The EURAXESS TOP III consortium includes partners from almost all EURAXESS countries (either as beneficiaries or associated partners, from altogether 39 countries), in order to ensure the widest possible coverage as well as increased impact. The project has been divided into eight work packages. Two WPs are devoted to the development, testing and pilot introduction of new services on career development within the EURAXESS network. The remaining WPs will focus on the environment of researchers including the institutional context, the integration of third country researchers and reaching out to researchers beyond the EU; researchers within and outside academia, most notably industry; the consolidation of the ongoing services portfolio, be it personal or electronic; the further capacity building of the EURAXESS network members and meeting the challenge posed by staff turnover by trainings, twinning and study visits; networking and knowledge exchange with a wide range of other networks; implementation of a consistent quality assurance and monitoring system operating on several levels on the project, and working out a future vision for EURAXESS in light of the policy goals of the EC set for the period up to 2020. The project will significantly contribute to matching research talents with R&I needs and capacity on a European scale and it will help the circulation of researchers within Europe and among sectors. As a result of the project, members of the EURAXESS network will have better and broader knowledge and more integrated good practices regarding service provision for researchers. EURAXESS national portals throughout the EURAXESS member countries will offer tailor made information in line with Horizon 2020 objectives on making science careers attractive for researchers, especially young researchers.

At EU level there are no homogeneous mechanisms to track students in Higher Education lifecycle (Entry, Education, Exit) nor models to anticipate students’ needs that take into account subjective elements. Seldom HEIs assess relevance and impact of their student support services. Such gaps are best captured by “Report to the EU Commission”2013 High Level Group on Modernisation of HE “a still underdeveloped area in EU is the tracking of students”. The report urges HEIs to “establish counselling, guidance, mentoring and tracking systems to support students”. The EU Commission “Report on Progress in Quality Assurance in HE”2014 confirms that better tracking of students and anticipating their needs is a priority, but that “at present only 40% of HEIs do so”. The “Agenda for Modernisation of EU HE Systems” identifies the answer to those challenges in “tailored guidance to inform study choices and reduce drop-out”. Against this background WISE aims at enhancing the welfare of students as a means to improve their performance, personal and professional development through improved tracking systems and student support services. The objective of WISE is to develop an innovative methodology to track students in the educational lifecycle taking into account both objective and subjective elements so as to better assess their needs and provide tailored support services.Six partners representing HEIs, HEIs associations and student support service providers bring together complementary experiences and knowledge to devise innovative student tracking and needs’ identification mechanisms. The partnership is representative of EU HE ecosystems, reflecting the various connotations of EU’s diversity: large and small Member States; Eastern, Nordic and Mediterranean realities; various size of HEIs and student bodies. Directly and indirectly, the partnership represents a wide network of HEIs in 4 countries. WISE involved directly 126.377 students in the primary research and 33.917 in the pilot stage, ensuring the student-cantered approach of the innovative model. WISE immediate target groups are the students (on the demand side of tracking and support services) and the support service providers within HEIs (on the supply side).The long term beneficiaries of project results are primarily the students enrolled in the HEIs represented in the partnership, amounting to a total of 340.000.Other potential beneficiaries are students enrolled in other HEIs throughout Europe.Partners carried out research and analysis to identify drivers and inhibitors in the area of student tracking and needs identification. The research results allowed partners to pinpoint indicators, variables and response mechanisms that in the modelling activities have been embedded into the multidimensional WISE model and matrix. The partners run pilots of WISE model and matrix in real-life case scenarios to test and validate with the target groups of users (students) and providers (HEIs’ support service providers) of tracking and needs identification mechanisms in higher education. The pilots was crucial to fine tune and validate the WISE model and matrix that in its final version was disseminated and exploited at EU level by the partners. WISE main results:- Report on “Students’ Welfare and Social Dimension of HE: Demand and Supply Side Perspectives for Improved Tracking” details the research approach and consolidate findings and analysis on the various dynamics of students’ tracking, needs anticipation and welfare- Validated WISE Model and Methodology: it allows to track more accurately HE students, assess and anticipate their needs taking into account also subjective elements, and provide more relevant, timely and appropriate tailored support services.Specifically, WISE produced the following impacts1. HEIs are better equipped to properly track students throughout the entire educational lifecycle2. HEIs can assess students’ needs taking into account also subjective factors3. HEIs are able to anticipate students’ needs with more relevant support services4. Students – especially disadvantaged groups – have better access to education5. Increased educational attainment, performance and retentionThe partnership was strongly committed to long-term benefits of WISE and its deployment across EU and other HEIs. The innovative multidimensional tracking and needs assessment methodology can be flexibly adjusted to other EU Realities.Tanks to the structure of the consortium and to existing networks, project results will be disseminated at least 2 years after the EU co-financing.