<< Objectives >>The main aim of the project is to identify factors that support the incorporation of inclusive student participation, enhance student competences to allow them fully participate in the HEI community and create guidelines concerning organisational structures of European HEIs in the context of the uncertain times and rapid changes. Project will enhance the academic community and individuals involved, it will also re-define the meaning of this community in the context of everyday challenges.<< Implementation >>Interdisciplinary and cross-institutional approach involves students, academic and administrative staff. Activities aim at all students alike but especially consider needs of groups that traditionally are less engaged, i.e. working and international students. Project goes beyond mere acquisition of skills, it establishes structures that support implementation of socially relevant initiatives through activities such as survey, workshops, peer-coaching group, summer school and study visit.<< Results >>Results of the project will be presented in the user-friendly and inclusive forms, so it could attract attention of vide audience. The main outputs will be published in the form of a publication, infographics and podcasts on the importance of the skills, and video-tutorials on how to lead own initiatives. The main result for the institutional purposes will be a Handbook introducing stable yet flexible guidelines for institutions and academic communities suitable for unsettled times.

Throughout Europe, higher education institutions on regularly basis ought to go through an external process that will assess their quality and the system they have in place to assure it. Students, main education consumer, should play an important role in the processes that examine the quality of education. But due to lack of capacity, expertise and professional experience, their feedback is often disregarded and participation discouraged. The project aims to provide students with sufficient knowledge and resources to ensure their position as equal partners in the institutions’ evaluation. Recent changes in the Slovak legislature (Law on Quality Assurance in Higher Education, 269/2018 Z. z.) and lacking students experts in Hungary forced both student unions to seek an expert support in the European Students' Union and the European Consortium for Accreditation. In 24 months the four organisations will address challenges met not only by students and QA system in Slovakia and Hungary but are spread all around the continent. The results of the projects will raise awareness and develop strategies for more meaningful European students’ involvement in the quality assurance.The main activities of the project include:- Development of training materials (trainer handbook & video course) for the purposes of student experts’ training. These should based on both the European Standards and Guidelines (ESG) and national specific regulations on quality assurance. These materials will be available for an open access and will be used also by other national and institutional students' unions.- Student expert training is the main learning activity that will directly contribute to the creation of the student expert pool both in Hungary and Slovakia. This activity will make use of materials and other documents prepared throughout the project.- The ESU QA Student Expert Pool is a network of student experts from entire Europe, established to support cross-border QA evaluations and foster the exchange of good practices and expertise. This project will boost the network by providing new materials, publications, and experts that will become a valuable asset for this developing network. - Policy recommendations will be drafted both on national and European level to address the situation as identified by the reports and experts in participating countries.- Awareness about QA is necessary for the sustainable continuation of the project and student expert recruitment. Report on the best practices on national levels will focus on the involvement of students in existing internal quality assurance system at individual universities. Two rounds of discussions with experts and students will help to spread findings of the report and other project outputs. The project will finish with two conferences, one will address the topic of QA and the place of students within that system. The second will focus on policy recommendations and presentation of ESU QA Student Expert Pool.European Students' Union and European Consortium for Accreditation are partners with great experience and useful resources. This strategic partnership aims to make use of their experience, train Slovak and Hungarian QA experts, develop and translate materials so they could be used for future training purposes. In the later stages, when Slovak and Hungarian students' unions will work on their intellectual outputs, ESU and ECA will serve as evaluators and provide feedback to ensure high quality of the project outputs. As the systems are still developing any materials developed through this process will become a valuable resource for the future. Those are going to be also shared with other national students' unions in Europe to promote also greater European cooperation in this field. The current situation opens an opportunity for students to participate in an evaluation of quality and raise voice in the future development of higher education, through this project we want to take this opportunity and provide students with means to participate on equal expert level.

