A Comparative Study of The Effect of Bologna Process on the Italian Higher Education and Czech Higher Education

Abstract

It ’ s been over 60 years since the very beginning of European integration when European Coal and Steel Community was established in 1951. In terms of developmental stage, European integration has already passed economic integration and political integration. Profound educational integration is the next development goal of European community. As the spill-over effect of European economic and political integration, Bologna Process proposed a promising solution to establishing a European Higher Education Area in the hopes of strengthening integration of higher education across Europe. As stated in the Prague Communique, ministers reaffirmed that efforts to promote mobility must be continued to enable students, teachers, researchers and administrative staff to benefit from the richness of the European Higher Education Area including its democratic values, diversity of cultures and languages and the diversity of the higher education system (Prague Communique, 2002, p. 1). In the last two decades, it has witnessed that academic exchanges across Europe has increased a lot. Italy, as one of the most developed western European members, is among the first which implemented two-cycle system. Czech Republic, as an emerging member in the Eastern Europe, has also been very supportive of Bologna Process. One of the major targets of Bologna Process is to facilitate students ’ mobility. This project studies how much effect has Bologna Process exerted on students mobility in the two countries ’ higher education, and find out the limitation to students mobility that Bologna Process has not solved yet, and then compare the situations of students mobility between the two countries, one representing the west of Europe, the other the east.