Η δράση ERASMUS + KA103 κλείνει φέτος τέσσερα έτη στο ΤΕΙ Στερεάς Ελλάδας (ΤΕΙΣΤΕ). Το γραφείο ERASMUS κατάφερε να αντεπεξέλθει στις οργανωτικές και λειτουργικές δυσκολίες που οφείλονται τόσο στην συγχώνευση, που προέκυψε από την συγχώνευση του ΤΕΙ Χαλκίδας με το ΤΕΙ Λαμίας, τον Ιούνιο του 2013, όσο και στα 5 campus του ΤΕΙΣΤΕ. Οι δραστηριότητες που υποστηρίζονται είναι η κινητικότητα των φοιτητών για σπουδές και πρακτική άσκηση, διδακτικού προσωπικού για διδασκαλία και επιμόρφωση και διοικητικού προσωπικού για επιμόρφωση. Στόχος μας είναι η σταθερή αύξηση της κινητικότητας κάθε έτος ώστε το 2020 να συμμετέχει το 1% των ενεργών μας φοιτητών. Κατά το ακαδημαϊκό έτος 2016-2017 μετακινήθηκαν 25 φοιτητές για σπουδές, 72% περισσότεροι από πέρυσι και 14 φοιτητές για πρακτική άσκηση, 71% περισσότεροι από πέρυσι. Σταθερή και σημαντική αύξηση σημειώνεται τα τελευταία χρόνια η κινητικότητα για πρακτική άσκηση. Για το 2016-2017 αύξηση παρουσίασε η συμμετοχή του διδακτικού προσωπικού, 1 για διδασκαλία και 1 για επιμόρφωση. Μηδενική υπήρξε η συμμετοχή του διοικητικού προσωπικού στο πρόγραμμα. Αυτό οφείλεται στον υπερβολικό φόρτο εργασίας του διοικητικού προσωπικού, απόρροια της χρόνιας υποστελέχωσης και υποχρηματοδότησης, η οποία καθιστά προβληματική ακόμα και την αξιοποίηση των προβλεπόμενων αδειών.Γενικά το πρόγραμμα κινητικότητας υλοποιείται μέχρι στιγμής ικανοποιητικά, όπως προκύπτει και από τις εκθέσεις των συμμετεχόντων. Η δράση του ERASMUS στο ΤΕΙ Στερεά Ελλάδας αναμένεται να ενισχυθεί από την λειτουργία των 4 μεταπτυχιακών προγραμμάτων του. Επίσης σημαντική είναι η συμβολή του προγράμματος στην εξωστρέφεια του ΤΕΙ η οποία ενισχύθηκε φέτος με την υλοποίηση για πρώτη φορά της Διεθνούς Κινητικότητας με χώρες των Δυτικών Βαλκανίων.

Key Action KA103 has completed its third year at the TEI of Sterea Ellada (TEISTE) which emerged from the union of the TEI of Lamia and the TEI Chalkida in June, 2013. The ERASMUS Office of TEISTE, which is also the result of the merging between the respective ERASMUS Offices of the parent TEIs, managed to overcome the organization and functional problems caused by the merging as well as by the geographical diaspora of the TEISTE campuses in 5 cities of Sterea Ellada. The TEISTE ERASMUS Office supports the following activities: student mobility for studies and placements, teaching staff mobility for teaching and training, administrative staff mobility for training. We aim at a steady annual growth of the mobility so that the participation of our active student population reaches 1% by the year 2020. During 2015-2016, 18 students got an ERASMUS grant for studies, which corresponds to a reduction of 11%, and 10 students got an ERASMUS grant for placement which corresponds to a 67% increase. The student interest in traineeships is growing steadily since the beginning of the activity at the TEISTE while the mobility for studies is fluctuating around the same point. This is due to two reasons: a) It is not easy to match courses between our curricula and our partners' HEIs b) the financial problems faced by the majority of our students who often have to work to support themselves as well as their families and cannot stop working for 6 months to study abroad. Because the second factor is not expected to change in the forthcoming years, we feel that we have to readjust our goals for the mobility increase. Staff mobility was non existent in 2015-2016. Because of staff reductions over the past 6 years, both teaching and administrative staff are seriously overloaded which does not allow them time away from the office. The mobile students are mostly in the final year of studies and are represented uniformly with respect to gender and field of study. Overall, the implementation of ERASMUS activities at TEISTE so far is satisfactory as deduced by the student reports. The ERASMUS activities are expected to be enhanced by the 4 new graduate programmes. We must also comment on the impact the ERASMUS programme has on TEISTE's international visibility which is going to be further enhanced by the implementation, for the first time in 2016-2017, of International Credit Mobility (KA107) with West Balkan countries.

