IAU Horizons, the Association's news and information magazine is addressed primarily to IAU Member Institutions and Organizations, but is also sent to a selected audience beyond the IAU Membership such as Ministries of Higher Education, international organizations, national and regional associations of universities and others.
Be informed, get involved, make a difference – oikos Student Entrepreneurship for Sustainability (IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2)
By Jost Hamschmidt, academic director, oikos foundation for economy and ecoloy and Dawid Wroblewski, president, oikos International. Oikos (name chosen for its etymological reference to both economy and ecology) is a student-inspired organisation for Sustainable Economics and Management, that operates through a broad network. Founded at the University of St. Gallen in 1987, oikos now counts more than 35 student groups (oikos chapters), among them a growing number outside Europe. oikos’ mission is to strengthen action competence for sustainable development among tomorrow’s decision makers. With a learning-by-doing approach, oikos students implement sustainability-driven innovation and promote the integration of sustainability perspectives into research and teaching at their schools. Over time, the organization has developed its activities beyond student activism. ‘Be informed – get involved – make a difference’ is the organizations’ guiding motto. Read more in IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2.

IAU Horizons, the Association's news and information magazine is addressed primarily to IAU Member Institutions and Organizations, but is also sent to a selected audience beyond the IAU Membership such as Ministries of Higher Education, international organizations, national and regional associations of universities and others.
Transforming our universities into sustainable development labs opened to the world (IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2)
By Alain Webster, Vice-President, Sustainable development and government relations and Véronique Bisaillon, Educational consultant – Sustainable development, Université de Sherbrooke, Canada. In our universities, any global sustainable development strategy should be woven into teaching, research and management activities altogether. In fact, universities are poised to become efficient sustainable development labs, locally committed and set to address global issues. This has always been Université de Sherbrooke’s approach, with results that extend far beyond its three campuses. A common challenge Since the beginning of its sustainable development efforts, in 2004, Université de Sherbrooke always endeavoured to closely interact with civic partners. This approach allowed for the enactment of sustainable development policies by major Sherbrooke stakeholders, including City, health and teaching institutions. Université de Sherbrooke’s sustainable mobility strategy, including the renowned Open Access to Public Transit Programme for students, well illustrates the relevance of this cooperative approach. Created in close collaboration with City transit officials and student associations, the success of the programme – and of the whole strategy – is measured by the lowering of GhG emissions, a diminution of parking space, the creation of similar programmes by many other institutions, and the fact that sustainable mobility has become a major stake in the City’s development! Building upon its success, Université de Sherbrooke managed to eliminate 200 parking spaces to replace them with an attractive and very central green space dubbed Coeur campus (the heart of the Campus), which also acts as a rainwater purifier system. The strategy also made it possible for a student coop to build a university residence downtown Sherbrooke, very close to the city’s main bus terminal, in an effort to promote Transit Oriented Development (TOD). What’s more, by advocating the use of eco-efficient vehicles, this sustainable mobility strategy plays a part in teaching and research activities in the fields of biofuels and electricity-based transports. Read more in IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2.

IAU Horizons, the Association's news and information magazine is addressed primarily to IAU Member Institutions and Organizations, but is also sent to a selected audience beyond the IAU Membership such as Ministries of Higher Education, international organizations, national and regional associations of universities and others.
African higher education in the 21st century (IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2)
By Heila Lotz-Sisitka, Murray & Roberts Chair of Environmental Education and Sustainability and Professor Rhodes University, South Africa and by Mahesh Pradhan, UNEP, Director of Education and Training. What direction for education in the 21st century? how should higher education in Africa prepare young leaders for the future? These questions are significant, since Africa is soon to be the world’s most youthful continent. An expanding network of African professors and their leaders have been meeting and working on these problems since 2004 when the Mainstreaming Environment and Sustainability in African Universities (MESA) programme was initiated through the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and the African Association of Universities (AAU), in partnership a number of other global and regional organisations and universities as a flagship programme of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development.
