Republic of turkey

2. FORMATION OF EUROPEAN HIGHER EDUCATION AREA AND THE BOLOGNA PROCESS

Formation of European Higher Education Area

European Universities that create university concept and extend it across the world and that were without rival until the start of the 20^th century began to slow down since the middle of the 20^th century and superiority passed to the USA. According to Shanghai index the best 20 universities in the world are distributed as follows; 17 in the USA, 2 in Great Britain and 1 in Japan.

Europe, which targets to be the “most competitive and dynamic knowledge-based economy in the world” by becoming a single market and single block by unifying and expanding in a globalising world, started to seriously deal with the problems of universities, which are at the focus of this objective, only since the middle of 1990s. In these years the higher education system in Europe expect Great Britain were generally faced with basic problems as follows;

• 
  An over centralized management, limited administrative and financial autonomy,
  
• 
  Low and lowering public resources¹⁹ and tuition fees that cannot be collected,
  
• 
  Inefficiency in education; very low graduation rates and extending education periods,²⁰
  
• 
  Inefficiency in research,²¹
  

During 1990s and at the start of 2000s almost all European countries have realized legal regulations in administrative and financial issues (as stated in previous sections) in order to find solution to problems of their own higher education systems. These regulations realized radical changes in some countries (Austria, Poland, Czech Republic, Bulgaria, Rumania, Hungary) and some improvement in other ones (Germany, France, Spain).

However, the common problem of all European countries and especially the EU is the fact that the countries have very different university traditions and most important very different quality and education processes. These differences increased more after unification of previous socialist countries with Europe and triggered harmonisation of the higher education system in Europe and especially in the EU and formation of European Higher Education Area in the long-term.

Formation of a common European Higher Education Area is very important for the EU countries and the countries around theme in terms of the following issues;

• 
  Removing some obstacles in front of free movement of services via accreditation and diploma recognition mechanisms,
  
• 
  Increasing student mobility and forming a common “European” conscious and culture,
  
• 
  Improving competition power in science and technology via cooperation between universities.
  

In order to establish a common higher education area, first countries should mutually recognize their higher education institutions and degrees awarded by these institutions. For this reason, certain processes and procedures considered necessary for academic recognition by Council of Europe/UNESCO Lisbon Recognition Convention in 1997 were accepted by 36 European countries, USA, Canada, Australia and Israel. However, since assessments and decisions in the processes determined for academic recognition to higher education institutions, a significant change compared to the practices that have been applied for a long time between these institutions could not be achieved.

The first serious step toward formation of a single European Higher Education Area was taken with Sorbonne Joint Declaration issued by ministers responsible for higher education of France, Germany, Italy and Great Britain in May 1998.

Bologna Process (Bologna, Prague, Berlin, Bergen Declarations)

One year after the initiative started in Sorbonne 29 European countries issued Bologna Declaration in June 1999 and taken the first step towards the establishment of European Higher Education Area.

In this declaration;

1. 
   Formation of a two-cycle degree structure (undergraduate and graduate),
   
2. 
   Adoption of European Credit Transfer System and application of semester systems,
   
3. 
   Increasing academic mobility and removing the obstacles in front of it,
   

as suggested in Sorbonne declaration were accepted and in addition the following decisions were rendered

4. 
   Issuing Diploma Supplement that summarize received education in order to make academic degrees readable and comparable,
   
5. 
   Making cooperation between European countries in order to assure quality in higher education (European Co-operation in Quality Assurance),
   
6. 
   Giving weight to subjects peculiar to Europe in education and research activities of higher education institutions,
   

and in this way, Bologna Process was started.

In line with these decisions, Ministers of Education of 33 countries with participation of Turkey added the following issues to their objectives by issuing a joint declaration named “Towards European Higher Education Area” and evaluating the developments in 6 action lines stated in Bologna declaration in Prague in May 2001;

7. 
   Improving lifelong education,
   
8. 
   Enabling active participation of students to formation of European Higher Education Area, and
   
9. 
   Cooperating in order to increase attractiveness of European Higher Education Area for students of other countries and developing transnational education in Europe.²²
   

Also in this meeting, decision was rendered to make Bologna Follow Up Group constituted of representatives of member countries to be responsible for continuous improvement of Bologna Process in order to decide on the measures to be taken for realising action lines of the Bologna Process and follow up development of the process.