A lacking sense of belonging within higher education, both regarding connections to fellow students as well as the identification with the institution and academic life itself, represents one of the three major reasons students drop out and break off their higher education experience. Especially for under-represented groups, such as first-in-family students or those with a migration or BME background, mature students or women in STEM, feeling out of place can be considered the main reason for student departure, more so than academic difficulties or having chosen the wrong study programme.The project’s objective is to increase this sense of belonging of under-represented groups while at the same time avoiding the triggering of “Othering”-effects or stereotype threat. Measures aiming at specific “vulnerable” groups often prove unsuccessful and are not taken on by the targeted groups due to a degree of stigmatisation associated with it. Also, accessing and acknowledging the need for support in case one feels isolated or disoriented is often associated with a high threshold, especially among non-traditional students who are generally more reluctant to ask for support. Thus, instead of developing measures exclusively for specific groups of students, the project takes an anti-categorial approach addressing all beginner students alike: it strongly relies on initiating and fostering exchange between different student groups (especially between non-traditional and traditional students) and provides anonymously available, issue-based support. To reach the objective the following project outputs will be developed: 1)a programme for an obligatory COMMUNITY BUILDING COURSE (O3) for first-semester students which will be carried out at all three participating HEI. The course aims at initiating and encouraging exchange among new students, establishing more tightly relationships by didactically focusing on changing group formations, but also by empowering students to act as experts in their own right. Further, by making the own institution a subject of inquiry it is hoped to achieve a stronger identification with the institution.2)an online STUDENT EXPERIENCE PLATFORM (O2). The anonymously available content of the web-based platform will offer interactive content with a strong focus on sharing and relating experiences of other students (via podcasts, video material, etc.). Further, it will also bundle relevant information on belonging issues – which is currently not available – in one site. Students participating in O3 will be exposed to the platform which is intended to function as a natural companion through student life.3)a STAFF TRAINING (O4) To establishing and maintain a sense of belonging it is vital that students are met with staff sensitised to their needs. In two formats, one for teaching staff, the other for administrative staff, issues of unconscious bias and the importance of belonging will be addressed, ultimately enabling staff to recognise and deal with problems arising out of a lacking integration into the HEI. The outputs will be informed by an initial NEEDS ASSESSMENT (O1) in the form of a Europe-wide student survey among first-semester students gauging their sense of belonging and possible difficulties in adapting to academic life.The impact of the proposed measures, i.e. testing if they were successful in raising a sense of belonging and a higher integration and identification with the institution, will be measured by surveying those students who went through the programme and comparing the results to a control group of students who did not. The project participants include beginner students from all three participating HEI. In this run, around 25 students per HEI will participate in the course; they will also function as a testing group for the platform. Further, teaching and administrative staff from all three HEI will participate in the training. The project also includes students, staff and renowned international experts in advisory functions (Student and Staff Advisory Board, Quality Council). Throughout the project, tight quality control regarding relevance and adequacy of proposed content will take place.The consortium was chosen carefully: The three participating HEI all have a high percentage of non-traditional students (UDE: 30% students with migration background, among the highest in Germany; BCU: 70% BME; FHOOE: 80% first-in-family) and thus have extensive experience in inclusion and diversity management practices in HE. ESU, on the other hand, contributes the student perspective and its Europe-wide networks. In the longer run and with a view to sustainability, the project results (i.e. the course-programme, the content on the platform, the training formats) are highly transferable. The outputs, or modular parts thereof, can be adopted easily by other HEI or rolled out to a larger group of students at a later point.

At the early stage of the Bologna Process, European leaders made an unprecedented political affirmation of the importance of student participation in the governance of higher education systems and institutions. The enhanced engagement of students became one of the principles of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) and has been perceived as a political objective, substantial value and procedural principle at the same time. This idea was reflected in the Prague (2001), London (2007), and Yerevan (2015) Communiqués, among others.Even so, student participation is currently far from the desired standards both in terms of quantity and quality, and the engagement of underrepresented and disadvantaged groups of students is almost non-existent. In order to promote good governance and inclusion, these challenges need to be addressed forthwith at the institutional, national and European level.Thus, the general objective of the project Student Participation Without Borders (STUPS) is to lay the foundations of a European network focusing on the development of new practices to promote student participation, with the aim of finding genuine solutions to one of the most pressing challenges of higher education. To complete this goal, the specific objectives of the project seek to increase and improve the knowledge of, cooperation in, training on and awareness of student participation, which is an invaluable source of social