In this way, given who commissioned the report, Lamassoure's findings might be seen as public relations, or as subversive, depending on perspective.
Quick other point:
Only 3% of European researchers work in another member state (while 7.5% work in the... US).
Maybe if post-docs in the EU were paid as much as a decent open market seller in your average french town, more would stay at home. Salaries for researchers, in particular in the vastly underfunded basic research fields, are pathetic in most places in the EU, and working conditions can be quite unrewarding as well. This is sympomatic, in a way, of the same lack of leadership described above in re: social integration, and the solution is the same - greater EU integration.
Wonder if it will happen in my lifetime.
I don't think Lamassoure is massaging on Sarko's behalf. He's very different from the biznis-biznis Sarko-type. I doubt if Sarko greatly appreciated the report. When locusts move on, they leave nothing behind
From Nature, Vol. 446, p. 854 (April 2007) In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
And, in fact, sometimes the standard of English of foreign PhD students and postdocs in US universities is appalling. This leads to regrettably xenophobic attitudes by American undergraduates, but one has to understand their frustration at having barely intelligible teaching assistants. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. — John M. Keynes
Otherwise, Martin is quite right that languages are part of the European problem, in research or in other fields. Not insuperable, however. When locusts move on, they leave nothing behind
... {muttering} I got your lingwa franca right here ... Utsukushikereba sore de ii
I live in a country that has 4 official languages. Traditions, customs, culture and language in Switzerland
No less than four languages are spoken in Switzerland: German, French, Italian and Rhaeto-Romanic. Swiss people working in tourism usually speak English as well.
The government websites are usually in German, French, Italian, Rumantsch and English.
There is very little discussion about the language situation, it just is.
I school we usually start out with out mother tongue, then the first foreign language is one of the official languages and the second foreign language (often one of choice) is mostly English. The only question that is discussed here is at what age a foreign language should be learned in school. However, this does not mean all Swiss are well versed in those foreign laguages. :-)
So, maybe it is time for the EU contries to integrate foreign (especially other EU languages) into their educational system.
T
However in the meantime we have to live with people who can speak only one foreign language well (and maybe Latin, what usually doesn't help too much). And the way to do this is using English. I don't like that, I think English is a very ugly language. But even here on ET, you probably will exclude a majority by using any other language. Gemach, gemach
We have had battles on ET over language. One idea was to create a multi-lingual site, or a cluster of blogs in different languages, but these schemes come up against major software problems (not feasible with Scoop) and would also create extra workload in terms of admin and translation. Yet using only English probably excludes a majority of Europeans, even though it's the most common second language...
PS: Don't say Latin's no use, or PerClupi will deal with you ;-) When locusts move on, they leave nothing behind
(source: Eurobarometer 243: Europeans and Their Languages - last debated here) When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. — John M. Keynes
The real issue is that being a graduate teaching assistant in the US is a form of cheap immigrant labour. Now that the post-9/11 security situation has all but ground the "brain drain" to a halt, and even reversed it, the situation might be different. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. — John M. Keynes
I wonder if this is because in the old days, for those of us 35 years and above, typically the 1st language serious people would take is German, and then maybe English but also quite possibly Latin. So maybe generational.
The sad thing is, one of the first things Sarkozy did, which many researchers I know here who are left of various stripes still seem to say good things about viz their professions, was getting through a law reforming the university system. Even left professors and espeically researchers like the new law as now restrictions on funding sources are lifted, and fundraising, american-style, from private sources, in order to fund research and other university undertakings, is now permitted (and actually pretty much encouraged given other parts of that reform bill). This should over time make it possible to put more meritocracy in who gets research moneys and also salary and funding for equipment, travel and so forth, and these are of course good things.
But I can't help but note that now they get to put the hat out to the private sector for research in basic science, and give credit to a neo-liberal government doing a neo-liberal reform which only was needed because the conservatives in france have underfunded research for decades. Typical bait and switch, and evidence that even the biggest minds still are somewhat clueless at certain levels.
I'd also point out that grant-writing as well as management and administration of the sorts of institutes now being created are quite time consuming and not typically part of the average researcher's skill set. We shall see how things go.
Typical bait and switch
And how. Someone else called it "drowning government in a bathtub". When locusts move on, they leave nothing behind
It would be interesting to know how many of the 3% are in a country with another language (i.e., exclude Austrians in Germany, Belgians in France and Holland etc.).
Cea INSTN
Every year, CEA grants thesis allowances for high level students that prepare their research work in its laboratories. In 2007, over 230 thesis contracts (3 years) have been granted that cover the full salary (gross montly wage : € 1990.25 during the first two years, € 2049.75 the third year).
A side issue is the lack of people studying the history of other EU countries. For any given EU country there are far more posts in the US than there are in all the EU put together outside the country in question.
If I'm evil minded, I could suggest, that the lack of willingness to accept foreign historicians is the fear they may express opinions differing from the dominating view... Gemach, gemach
As they say, the plural of anecdote is not data but bullshit. When the capital development of a country becomes a by-product of the activities of a casino, the job is likely to be ill-done. — John M. Keynes
The purpose of the Bologna process (or Bologna accords) is to create the European higher education area by making academic degree standards and quality assurance standards more comparable and compatible throughout Europe
This is supposed to improve mobility of students across Europe by harmonising the degree and qualifications frameworks, but if other aspects of civil life are hindered, a European Higher Education Area by itself won't make a great deal of difference. Ad astra per aspera
Translating on the fly:
The very first directives on the subject, dating back to the 1970s, set the goal of harmonising degrees throughout the Union. <...> ...the original ambitions have been considerably downscaled. They collided with the principle of competence of member states concerning education, and with the even older principle of the independence of universities: universities were born in Europe, they were born free, and they mean to remain so. In a second phase, the harmonisation goal was dropped and replaced by that of correspondence between degrees: the idea was to put together a big table making automatic mutual recognition easier. Fresh failure. New downscaling. If general recognition isn't possible, let's at least try to ensure transparency, which will facilitate direct agreements between fully autonomous universities.
...the original ambitions have been considerably downscaled. They collided with the principle of competence of member states concerning education, and with the even older principle of the independence of universities: universities were born in Europe, they were born free, and they mean to remain so. In a second phase, the harmonisation goal was dropped and replaced by that of correspondence between degrees: the idea was to put together a big table making automatic mutual recognition easier. Fresh failure. New downscaling. If general recognition isn't possible, let's at least try to ensure transparency, which will facilitate direct agreements between fully autonomous universities.
But here too, Lamassoure notes, the results are not up to expectations. He cites the example of French universities that will accept work done at a foreign university under Erasmus as course credits, but may not recognize the degree obtained by the same Erasmus student in that foreign university.
On the Bologna Process, Lamassoure says it was ambitious and a solemn political commitment, followed by a common organisation of university degrees on the Bachelor-Master-Doctor plan, but that it still hasn't solved the problem of mutual recognition of degrees, and the complications and administrative constraints are still considerable.
When locusts move on, they leave nothing behind
That in itself makes mobility of students and transferability of qualifications problematic. Trying to force such huge change to me seems unfeasible. Attempting to create transparency so that comparisons can be made, seems more likely to be achieved imo. Ad astra per aspera
some other parts of the world
Um, English-speaking parts?
But in fact the B-M-D structure has been largely adopted. The problem seems to be that there's no guarantee that my university will recognize that your university's Master's is equivalent to mine, and vice versa. When locusts move on, they leave nothing behind
[T]he reasoning was that the changes envisioned would also make the new European standard more in line with some other parts of the world
