The European Education Area is taking shape. Through Erasmus+, the European Universities Initiative and growing collaboration between institutions, European higher education is becoming more connected. Students study across borders, institutions share courses and qualifications are increasingly recognised beyond national boundaries.
For this to work at scale, digital infrastructure is needed that makes mobility and collaboration seamless, secure and interoperable. That infrastructure is still being built, and open standards are a crucial part of it.
More than logistics
The Open Education API (OEAPI) is one such standard. Developed through international collaboration and publicly owned, OEAPI enables institutions to exchange educational data in a common language, aligned with European frameworks like Erasmus+, the European Learning Model (ELM) and the Higher Education Interoperability Framework (HEIF). OEAPI is not a national initiative; it is designed from the ground up for cross-border use. Here’s how two European University Alliances are putting OEAPI in practice.
A decentralised approach
EuroTeQ Engineering University uses OEAPI firstly to gather educational data from the various partner institutions into one shared educational catalogue, then further to enable automatic enrolment and sharing of results. Advantage: institutions do not need to abandon their own systems, or duplicate data to a central platform, because OEAPI functions as a common language. The decentralised approach keeps the institute in control, preserving institutional autonomy. Data remains only at universities who need it, and students still have control over their data.
Ben Parker, Project Manager EuroTeQ: “Our alliance member universities are all different – which is what offers our students such added value – but using the OEAPI gives a standard way of holding, moving, and receiving data, allowing seamless exchange of course and student information for mobility. It enables the unified structure that the alliance needs, whilst accommodating existing variety at each partner. It helps remove bottlenecks that limit the scale of student mobility, and removes administrative hurdles, making for a much-improved student experience.”
Finding common ground
Unita is a European alliance of 10 universities from Italy, France, Portugal, Romania, and Spain. The alliance aims to expand learning opportunities through joint degrees, shared programmes, and lifelong‑learning initiatives such as micro-credentials and rural mobility.
Carlos Alonso Vega, Head of the Campus Online IT Services at Universidad Pública de Navarra, one of Unita’s member universities, explains: “The goal is to offer a common catalogue that brings together all learning opportunities Unita can provide across its geographical scope. After evaluating the available options, we chose OEAPI due to its proven effectiveness, multilingual capabilities, and ability to accommodate diverse information that may be required for educational offerings. Given the diversity of course types, regulations and multilingual requirements, finding common ground required significant effort. Now, we are in the production deployment phase, and OEAPI is a central component of our Learning Opportunities Catalogue.”
Get involved
Interested in adopting OEAPI or exploring what it could mean for your alliance? Find out more at oeapi.eu or contact Patrick van der Veer directly via info@oeapi.eu.
