Brussels, 16 November 2007
Partners and Competitors: Analysing the EU-US Higher Education Relationship
Theme
Whether a role model, threat, or partner, the US has always been some sort of reference point for European higher education. Now with the development of the European Higher Education Area, the Bologna Process, and the global campaigns of many European countries to grab a share of the world’s talented minds, the US is starting to revisit one of its closest political allies from a new angle. The accelerated rate of higher education change in Europe merits great attention from the other side of the Atlantic. Reciprocally, Europe has much to learn from both the successes and mis-steps in American education. As such, we aim to explore new forms of transatlantic cooperation and evaluate the impact the Bologna reforms have on mobility recognition, and future collaboration. From university finance and governance, to diploma structure and length, to transatlantic university partnerships and programmes, this ACA seminar tackled a plethora of pertinent topics on US-EU higher education relations.
Programme
Thursday 15 November 2007
19:30 Seminar dinner @ Volle Gas
Friday 16 November 2007
8:30 | Registration |
9:15 | Welcome and introduction |
9:25 | Opening speech US Developments in International Education: Celebrating US International Education Week Julie Nutter, Economic Policy Unit Chief, United States Mission to the European Union |
10:00 | On Cooperation: Transatlantic Policy and Programmes Diego Sammaritano, European Commission, Directorate General Education and Culture |
10:30 | Coffee break |
11:00 | Thematic Thread 1: Redefining the curriculum in a globalised world: How does US and EU internationalisation reform differ? |
US Speaker: Rolf Hoffmann, German-US Fulbright Commission, BerlinEU Speaker: Volker Gehmlich, Fachhochschule Osnabrück, Germany | |
12:10 | Chair and discussion Chaired by an ACA representative |
12:30 | Lunch |
13:30 | Thematic Thread 2: The fees debate? Funding higher education Richard Yelland, Head of the Education Management and Infrastructure Division, Directorate of Education, OECD |
14:15 | Chair and discussion Chaired by an ACA representative |
14:30 | Coffee break |
15:00 | Thematic Thread 3: Education and the market: Attracting the best and the brightest |
US : Becoming proactive in a new world of competitors Daniel Obst: Institute of International Education, US |
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EU: Reaching out to foreign student markets Neil Kemp: Education Consultant, Brighton, UK |
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16:20 | Discussion: Cooperation or competition? Chaired by an ACA representative |
16:50 | Wrap up and goodbye |
Speakers
Julie Nutter
Julie Hagarty Nutter is the Economic Counselor at the U.S. Mission to the European Union. Ms. Nutter is a Foreign Service Officer with the Department of State. She returned to USEU this summer from a tour as a Provincial Reconstruction Team Leader for Maysan Province in southern Iraq. Prior to Brussels, Ms. Nutter was at the National Defense University and prior to that was the head of the Ukraine office in the State Department in the run-up to the Orange Revolution. Her previous assignments includepostings in London, Lagos, and Monrovia during the Liberian civil war. Ms. Nutter’s specialty in the Foreign Service is economics, with a sub-specialty in Finance and Development. She holds Master’s degree from the National Defense University in National Security Resource Strategy anda Master’sfrom Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in International Economics, as well as a Bachelor’s degree in International Politics from Georgetown. She hails from Philadelphia and has two school-age daughters.
Diego Sammaritano
Diego Sammaritano holds a MA degree in Economics and Business Administration from the University of Palermo (Italy) and a second MA Degree in European Integration and Development from the Vrije Universiteit Brussels (VUB, Belgium). In the very early stages of the Erasmus Programme (1990) he spent one semester at the then Thames Polytechnic in London (now University of Greenwich) studying marketing and international business.
After having worked for three years at the San Paolo Bank in Italy, he started his career in the European Commission in 1994 working in the Directorate General for External Relations as desk officer for trade relations with Japan. He was in charge of the Executive Training Programme in Japan and for the EU export promotion campaign Gateway to Japan. He also served in the Directorate General for Enterprises carrying responsibility for access to finance for SMEs.
Since 2003 Diego has been serving in Directorate General for Education and Culture as programme manager for education cooperation with industrialised countries. In this capacity he coordinated the EU-US and EU-Canada cooperation programmes as well as pilot projects with Japan, Australia and New Zealand. He has been in charge of the renewal of the education agreements with the U.S. and Canada. Working in close contact with the U.S. Department of Education, Diego has developed the new EU-US Atlantis programme focusing on transatlantic joint and double degrees.