The declaration named Realising EHEA issued in Berlin in 2003 after 1999 Bologna and 2001 Prague declarations was signed by 40 countries. In addition to 9 action lines determined in Sorbonne, Bologna and Prague, this declaration adopts the 3-cycle degree structure in higher education instead of 2-cycle (as bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degree) and structured doctoral studies in a way that will ensure compatibility between countries for this purpose and in this way increasing mobility of doctorate students and accelerating the cooperation between institutions in research field as the 10^th action line of the Process. It is envisaged to form the link between European Higher Education Area and European Research Area with doctorate programs.²³

Evaluation of Bologna Process

Bologna Follow-up Group formed in 2001 with Prague declaration realized a stocktaking exercise in 2005 in order to determine the improvement level reached by member countries on the following three priority action lines of Bologna Process;

• 
  Quality assurance,
  
• 
  Two-cycle degree system,
  
• 
  Recognition of degrees and periods of study.²⁴
  

In this evaluation statuses of member countries were determined as shown in Table 5. This table indicated that countries have already covered a significant road in scope of Bologna Process.

Results of the evaluation made in order to determine the road taken by Turkey in scope of Bologna Process is given in Table 6.

Table 5: Average Scores of Countries for the Three Priority Action Lines Year 2005

Action Lines	NUMBER OF COUNTRIES*
	Excellent Performance	Very good performance	Good performance	Some Progress	Little Progress
Quality Assurance	15	13	7	8	0
The two-cycle degree system	18	13	4	6	2
Recognition of degrees and periods of study	14	20	9	0	0
Score for all three action lines	10	10	22	3	0

*While there are 40 countries, there are two separate scores for three of the countries: Belgium, Serbia and Montenegro, and the United Kingdom.

Source: Bologna Process Stocktaking, Report from a Working Group Appointed by the BFUG, Bergen May 2005.

Table 6: Bologna Scorecard of Turkey, 2005

QUALITY ASSURANCE	Some Progress
Stage of development of quality assurance system Key elements of evaluation systems Level of participation of Students Level of international participation, cooperation and networking	Some Progress Some Progress Some Progress Some Progress
TWO-CYCLE DEGREE SYSTEM	Excellent Performance
Stage of implementation of two-cycle system Level of student enrolment in two-cycle system Access from first cycle to second cycle	Excellent Performance Excellent Performance Very Good Performance
RECOGNITION OF DEGREES AND STUDY PERIODS	Very Good Performance
Stage of implementation of Diploma Supplement Ratification of Lisbon Recognition Convention Stage of implementation of ECTS	Very Good Performance Good Performance Very Good Performance
TOTAL	Good Performance

Source: Bologna Process Stocktaking, Report from a Working Group Appointed by the Bologna Follow-up Group, Bergen, May 2005, page 104

As can be seen in this table, status of Turkey is fine except quality assurance. Quality Assurance issue should be corrected without loosing time and National Quality Assurance System should be realized until the end of 2007. Turkey has been realizing harmonisation with Bologna process easier than many European countries.

Bologna Process is a “top-down” process started and tried to be maintained by governments. Higher education institutions, which are leading actors of this process, could not take sufficient role in the process. Evaluations of European Universities Association made on behalf of these institutions regarding Bologna Process does not seem as pessimistic as evaluations of “Bologna Follow-Up Group”.²⁵

In their evaluations, European Higher Education Institutions emphasize that “the process aims a cultural transformation in higher education and time and support is needed for this purpose, governments should be aware that the objectives cannot be achieved only with legal regulations, universities should have more autonomy and resources for a real reform and finally the real power of Europe was depends on the fact that until now higher education has been perceived as a public service that seeks solution to social problems and has continuously fed by public funds” and displayed a critical attitude.

