Gro Tjore is the President of the Academic Cooperation Association and the Deputy Director General at the Norwegian Directorate for Higher Education and Skills (HK-dir). The Directorate is the executive agency for the Ministry of Education and Research within the higher education and higher vocational education sectors and is responsible for the national skills policy. Gro Tjore has been working in education since 2006. Her main focus has been on international cooperation in higher education, including programme administration, programme development and policy development. Since 2018 she has mainly been working with organizational development, managing large restructuring processes and developing new strategies. She previously worked within the field of humanitarian assistance and spent 9 years working for the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP). She holds a degree in political science from the University of Bergen, Norway.

Irina Ferencz is the Director of ACA and has been working in international higher education since 2008. Irina has specific expertise in the area of international student and staff mobility in the European context (data collections, trends, policies), as well as in planning, monitoring and assessing internationalisation activities at institutional and national level. She also has a growing interest in widening inclusion in internationalisation activities. Currently, she is also a PhD candidate at Ghent University, CHEGG, and an occasional reviewer for two higher education journals. She has authored and co-authored multiple publications in the field. Irina holds an MSc degree in European Politics and Policies (KULeuven, Belgium) and a Bachelor's degree in International Relations and European Studies (Universitatea Babeş-Bolyai, Romania). She is a Romanian national, speaks several languages, and calls Belgium 'home'.

Vanessa Debiais-Sainton is Head of the Unit in charge of Higher Education policies and programme at the European Commission’s Directorate General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture. The unit is the lead service for European policies on reform and modernisation of higher education, the new European Universities initiative, automatic mutual recognition of higher education qualifications, the EU student card initiative, and the higher education strand of Erasmus+. In previous posts in the European Commission, Vanessa has worked in DG Research and Innovation. Before moving to the European Commission in 2006, Vanessa spent eight years working for several petroleum and chemical companies.

Joerg Niehoff is Deputy Head of Unit for “ERA, Spreading Excellence and Research Careers” in the Research and Innovation Directorate General of the European Commission. The Unit is responsible for the design and implementation of the ERA policy agenda, coordinates the ERA governance, develops a policy for research talents and careers, and empowers higher education institutions. The unit is also responsible for promoting the Spreading of Excellence and preparing the Horizon Europe work programme on “Widening participation and strengthening the European Research Area”. Joerg has more than 15 years of experience with the coordination of national research policies and programmes and European Partnerships. Previously he was as head of the Brussels office of VDI The Association of Engineers in charge of VDI’s European representation. First experience in management of research programmes he gained as Technology Consultant in the VDI Technology Centre, Research funding organisation on behalf of the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research, with projects and programmes related to photonics research. He started his professional career as a researcher at the Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology. Joerg Niehoff holds degrees in engineering and in industrial engineering and a PhD from the RWTH Aachen. 

Agnieszka Skuratowicz leads the “youth, education and culture” unit in the International Partnerships Department of the European Commission. Her previous assignments include strategic advice to the Commission political leadership as well as policy-making defining economic relations with the EU neighbouring countries in the field of economic affairs. She was member of the management board of the European Political Strategy Centre – the Commission in-house think-thank.

Florian Pecenka studied law at the University of Vienna and during his studies he spent one year in Madrid, participating in the Erasmus program. Since 2005 he works for the Ministry of Education, Science and Research. He is since 2010 Attaché in Brussels where he is head of unit for Education, Science and Research at the Austrian Permanent Representation to the EU. During the Austrian Presidency 2018, he was co-chair of the Education Committee. Mr. Pecenka holds a master's degree in law (2002) and received his Master of Advanced International Studies from Aliter Madrid (2004). He also holds an MBA in Public Management from SMBS – University of Salzburg Business School (2010).

