On 2 - 4 July 2018, eight higher education institution representatives from Kosovo*, including Ministry of Education officials, rectors of two public universities in Pristina, representatives of the Kosovo Accreditation Agency and Kosovo Anti-Corruption Agency, took part in a three-day visit of higher education institutions in Geneva and Bern in Switzerland, to learn from their Swiss counterparts experience of ensuring integrity in higher education.
The aim was to provide the Kosovo representatives with a better understanding of the ways in which academic integrity is ensured in higher education institutions in Switzerland. The Kosovo delegation was hosted by various higher education institution representatives, who spoke about the higher education system in Switzerland, its challenges and the way ethics and integrity are ensured and promoted at university, canton and federal level.
A visit was also organised to the Swiss Agency for Accreditation and Quality Assurance, during which participants were briefed about the organisation of the institution and about the requirements that must be taken into account when accrediting a study programme.
During the last session, the delegates were invited to reflect on their impressions from the visit and the ways in which the lessons learnt during the three day visit could be used in Kosovo. The participants expressed their highly positive impressions from the meetings and came up with a list of recommendations and ideas which could be implemented within their respective institutions in order to ensure academic integrity.
The study visit was organised within the framework of the Horizontal Facility action “Strengthen Integrity and Combat Corruption in Higher Education “, in close cooperation with the International Institute for Educational Planning (IIEP) of UNESCO.
* This designation is without prejudice to positions on status and is in line with the UNSCR 1244 and the ICJ opinion on the Kosovo Declaration of Independence.
