NARIC guide on Higher Education Systems in the European Union

Addendum
Higher education reforms
Higher education has recently been the subject of extensive reform, to which reference is made in Section I.1.2 of this
document. Apart from what is added here, the document was drawn up at a time when the reforms had been ratified by formal
decree but not yet applied in the case of higher education and were no more than a project in the case of non-university higher
education.
Now that these dual reforms are in force, there is a need to present them in more depth than in the aforementioned pages,
despite the fact that new implementing decrees are still to be passed and the difficulties raised by some of those already
passed are likely to bring amendments in the near future.
I — Decree of 5 September 1994 on university studies and academic degrees
This decree, which entered into force at the beginning of the 1995/96 academic year, essentially replaces the coordinated laws
of 31 December 1949 on the conferment of academic degrees.
The new measures have the effect of:
increasing the autonomy of the institutions,
taking better account of the needs and interests of the student,
simplification at two levels:
(a) in the statutory status of the degrees awarded
(b) in the names of the various diplomas.
(1) Measures introducing greater autonomy
The decree of 5 September 1994 is not the first piece of legislation to grant more autonomy to universities, or even the only
one in this period, as a decree of 10 April 1995, for example, confers greater responsibility upon universities in appointing
teaching and scientific personnel.
As regards our own field of interest, the academic authorities receive new responsibilities in two main areas:
they themselves determine the content of courses, provided they include at least the study of the principal subject matter
of the discipline which determines the degree together with subject matter ensuring the general education of students;
they are competent in the area of the equivalence of foreign diplomas in all cases where the request is for academic
purposes alone (the continuation of studies), and for higher secondary education teaching diplomas and third-cycle
diplomas (see also the implementing decree of 28 August 1996).
(2) Measures introducing greater flexibility for students
(a) The diploma of aptitude for higher education (DAES) having been abolished from the end of 1993, the certificate of
advanced secondary education (CESS) now permits access to any form of higher education (except for university studies
in applied science, for which a special admission examination still applies), provided:
it was obtained after the 1992/93 academic year;
certain strands of professional secondary education have not been taken.