Fabienne Metayer is Head of the sector in charge of programming, reporting and evaluation in the Erasmus+ coordination unit, at the European Commission’s Directorate General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture. In previous posts in the European Commission, Fabienne has worked in cultural policy and in youth policy. She also worked for a number of years in national public administration before joining the European Commission. Fabienne holds degrees in law and political science (Bordeaux, Strasbourg, France), and in European law (College of Europe, Belgium) and spent a year at the University of Kent at Canterbury, UK, under the first Erasmus programme.

Rita Dias comes from the coast of Portugal. She is currently the president of Erasmus Student Network (ESN). Rita joined ESN in 2018 and has held several positions in the network, such as President of Portugal and Liaison Officer for Inclusive Mobility. As president, she is responsible for the general coordination of the organisation, external relations, policy, and advocacy. Her main priorities include increasing participation in learning mobility and fostering civic engagement and participation of young people through Erasmus.She has a bachelor's in Political Science and International Relations and a master's in Public Policy. Rita did her Erasmus in Leuven, Belgium, and worked at the United States Embassy in Lisbon in 2018 and in the Political Observatory in the Association for Political Studies and Scientifical Research in 2020.

Michael Gaebel joined the EUA (European University Association) in 2006, where he was first in charge of Global Dialogue and internationalisation, to become in 2009 Head and later on the Director of the Higher Education Policy Unit. This unit focuses on issues related to higher education learning and teaching, including the Bologna Process, lifelong learning, e-learning and MOOCs, internationalisation and global dialogue. He worked for more than a decade in higher education cooperation and development in the Middle East, the former Soviet Union and Asia. From 2002 to 2006, he was the European Co-Director of the ASEAN-EU University Network Programme (AUNP) in Bangkok.

Anni Kallio works as a Programme Manager at the Finnish National Agency for Education EDUFI in Finland. She has been employed by EDUFI (formerly Centre for International Mobility CIMO) since 2007 and is now in charge of Erasmus+ actions for higher education and the Erasmus+ for higher education team leader. Before joining the national agency, Anni Kallio worked as an International Relations Coordinator at Haaga-Helia University of Applied Sciences in Helsinki. She has over 20 years of experience from internationalization of higher education at both practical and policy level. Currently her main areas of expertise are international student mobility trends and Erasmus+ European Universities initiative.

Svava Finsen is a Policy Officer in the Higher Education unit in DG EAC in the European Commission. Her focus is on Key Action 131 and the implementation of the Erasmus+ programme for student and staff mobility in higher education. She also works on inclusion in the Erasmus+ programme and the Erasmus Charter for Higher Education.

Wannes Gijsels serves as a domain coordinator at the International Relations Office of the University of Antwerp, where he leads the unit "Alternative Internationalisation and Antwerp Summer and Winter University." Commencing his internationalisation career as a summer school coordinator and policy officer, Wannes has effectively developed and implemented (a framework for organising) short international programmes catering to students (Bachelor, Master, PhD) and professionals. His collaborative efforts with colleagues have played a pivotal role in transforming a modest initiative in 2010 into a well-established provider, boasting a portfolio of nearly 30 courses by 2024.
In addition to overseeing the activities of the Antwerp Summer and Winter University Office, Wannes has embraced the task of fulfilling the University of Antwerp's ambition to foster the acquisition of international and intercultural competencies among all its students. Beyond policy formulation, his responsibilities extend to coordinating and implementing alternative and more accessible forms of internationalisation, to ensure an inclusive internationalisation experience for all.

Michela Cobelli is the Head of the International Mobility Unit of the University of Pavia. She has 15 years’ experience in internationalization of HEIs and in Student's and Staff exchange agreements. She graduated with degress in International Relations (2004), an MA in Political Theory Studies (2008) and Executive master’s in business and administration (2023). She has been involved in the implementation of international projects such as Erasmus+ Individual mobility with Programme and Partner Countries, Erasmus Mundus Actions, Cooperation Partnerships, Capacity buildings in the field of higher education. She has been the creator and project coordinator of the UNISAFE Project, and she has covered management roles in more than 20 European Projects since 2008. In 2023, she contributed in the “EWP champion” label awarded to the University of Pavia and member of ENIS Cost Action and member of the Quality Assurance Board for GaragErasmus Foundation.

