Why choose this programme?

The 2-year international programme is the first ever European Master’s programme on higher education. It is unique in three specific ways:

• Worldwide, it is the only program covering a broader range of disciplinary (specialisation) perspectives on higher education.

• The program is based on multi-faceted mode of delivery (lectures, seminars, colloquiums, etc.), supported by a state-of-the-art e-learning platform (podcasts, student blog, online resources, etc.)

• It builds upon the involvement of a variety of leading research centers and partner universities from Europe, Asia, Africa and North America, bringing together a variety of leading experts in the field.

The programme introduces students to generic disciplinary concepts, theories, and perspectives, and discusses their relevance for understanding change processes in higher education at various levels: the basic unit (department, institute, faculty); the institutional or organisational level; the national; as well as, the supra-national (e.g. European Union) level. Such perspectives are highly relevant not only for researchers, but also for active practitioners such as institutional managers, policy-makers, and all those directly involved with the field of higher education.

Examples of recent change processes in higher education include:

• The increasing awareness by international bodies and agencies like UNESCO, the OECD, the World Bank, development aid organisations, etc., of higher education as a critical sector in fostering socio-economic and cultural development both, at the national as well as local/regional levels.

• The growing attention towards the quality of teaching, research and third steam activities, nationally as well as internationally.

• The creation of European Areas for Higher Education and Research and ongoing national and supranational efforts aimed at modernising universities across Europe.

In addition to a rather sophisticated, web-based student support architecture students enrolled in the programme receive close tutoring and regular guidance both, from an administrative and an academic perspective. Over the years, the programme has attracted students from more than 40 countries from the four corners of the globe, from Asia to Southern and Northern Europe, to Africa and the Americas.

The Faculty of Educational Sciences is proud of the fact that the programme builds upon an active and fruitful collaboration with leading research centers in the field of higher education studies, in Europe (the Hedda consortium ) and beyond. Students enrolled in the programme not only have the unique opportunity to meet, face-to-face, experts from across the globe, but also to spend a period overseas (financially supported by Erasmus scholarships) as part of their formal studies. Current foreign partners include, but are not limited to, the following entities:

• The Higher Education Group (HEG), University of Tampere (Finland)

• The Center for Higher Education Policy Studies (CHEPS), University of Twente (the Netherlands)

• The Centre for Research in Higher Education Policies (CIPES), University of Aveiro (Portugal)

• The Institute for Research in the Sociology and Economics of Education (IREDU), University of Bourgogne (France)

• The Nordic Institute for Studies in Innovation, Research and Education (NIFU), Oslo (Norway)

• The Centre for Higher Education Studies (CSVS), Prague (the Czech Republic)

• The Centre for Higher Education Development (CHE), Gutersloh (Germany)

• The Centre for Higher Education Transformation (CHET) and the Faculty of Education at the University of the Western Cape, South Africa.

• The Institute of Higher Education (IHE), University of Georgia (USA)

• The LH Martin Institute for Higher Education Leadership and Management (MIHELM), University of Melbourne (Australia)

• The Research Institute for Higher Education (RIHE), Hiroshima University and the Graduate School of Higher Education Administration, J.F. Oberlin University (Japan).