innovation. This is key to establish efficient governance and a more inclusive higher education system.The target groups of STUPS are students, student leaders and students from underrepresented and disadvantaged backgrounds. Likewise, the project pays special attention to university managers with competence over student participation, inclusion and equality to engage in dialogue and raise awareness of the benefits of cooperation.The STUPS consortium consists of five members and is led by the University of Huelva (Spain). Other partners are the University of Évora (Portugal), the University of Applied Sciences of Upper Austria (Austria), the European Students' Union (Belgium) and the Directorate of Evaluation and Accreditation of the Junta de Andalucía (Spain). Thus, a well-balanced and complementary team has been created, which includes three higher education institutions, a public agency for evaluation and accreditation of university activities, and the most representative student organisation in Europe with members from 39 countries of the EHEA. The expected intellectual results are the following:- Comparative Study of Student Participation in the European Union (O1);- Student rights charters (O2);- Student participation indexes (O3);- Guide to new student participation methodologies (O4);- Two MOOCs on student participation and improving soft skills for effective and efficient participation (O5 and O6);- Integral plans to encourage student participation (O7).The various activities to be carried out during the project seek to promote a high level of participation and its mainstreaming, as well as to ensure the excellent quality of the results and achieve substantial impact. To this end, three groups of learning, teaching and training activities will be organized: 1) A pilot test of student participation indexes; 2) A simulation of MOOCs on student participation and soft skills; 3) A workshop to stimulate participatory processes and integrated management.Likewise, two major international multiplier events will be held to familiarize higher education stakeholders with the intellectual outputs in an open and interactive format. The first will take place in Brussels, and disseminate O1, O2, O3 and O4. Subsequently, another event will be held in Huelva to present O5, O6 and O7, as well as the evolution of O2 and O3.The work method will be participatory, open and transparent, based on horizontal and multidirectional cooperation. Depending on the activity, a wide range of methodologies, like gamification, design thinking, role play and directed learning will be used.The expected results are directly and indirectly related to each other, and can be classified according to the priorities they address:a) Governance: Improved democratic functioning and the modernisation of management are expected as a result of enhanced student participation.b) More inclusive education systems through increased participation of underrepresented and disadvantaged groups in students’ decision-making processes.c) Social inclusion as a result of a more equitable and egalitarian culture of participation of local communities in line with the concept of social osmosis.In the long term, the project is expected to contribute to the increased awareness of students, managers and policy makers. In addition, the standardisation of a common analysis model of student participation and enhanced inclusion are anticipated thanks to the increased number of social leaders coming from disadvantaged backgrounds.

Green Erasmus is a project on the topic of the environmental impact of the Erasmus+ Programme, in particular the higher education part. While the benefits of the Programme are well-known, it must be recognised that it also has a negative impact on the environment. The young people who were protesting in actions such as Friday for Future in 2019 will be higher education students soon and many of them will take part in an Erasmus+ exchange within the coming programme period (2021-2017). It is important to make sure that the programme is as environmentally friendly as possible.The aim of Green Erasmus is to improve the environmental sustainability of the Erasmus+ Programme, whilst also contributing improvements in environmental sustainability across Europe.The objectives are:1. To decrease the negative impact of the Erasmus+ Programme on environmental sustainability.2. To raise awareness across the European higher education sector about the importance of sustainable internationalisation.3. To empower student organisations to be the agents of change, pushing for improvements on the topic of environmental sustainability.The results which will lead to the objectives will include:1. Students use more sustainable modes of transport before, during and after their mobilities.2. Students become more responsible consumers during their exchange abroad.3. University staff support a “sustainable Erasmus” as a carrier for environmental sustainability 4. Sustainability is at the heart of activities organised by student organisations. In order to reach these results, six project partners from Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany and the UK have joined forces. The above-mentioned results will be reached through a combination of a comprehensive Green Erasmus research report (IO1) on the environmental behaviour of Erasmus students, Handbook for University staff members on sustainable internationalisation (IO2), Educational Portal for Students on Sustainable Internationalisation (IO3), A petition to highlight the major believes and expectations of the Erasmus Generation in the field of environmental sustainability (IO3) an educational framework to include environmental sustainability and sustainable skills in the curricula and a Toolkit for Environmental Sustainable outreach activities that will cause many intercultural dialogues between international students and their local communities.In the course of the project, we will reach, among other things, 10,000 respondents to the student survey, 20,000 visitors to an online portal for sustainable internationalisation and 100,000 people through a social media campaign. The project main results will be presented in two conferences in Brussels in October 2021 and October 2022.Green Erasmus will run for 28 months, from September 2020 to December 2022.