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outreach role of universities in international society have inspired its success.
These values and purposes were referenced in the Bologna Charta
Universitatum (1988) in view of the needs for a knowledge economy i.e. the
creation of a ‘Europe of knowledge’, as stipulated in the La Sorbonne
Declaration (Pol, 2015, p. 14).
Following the aspiration of EHEA, the development of a European academic
community was driven through the Erasmus Mundus programmes for student
and staff mobility across Europe during 2004–2013. This programme operates
through scholarships and cooperation between European countries, and
subsequently between the EU and the rest of the world. It supports key actions
to improve the development of human resources, promotes dialogue and
communication between people and culture for enhancing the quality in higher
education, and promotes Europe as a centre of excellence in learning around
the globe. Hence, it has become the living emblem of the Bologna Process as
it successfully “builds bridges with other regions of the world” (Pol, 2015, p.
12) and becomes the elite mobility programme under the Key Action 1 of
Erasmus+ programme, which is the EU’s signatory programme in the fields of
education, training, youth and sports for the period 2014–2020 (Erasmus
Commission, 2017a, p. 5).
Erasmus Mundus (and today, cf. Erasmus+) programmes are facilitated by
various Bologna principles, tools and instruments necessary for the
establishment of the EHEA. These enablers are important in higher education
and have been adopted since the Yerevan conference in 2015 and within all
other Ministerial Communiques. Notably, the EU efforts have generated a
myriad collection of Bologna initiatives and instruments to achieve quality in
higher education and recognition of higher education qualifications. Such
initiatives include, but are not limited to, the 3 Bologna cycles; the European
Qualifications Framework (EQF); the European Credit Transfer System
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