I have worked in policy and practice in international higher education for more than two decades. Throughout this time, I have regularly met students in different part of the world who could not get their qualifications recognised, despite having graduated from good institutions. And vice-versa, I have also repeatedly seen how a well-functioning recognition system can open doors that would otherwise stay closed. These experiences are what draws me to the current momentum around the UNESCO Global Convention on the Recognition of Qualifications concerning Higher Education. 

What the Convention does 

Adopted in November 2019, the Global Convention is the first United Nations treaty on higher education with a global scope. It sets out legally binding principles for fair, transparent and non-discriminatory recognition of qualifications, covering: traditional and non-traditional study, including cross-border and online provisions; partial qualifications; recognition of prior learning, and qualifications held by refugees and displaced persons. The Convention entered into force in March 2023 and now counts 41 States Parties from all continents, the most recent being the Republic of Korea, Uzbekistan, Zambia and Slovenia. 

A system of conventions, not a single treaty 

The Global Convention does not stand alone. UNESCO also administers five regional recognition conventions, covering Europe (the Lisbon Recognition Convention), Asia-Pacific, Africa, the Arab States and Latin America. These regional instruments, some dating back several decades, provide detailed frameworks shaped by the needs and circumstances of their own regions. For ACA member organisations and for the European readership of the ACA Newsletter – Education Europe, the Lisbon Recognition Convention is likely the most familiar: it is the legal foundation for recognition practice across Europe. 

The Global Convention connects these regional frameworks, as its main scope is mobility between regions. It does not replace the regional conventions. It reinforces them and extends their reach to qualifications that fall between or outside existing regional agreements. By way of example, a graduate from an Asian university seeking recognition in an African country, may find that no regional framework covers their case. The Global Convention is designed to precisely fill such gaps. One of the three recommendations currently under development addresses specifically how the global and regional frameworks relate to each other, working towards a system where global and regional frameworks genuinely reinforce each other. 

The Operational Guidelines: from treaty text to practice 

A convention, however well drafted, only goes so far on its own. Practitioners need  guidance on what the principles mean in specific situations and on how to apply them day to day. That is precisely what the Operational Guidelines provide, which was adopted in June 2025 at the second session of the Intergovernmental Conference of the States Parties, the biennial decision making body of the convention.   

For institutions and national authorities, the Operational Guidelines are the real moment of opportunity: a practical framework to draw upon as internationalisation strategies are reviewed and updated. They spell out what the Convention’s core principles mean in practice, for ministries and national authorities, quality assurance agencies, and higher education institutions alike. They address how the presumption of recognition works, what constitutes a substantial difference justifying non-recognition, and what a fair and reasoned decision process should look like.  

For ACA member organisations, which support transnational mobility of different types and through various funding instruments, they are directly relevant: national agencies responsible for recognition are among the competent authorities the Operational Guidelines explicitly address, and quality assurance agencies are referenced in the context of providing the reliable information on which sound recognition decisions depend.  

In addition to national-level organisations, the Guidelines deserve a place on the desk of anyone working in admissions, recognition or policy development. 

What comes next? 

The third session of the Intergovernmental Conference is scheduled for July 2027, with three further recommendations on the agenda. Each takes up an area where the Convention’s principles call for more specific guidance. 

The first recommendation concerns quality assurance in higher education, including transnational education. As cross-border provision grows and takes new forms, recognition decisions depend increasingly on having reliable and comparable quality information. This recommendation will address how quality assurance frameworks and recognition processes can support each other more effectively, including across borders. 

The second takes up the relationship between the Global Convention and the five regional recognition conventions, as shortly mentioned above. For practitioners working within the Lisbon Recognition Convention framework, this recommendation will clarify how the two levels of the system fit together and what the global framework adds in situations where regional arrangements already apply. 

The third addresses the recognition of qualifications held by refugees and displaced persons. This is an area where considerable experience already exists, including through tools such as the European Qualifications Passport for Refugees (by the Council of Europe) and the UNESCO Qualifications Passport. The recommendation will translate that experience into a global normative framework, something neither instrument can achieve on its own. 

What could the future look like? 

Reaching 41 States Parties is already an achievement. But the Convention’s potential will not be realised without broadening participation to more countries. Several of the world’s largest higher education systems have not yet ratified. By ratifying, countries commit to strengthening international cooperation in higher education and helping make academic mobility and the recognition of qualifications a reality for more students around the world. Making that case is precisely the kind of work that ACA member organisations as well as stakeholder networks amongst this newsletter’s readership do well: talking to policymakers, connecting recognition to the everyday work of their institutions, and demonstrating that this has real consequences for students and graduates. 

Of the 41 States Parties, 19 are countries from geographical Europe, where a large part of the readership of this newsletter is located. The remaining States Parties consists of countries from all continents. National-level actors like the ACA members, rectors’ conferences and university networks (active at European and national level), can play an important role in drawing the attention of their governments towards the convention and its salience. I warmly encourage all related organisations to raise the question with their governments. The Operational Guidelines and supporting documents are available on UNESCO’s webpage. For details on the ratification process, please contact me directly or reach out to UNESCO’s Secretariat. 

Stig Arne Skjerven is the Chair of the Bureau of the Intergovernmental Conference of States Parties of the Global Convention on the Recognition of Qualifications Concerning Higher Education. He has previously held roles as Director of Academic Affairs at a Norwegian HEI, Director of Norway’s ENIC-NARIC office, elected Chair of the ENIC Network and Norway’s Deputy Permanent Representative to UNESCO.