Consortium of Thuringia’s Higher Educational Institutes

EU-Praktikum THÜRINGEN the office of the consortium of Thuringian higher education institutions, which promotes the targeted cooperation between higher education institutions and the economy in a centralized manner and prepares and implements mobility projects at the European level. The main focus of the work is the realization of internships abroad for students and graduates. The special competence of the office lies in the experiences since 1992 as a training partnership university-business with a broad regional and transnational partnership network. European programs such as LEONARDO DA VINCI I and II, ERASMUS, the Lifelong Learning Program LLP, and since 2014 Erasmus+ have been used to attract funding for stays abroad.

On 1 April 2020, the consortium of the Thuringian universities was renamed from LEONARDO Office Thuringia to EU-Praktikum THÜRINGEN.

The LEONARDO office celebrated its 20th anniversary on November 28, 2012 in the Baroque Hall of the Thuringian State Chancellery. Together with the Thuringian partner universities, international guests from Norway, France, Romania, England and the Czech Republic, Thuringian ministries, regional project sponsors and multipliers, companies and associations as well as participants in the mobility measures themselves, a review of transnational work in the field of internships in Europe was made and the successful joint work was balanced. In the context of this event, the Thuringian Ministry of Education, Science and Culture expressed its gratitude for the commitment in Ilmenau through individual lectures. The Thuringian State Chancellery / Minister Walsmann presented the office with a woodcut by the artist Otto Schulze "Bilder aus Erfurt 1880".

The Thuringian Consortium consists of the voluntary association of public Thuringian higher education institutions with the purpose of participation in European mobility measures within the framework of existing EU programs. The office of the consortium is the LEONARDO-Office Thuringia, placed at the TU Ilmenau since its foundation in 1992, providing the service for all university partners in the Free State to develop and implement regional projects for mobility measures - in this case internships abroad in companies and research institutions. Thus, this measure is a central bundling of forces and also a relief for the International Offices in their efforts to strengthen the internationality of the university landscape of the Free State.

The office is one of the most efficient in Germany and also in Europe. This is proven by corresponding recognitions such as the second place at the European Quality in Mobility Award 2006 (awarded in Graz) as well as the first prize in the LEONARDO/SOKRATES competition of the Thuringian Ministry for European Affairs in 2002, recognition of the achievements by awarding the quality seal in 2012 as well as in individual or collective honors of projects and persons of the LEONARDO office.

The LEONARDO Office meets the requirements of changes in new program structures, willingly shares and publishes experiences, motivates other initiators to participate in the measures and puts a high emphasis on ensuring quality in the internships, equal treatment of partners and participants

The target groups are mainly students and graduates of the partner universities. Nevertheless, the projects are dynamic, like the EU programs themselves. Thus, the office participates in European initiatives and networks, creates new connections and maintains close contact with European actors in its own region as well.

Today, ERASMUS is considered one of the great achievements for European citizens. For more than three million students, "Europe" has become a natural dimension of their lives thanks to ERASMUS. But what today stands as an indispensable pillar of the "European house" was once anything but a matter of course.

The road to the ERASMUS program

1969 - the Parliamentary Assembly spoke out in favor of the "Europeanization" of universities in a resolution.

1971 - the European University Institute was founded in Florence.

1976 - the first EC "action program in the field of education" was formally adopted. Community cooperation was intended to support national higher education systems without undermining fundamental national responsibility for shaping education - a principle that also underpinned the later ERASMUS program.

1976/77 - the system of "Community Grants to Support Joint Study Programs" of higher education institutions of different Member States was launched. It was the first multilateral initiative for operational university cooperation in Europe.

1979/80 - the successful measure "Integrated Study Abroad" (IAS) was introduced in Germany by the DAAD.

1985 - the examination of an inter-university European exchange and study program as well as a European system for Community-wide credit transfer ("European Academic Credit Transfer System") was commissioned by the European Council. The Commission then presented a comprehensive package of measures and invited to a major "Meeting on University Cooperation" in Brussels, which was also the second plenary meeting of the Joint Study Programs.

1986 - By this year, a total of 586 "Joint Study Programs" (JSPs) based on integrated student exchanges, faculty exchanges, and/or joint curriculum development by higher education institutions had been launched in a broad range of subjects at more than 500 institutions in all member countries.

In January 1986, the Commission presented its proposal for a new action program to promote student mobility. The program was to be called ERASMUS - a reference to the philosopher Erasmus of Rotterdam as well as an acronym for "EuRopean Community Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students."

In June, the European Council confirmed the importance of the program and the Council of Education Ministers agreed on its objectives, structure and name.

1987 - After long negotiations between the Commission and Member States on the legal basis to be chosen and the financial allocation, the compromise, the dual legal basis and the anchoring of funding for student mobility, was reached in the Council of Education Ministers on May 14, 1987.

Following the formal adoption of the decision in the Council on June 15 and its publication in the Official Journal ten days later, ERASMUS finally entered into force on July 1, 1987 - two years after the European Council had given the original mandate and a year and a half after the Commission had presented its program proposal.

Source: National Agency for EU Higher Education Cooperation DAAD

ERASMUS Quality Seal 2012

In 2012, the LEONARDO Office participated in the DAAD Quality Seal competition and received the award.

At the annual conference of the DAAD, combined with the celebration of the 25th anniversary of the ERASMUS program, Mrs. Prof. Wintermantel - President of the DAAD - handed over the quality seal to Mrs. Thron in the Stadthalle in Bonn.

ERASMUS INDIVIDUAL AWARD 2012

During the annual meeting of the DAAD on June 14, 2012 in the Stadthalle in Bonn, the ERASMUS Individual Award 20102 was presented to Dr. Frank March from the LEONARDO Office Thuringia, among others, on the proposal of the TU Ilmenau and an external selection committee, thus honoring his many years of work for the ERASMUS program in close cooperation with the DAAD.

Dr. March was an ERASMUS expert for many years, experienced in the work of a regional university consortium for the realization of internships abroad through the ERASMUS and LEONARDO program for students, graduates and trainees and can look back on a seamless project participation in mobility projects on a European level since 1992.

European Quality in Mobility Award 2006 - Graz / Austria

In 2006, the work of the LEONARDO Office Thuringia was honored within the framework of the Austrian National Agency's tender for the European Quality in Mobility Award.
The office took the second place in the European scale in this procedure.  The German National Agency at the DAAD had selected the LEONARDO Office from the German project sponsors and nominated it for the competition.

Honorary doctorate

Dr. March was awarded an honorary doctorate (Doktor honoris causa) on November 17, 2011 at Stefan cel Mare University Suceava (Romania) for his more than 16 years of successful cooperation with Romanian universities in exchange, networking and pilot projects. The members of the awarding committee were the rectors of the universities in Suceava, Cluj-Napoca, Timisoara as well as professors from Suceava and Brasov.