Angeliki Psychogyiou works in the ACA Secretariat as a Policy and Project Officer. She is an EU Funding and Grants specialist, with considerable experience in the Higher Education and Vocational Education and Training sectors. Her main focus within the Secretariat is digitalisation, conducting both project and policy related work in this area. She is also the co-chair of the Thematic Peer Group ‘New mobility formats’, exploring the intersection between digitalisation & sustainability. Angeliki’s main areas of professional and personal interest are international cooperation, mobility as a foster agent for European identity, digitalisation, inclusion and social responsibility of educational institutions.

Sandra Nuždić currently manages the Office for Students with Disabilities at the University of Rijeka Counselling Centre, works as a student counsellor within the same office and occupies a role within the University of Rijeka Diversity Team. She has a Master’s degree in Education from both the University of Rijeka, Croatia (2009) and University of Cambridge, UK (2011). Since 2016 she has been studying to be an accredited psychotherapist. She has been involved in the implementation of many local and international projects on higher education topics, such as university civic mission, service learning, social dimension of higher education and inclusion. Despite juggling multiple roles and responsibilities, she is passionate about equity, diversity and inclusivity and loves youth work.

Mira De Moor has been working as a policy staff member in internationalization and an institutional Erasmus Coordinator at Artevelde University of Applied Sciences since 2012. As a policy staff member in internationalization and institutional Erasmus Coordinator, she has been building expertise in writing, coordinating and evaluating both Mobility Projects, inside and outside the EU, and Cooperation Projects within the Erasmus+ Programme. Also within that role, she makes sure that the Erasmus+ priorities are being put high on the agenda in the domains of sustainability and climate change, civic engagement, inclusion, and digitalization, with the last one resulting in obtaining the ‘EWP champion’ label in 2023. Since 2022, she additionally took on the role of head of international policy. She is a member of the Flemish Higher Education council (for Universities of Applied Sciences) in the field of internationalization, and is a coordinator within the EUniverCities network. Mira originally graduated as an Art Historian from Ghent University in 2002 and started her career in the cultural and later on in the scientific international book field.

Martin Bogdan is a policy and project officer at ACA where he first started as a trainee in 2019. While at ACA he has managed the CARe project, which deals with labour integration of refugee researchers in Europe, and the Internationalisation in Higher Education for Society mapping report. Before joining ACA, he completed a Blue Book Traineeship in the Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency of the European Commission in the unit working on Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degrees. In his pre-Brussels life, Martin worked for a number of NGOs in different capacities and briefly taught social sciences and history in an international school. He has a joint MA in European studies from Rijksuniversiteit Groningen and Jagiellonian University Krakow, as well as a MA in cultural anthropology and museum studies from the University of Zagreb and a BA in anthropology and information science also from the University of Zagreb.

Anna-Lena has been working at EUA in various positions since 2011, first on university governance and funding and since 2017 in policy coordination. In her current position as Deputy Director for Policy Coordination and Foresight, she coordinates EUA’s positioning and advocacy on the European Universities Initiative and transnational cooperation and currently co-leads EUA’s UniFE project, a future thinking exercise looking at universities and the future of Europe. She represents EUA in various working groups in the context of the European Education Area and the European Research Area and is a frequent speaker and moderator at events. Prior to joining EUA, Anna-Lena worked at the European Commission’s Directorate General for Education & Culture on higher education policy and the Erasmus Programme. Anna-Lena holds a Master’s degree in European Political and Administrative Studies from the College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium as well as a Magister degree in Communication Science, Political Science and Philosophy from the University of Münster, Germany. During her studies she spent one year at the Institute of Political Sciences of Bordeaux, France. Besides her position at EUA, Anna-Lena works as independent self-leadership coach for women since mid-2023.