Integration of our country with European Higher Education Area started with its official participation to Bologna Process in 2001. In scope of 10 action lines of Bologna Process the following activities have been realized until now:

1. 
   Works related to Diploma Supplement and European Credit Transfer System carried on under coordination of the Council of Higher Education was completed. With General Board decision of the Council of Higher Education of March 11, 2005, Diploma Supplement and European Credit Transfer System became mandatory for all higher education institutions since the end of 2005-2006 academic year. According to the decision, Diploma Supplement that will include the ECTS credits System and comply with minimum conditions of national standard model approved by the Council of Higher Education will be given to all graduates upon request. Its first copy will be free of charge and it will be issued either in English, France or German.
   
2. 
   Regarding to establishment of national student’s union, which will enable active participation of students to the process that is one of the main action lines of Bologna Process, the “Regulations for student councils of higher education institutions and the national student council of higher education institutions” took effect after published in the Official Gazette of September 20, 2005 and No. 25942. Chairman and bodies of Turkish National Student Council elected in the General Assembly of Student Councils on December 26, 2005 continues their activities.
   

3. 
   Another issues significantly emphasized by Bologna Process is to establish quality assessment and improvement systems that are fully compatible with the principles and procedures determined at European level. In this context, the “Regulations on Academic Assessment and Quality Improvement at higher education institutions” prepared by the Council of Higher Education was published in the Official Gazette of September 20, 2005 and no. 25942 and took effect. The regulation determines the general principles regarding assessment of education, teaching and research activities and administrative services of higher education institutions in a certain system, developing their qualities, approval and recognition of their quality levels with independent “external evaluation” processes and duties and responsibilities of upper bodies in higher education and higher education institutions.
   

In accordance with the regulation, the Commission on Academic Assessment and Quality Improvement in Higher Education including nine members elected by the Interuniversity Board was formed in order to carry on and coordinate the tasks regarding this issue and started to work. The regulation was prepared by taking the developments in the world and especially in Europe in scope of Bologna Process into consideration.

Activities of the Commission on Academic Assessment and Quality Improvement in Higher Education reached to their final stage. In this context, starting from this year, higher education institutions will realize their “internal assessments”, which is the most important element in scope of European Quality Assurance principles and procedures, each year and prepare their strategic plans in the light of obtained results and periodically review their developments with continuous measurement and improvement process. On the other hand, in scope of the regulation and the principles and procedures established in this context, higher education institutions are open to “external assessment” processes, which is accepted as one of the most important elements in scope of European Quality Assurance principles and procedures and it is envisaged that they will implement this process in every five years. All of these developments are compatible with basic elements of the Quality Assurance system targeted in scope of Bologna process, they will accelerate an important quality assessment and development process in our higher education institutions starting from this year and it is expected that they will be successful in this area. Some of our universities prepared their strategic plans and some of them are in preparation stage.

The first results of the efforts related to improvement of quality assurance will be received at the end of 2006-2007 academic year and our country will transform all conditions of action lines related to quality assurance to action before it participate in the Conference of Ministers of Education on Bologna Process to be held in London in 2007.

4. 
   The Council has been working on Bologna Process action line related to national qualifications framework for higher education. The work on levels of higher education competencies will be completed in two months. It is planned to complete the work on engineering competencies at the end of 2006. It was scheduled to complete the works on other sectors at the end of 2007.
   
5. 
   Lisbon Convention on “the Recognition of Qualifications concerning Higher Education in the European Region (1997)” signed by our country on December 1, 2004 was approved with the Law No. 5463 of February 23, 2006 and came into force after published in the Official Gazette No. 26094 of December 28, 2006. According to the basic principles stated in Section III “Basic Principles related to the Assessment of Qualifications” of the Convention, at the General Board meeting of Council of Higher Education on April 13, 2006 it was accepted to make necessary changes in the “Regulation on Equivalence of Higher Education Diplomas Received from Abroad” in order to use it a basis for assessment of applications for approval of equivalence. The new regulation including the changes required by the convention will be adopted in the year 2006.