An Asian "Bologna Process" moves forward

The ten  countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) have begun to discuss  the creation of an Bologna -type process in their region.   The Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization (SEAMEO) organized a meeting in Thailand in early November, 2008, to begin to consider the challenges and opportunities that could be provided by a harmonization of higher education in Southeast Asia. 

Prof. Dr. Supachai Yavaprabhas, the Director of SEAMEO RIHED, the organization’s Center for Higher Education and Development, had spoken earlier at a UNESCO regional conference about harmonization in the ASEAN region.  In his speech, he outlined the history of higher education cooperation in the region, and described some of the aspirations behind this cooperation.  They are quite parallel to those that can be found in the  Bologna accords: to promote higher education quality, and to build ASEAN identity through free movement of scholars around the region.  In 2007, the leadership of the region agreed that the focus should be on five areas:

a) ASEAN Quality Framework and Curriculum Development;
b) Student Mobility;
c) Leadership;
d) E-learning and Mobile learning; and
e) ASEAN Research Clusters

Dr Yavaprabhas also discussed the very uneven levels of quality assurance mechanisms currently in place in the various ASEAN nations.

The November meeting was based on preliminary reports on prospects for harmonization prepared by representatives from Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam. The meeting itself has been described in the Australian and University World News.

Clearly, creating the desired “higher education common space” in the ASEAN region will be very difficult.  The countries vary considerably in the level and organization of their systems of higher education, and most are developing nations with relatively limited resources.  Nevertheless, the potential payoff could be enormous, and would greatly increase the ability of the region to compete effectively in the knowledge-based world of globalization . 

ASEAN has set 2015 as the target year for the creation of this higher education common space.  Just as Bologna has found that its original targets were too optimistic, ASEAN will certainly find that this target cannot be realistically attained.  However, there will be major benefits to the region from every successful step taken along the path to a functioning regional higher education common space.

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