Kevin Guillaume has been Secretary General of Circle U. since September 2021. Circle U. is an inclusive, research-intensive and interdisciplinary European university alliance. The alliance consists of nine leading universities in Europe with a shared dedication to the long-term transformational process of this unique collaboration. As Secretary General, Kevin is in charge of the day-to-day management of Circle U. legal entity and ensure the sustainable and strategic development of the alliance.

In his various positions at the Ministry for higher education and research in the French-speaking Community of Belgium and then as director for international relations at the newly established Academy of Research and Higher Education, Kevin Guillaume has acquired extensive knowledge and experience in specific fields such as internationalisation, mobility, quality assurance, recognition, governance, etc. He has been invited as expert at several occasions by the European Commission, UNESCO, the Council of Europe, EUA, EURASHE. In June 2022, Kevin was decorated Knight of the Order of Academic Palms by the French Government.

Veronika Kupriyanova is Deputy Director at ACA. Before re-joining ACA in November 2020, Veronika worked for the European University Association (EUA) and several consulting companies specialising in higher education and research. Veronika spent two years in Berlin hosted by the Humboldt University of Berlin with the fellowship of the Alexander von Humboldt Stiftung and later worked as a researcher at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). She is experienced in a wide range of higher education and research topics and has a keen interest in policies and programmes supporting internationalisation at the institutional, national and European level. Veronika holds a joint Master’s degree in World Politics from the Moscow State Institute in International Relations (MGIMO) and the Paris Institute of Political Studies (Sciences Po). She speaks three official languages of Belgium in addition to her mother tongue (Russian).

Yann-Maël Bideau is a Policy Officer in the Higher Education Unit of the Directorate General for Education, Youth, Sport and Culture, in the European Commission. Yann-Maël is currently mainly working on quality assurance and the European degree. Before joining the European Commission in 2019, he worked as a language teacher and in the field of university cooperation in France, Czechia, Slovakia and Belgium.

Daniela Craciun is an Assistant Professor of Higher Education Policy at the University of Twente (UT) as part of the Knowledge, Transformation & Society (KiTeS) section and the Center for Higher Education Policy Studies (CHEPS). She researches higher education policy, specifically internationalization, fundamental academic values, social inclusion, graduate employment outcomes and quality assurance. Before joining the University of Twente, she was a lecturer at Bard College Berlin and a tutor and academic advisor in the OLIve Refugee Education Initiatives (Germany). While doing her Ph.D. at Central European University (Hungary), she was also visiting scholar at the University of Yangon (Myanmar), the Federal University of Sao Carlos (Brazil), and the Center for International Higher Education at Boston College (USA). She has conducted impactful research to inform higher education policy for the European Commission, the European Parliament, the Council of Europe, and the World Bank.

Andries Verspeeten is Deputy Head of Office at Ghent University's central International Relations Office. He coordinates its team of education project advisors and is university liaison for education policy matter to stakeholder organisations EUF, CESAER and The Guild. Andries advises university staff on the development of joint programmes, with the university currently involved in 16 Erasmus Mundus Master programmes, and has been involved in various EU-funded projects sharing practice on joint programmes. From 2016 to 2020 he was a member of the EAIE's Joint Programmes expert network. Within the European University Alliance ENLIGHT, he is involved in the development of the inter-university system. Currently he is participating in the EDLab project, one of the pilot projects on the joint European degree label.   

Eric Tschirhart is Full Professor of Physiology at the University of Luxembourg, Special Advisor to the Rector, coordinator of the Erasmus+ 'UNIVERSEH European University', 'University of the Greater Region' activities and of the pilot project 'Leg-UniGR - Blueprint for a legal entity for cross-border university alliances' in Luxembourg. Professor Eric Tschirhart holds a PhD in Pharmacology and an MBA. After working in the pharmaceutical industry and in public research institutions, he joined the University of Luxembourg in 2002, where he contributed to the development of Life Sciences, before holding a series of management positions at the University of Luxembourg in research, finance & administration, technology transfer, fundraising and academic organisation as Vice-President. He also has recurrent experience in the evaluation of higher education institutions. Professor Eric Tschirhart still teaches human physiology in Medical and Life Sciences programmes and has supervised PhD candidates recurrently. He has more than 50 publications in peer-reviewed scientific journals in the fields of physiology, pharmacology, drug development, and space physiology and immunology.

