By Nico Göricke, Deputy Chairman of CREAS
In many ways the Erasmus exchange programme, since 2014 incorporated into the broader “Erasmus +-programme”, can be seen as the most successful legislation of the European Union. Few other programmes have had such a substantial impact on the lives of many of its citizens and few other programmes represent the process of European integration as much as the Erasmus programme. While there is substantial and often warranted criticism of the EU, no topic area represents the ideal of Europe so well and positively as the free movement of persons. Erasmus provides the necessary bridge between the right to free movement of persons and the actual possibility to use it and live in another country. Additionally, the Erasmus exchange programme leads to a better understanding of the workings of the EU and support for shared “European values”.
This does not mean, however, that there is nothing to criticise about the Erasmus programme. The Erasmus programme has the poor reputation that it is a “party semester” and that integration into the communities of the host institution is difficult. In this text, I take the current Erasmus+ mid-term evaluation in the European Parliament as a reason to look at the current Erasmus+ 2021-2027 programme from a student perspective.
Financial Situation of Students
Before addressing the soft factors, let’s consider the financial situation of the students first. While the Erasmus grants provide substantial help for students, they still have to rely on their relatives, personal savings, or part-time work. According to the latest European Student Network (ENS) survey, more than half of the grants lie within 201 to 500 euros per month (p. 8), which is short of the student needs. In total, about half of the exchange students are not able to cover the cost of their mobility with the grants (ibid. p. 50).
In addition, the EU has introduced top-up grants for using sustainable forms of transport or coming from academically disadvantaged households. Here, however, lack of awareness about these programmes is common (ibid. p.9). Student representatives and the European Parliament agree that the assigned funds for the Erasmus+ programme should increase in the coming financial period. Only in this way rising costs can be countered and overarching goals of a more socially sensitive exchange semester fulfilled.
Soft Factors
The reputation as a “party semester” is often warranted. This is nothing bad in itself and nobody should aim to take away the fun of the Erasmus semester. It, however, indicates that the Erasmus semester leads to what has been called the “Erasmus bubble”, i.e., the situation is that exchange students often only socialise with other exchange students and do not have much contact with the local communities at the guest institution. In addition, decreased accountability on the students’ side leads to the feeling of having to learn less.
50% of students do not join a community at the host institution (ibid. p. 36) and only 20% feel fully integrated in the local community (ibid. p. 39). This certainly also is caused by missing language competencies. Respective statistics are difficult to find, while the Commission’s 2022 Erasmus+ report claims that almost 80% of participants have improved their foreign language competence (p.41), it is not transparent to what language this refers. One can assume that this refers to the English language. Although otherwise highly worthwhile, double degree programs such as ErasmusMundus reinforce this trend, sometimes even offering courses where one studies in three countries in two years making cultural exchange with the host countries impossible.
This might indicate that we should value 2 semester stays more than 1 semester stays. According to the ESN study about 75% of students stay one semester (p. 31). Flexibility might be useful here. It is not uncommon that students decide to stay for longer than one semester shortly after their arrival to the guest institution, which is then, however, often not possible either because of the home or guest institution.
Another rarely considered aspect is the difficulty for students of certain degrees to fully participate in the Erasmus programme. Depending on the country, studying subject areas such as law or medicine as well as courses where one prepares to become a schoolteacher are considered a special degree programme. In Germany, for example, future lawyers are not part of the bachelor/master system of the Bologna reform and students have to get out of their way to pursue an exchange semester. Here, the member states should make sure that exchange semester can be optional in all degree courses even though it might be historically not the case.
Credit Recognition
All changes and budget-increases of the Erasmus programme are, however, toothless, if the Lisbon agreement on the full recognition of qualifications is not completely implemented. This seems to be a shockingly underrepresented fact in the European Commission. In the Commission’s mid-term report this is only considered once while in the latest ENS survey almost a third of the participants report that they have not received full credit recognition (p. 50).
While many students can handle the monetary pressure of the Erasmus semester because of the Erasmus grants, support from relatives and part-time work, not being able to fully recognize the courses at their home institution can lead to substantial delays in their careers. Missing credit means not being able to graduate in time and entering the job market delayed. This makes the Erasmus semester either unnecessarily difficult or completely impossible especially for those students from economically unstable households.
It is understandable that universities find it difficult to recognize all courses without being able to assess quality standards at the guest institution but here is more flexibility warranted. Participants of the ESN survey consider “arbitrary decisions by professor and program coordinators” (p. 63) as an important reason for not receiving full credit recognition. Students cannot be let alone in making difficult financial decisions which might at the end depend on “arbitrary” evaluations of their home institution. National agencies must guarantee that the burden of proof lies at the department and not the student and the Commission as a whole should address this problem more often.
Nico Göricke
Deputy Chairman CREAS