Erasmus enjoys growing success

Citation

(2000), "Erasmus enjoys growing success", Education + Training, Vol. 42 No. 6. https://doi.org/10.1108/et.2000.00442fab.015

Erasmus enjoys growing success

Erasmus enjoys growing success

Keywords European Union, Students

Increasing numbers of students are benefiting from the EU Erasmus programme and studying in a European state other than their own, according to the latest edition of Key Data on Education in Europe. The publication, by the European Commission, Eurostat (the statistical office of the EU) and Eurydice (the information network on education in Europe), shows that the number of Erasmus participants is rising by between 8 per cent and 10 per cent a year. Some 27,000 students were selected in 1989-90, compared with 181,000 in 1998-99. France, the UK, Germany and Spain are the most actively involved states. But the programme is enjoying increasing popularity in Finland and Sweden, largely because courses there are often in English. But if the Erasmus effect is disregarded, mobility remains low. Barely 2 per cent of the 12 million students enrolled in higher education in the EU studied abroad in 1996-97.

The UK remains the most popular destination for foreign students outside the Erasmus programme. More than 80,000 of them studied in the UK in the 1996-97 academic year. This accounts for more than a third of all students in higher education studying abroad. Germany and France followed with, respectively, 46,000 and 29,000 incoming students.