Elodie Ham is Programme and Financial Coordination Officer in the European Education and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA). Elodie is currently and eGrants Correspondent and has been involved in the simplification of financial and operational aspects of the current programmes delegated to EACEA. She will be soon joining the EU student card initiative team at EACEA. Before joining EACEA, she worked as language teacher in China, Netherlands, Belgium and France. She is graduated from La Sorbonne Nouvelle.

Bert Willems is the coordinator of Student Accounting and Mobility at the Teaching and Learning Services of KU Leuven (Belgium), where he coordinates all central processes regarding tuition fees, mobility and scholarship administration, including Erasmus+ scholarships. In addition to this, he has a specific focus on the administrative organisation of joint degree programmes, such as Erasmus Mundus programmes but also Europe’s first joint Bachelor programme in European Studies, as well as on the digitalisation of mobility processes. He is also an active member of the community of Una Europa, the European University Alliance of which KU Leuven is a founding member, as co-chair of the Student Administration Cluster and as project lead of the EWP and ESCI project groups.

Emma Zeniou is an International Relations professional with over 15 years of experience in Erasmus+ mobility and European projects management. Currently, she is the Coordinator of the International Relations and Development Sector and Head of the Mobility office of the University of Cyprus. Emma is the Vice President of the European Association of Erasmus Coordinators EAEC, which is a membership association of the Erasmus+ Programme Coordinators in Europe and she is actively involved in the activities of the association such as the organization of the Annual conference of the Erasmus Coordinators, ERACON. Emma is also a EURES advisor for Cyprus as of November 2019, participating in all actions of the EURES network and recently appointed as a EURES Training Expert. Emma also participating in the YUFE European Universities Alliance, in which the University of Cyprus is a partner and is the YUFE Representative in the work packages dealing with Student Mobility and Civic Engagement activities. Very recently, the University of Cyprus was selected as an Erasmus Without Paper (EWP) Champion by the European Commission and Emma is the representative from Cyprus in the EWP Champion Working Group of the European Commission. Emma is passionate about creating more opportunities for young people.

Stephan Geifes is the Director of the Erasmus+ National Agency Higher Education within the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) since Feb 1, 2020. Geifes has been working for the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) since 1999. Before his current position he was Head of Division Transnational Education and Cooperation Programmes at the DAAD in Bonn since 2013. Prior to this position he was Director of the DAAD Paris Office from 2001 to 2005, Secretary General of the Franco-German University (FGU) from 2005 to 2008, and Scientific Coordinator at the German Historical Institute of Paris from 2008 to 2012. Geifes has studied History, Sociology, Roman Languages and Political Sciences at the University of Bielefeld, the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris (EHESS) and at the Institute d’Études politques (IEP) in Paris. After earning a Master’s degree in History from the University of Bielefeld he continued his studies at the École nationale d’administration (ENA) in Paris. He has a PhD in History from the University of Bochum and has published on international higher education exchange.

Yvona Vyhnánková has been working in international education since 1994. At Palacký University, Olomouc, she has administered several student exchange schemes. As Erasmus institutional coordinator since 1998 and Head of the International Relations Office between 2003 and 2015 she has wide experience in project management, student and staff exchanges administration as well as in development of international cooperation policies and services.

Ivana works as Senior Policy Officer at The Guild of European Research-Intensive Universities. She covers the network’s activities in education policy, including the Erasmus+ programme and the European Universities Initiative. Ivana supports the Future of Education project within the network through the work of the Guild’s Education Leads group on transnational collaboration and pedagogic innovation. Previously, she worked in the Croatian Erasmus+ National Agency where she focused on Key Action 1, and especially the International Credit Mobility. Ivana studied at KU Leuven and holds a Master’s degree in European Politics and Policies and a Master’s degree in Political Science from the University of Zagreb.