Since its establishment MESA network has expanded in scope and size. Today it is possible to find that approximately one quarter of Africa’s universities are engaged in various environment and sustainability curriculum and campus innovations. Capacity building for university staff is an important feature of the programme, and training programmes exist that connect faculty in Africa with faculty in Asia and in other parts of the world. The various training programmes associated with MESA already have over 300 alumni. Through wider interest in the MESA programme, UNEP has turned the programme to a global initiative named the Global Universities Partnership for Environment and Sustainability (GUPES) which will be launched in Shanghai as an associated event of Rio+20.
But what has resulted from this continental network? There is evidence of at least 100 different curriculum and campus innovations. These range in scale, from single subject changes, to whole new degree programmes which have been launched and funded as a result of faculty participation in MESA. The University of zambia for example introduced a Bachelors of Environmental Education degree, with hundreds of young people applying for it each year, while the University of Cape Town has restructured its entire Environmental Law programme, with new staff appointed. The kigali Institute of Technology in Rwanda started an innovative community engagement and training programme based on the bio-digestors designed at kIST. This has provided skills development and entrepreneurship opportunities for hundreds of prisoners and youth. The universities of Jomo kenyatta University in kenya, the University of Swaziland and others have developed and implemented Education for Sustainable Development policy frameworks for the entire university. These are just a few of the results emerging from the networking and professional development opportunities that have emerged from MESA across the continent.
At the core of the initiative is a commitment to transformative learning, and a ‘Change Project’ concept, in which all participating faculty or university leaders choose what they can and would like to change in their universities to improve education in ways that strengthen sustainable development on the continent. In the final analysis it is this self-directed, emergent model of change that has proven to be successful as it allows for ongoing, reflexive change in a context where many change initiatives have failed because of their top down or ‘outsider driven’ orientation. Future goals of MESA are to continue with this movement for change in universities; to expand international exchange opportunities and access to the latest knowledge resources and policy developments on environment and sustainability through networking and training. UNEP are developing curriculum guidelines to strengthen curriculum innovations, and support for Green Economy programme developments in universities. The vision of MESA academics is a continent free of poverty, where Africa’s people have the knowledge, values and capabilities necessary to develop the continent sustainably, peacefully and equitably for current and future generations. Read more in IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2.

IAU Horizons, the Association's news and information magazine is addressed primarily to IAU Member Institutions and Organizations, but is also sent to a selected audience beyond the IAU Membership such as Ministries of Higher Education, international organizations, national and regional associations of universities and others.
COPERNICUS Alliance – promoting transformative learning and change for sustainability in higher education (IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2)
By Ingrid Mulà, Secretariat, Clemens Mader, Vice President and Daniella Tilbury, President, COPERNICUS Alliance.
Research studies demonstrate that only a few universities have been successful in transforming the whole institutional culture and inspiring a widespread institutional change. The reality is that changing the culture and structure of universities and colleges is highly complex and requires the involvement of the whole institutional community.
Change for sustainability in higher education has been primarily driven by international partnerships and networks which are directing efforts to support sustainability innovation in all areas of universities. The COPERNICUS Alliance, a European network for higher education and sustainability, is a network which promotes transformative learning and change for sustainability across the higher education sector. The COPERNICUS Alliance has its roots in the COPERNICUS Charta which was published by the European Rectors Conference in 1993. The Charta outlines ten “change pathways” including sustainable development values and ethics, education for university employees and students, and institutional strategic frameworks. The Charta, which resides with the Copernicus Alliance, has been endorsed by 326 European universities, showcasing their commitment in leading change for sustainability, and was updated as COPERNICUS Charta 2.0 in 2011.
