Higher education isn’t generally seen as a page turner or a piece of “breaking news” by those who bring world events to our attention.  Journalists, especially at the European level, tend to overlook it in favour of more ‘attention-grabbing’ topics such as foreign affairs, security and the perennial favourite, the economy.

The month ahead may just be a little different.  The holding of the biannual Ministerial Conference of the Bologna Process – the initiative designed to lead 46 countries into a European Higher Education Area – is one event that is almost certain to attract some coverage.  Not least because the venue this time is a mere stone’s throw from Brussels, where the European media is almost exclusively based.  For once, higher education may just manage to sneak into the ‘News’ pages of the international press.

Nor may Bologna provide student and higher education issues with their only media flirtation in the months ahead.  While debate and coverage of the forthcoming European Parliament elections is unlikely to even delve into the seemingly peripheral matter of education in EU decision-making, the holding of the second UNESCO World Conference on Higher Education may also succeed in inciting a couple of column inches.

The silence needs to be broken.  Higher education counts, never more so as in the current economic climate where a focus on innovation and skills is recognised as a key way of lifting the flagging global economy.  ESU is going to be working tirelessly in the weeks and months ahead to ensure the wider world wakes up to the realities of European higher education and that commitments are made to deliver us to our destination of a high quality, equitable and accessible higher education area for the 46 Bologna countries by 2020.
The stakes are high, and time is short.  Excitement, uncertainty, debate, drama, tension and controversy...the world of European higher education is about to hit the headlines.  Let’s hope it’s for all the right reasons.