First Conference Paper Accepted

Just had e-mail that my first conference paper has been accepted which is exciting, if a little terrifying.  What if no-one turns up?  What if, in the 10 minutes discussion after the 20 minute presentation, they ask me questions I cannot answer ?  Now I need to write the paper (3500 words or so), prepare slides and think through questions. 

The abstract which has been accepted was as follows:

The European Commission envisaged its Erasmus Mundus (EM) programme as having 2 purposes, offering both “a framework for valuable exchange and dialogue between cultures […and] a distinctly ‘European’ offer in higher education to those beyond EU borders.” (European Commission: 2008) To this end, Masters Courses created by European collaborations and inspiring international collaborations were formed. Amongst the masters courses was EM SEN from which 110 students from 39 countries have graduated following studies in the UK, Netherlands and Czech Republic.


This is an example of what some have called ‘soft power’ (Nye 2005, Trilokekar 2009) and what others have seen as “globalisation from below” (Malhroum 2008): using networks of students to facilitate change in collaboration with European organisations. However, a pilot study into the student experience has found that although 66.7% of EM SEN’s students were interested in changing inclusive education in their home context and 32.0% recognised the European Union’s drive for collaboration through the EM programme, only 18.5% of students actually wanted to work in collaboration with other countries after graduation.

This paper will discuss some of the academic, policy and legislative discourses around the EM programme and specifically the EM SEN course before examining the students feelings towards collaboration to work on inclusion. Perhaps, following time as part of a global cohort, EM SEN’s students find ‘being with others’ is the greatest inspiration for collaboration in inclusive education.