Towards Building an European Common Reference Framework for University Social Responsibility

Abstract

EU-USR project (http://www.eu-usr.eu) was conceived as a response to the policy priority of the European Commission about the need for a common social responsibility strategy for all European universities. In this context, the EU-USR project creates a European model to enhance social responsibility of universities in a long-term perspective. To this end, the project uses a bottom-up approach by collecting examples of good practice from across Europe and using these to help inform the development, piloting and validation of a set of completely new benchmark standards. These standards are providing a Common Reference Framework for University Social Responsibility across the European Higher Education Area that is consistent with USR being a Core Competence of European universities by covering the following four areas: Research, Teaching, Support for Learning and Public Engagement.