Rolf Hoffmann
Andrée Sursock is Deputy Secretary General of the European University Association, where she is responsible the institutional development area. These include the Institutional Evaluation Programme, activities to promote internal quality processes in universities, management and leadership seminars and a new project on creativity in higher education. She has participated in over 70 evaluations across Europe, prepares the quality policy positions of the EUA and is involved in the QA policy discussions at the European level.
Previous to this post, she was Director of Development at the Centre for Higher Education Research and Information (Open University, UK) and taught at a variety of US institutions, including the University of California (Berkeley) and Stanford University. She holds a first degree in philosophy from the Université Panthéon Sorbonne and a PhD in social/cultural anthropology from the University of California, Berkeley.
Volker Gehmlich
Since 1972, Volker Gehmlich is Professor of Business Management at the University of Applied Sciences in Osnabrück, Germany. He is course director of undergraduate and postgraduate double degree programmes. He is also the major initiator of the restructuring of the faculty and the whole institution in terms of modularisation and introduction of a credit based system that is coherent with ECTS.
Volker Gehmlich has been involved in EU-programmes since 1978, and for various functions: project co-ordinator, assessor of project applications (e.g. EU-US/ EU-CND), contributor to the design of new initiatives, evaluator and trainer of assessors, EU-expert. He is also active in the Tuning Project, and the author of various publications on the internationalisation of organisations, skill needs, and credit systems in particular.
Richard Yelland
Richard Yelland is Head of the Education Management and Infrastructure Division in the OECD Directorate for Education. This Division is responsible for the work of the Programme on Institutional Management in Higher Education (IMHE) and the Programme on Educational Building (PEB).
Richard joined OECD in 1986 from the then Department of Education and Science in the United Kingdom where he had held a range of posts in educational policy and administration since 1974. He has led PEB since 1989. Following a secondment to the University of Adelaide, South Australia, he was given the additional responsibility for IMHE in 1998. Richard has been responsible for or contributed to a range of OECD publications on higher education and educational infrastructure. He is frequently invited to address international and national meetings on different aspects of education.
Richard is a member of the Advisory Board of the UNESCO Centre for European Higher Education (CEPES), and of the International Advisory Network for the Leadership Foundation for Higher Education in the United Kingdom. He has contributed as an international expert to the evaluation of educational institutions and programmes in Belgium and France.
Richard is 55 years old and was born and educated in England. He studied Mathematics and Religious Studies at Cambridge University. He and his wife, Anne, have one child at secondary school in France, and two at university in England.
Daniel Obst
Daniel Obst is Director of Membership and Higher Education Services at the Institute of International Education (IIE) in New York, one of the leading not-for-profit organization in the field of international educational exchange and development training. Mr. Obst directs all the activities of the IIENetwork, the Institute’s university membership association of 900 higher education institutions around the world, is responsible for IIE’s print and online publications, conferences and seminars, and is managing editor of IIENetworker, IIE’s international education magazine. Mr. Obst recently published Funding for United States Study: A Guide for International Students and Professionals. Mr. Obst received his B.A. in International Relations from the George Washington University and holds a Master’s degree in European Studies from the London School of Economics.
Neil Kemp
Neil Kemp has contributed to a wide range of education and training projects in over 20 countries. He has lived and worked in South and East Asia for 20 years, including eight years each in Indonesia and India. His career has involved several posts in the British Council: Country Director in Sri Lanka and Indonesia and in the UK as, Director of Science and Technology, Development Services, Education Services and Education UK Marketing.
For the last 12 months he has been managing his own international education consultancy and his clients include several UK universities, the UK’s Department for Education and Skills and Home Office, the British Council, Education Ireland, Kaplan International etc. His current professional interests concern the internationalisation of education, the role of the independent sector in higher education, particularly in developing countries, and international student mobility.
He has a number of part-time posts, including at the Institute of Education, University of London; as Adviser to the UK-India Education and Research Initiative; and Board Member for the Association of Independent Higher Education Providers in the UK. Over recent years he has been a member of the UK government’s Education and Training Export Group, the Higher Level Steering Group for the Prime Minister’s Initiative on International Students, the Education UK Board and the UK New Route PhD Committee. He is also a Trustee of the Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, a Director of Open University Worldwide, and a member of the International Boards at the University of Westminster and Sussex Downs College.
Venue
Club de la Fondation Universitaire
Rue d’Egmont 11 – 1000 Bruxelles
Tel : +32 2 545 04 40
Fax : +32 2 513 64 11
E-mail : club.fu.us@universityfoundation.be
Website: www.fondationuniversitaire.be