AU-EU talks: Partnerships to drive innovation agenda

Harmonisation of standards and quality assurance efforts in higher education were scrutinised as African and European experts shared experiences ahead of the European Union-African Union Summit held on 17 and 18 February in Brussels, Belgium.

What emerged during an official pre-summit event, aimed at building upon the existing partnerships between the two geopolitical and economic blocks, is the importance of harmonisation – despite difficulties associated with the process – and how these initiatives could be developed further.

The meeting took place on 10 February and was organised by the European University Association and Obreal Global, which works on the strengthening of South-South-North cooperation within and between regions.

The importance of strengthening partnerships has also been emphasised in a working document, ‘The AU-EU Innovation Agenda’ dated 14 February, that was also discussed at a separate event ahead of the summit.

The development of “sustainable, long lasting and mutually beneficial higher education, research and innovation partnerships between the AU and the EU countries [is] seen as the foundation for resilient knowledge economies and societies, preventing or mitigating, among others, the effects of major crises,” according to the document.

In the Innovation Agenda, universities take up a central place in the development of AU-EU relations.

The African Research Universities Alliance (ARUA), a network of 16 of the region’s leading universities, and the Guild of European Research-Intensive Universities (the Guild), which has 21 members, said it supported the AU-EU Innovation Agenda that was discussed ahead of the summit.

“The Guild and ARUA fully share the Innovation Agenda’s key concern – that we need to reverse the brain drain of young, talented African researchers into a brain-gain. The agenda rightly points to the need to strengthen existing research and innovation funding programmes, and the establishment of new programmes to strengthen higher education.

“Most of all, ARUA and the Guild welcome a central strategic focus: the comprehensive strengthening of African universities’ research capacity, with a focus on the long term,” according to a statement.

Some of the key areas touched upon by ARUA and the Guild are the need to develop clusters of excellence to foster South-South and North-South collaborations and foster research excellence by supporting highly talented young researchers, as well as more senior researchers through the establishment of “advanced study institutes, the strengthening of inclusive and accessible world-class research and innovation infrastructures in the EU and AU and the promotion of joint African-European master and doctoral degree programmes”.

It is in this broader higher education spectrum that harmonisation at different levels within the higher education system and quality aspects were also discussed.

Cooperation and integration frameworks

The Bologna process has conceived a global dialogue to discuss higher education and build trust among participants, said Magalie Soenen, an education consultant and global dialogue co-chair of the Bologna Follow-Up Group.

The Bologna process, which started in 1998, resulted in the Bologna declaration in 1999, leading to the formation of the European Higher Education Area in 2010, has 49 member countries and five consultative members. Reviewing its work from previous years, a sub-group working on cooperation, including one with a focus on Africa, has emerged.

Against this backdrop, Juma Shabani, the chair of the higher education sub-cluster for the African Union’s Continental Education Strategy for Africa (CESA), said harmonisation is important for the process of building partnerships.

At the continental level, harmonisation is being carried out through different initiatives. These efforts are working to harmonise assessment competencies in bachelor and masters degrees as well as doctorates.

Francophone countries have a mechanism for promoting teacher training. The Southern African community started by implementing a regional framework of qualifications.

In East Africa, a regional system of quality assurance is based on regional guidelines, ensuring compatibility with other systems.

The West Africa regional economic block, ECOWAS, is in the process of harmonising medical and pharmaceutical programmes.

Shabani said the challenge is that harmonisation has to be implemented after ratification. So far, only four out of 15 countries have ratified the required harmonisation agreements in Africa.

Partnerships for success

Amanda Crowfoot, the secretary general of the European University Association (EUA), who banks on the stakeholder participation for success, said there is emphasis on mutual learning and sharing expertise.

The EUA, with its 80 organisations, mainly universities in 45 countries, represents the university sector and disseminates guidance to the university sector as the interface of policy and practice.

“The goal is not always harmonisation in the context of making everybody the same. We don’t want to get rid of diversity. There is no one-size-fits-all way of doing things,” Crowfoot said.