The current mobility project is in line with the internationalization strategy of TEISTE forcooperation with HEI and other organizations in neighboring countries, Western Balkans in particular, for staff training and development of study programmes in cutting edge technologies as well as exchange of best practices in education. The project targeted staff mobility in the area of smart grids and electricity microgrids, as well as in engineering studies in general. The participants belong primarily to the teaching and research staff. The administrative staff that participated was trained in project management and management of mobility programmes, in particular. More specifically, 16 staff members from Bosnia & Herzegovina, 7 staff members from Serbia and 2 graduate students from the International Burch University in Bosnia & Herzegovina visited TEISTE in the framework of the project. The corresponding TEISTE staff member mobilities to these countries were 2 and 1 respectively. The project led to ongoing collaboration between staff members of the participating HEIs, design of joint study programmes, joint PhD supervision and synergies in research projects.

ΤΕΙ of Sterea Ellada has implemented the program ERASMUS+ - Learning mobility for individuals / Higher education student and staff mobility, for the academic year 2014-2015 with the following results: 22 mobilities of outgoing students, 3 mobilities for incoming students for traineeships, 2 mobilities of outgoing staff members for training and 4 mobilities for incoming staff for teaching. Out of the 22 outgoing 16 students received an ERASMUS grant for studies and 6 for internships. Overall, the mobility was a little lower than in previous years despite the fact that the expression of interest of students was increased. Long-term economic crisis and the problems faced by an increasing number of students and their families prevent their participation in the mobility program for studies. First, the scholarship is not sufficient to cover costs and secondly, by remaining in Greece they can work on a temporary or part time while studying and this way they are not a burden to their families. At times, they even support their families. Another significant obstacle to mobility for studies remains the difficulty of course selection. Teachers are willing to recognize the courses studied abroad and match them to those taught at the TEI of Sterea Ellada study programs but the study programs between institutions vary widely. Another factor that considerably limits the choices a student has in selecting courses for the preparation of the learning agreement is the language the courses are taught in. Most of our students speak as a second language, English, but few cooperating university curricula contain courses taught in English as it is difficult to develop a curriculum in a language other than the native language of the host institution. That is indeed the reason why the mobility incoming students is kept at such low levels: given the lack of funds, offering English language courses is extremely difficult because teachers are already overburdened with teaching obligations.Instead, for the fourth consecutive year the increased interest of students for internships remains. The difficulties with this type of mobility are mainly focused on finding an adequate level position. Mobility for teaching and administrative staff was on a par.Given that the problems concerning the mobility for studies are expected to exist in the subsequent years, as their causes are not expected to be eliminated nor or are they dependent on the TEI of Sterea Ellada, the target of a three-fold increase in mobility for studies and placements by 2020 is revised to 50%.

The ERASMUS office has managed to cope with the organizational and operational difficulties due to the TESTE 5 campus. The activities supported are the mobility of students for study and internship, teaching staff for teaching and training and administrative staff for training. Our goal is to steadily increase mobility every year so in 2020, 1% of our active students will participate. During the academic year 2017-2018, 26 students were trained for internships and 17 students for study. Stable and significant growth has been observed in recent years in mobility for internships, while mobility for studies varies with small fluctuations at the same levels. This is mainly due to the difficulty of matching courses and the economic tightness of students who often work alongside their studies, which makes it unprofitable to move away from Greece for 5-6 months. For the 2017-2018 increase was recorded the participation of teaching staff, 3 for teaching and 2 for training. There was no administrative staff involvement in the program. This is due to excessive workload of administrative staff, as a result of chronic under-subsistence and under-funding, which makes it even problematic to use the envisaged licenses. In general, the mobility program has so far been satisfactory, as is shown by the participants' reports. The ERASMUS action at the TEI of Central Greece is expected to strengthened by the operation of its four postgraduate programs. Also important is the contribution of the program to the extolling of the TEI which was reinforced this year with the implementation of International Mobility with countries of the Western Balkans.