By Regina Schwendener

With the Bologna Declaration of 1999 European ministers of education passed the resolution to harmonise university degrees at European universities based on the introduction of a two-level Bachelors/Masters system (1). Regulations for restructured courses and detailed implementation plans must be in place and operative by the end of 2005.

According to numbers published by the Swiss Federal Statistical Office at the beginning of the academic year 2003/04 12,610 students enrolled at Swiss universities for a Bachelors and 868 for a Masters degree – 2,632 and 180, respectively, at ETH Zurich. VSETH has no problem with "Bologna" per se, it was stated, but with ETH's internal adaptation of the system. Because the current regulations made it difficult for ETH students to carry out part of their studies at another university.

VSETH pinpoints the problem

VSETH (2) feels that, at the moment, this "serious problem" is not receiving adequate attention from "the powers that be". It was the urgency of the problem that led Cornelius Niemeyer VSETH University Politics officer, to put the item on the agenda of at the most recent HV plenum meeting, calling for support for the wishes of students. Niemeyer illustrated the problem clearly, using a list of term and exam dates from eight European universities. According to his exposé it was clear that the beginnings of terms at ETH Zurich – especially the winter term – were later than in nearly all other countries in an international comparison. As Niemeyer said: "The ETH exam dates coincide with the start of the winter semester, i.e. at a time when the semester has already commenced in other countries."

Mobility still poses a problem for students at ETH Zurich. large

Federalism at work

In a recent issue of "Polykum" (the students' newspaper) VSETH's Therese Haller, also a University Politics officer, writes: "Moreover, at ETH the changeover to the new system is happening in a typical Swiss-federalist manner; every department tries to implement the regulations issued by the Rectors Conference and ETH's Executive Board by choosing its own interpretation when planning the new courses of studies." With so many different solutions to choose from, she says, tongue-in-cheek, it probably won't be hard to find the best possible one.

In fact the old ETH exam system already wasn't much use as far as students' mobility is concerned. Exams had to be postponed and/or the student wasn't able to enter the term at a foreign university at the start of term. In addition, the time and effort expended on organisation by students, lecturers and the administration was quite considerable, as Niemeyer told the HV in his address. Mobility was practically impossible to achieve without wasting a lot of time. Not enough attention was paid to this problem when the plans for the change-over to a Bachelors/Masters system were set up and the responsible bodies were too little aware, according to VSETH, of the need and wishes for "horizontal mobility", i.e. starting studies at ETH, spending an intermediate term in another country and returning to ETH to conclude studies. "This problem has been accentuated with the introduction of the new system because students now sit supplementary exams in spring and, at the same time, more students are interested in taking advantage of the chances mobility offers", says Niemeyer, voicing VSETH's concerns.

ETH ambassadors all over the world

It is important to ETH Zurich with the adoption of the studies regulations to initiate a "brain-gain", i.e. to attract foreign students to Zurich to study for their Masters, as the Executive Board never tires of saying. VSETH has no problem with this but says that considerations for the counter direction have been neglected. Within the framework of the Bologna reform adaptations had to be put into place for both "incoming" and "outgoing" students.

To take an example: Within the Idea League (3), ETH Zurich wants to encourage vertical mobility, i.e. Bachelors degree at the home university and Masters at another. The trouble is that in order to be successful students need to in apply for a Masters course a month or two before the courses start. This presupposes that they can prove by that point in time that all conditions are fulfilled and that they will obtain their Bachelors degree. Georg Wilckens, President of VSETH neatly sums it up: "ETH would like to attract the best students from other countries but puts obstacles in the way of its own students when it could it could be sending out a whole host of ambassadors into the world creating free publicity for ETH Zurich."

VSETH is convinced, as a statement at the HV meeting put it, "Mobility is part of an excellent education and should be nurtured and made simpler. ETH regulations need to be modified so that present hurdles can be overcome or fall away completely." This is a decided advantage in the national and international competition of universities. As the Bologna reform is not yet fully completed, now would be an ideal opportunity to do something about it.