The COPERNICUS Alliance within and across its network of members and partners promotes learning through dialogue and exchange opportunities; encourages the development of publications and resources; collects and shares best practice; provides opportunities for collaborative research; and reviews assessment tools to assist organisations in their journeys towards sustainability. All activities of the COPERNICUS Alliance are based on the active engagement of its members. Members can be institutions (involving all staff) as well as individuals and have the opportunity to actively exchange with others and initiate projects that support endeavours of sustainability integration in institutional as well as European wide or international context.
The Alliance has recently identified its key priorities for the period 2012-13 and has committed to prioritising Education for Sustainability (EfS) activities, strengthening Rio+20 Earth Summit outcomes for higher education and extending the network across Europe. The intention is to inform and influence policy developments as well as to raise the profile of higher education in key international dialogues and gatherings.
COPERNICUS Alliance website: www.copernicus-alliance.org/
COPERNICUS Alliance Secretariat: office@copernicus-alliance.org
Capacity building on sustainability assessment in higher education
To support higher education institutions within their management of sustainability agencies, the COPERNICUS Alliance, together with the United Nations University has launched a capacity building initiative for higher education sustainability assessment. An international workshop was organised in 2011 to exchange knowledge and experiences among members and international experts. A book publication is under development and a special issue in Sustainability Accounting, Management and Policy Journal (Emerald Publishing) has recently announced its call for papers in the field. See: www.emeraldinsight.com. Download IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2.

IAU Horizons, the Association's news and information magazine is addressed primarily to IAU Member Institutions and Organizations, but is also sent to a selected audience beyond the IAU Membership such as Ministries of Higher Education, international organizations, national and regional associations of universities and others.
The Contribution of Higher Education to Sustainable Development – An introduction (IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2)
By Hilligje van’t Land, IAU Director Membership and Programme Development, and Daniella Tilbury, University of Gloucestershire, UK. The concept of sustainable development has evolved quite substantially since it was first introduced some decades ago. Many have spent time defining it, believing that this would make it easier to take it up and implement its principles. Others have initiated pilot projects to test out practices but also to inspire action and commitment across stakeholder groups. Time has shown that higher education institutions are seeing the relevance of this agenda but also that they have often struggled to locate it in the right ‘place’ within the institution’s mandate and various practices, including teaching, research, and management. Until recently much activity has remained in the fringes of the tertiary education.
Recently the attention has shifted from Sustainable Development to ESD (education for sustainable development) as Universities see the criticality of embedding sustainability into its core business – education. In parallel, sector commitments have been revisited and reoriented by University Leaders with climate change, coming to the fore-front of dialogues in this area. Parallel to these movements we see greater expectations from students, communities, government, business and industry and other stakeholders as they ask questions regarding the role currently played by higher education in the transition towards a more sustainable future.
The following 26 articles present the reader with a rich set of briefs explaining the diversity of actions undertaken around the world in the fields of policy advocacy, leadership and management, education and curriculum reform, research, outreach, campus greening, student initiatives, and includes an insight to a selection of assessment tools developed to measure reforms and innovation at all levels. What is stressed by the many authors, whom we thank for their valuable contributions to this issue of horizons, is that higher education is not standing still; on the contrary. higher education is moving ahead challenging unsustainable practices and innovating for more sustainable futures.
The current global economic crisis may have contributed in some way to this deeper commitment: some indeed see it as an extra push for rethinking, redefining, ‘refounding’ the way universities teaching and research is being done. Yet at the same time the crisis are as well often used as an excuse to not ‘re-think’ but to ‘re-duce’ what is being taught, when courses and/or programmes are labelled as ‘economically not viable’. Better address the challenges humanity and the world face requires students to benefit from interdisciplinary rich programmes. Excessive streamlining can only be detrimental and, in the end, counterproductive.The papers stress the need for more visionary leaders who can foster and sustain initiatives at all levels. Change management is a huge task, implementing it requires much effort, but it is a task worth pursuing: tools are available; staff is receptive and available and students are eager to get more involved and take it up. The complexity of this agenda means that not only can it be carried out by visionary leaders, they will only success if all – funders, legislators, supporting agencies, trade unions, employers, local communities as well as staff and students – are being engaged in rethinking higher education and in reorienting systems and practices towards sustainability.
