Students from across Europe gathered at the UPT

Students from across Europe gathered at the UPT

The Senate Hall of Politehnica University Timisoara hosted on Friday, March 15, 2019, the official opening of the 37th edition of the European Student Convention (ESC 37), an event organized by the National Alliance of Student Organizations in Romania (ANOSR) with the support of the Ministry of National Education, Politehnica University Timisoara and the Students’ Organization from the Faculty of Automation and Computing  (Liga AC). The event takes place under the patronage of the Romanian Presidency of the Council of the European Union.

The opening was attended by Ligia Deca, State Counselor within the Presidential Administration of Romania; Gyula Cserey, Deputy Director of the Higher Education Unit of the European Commission; Petru Andea, State Secretary, Ministry of National Education; Ciprian Preda, State Secretary, Ministry of Research and Innovation; Dan Diaconu, Deputy Mayor of Timisoara; Liviu Cădariu, Vice-Rector, Politehnica University Timisoara; Mădălin Bunoiu, representative of the Romanian Agency for Quality Assurance in Higher Education; Marilen Pirtea, member of the Bureau of the National Council for Higher Education Financing; Adam Gajek, President, European Students' Union. The works of the Convention continued at the Conference Center of Politehnica University Timisoara.

This is one of the most important meetings of the European Students ' Union calendar. In the three days of activities, about 100 student representatives from 40 countries of the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) will discuss the most important topics on the European educational agenda.

The motto of this edition is "Shaping the future through policies" and therefore aims to bring to light the most important educational policies that are on the table of European decision-makers during this period.

This year marks the 20th anniversary of the signing of the Bologna Declaration, which laid the foundations for the process of the same name and the European Higher Education Area. In this context, the students' representatives aimed to analyze and discuss, including with representatives of the European Commission, universities and other actors in the field, the objectives that have been achieved so far, which are those which did not enjoy success, but especially what would be, from the students' perspective, the future of EHEA and what measures are needed in this direction.

The agenda also includes current topics such as the European Universities Initiative, which will materialize starting with the next academic year, the Global Convention for the Recognition of Study Documents, or the Global Education Campaign, which is a new initiative to create a network of actors involved in the world education.

Last but not least, the discussions also focused on the elections to the European Parliament and what will be the students' demands for future MEPs.