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.

John was the Director of the UK Socrates-Erasmus Council, and responsible for the UK Tempus Information Office and the UK Erasmus Mundus National structure. He was Director of Academic Administration at the University of Kent and has considerable experience of U K Higher Education. John has long experience of European co-operation.  He was involved in the ECTS pilot project and has been active in promoting ECTS, the Diploma Supplement and above all student mobility. He is a member of the Management Committee for the Tuning Educational structures in Europe project and was a member of the stakeholder group preparing the Erasmus action for the new Lifelong Learning Programme.John is also an enthusiastic and active member of the UK Team of Bologna Promoters.

Olof Blomqvist is the founding Preseident of University West in Sweden. His university introduced Cooperative Education in Sweden and is now one of the leading Work-Integrated Learning institutions in the country. Olof has his background in Social and Economic Geography. He has served 12 years as President. Before that he was responsible for the preparation of the new university. Since 2002 he has served his institution as Senior Advisor and deals mainly with industry and community interaction, international affairs and work-integrated learning.Olof has been committed to the governance of the World Association for Co-operative Education (WACE) for many years. From 2002-2004 he served as WACE President and is now on the WACE Board of Governors. Olof also initiated the Swedish Association for Co-operative Education (SACE) and has been the Chair of this network since 1986. Olof has given many presentations, workshops etc on Work-Integrated Learning and has also done consultancy work related to this topic.

Martin Unger studied Sociology at the University of Vienna and completed a subsequent postgraduate Programme in Sociology at the Institute for Advanced Studies (IHS) also in Vienna. He has been a researcher at the HIS since 1998.His areas of research include: Equity in education, social situation of students, funding of universities, and the value added of HEI. Martin is currently highly involved in the access question, surveying students about their social situations and serving as a member of the steering board for “Eurostudent”. Martin is also the Austrian delegate to the working group on social dimensions and mobility within the Bologna Process.

The aim of Frances’ counsellor position in Brussels is to strengthen New Zealand’s education system and intellectual wealth through mutual understanding of policy relationship building with individuals, organisations and institutions. A particular focus to Frances’ role is analysing and monitoring the Bologna process in Europe and its implications for New Zealand. European countries, in particular the UK, France and Germany where New Zealand has bilateral relationships, are primarily where Frances is concentrating her attention.Prior to taking up this position, Frances was Senior Policy Manager with the Ministry of Education, where she provided strategic policy advice to government on the overall direction and investment priorities for the education system. Her responsibilities also included the opportunity to represent New Zealand on two OECD committees: the Education Committee and the Board of the Centre for Research and Innovation. Frances has also served as Academic Services Manager at Auckland College of Education from 1992 – 1999, taught secondary classes primarily in Music and English at a variety of schools in New Zealand and England and was Assistant Principal at Sacred Heart Girls’ College, Hamilton, New Zealand from 1990 – 1992. 

Bernd Wächter is the Director of the Academic Cooperation Association (ACA), a consortium of European and global agencies which support international cooperation in higher education. ACA is a think-tank which promotes innovation and internationalisation in higher education. Bernd was born in Giessen (Germany) and studied at the universities of Hull (UK), Giessen and Marburg (Germany).  He lives in Brussels (Belgium) and is married to Thora Magnusdottir, a delightful lady from Iceland.Bernd’s career has been focused on international higher education. In his first post, at the University of Kassel (Germany), he devised international degree programmes in cooperation with universities abroad. He later joined the British Council, before becoming the Director of the international office of the Fachhochschule Darmstadt. Moving on to Germany’s internationalisation agency DAAD, he became the head of this organisation’s European section. He subsequently became Director of Higher Education in the Brussels Socrates Office, with overall responsibility for the Erasmus Programme in Europe. In 1998, he took up his present post as the director of ACA. Bernd has published widely on international matters in higher education, and he is a frequent speaker at European and international education conferences. He is the editor of the ACA Papers on International Cooperation in Higher Education and.  He also works, as an expert advisor, for many international organisations.