Tempus Srbija

Tempus in Serbia

In Serbia, Tempus programme is perceived as:

A

An instrument which re-established cooperation links with the higher education institutions in the EU and other partner countries after a period of isolation during 1990s:

At the beginning of 1990s Serbian, as well as all former Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia higher education institutions, were part of the Tempus programme initial phase, but, unfortunately, just for a short time. When the civil war broke out in the region all further cooperation actions and initiated projects involving Yugoslav institutions were interrupted. The return of the Serbian higher education institutions to the big “Tempus family of countries” happened at the end of 2000, after the October democratic changes. At that time, the third programme phase started to be implemented.

As the Tempus III Council Decision (of 29/04/99) states: "cooperation on higher education strengthens and deepens the whole fabric of relations existing between people, brings out common cultural values, allows fruitful exchanges of views to take place and facilitates multinational activities in the scientific, cultural, artistic, economic and social spheres."

B

An instrument for promotion and implementation of the Bologna process

In its third phase (2000-2006) the European Commission placed the Bologna Process to the centre of the Tempus programme which was reflected in the national Tempus priorities. Serbian Ministries of Education agreed to support this direction of Tempus priorities seeing them as a move ahead in bringing together the European Union HE policy and the national concept of the HE. Hence, Tempus projects were among the first promoters of basic principles of the Bologna process among the higher education institutions in Serbia.

Following the signing of the Bologna Declaration during the September 2003 at the Berlin Meeting of the European Ministers of Education, Serbia officially joined other European countries in this Trans-European process aiming at creation of the European Space in Higher Education by the year 2010. Thus, it made commitment, together with all other European countries, to make concrete progress in establishing three-tier structure of studies, student centred methodology of teaching, develop quality assurance systems and advance the issue of the recognition of diplomas.

Many European Union countries have developed national programmes for the implementation of the Bologna process. In some countries amendments of the HE laws were made in order to create a sound legal framework accommodating the novelties in the HE. In Serbia successful implementation of Bologna process principles required significant adjustment of the higher education legal framework. Hence, in 2005 the new higher education law was adopted which provided basis for an systematic approach in proceeding with the Bologna reforms in all its important aspects.

Law on Higher Education in Serbia 2005

Participation of universities in Tempus projects made a contribution to the work on the implementation of undertaken Bologna commitments. The projects were an optimal framework for exchange of experiences with the EU academics and lining up with the modern trends. Projects enabled a significant mobility of professors and a certain number of students into the EU institutions, purchase of equipment and modernisation of study programmes.

Statistics on participation in Tempus III

The work on achieving more efficient and better quality higher education is still ongoing. The institutions are guided with the ambition of being recognized as fully-fledged members of the European Higher Education Area. In the current, programme phase, there is a strong engagement of the Serbian university Rectorates, National Council of Higher education and Ministry of Education in Tempus project. Most importantly, they are involved in implementation of structural projects addressing issues relevant for the whole HE system and dictating further course of the HE reforms.

C

Instrument contributing to the EU integration process

Within the period 2000-2006 Tempus in Serbia was funded through the Community Assistance for Reconstruction and Development programme (CARDS). From 2007, with the start of phase IV, funding for Tempus and the programme Erasmus Mundus, comes from the funds of the EU Instrument for Pre-accession (IPA). The name of the funding instrument is indicative of the EU support aims as well as clear ambition of the Republic of Serbia to become an EU member state in the near future.

From 2007, in addition to Bologna process, the programme started to be perceived as a promoter of the Lisbon process by which the EU strives to achieve the objective of becoming “the most competitive, knowledge-based society and economy in the world”. Specificity of the European approach in Lisbon process is that dynamic economic growth is expected also to strengthen social cohesion and maintain a European social model. Here, higher education institutions are given an important role as drivers of innovation and development but also as contributing to elimination of inequality and democratisation of education.

In the current programme documents it has been stated that participation of Western Balkan countries, including Serbia, in Tempus should lead towards the countries’ preparation for joining Lifelong Learning Programme (LLP) which is open for all EU education institutions from kindergartens and primary schools to institutions educating adults. (LLP subprogrammes Comenius, Leondardo, Erasmus and Gruntvig and there is a number of transversal actions)

Thus, Tempus projects in Serbia in the coming Calls would probably be expected, among others, to make use of the huge intellectual potential of the higher education institutions and influence appropriate preparation for joining LLP by spreading the examples of good practice and contributing to build up European dimension in education.

Current stage of HE reforms in Serbia

The latest Ministerial conference in Louven in April 2009, is the third one at which Serbia has submitted its Bologna progress reports (Serbia – report Louven conference). For the first time the report was submitted in Bergen in May 2005. While a significant improvement has been undoubtedly noticed since 2003 in all areas of interest further effort is needed so as to achieve higher efficiency of study programmes, more thorough work on defining learning outcomes and distribution of credits for the study programmes, development of quality assurance systems and accreditation process. In addition, a stronger link of higher education and society will need to be considered.

Tempus programme stays open for project proposals which can contribute to address the above mentioned issues.