Statement: Vertical Mobility

ESIB strongly promotes the mobility of students in Europe and beyond. This mobility can
be for a shorter period, such as a semester, or it can be for a full degree study period. In
the latter case, a student is enrolled for one or several years. We speak here of vertical
mobility, because student takes up of a total programme in one university and than moves
on to the next level in another university.

In the case of a vertical mobile student, welfare arrangements must be set in order to
allow foreign students to exercise their right to education on an equal basis.Therefore,
ESIB states that foreign degree students must be allowed to fully take part in the welfare
support of the hosting country. This includes all the in kind services, such as health care,
housing, subsidised food, cheaper transportation and other. In general, it does not
necessarily include, however, the social grantsgiven to the domestic students. In that case,
these should be taken care of by the home country government. All forms of domestic
social support to students must be fully transferable to abroad. Further, a foreign degree
student must be entitled to the same rights as domestic students in fields of labour
legislation, educational rights and any other. In short, a foreign degree student must be on
equal basis as a domestic student.

ESIB has the conviction that in this way, students are treated in the most fair and equal
way, and this without setting up a costly and unnecessary bureaucracy. Furthermore, it
allows students to integrate fully in the hosting society. It lowers the barriers for studying
abroad and promotes mobility. Finally, this equality will contribute to balance the student
mobility between countries.