The SHARE Programme Attended the 16th ASEAN Senior Officials Meeting on Education
The Open Session of the 16th ASEAN Senior Officials Meeting on Education (SOM-ED) was held on 29 September 2021. Attended by Senior Officials of the Education Ministries from 10 ASEAN member states, the European Union (EU) Delegation to ASEAN and SHARE were invited to the meeting to update the progress and gain feedback on the programme's implementation and ways forward on its sustainability.
On the same occasion, SHARE participated in two other agendas those being the ASEAN Working Group on Higher Education Mobility (AWGHEM) 2025 and the Proposal on the Intra-ASEAN Scholarships Programme.
Launched in July 2021, AWGHEM was established to develop a cohesive roadmap to realise and implement the ASEAN Higher Education Space for greater people-to-people connectivity and knowledge transfer across ASEAN, in the framework of the ASEAN Education Work Plan 2021 – 2025. The working group also aims to assess the possible integration of the ASEAN-EU Credit Transfer System and its accompanying features to an ASEAN-based institution. The discussion on AWGHEM took place to update the attendees on its establishment and provide guidance on the activities of the working group.
The agenda items were then followed by a discussion on the topic of the proposed Intra-ASEAN Scholarships Programme. Aiming to establish an accessible and sustainable student mobility scholarship programme for higher education students in 10 ASEAN Member States, the discussion was intended to exchange views between the officials and offer ideas for the programme.
The 16th ASEAN SOM-ED was held by the ASEAN Secretariat. The EU Ambassador to ASEAN, Igor Driesmans and SHARE Team Leader Darren McDermott attended the meeting to present the key milestones and achievements of the SHARE Programme from each of its result areas (RA 1: Policy Dialogues; RA 2: Qualifications Frameworks and Quality Assurance; and RA 3: Student Mobility and Credit Transfer) to date as well as future plans.