The Rio+ 20 Summit will take place as this issue will come off the press. We hope that this magazine along with other initiatives lead by higher education stakeholders will once more make the case for what higher Education stands for: building equitable, future-facing, innovative and intellectually challenging societies for all. higher Education must take responsibility as well as carve more responsible pathways for the communities it serves so that people and planet are not exploited in the development process. Download IAU Horizons Volume 18, No.2.

The IAU is pleased to share activities carried out by IAU Members, Women’s University in Africa and the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, to improve children’s learning through quality teacher education in response to IAU's call for support in the 2013 Global Action Week campaign, Every child needs a teacher.
At the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, the Centre of Excellence for Learning Diversity responds to varied needs of stakeholders while their university-community initiative, Academic Excellence Programme For Schoolers, aims to improve a community’s well-being through education and better trained student-teachers. Read more here.
The Women’s University in Africa focuses on ongoing teacher education through a comprehensive teacher education programme.
IAU decided to become involved in the 2013 Global Action Week due to this year's theme. IAU solicited support through its membership to raise awareness of the direct link between higher education and EFA.

Early research into user experiences of the Unistats web-site, published today, shows that it is one of the most widely used higher education course comparison web-sites, and that universities and colleges rose well to the challenge of providing a new data set. Since its launch in September 2012, the Unistats web-site has received over 3.8 million page views and over 175,000 unique visitors – an average of 984 new visitors per day. The site is used extensively by prospective higher education students, their parents, careers advisers, teachers and higher education staff. The research, commissioned by the Higher Education Funding Councils (note 1), looks at the site’s position in the market and how it is perceived and used, as well as issues such as navigation, search, filter and comparison functions, and data presentation. A separate report by the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) focuses on the experiences and views of higher education institutions (note 2). 
Key findings include:
    * The average length of visit to the site is over eight minutes (a long time compared with use of other web-sites).
    * Many users regarded the independent and authoritative nature of the site as one of its key strengths.
    * Prospective students, current students and parents were more positive about the site than careers advisers, teachers and higher education staff, and more likely to describe the site as ’useful’ and ‘easy to get around’.
    * Most users (73%) had come to the site directly by typing in the URL, rather than following a link from another web-site or from a search engine. Of those using a search engine, the majority (over 60%) searched for the term “Unistats”. The majority of referrals to the site have been from KIS adverts, or ‘widgets’, on university and college web-sites.
Both reports made a number of recommendations for improvements to the search and filter functions and the presentation of data. HEFCE and HESA are using these findings to inform the development of the site.  A number of changes have been made already, including enhancements to the search function. Improvements planned for September 2013 include:
    * the inclusion of a location marker for each course, allowing filtering by location of delivery
    * more uniform presentation of award and title of course
    * development of a communications strategy and a mobile-compatible version of the site.
Longer-term recommendations will be considered as part of a wider review of the provision of higher education information which is due to report in 2014-15.
Notes
1. ‘Early Evaluation of Unistats User Experiences’ was commissioned by the Higher Education Funding Councils and carried out by the International Centre for Guidance Studies (iCeGS) in partnership with The Careers Research & Advisory Centre (CRAC). The research took place in the three months immediately after the launch of the new Unistats web-site, and included fieldwork observation of groups of users, an online survey, and web statistics analysis. Users included prospective and current students, parents, teachers, careers advisers, and higher education outreach workers.
2. ‘Early Evaluation of KIS/Unistats Institutional perspective’, HESA, March 2013.

HEFCE Annual Conference 2013. Thursday 18 April 2013, Imperial College London, South Kensington Campus, London SW7 2AZ.
Shaping the future: the social and economic contribution of higher education
This was an event for heads of higher education providers in England and representatives of HE stakeholder organisations.
