A nine-university Consortium will submit a project for joint courses and programmes
On 28 and 29 October 2019, the University of Tartu in Estonia hosted a meeting of representatives from nine universities, including Comenius University in Bratislava, who have decided to seek support from the European Commission within its European Universities Programme.
The consortium consists of the following institutions: 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, the University of Tartu, and Comenius University in Bratislava. This unique network of universities represents geographical, cultural, and linguistic diversity (twelve European cities and eleven European languages) and has a tremendous potential to disseminate European values.
The rectors and authorized representatives of the universities signed a memorandum confirming their intention to create an alliance of European universities and submit a project called "ENLIGHT: A European University Network to Promote the Quality of Life, Sustainability, and Global Engagement Through Higher Education Transformation".
One of the main objectives of this European programme is to enable students to earn an academic degree by studying in several EU countries, thus contributing to the competitiveness of European universities globally. These nine universities altogether train over 312,000 students each year. Students were also present at this meeting and have been involved in its preparation from the start of project planning, as they are the important end users of the project. The ambition of this project is to better prepare students for the future. The universities will apply for funding in the second call of the European Universities programme. In the first call, seventeen alliances were supported, but no Slovak university was involved. If successful, the project will receive five million euros over three years.