Gerhard Volz is Head of the Department for International Cooperation in Higher Education at the OeAD (Austrian Agency for Education and Internationalisation). He is responsible for national, European and international support schemes in higher education, including Erasmus+ and various global funding measures, as well as for additional initiatives such as Study in Austria, EURAXESS, Bologna support projects and activities of ENIC NARIC Austria. Working for the OeAD since 1998, Mr Volz was initially responsible for university cooperation programmes and funding schemes for Central and Eastern Europe as well as for development cooperation programmes worldwide. Between 2007 to 2020 he was Head of Section for Erasmus+ Higher Education. Mr Volz holds a Master’s degree in Political Sciences, History and Education (University of Vienna). He has studied and participated in work-related activities in Europe, the US, Asia and Africa.

Filip van Depoele is an economist by training (University of Leuven, Belgium) and subsequently studied European Economic Integration (College of Europe, Bruges, Belgium) and International Relations (Johns Hopkins University, Bologna, Italy). He worked for a number of years in the private sector (banking) before joining the European Commission in 1997. Filip held several positions in the Directorate General for Employment and Social Affairs and the Directorate General for Competition before moving to the Directorate General in charge of Education, Youth, Sport and Culture. After having managed the Policy Coordination unit for 5 years, he is currently heading the International Cooperation unit.

Mirko van Muijen is a policy officer for DG Research and Innovation of the European Commission since September 2022. In the Directorate responsible for International R&I Cooperation, he is -amongst other things- responsible for issues related to research security. Mirko is a Seconded National Expert from the Netherlands, where, prior to coming to Brussels, he was the Programme Leader within the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science for the development of the Dutch knowledge security policy. He has been working for over 20 years for public administration, in different Ministries in The Hague as well as in Brussels where he was the Education Counsellor at the Dutch Permanent Representation to the EU. During the Dutch EU Presidency in 2016, Mirko was the Chair of the Council’s Education Committee.

Anders Ahlstrand works as analyst at the Swedish Council for Higher Education. He has worked with internationalization of higher education for the past 25 years. He has experience of implementing a wide range of European and national mobility and cooperation programmes both at university and national level and he has co-ordinated numerous projects and studies concerning internationalisation of higher education. He coordinates a cooperation between several government agencies to improve the conditions for internationalisation in higher education, research, and innovation. At present he is involved in a government task to formulate national guidelines för responsible internationalisation in higher education, research, and innovation.

Dawid Kostecki is the Director General of the Polish National Agency for Academic Exchange. He is an experienced employee of public administration units at various levels. He tied his practical skills in management with being an academic lecturer. He is the author of two monographs and several articles relating to law and management in public administration. He holds a PhD degree in law and a master’s degree in history from Catholic University of Lublin. He is a graduate of the Executive Master of Business Administration (EMBA), as well as Doctor of Business Administration (DBA) at Warsaw Management University.

Elodie Decostre is the Director of International Relations at the Academy for Research and Higher Education (ARES). Elodie joined ARES in 2019 as a project manager and has been director since 2021. In her current position, she coordinates various initiatives, projects and actions supporting the internationalisation of higher education institutions in the Wallonia-Brussels Federation. Prior to her work at ARES, she was a country product manager at EF Education First, a private company active in the education sector. Elodie holds a master's degree in Business and Management (ICHEC), and started her career as an international relations coordinator at ICHEC Brussels Management School.

Tommy Shih is an Associate Professor in Business Administration at Lund University in Sweden. His research focuses on R&I internationalisation and geopolitics. He is also a Senior Adviser at the Swedish Foundation for International Cooperation in Research and Higher Education, STINT where he leads the work on responsible internationalization. This work is done with close collaboration with funding agencies and universities in Asia, North America and Europe.