The aim of the research is to measure the impact of EMREX on mobility rates in partner countries. It utilises administrative data on student mobility in partner countries. 

Research design 

The basic assumption is that the perspective of improved recognition process may affect student’s willingness to study in countries offering the solution and translate into a greater participation in exchanges with the countries offering EMREX. The analysis monitors changes in both outbound and inbound mobility. If the impact of EMREX is independent of any other policy affecting student mobility that was implemented at the same time, the number of students going to or coming from one of the countries participating in the trial should rise faster or fall slower than the number of students going to or coming from the other countries. Therefore, this study focuses on the changes in the share of outgoing exchange students choosing to go to one of the trial countries and the share of incoming exchange students coming from trial countries. It compares the share of students going to EMREX countries or coming from such countries in the year when the tool was implemented and in the year preceding it. Focussing on the share of incoming or outgoing students has two advantages. First, it takes into account a possible variation in the number of students at an institution. Second, it should not be affected by a general rise or fall in student mobility.

EMREX promised easy transfers between three countries: Finland, Norway, Sweden, and selected institutions in Denmark and Italy. But EMREX’s delayed roll-out in Denmark and limited implementation in Italy mean that during larger part of the field trial the system was operational only in Finland, Norway, and Sweden. That is why the share of exchange students coming from or going to EMREX offering countries was calculated twice: for all EMREX countries and only for the three countries that had fully implemented the tool.

The analysis has two levels: national and institutional (HEI). In the case of single HEIs not all results are presented as some institutions have the number of exchange students so small that even a minor change in student choices could significantly affect the indicators. In the case of outbound mobility only institutions with over 100 outgoing students in both measurements are included in the tables. Analogically, in the case of inbound mobility only institutions with over 100 incoming students in both measurements appear in the tables.

Administrative data create an opportunity to include in the analysis entire populations on one hand. On the other hand, administrative practices and data collection procedures restrain the scope of the research. Due to lack of sufficient data on the student level (see the report: Research based on administrative registers - 2015 summary) the scope of the study was reduced (the original methodology is described here: Original methodology). 

Data collection

There is no centralised register of all exchange students in Europe. Apart from Erasmus+ exchange programme institutions establish bilateral agreements for student exchanges as well as accept freemovers. Moreover, in student mobility between Nordic countries the Nordplus programme plays a significant role. Therefore, the partners were asked to provide data on student mobility in their countries. They were provided with a list of variables (see Data formats section). The delivered datasets come from different types of sources and were collected with different methodologies.

An important downside of the lack of a centralised data collection system is that the collected data are not directly comparable between countries. However, a comparative analysis of any trends in student mobility is still feasible.

Data formats

Partners were provided with a package describing desired data format. The archive contains letter for HEI asking for data, two sets of 4 XLS files showing format of the data to be delivered: Data-from-registers.zip. It was meant to be used it while asking for data from registers. However, some changes in the format were necessary. 

Originally data were to be exported separately for every semester. Unfortunately, that was impossible to achieve. The varying definition of semester (different starting and ending dates in various countries) was one problem. However, data availability was even more important issue. On the one hand, in countries collecting aggregated data from HEIs a typical reporting period is a calendar year or an academic year. Forcing HEIs to submit data twice a year would be a serious institutional change. On the other hand, in countries with centralised databases, universities fail to register all data regularly. Data quality improves dramatically before the scheduled exports for reporting purposes. Therefore, the analysis uses data for years (calendar or academic depending on the country) not semesters. The inflexibility of reporting systems has one more adverse consequence, namely different reporting periods. Some countries, including Denmark, collect statistics for academic years while others do so for calendar years.

Delays in data processing proved to be a serious challenge. It may take several months after the end of a semester or a year before official statistics are available. Even in countries were the export of the data was done directly from central databases reliable data for 2017 were not available. Institutions fail to keep their records up to date. Therefore, mobility data on 2017, the year with the highest number of EMREX users, could not be included in the analysis. However, it should be noted that the project was extended and data collection in 2017 was not a part of the original research design.

The number of recognised grades or ECTS credits (not even mentioning the recognition rates) proved to be even more problematic. The advantage of centralised data collection systems is their standardisation but they are often inflexible and lack more detailed data. The number of recognised grades needed to evaluate the impact on the recognition process is but one example of such information. The only solution would be to use data collected by universities which tend to have more detailed information (Norway is an exception because it runs a centralised database for all public institutions in the country). This solution was not organisationally viable in Sweden and Denmark. In Norway, Finland, and Italy the exported data on the recognised achievements did not seem reliable enough to be analysed. The differences in organisation of the recognition process between institutions or even between departments within an institution (mentioned in the qualitative study) may be to blame. Apparently without a centralised and standardised approach to such a complicated matter as recognition the records will not be useful for evaluation purposes.

Contact person from each country 

This is the list of contact persons for each country (the same as for the field trial). Of course, each country can delegate the task to someone else, but if no further info is given the list is as follows.

Data availability for the final study

Partners are responsible for delivering data about their countries. Data are exported from national registers or from individual HEIs' registers. The table below contains information on data collection in each country.