See conference videos: the chair's summary and comments from delegates.
See our live commentary on the conference.
Conference programme and speaker biographies
Download the Conference programme.
Tim Melville-Ross, Chair, HEFCE
Welcome and introduction. Read the commentary.
RT Hon David Willetts MP, Minister for Universities and Science
What's the value of going to university? Read the minister's speech in full. Read the commentary on David Willetts' speech.
Sir Alan Langlands, Chief Executive, HEFCE
The social and economic contribution of higher education. Download the Alan Langlands. Read the commentary on Alan's speech.
Heather Fry, Director (Education, Participation and Students), HEFCE
Higher education and social mobility. Download the Heather Fry. Read the commentary on Heather's speech.
Shami Chakrabarti, Director, Liberty
Higher education - a rights perspective. Read the commentary on Shami's speech.
Professor Danny Dorling, University of Sheffield
Patterns of social mobility. Download the Danny Dorling. Read the commentary on Danny's speech.
David Sweeney, Director (Research, Innovation and Skills), HEFCE
Universities: the social, cultural and economic contribution to society. Read the commentary on David's speech.
Professor Craig Calhoun, Director, LSE
An international view. Read the commentary on Craig's speech.
Hans Dröge, Senior Vice President, Unilever Research and Development
Universities and economic growth; Unilever's perspective. Download the Hans Droge. Read the commentary on Hans' speech.
Sue Hoyle, Director, Clore Leadership Programme
A view from the arts. Download the Sue_Hoyle. Read the commentary on Sue's speech.

Qu'est-ce que le programme Erasmus ?
Erasmus contribue à la réalisation d'un espace européen de l'enseignement supérieur en poursuivant plusieurs objectifs opérationnels dont:
* l'amélioration de la qualité et l'accroissement du volume de la mobilité étudiante et enseignante en Europe
* l'amélioration de la qualité et l'accroissement du volume de la coopération multilatérale entre établissements d'enseignement supérieur (EES), et depuis 2007, entre établissements d'enseignement supérieur et entreprises
* la transparence et la compatibilité des qualifications acquises dans l'enseignement supérieur et la formation professionnelle supérieure en Europe.
Premier grand programme européen, Erasmus favorise les actions de mobilité en Europe pour les étudiants (périodes d'études ou de stage), le personnel enseignant (mission d'enseignement), ainsi que l'ensemble des personnels des établissements d'enseignement supérieur (périodes de formation).
Erasmus facilite également la coopération entre établissements d'enseignement supérieur par l'élaboration de programmes intensifs, de réseaux et de projets multilatéraux. En France, aujourd'hui, la totalité des universités françaises participent à Erasmus ainsi que la plupart des établissements d'enseignement supérieur non universitaires.
Charte universitaire Erasmus
La charte universitaire Erasmus établit les principes fondamentaux qui sous-tendent les activités Erasmus que tout établissement d'enseignement supérieur s'engage à respecter.
Tout établissement d'enseignement supérieur éligible selon les critères nationaux (voir BOEN du 23 novembre 2011), souhaitant participer à Erasmus et obtenir des financements auprès de son agence nationale, doit être en possession de la charte universitaire Erasmus.
Consultez les modalités d'obtention et calendrier.
Appel à propositions spécifique: Charte Erasmus pour l'enseignement supérieur 2014-2020
L'appel à propositions 2014 spéficique pour la charte Erasmus 2014-2020 été publié.
Tous les établissements d'enseignement supérieur doivent déposer une demande de charte pour cette période, avant le 15 mai 2013.
En savoir plus.
LES CHIFFRES DU PROGRAMME ERASMUS
Consultez Statistics for All, la plateforme statistique européenne de l'agence 2E2F. Vous y trouverez tous les chiffres et cartes du programme Erasmus en France:
* destinations des étudiants Erasmus
* Profils des enseignants
* Cartographie des universités
* etc
Consultez Statistics for All.