“In everything that we do, partnership is essential,” she said. [Looking at the future of Africa-EU collaboration], “we realise challenges are global and we have to address them globally, and we have to learn from one another”, she said.

Olusola Oyewole, the secretary general of the Association of African Universities, agreed that the advancement of higher education sector collaboration with partners is required and CESA serves as a platform for collaboration and partnership in Africa.

Integration brings mutual learning, synergies to address global communication and facilitate mobility of learners and educators, he said, emphasising the need for regional continental and international qualification frameworks.

The issue of Africa’s academic credit transfer system (as building blocks for qualifications) is yet to be addressed, as it varies from region to region, he said.

UNESCO’s drive for recognition of degrees and diplomas in Africa has only 14 countries so far ratifying the convention.

“Intercontinental and interregional collaboration should be recognised as a deliberate strategy among ourselves,” said Oyewole.

Pockets of success

Gaspard Banyankiboma, the secretary general of the Inter-University Council for East Africa (IUCEA) based in Uganda, said the big difference in the European Higher Education Area is implementation. Unlike in Africa, the European higher education system is almost fully harmonised, he said.

He said IUCEA was putting quality assurance in place, developing programmes for systemic management for statistics, arranging scholarships and staff mobility programmes. IUCEA qualifications have a recognised credit transfer in East Africa and the students are being encouraged to study out of their home countries.

He noted that there is still a need to focus on capacity building in higher education research management, higher education research systems and processes and exploring joint research programmes and centres of excellence in local priority areas.

Deirdre Lennan, of the Directorate General for International Partnerships for the European Commission, a long-term advocate of African higher education, said that the EU is seeking to foster the critical level of higher education in line with supporting the African Union’s Agenda 2063 aspirations.

“By promoting harmonisation of African education, we are able to support mobility within the continent, cooperation at regional level and also to facilitate cooperation with Europe,” she said.

What is particularly important in cooperating with Africa is the diversity of the regions and its people. The content objectives are in the hands of African partners, she said.

“Universities should reinforce partnerships across Africa for African solutions. Universities are drivers of these solutions, and that’s where we will be looking to support Africa universities.”

Studies for regional integration

Abdoulaye Salifou, the regional adviser for higher education and information communication technologies, UNESCO regional office in Abuja, Nigeria, spoke about student mobility.

He pointed out that there are five million mobile students around the world, two million of them in Africa, where there has been a spike in the number of highly mobile students in the past 30 years.

By 2030, the number is expected to climb to 30 million – and 44% of them will be from Africa compared to 3% in the rest of the world.

Studies have shown that most African students want to study in countries bordering on their homelands, but there are problems: there is a lack of compatible education systems and a lack of institutional development of quality assurance to make the most of online teaching.

“It is necessary to know how to implement the Addis Convention (to harmonise the regional recognition of qualifications), because many countries are unaware of it. There is a need to train members of parliament [as] they are the ones who will vote to pass the ratification,” Salifou said.

Charles Awono Onana, the president of the Université des Montagnes, Cameroon, called for the African Framework of Qualifications or standard recognised teaching units.

“Standards are so different in teaching. A student that moves from one university to the other needs to develop trust of recognition of their training,” he said.

As Africa’s experts worried on harmonisation problems in Africa, Howard Davies, a senior adviser to the EUA, gave a clearer picture of what happens in Europe.

It depends on precise specifications of your degree programme, where one’s profession is regulated and one’s country of departure, he said.

Recognition is not the same as admission to an institution, nor is it a guarantee of employment, Davies said.

“What should be recognised, who should be recognised, is not standard across Europe,” he said, adding that recognition in the EU is now transparent and bound by legislation.

He said recognition ‘was not easy but desirable. If the labour market were to be more open, that would stimulate quality assurance,” he suggested. He called for trust between systems, the university and the industry.

“Each step in the EU has gone hand in hand with economic challenges and institutions integrate the needs of the labour market,” Davies said.