On April 18, Eurasia International University presented the Outcomes of Erasmus+ “HARMONY” Project for development of approaches to harmonization of comprehensive internationalization strategies in higher education, research and innovation at EU and Partner Countries. Angelina Hovhannisyan, the Head of the Department of International Relations of the RA Ministry of Education and Science noted that “HARMONY” is one of the successful projects implemented with the support of the European Union, which enabled participating universities to make progress in internationalization. Ms. Hovhannisyan noted that now a national education strategy is being developed in the framework of another program called “BOOST”, and one of its six main goals is to expand internationalization of HEI processes.
Within the framework of the project, the national strategy for internationalization will be elaborated as a basis for the development of institutional strategies. To develop internationalization strategies at an institutional level, the main outcomes and the tools of “HARMONY” project should be used.
Erasmus Plus National Office Coordinator in Armenia, Lana Karlova, stated that the results of the EIU recent monitoring visit proved that the program was truly successful and could be considered as the best example. However, the Armenian higher education system still has to do something with involvement of inbound students and lecturers. The RA higher education system should be open, accessible and high quality.
Svetlana Manshuryan, the Head of the International Cooperation Division of the Armenian-Russian University, presented the main goals and results of the program, after which the Head of the EIU Quality Assurance Center Arevik Ohanyan presented the analysis of the internationalization of RA higher education institutions, the collection and analysis of information on international activities, as well as the tools for developing internationalization strategies.
The participants actively discussed the above mentioned components. Suggestions were made; in particular to organize informational meetings aimed at disseminating the best practices of “HARMONY” program throughout universities.
The representatives of RA higher educational institutions took part in the meeting.
The Eurasia International University and the Armenian-Russian University, in close cooperation with the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Armenia, and under the aegis of the European Union (Erasmus Plus), implemented the “HARMONY” Program for Development of approaches to harmonization of a comprehensive internationalization strategies in higher education, research and innovation at EU and Partner Countries, within 2015-2018.