Countering environmental threats, endemic in Central Asia, is of key importance. Therefore, capacity building in environmental health expertise is warranted. A teach the teacher, interdisciplinary approach is proposed. The HARMONEE consortium will consist of nine Central Asian Higher Education Institutes (CA HEIs) in four different countries and two European Universities. The lack of resources and expertise in has hampered the development of systematic and appropriate MSc education in Public Health. This is essential for appropriate surveillance programmes and advice in tackling these problems. The general aim of the project is the improvement of knowledge and practices in Public Health (involving environmental and occupational health and One Health) in line with current needs and gaps in Central Asian countries. Based on a holistic perspective MSc education in Public Health will be developed by using a Teach the Teacher approach for a sustainable output.The project specific objectives will respond to the main needs that have been identified in the Partner Countries and their different institutes.1. The development of new Msc modules for strengthening of disciplinary skills required in the field of Public Health, such as environmental epidemiology, toxicology, infectious diseases, exposures sciences, occupational health, risk assessment for MSc students.2. Building local capacity by training teachers in the development and running of MSc education in Public Health.3. Improving the level of educational and research competences and skills in participating HEIs within Public Health related fields.4. Fostering and expanding existing regional and international network regarding Public Health education.5. The implementation of an interdisciplinary approach in Public Health education.We expect that PC participants will strengthen their local expertise in Public Health related disciplines and recognize the connectivity between them.

The Bologna process and EHEA brought necessary reforms to improve engineering education in Russia and Tajikistan. But despite obvious increase in attractiveness for young people engineering education is still facing many challenges. Drop-out rate among students majoring in engineering is almost 25%, employment rates for bachelor graduates decreases due to unwillingness of industry to employ engineers with 4 years of education, teaching staff is ageing and universities fail to create an effective system to retain young PhD graduates in engineering disciplines to perform teaching and research. One of the major unsolved problems behind these challenges is the deterioration of teacher training system in PC universities and irrelevance of teaching methods employed for engineering disciplines in Russia and Tajikistan. The answer to this problem is two-fold – modernization of pedagogic training of PhD students and development of sustainable system of lifelong education for university teachers of engineering disciplines. EXTEND seeks to promote a change in a system of pedagogic training of university teachers in engineering in RF and TJK through modernization of PhD programs curriculum and development of sustainable system of teacher re-training and consultation support by Network of Centres of Excellence in Engineering Education. The priority aim of the EXTEND project is to enhance the quality and the effectiveness of teaching. The project is targeted at solving of three specific problems: 1)The development of comprehensive model and descriptor of the competences of the university teacher of engineering disciplines;2) The establishment of Network of Centres of Excellence in Engineering Education (EXTEND centres) offering training courses, research and consultations in teaching engineering disciplines in PC HEI. 3) The development of training program for PhD students and university teachers in teaching engineering disciplines including MOOC.

Since HEIs perceive their prestige as closely linked to their master and doctoral programs, the lack of resources and expertise has prevented the development of a systematic and appropriate set of MSc courses in environmental health to prepare the strongly needed graduates in such disciplines. To overcome this limitation, MSc and PhD programs can strongly benefit from international cooperation and from state-of-the-art teaching technologies. Main objective of this project is strengthening research capacities in partner countries in areas of public health, promoting a sound exchange of information and building capacities between higher education institutions of European Union and Central Asia. This objective will be achieved by tuning existing doctoral studies, developing new MSc programs and implementing blended learning approach.The project will enhance the quality & relevance of higher education across European and Central Asian regions and India in the public health areas and improve their capacity for sustainable international cooperation, thus collaborating at the creating a long lasting excellence international network, to continue its activities after the end of the project period.Specific objectives:- To foster professional competences of teachers in distinctive areas of Environmental & Occupational Health and Public Health;- To revise & update existing MSc&PhD curricula in EH, OH & PH;- To develop new MSc in EH, OH&PH tailored to local needs;- To introduce new pedagogical methods & quality assurance mechanism for Master studies;- To establish educational laboratories at PC universities for graduate students;- To establish e-learning systems at PC universities to support regular students, correspondence students as well as professionals in life-long learning.We expect PC participants mastered Innovative teaching techniques, Increased academic mobility, Mutual cultural enrichment & sustainable international partnership between EU & PC partners.

DECIDE will foster the right of individuals with special needs in Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan to access education, enjoy the right of participation in everyday society and to combat discrimination by instilling awareness and acceptance in society as in line with the Bologna Process and the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. This in turn facilitates the creation of the Access Liaison Officer role at each institution, to promote disability access, and the National Special Needs Awareness Day focus via the nationally strategic Action Groups comprised of Universities, Public Administration institutes, Ministries and NGO's. The project will promote and develop access to inclusive education, social integration and non-discrimination treatment of those with special needs in education in accordance with Bologna Process and UN criteria. Through implementation of the 8 DECIDE Introductory and Advanced Curriculum modules, the project will foster regional integration and cooperation across different regions of the Central Asian countries through joint initiatives, sharing of good practices and cooperation to improve the level of competencies and skills in HEIs and Society by developing these new and innovative education programmes.

"In the last years, with the contribution of European Cooperation Programmes, the EHEA became a reference point for policy dialogue between the EU and several regions of the world on higher education and its key role for employability of graduates. The growing global dimension of education, needs further actions for the enhancement of exchanges between the EHEA and other parts of the world, sharing goals and principles, as the transparent recognition of studies and qualifications. Within the EHEA, the implementation of ECTS (as credit accumulation and transfer), the fundamental shift from a teacher-centred to a learner-centred approach (SCL) and the use of learning outcomes and workload in curriculum design and delivery, as result of a long process and experimentation, increased the transparency and readability of the educational process and facilitated the recognition of mobility from institution to institution and from country to country as well as successful learning mobility between institutions of EHEA for short-term study periods (""credit mobility""). The recent acceleration of mobility between EHEA and other regions through the EM programme put a renewed and global perspective of “mobility” which showed the huge challenges that HE institutions and systems still need to face and manage. The students participating to EM projects are experimenting the same problems in recognition of studies abroad, that EU students and institutions had to afford at the first stage of Erasmus mobility.The project proposal intends to harmonise the credit allocation and grading system in 5 study areas jointly developed in previous projects in 23 institutions from 8 countries belonging to 4 different regions, besides EU, providing a reliable scheme for credit and grades transfer, and is based on previous experiences of the partnership in TEMPUS Programme in CA, Caucasus, Russia and Asia and EMA2 projects in the same regions, and on the new ECTS Guide and pilot project EGRACONS"