The benefits of international cooperation

The European Honors Council (EHC) is a new European network

around the subject of talent development in European higher

education.

Open for individual membership from June 2, 2016!

Become a member at www.honorscouncil.eu

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Session set-up

• European Honors Council (EHC): background and goals

• EHC Board

• EHC membership (+ questionnaire)

• Discussion to gather themes and ideas to stimulate further

international cooperation

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EHC background

• What do European higher education institutions offer students

who can and want to do more than just the regular study

program?

• Some information available, mainly from field of gifted

education … but no structural research about or network in HE

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• Research in eleven countries

• Book published in open access at Springer

• Over 32,000 downloads so far

Honors provisionsper country (2014)

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Wolfensberger 2015

Overview of honors in eleven countries

Country HEIs researched in total HEIs with honors programs

Austria 22 3

Belgium 11 4

Denmark 16 6

Finland 14 3

Germany 110 17

Iceland 7 0

Luxembourg 1 0

Netherlands 52 39

Norway 18 0

Sweden 31 0

Switzerland 21 0

Total 303 72

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Honors in Europe –preliminaryoverview 2016

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EHC background (2)

• Initiative taken to bring together key persons from countries

included in the book in Nijmegen, June 2015

• Steering group formed: 10 people, representing 10 countries

• Two more meetings in the Netherlands (January / April 2016)

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• Organization now ready to

open for membership

At conference ‘Honours Futures’

Before:

• EHC initiated conference recognition by Dutch EU presidency

• Co-organizer International Faculty Institute in Groningen

At conference:

• EHC launched and opened up for individual membership

• Seven sessions initiated or supported by EHC

Follow-up:

• Development and expansion of network

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Network goals (1)

• Supporting and stimulating development of honors education

and its structural embeddedness in the education system

• Creating a common language

• Supporting teacher professionalization (within honors)

• Creation and exchange of knowledge about honors programs

• Stimulating and facilitating research about honors

• Enabling networking for people involved in honors

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Network goals (2)

• Stimulating spin-off of successful honors practices to regular

education

• Promoting an easier flow of talented students from secondary

to higher education

• Stimulating professional development of honors students and

connection to working life / research career

• Stimulating collaboration and inspiring student exchange at

honors level

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What we offer

• opportunities for exchange of knowledge and good practices

• possibilities for student and teacher exchange at honors level

• joint research projects

• a platform to support the development of (structural

embeddedness of) honors programs in national education

systems

Compared to existing networks, the EHC offers:

• Focus on talent development and honors in higher education

• Focus on programs that are designed for students who can and

want to do more than the regular program offers

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Four committees, related to goals

1. Research

2. Education

3. Student affairs

4. International affairs

Members can join one or more committees

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Acting board

• President: Dr. Marca Wolfensberger (Netherlands)

• Financial affairs (treasurer): Ron Weerheijm, MArch (Netherlands)

• Membership affairs: Dr. Marleen Eyckmans (Belgium)

• Secretary (internal and external communication): Dr. Maarten Hogenstijn (Netherlands)

• Commissioners education: Prof. Christian Fischer (Germany); withRon Weerheijm

• Commissioner research: Dr. Astrid Fritz (Austria)

• Commissioners student affairs: Drs. Pieter Veenstra (Netherlands); with Vivian van Gerven (Germany)

• Commissioners international affairs: Prof. Nils O. Andersen (Denmark); with Dr. Astrid Fritz

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Board members represent and/or link to organizations:

• Nordic Talent Network, uniting talent development initiatives in the Nordic countries (Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Iceland)

• ÖZBF, Austrian Research and Support Centre for the Gifted and Talented (linking to educational institutions at all levels)

• ICBF, Internationales Centrum für Begabungsforschung (ICBF), Münster – Germany

• Begabungsnetzwerk (national network Switzerland)

• ECHA, European Council for High Ability

• National networks in the Netherlands (follow-up Sirius)

• Higher education institutions taking a leading role in talent development and honors education, such as University of Antwerp, Utrecht University, Rotterdam UAS, Hanze UAS

• National Collegiate Honors Council (USA)

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Acting board

Top row left to right: Nils O. Andersen, Pieter Veenstra. Middle row: Astrid Fritz, Marleen Eyckmans. Bottom row: Ron Weerheijm, Maarten Hogenstijn, Marca Wolfensberger, Vivian van Gerven.

Not on picture: Christian Fischer, Victor Müller-Oppliger

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Membership

• Become an individual member now and be kept up-to-date and

involved in all this is happening in this field throughout Europe.

• Membership is open to all involved in honors education

• Membership is free (for the foreseeable future).

• Information is needed to further build the EHC. Therefore, to

join the EHC, you fill out a short questionnaire.

• The membership questionnaire can be found at

www.honorscouncil.eu

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www.honorscouncil.eu

Please join the EHC!