CU as Part of a European Super-university
Bratislava, 23 January 2020: Bratislava is hosting a meeting of representatives from nine universities who are jointly submitting a project called ENLIGHT enabling students to receive an education at nine universities at the same time.
Students will have a unique opportunity to study at several universities at the same time and to create their own study programmes according to their desired expertise. This option will also be available to both the doctoral students and the researchers. Curricula will be flexible and it will be possible to adjust study programmes to suit one’s individual needs. This idea was proposed by the European Commission, calling for the establishment of up to 20 European universities alliances within the European Union by 2024.
One such alliance is a nine-university consortium, of which Comenius University in Bratislava forms part, along with its partners: the University of Ghent, the University of Bordeaux, the University of Uppsala, the University of Groningen, the University of the Basque Country, the University of Göttingen, the National University of Ireland in Galway, and the University of Tartu. The alliance is currently working on submitting a project called ENLIGHT (European University Network to Promote Quality of Life, Sustainability and Global Engagement through Higher Education Transformation). If the project is successful, a kind of super-university will be created, which will bring international cooperation to a significantly higher level. In this context, a working meeting of the nine universities’ representatives is held on 22–23 January 2020 in Bratislava. They also received support from the ambassadors of Ireland, the Netherlands, France, Belgium, Germany, Estonia and Spain, with whom they met yesterday at the Primate’s Palace.
If the consortium proves to be successful and the project receives support, it will receive five million euros over a three-year period to prepare the curricula. “Thanks to the ENLIGHT alliance, Comenius University students will gain access to lots of new educational mobilities – from international online courses, summer schools, months-long study programmes to joint Master’s programmes,” said Jozef Tancer, Comenius University’s Vice-Rector for International Relations. The alliance will be based on reciprocal mobility, which will increase mutual internationalisation thanks to the mobility of students, teachers and administrative workers. “The alliance will strongly support the University’s cooperation with the non-academic environment and thus react to specific societal challenges through its teaching,” Jozef Tancer added.
“Today’s university needs to be a strong player at national as well as European and international level. Entering such a consortium will open up entirely new opportunities for our researchers as well as students – from innovative formats of exchanges to research cooperation. If, for instance, a doctoral student finds that one of our partner universities may be of greater help with his research project, he will be able to spend part of his doctoral studies there. Thanks to this initiative, studying at Comenius University will become increasingly more international,” said Marek Števček, the Rector of Comenius University.
The idea of joining European universities was presented for the first time in 2017 by the French president, Emmanuel Macron, at the Sorbonne University in Paris. The objective is to contribute to the competitiveness of European universities globally.