The renewed EU agenda for higher education adopted by the European Commission on 30 May 2017 aims to give a new impetus to higher education. It provides a set of initiatives to support the modernisation of higher education based on priority areas and streamlining EU support.
It builds on the Modernization Agenda for Higher Education which since 2011 has provided strategic direction for EU and Member State activities to meet the targets set by the Europe 2020 strategy and the strategic framework for European cooperation in education and training (ET 2020). It also delivers on the commitments made in the initiative on Investing in Europe’s Youth of 7 December 2016, in particular the Communication for improving and modernising education, in which the Commission has announced a set of actions to help Member States provide high quality education for all young people, in line with the first key principle of the proposal for establishing a European Pillar of Social Rights, which states that everyone has the right to quality and inclusive education, training and lifelong learning.
There are four priorities identified in this renewed Agenda:
- Ensuring that the skills of graduates meet the needs of the economy and of the labour market and promoting excellence in skills development;
- Building inclusive higher education systems;
- Ensuring that higher education institutions contribute to innovation, in particular at local and regional level;
- Supporting effective and efficient higher education systems.
The main measure will be the launching of a European initiative to track graduates, as part of the New Skills Agenda for Europe, with the aim of improving knowledge at EU and national level on how graduates from both higher education and vocational education and training progress in their careers or further education and thus supporting improvements in career guidance, programme design, institutional strategy and policy-making. This initiative has been developed in the proposal for a Council Recommendation on tracking graduates and should be based on a Europe-wide survey and on cooperation to improve the follow-up mechanisms for graduates.
DGES accompanies and participates in the discussion of these European Commission proposals within the Education Committee, which is a preparatory body in the framework of education and training for the Education, Youth, Culture and Sports Council.
