of the European higher
education policy debate.