The conference will gather researchers and policy makers from Serbia and other countries of the Western Balkans and will focus on the current state-of-the-art with respect to data and knowledge about systems of higher education and research in the region by presenting a comparative overview of key policy issues in higher education in the countries under study and preliminary results of the survey that focuses on excellence in higher education.

The event will also be an opportunity for researchers from the region to present their work and explore possibilities for collaboration with colleagues from the region and Norway.

You can find out more about the conference and the Call for Papers on the project web page: www.herdata.org.

The Call for Papers is now published and if you are interested in applying, you can download the call by clicking here.

The deadline to submit the extended summary of papers is 1 March 2013.

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"European Integration in Higher Education and Research in the Western Balkans" is a 3-year project funded by the Norwegian Research Council through its NORGLOBAL programme and is targeting the Western Balkan countries. The project seeks primarily to strengthen the basis for evidence based policy making in the area of higher education and research, by strengthening capacities for national and regional studies on higher education and research. Through close cooperation between institutions from Norway (Department of Educational Research and Intermedia as well as the Centre for European Studies – ARENA of the University of Oslo, and the Nordic Institute for Studies in Innovation, Research and Education – NIFU) and the region (University of Zagreb in Croatia, University of Belgrade, Faculty of Political Sciences in Serbia and Centre for Education Policy in Serbia), the project supports the development of technical and human capacity to address these issues in a comprehensive and sustainable manner.