EABHES Principles
EABHES as part of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) believes in principles of inclusion and accessibility, and in making higher education in Europe more attractive and competitive according to the following guidelines:
- International mobility of students and staff;
- Autonomous higher education institutions;
- Student participation in the governance of higher education;
- Public responsibility for higher education;
- The social dimension of the Bologna Process;
The Bologna Process
and EHEA
Implement a common three-cycle higher education system (bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral studies)
Ensure mutual recognition of study programs through a common credit system (ECTS)
Cooperate to guarantee quality assurance
ECTS: one of the key tools
implemented by EHEA
One of the key tools implemented by EHEA members to make study plans more transparent and, therefore, recognisable is the European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System (ECTS). ECTS serves as a criterion for consistency of programme design, delivery and monitoring, including the formulation of learning outcomes and workloads, learning activities and teaching methods, and assessment procedures. Credit allocation of study programmes is done according to learning outcomes and workload, taking into account that 60 ECTS is the equivalent to a full-time academic year. Typically, bachelor qualifications include 180 or 240 ECTS credits and master’s qualification include 90 or 120 ECTS credits (the 60 ECTS being the minimum required).
ECTS system
and mobility
Thanks to ECTS system, students are able to: accumulate credits to obtain qualifications and to document learning transfer or continue education at a different institution thanks to credit recognition and transfer.
The Bologna process has attracted a lot of interest in other countries, including the USA, Canada, Brazil, Japan and China. Bologna has successfully promoted recognition and transparency which is seen as a positive development. Universities everywhere are adopting credit based systems and many use the three cycle system as a basic qualification framework.
