1st Senior Officials’ Meeting (SOM1)
preparing the 10th Asia-Europe Meeting of Ministers for Education (ASEMME10) to be held in 2026 in the Philippines
18 & 19 November 2025
Bucharest, Romania
“Connecting Education. Fostering collaboration between Asia and Europe”
ASEM Senior Officials and Stakeholders met at the 1st Senior Officials’ Meeting (SOM1) in Bucharest, Romania on 18 & 19 November 2025 to prepare the 10th Asia-Europe Meeting of Ministers for Education (ASEMME10) that is going to take place in 2026 in Palawan, the Philippines.
The meeting was opened by Sorin Ștefan Decă, Deputy Secretary General of the Romanian Ministry of Education and Research and Adrian Georgescu, Director of the Erasmus+ National Agency.
The chairs from the Ministry of Education and Research, Elmira Chengiali and Madalina Matei in cooperation with Prof. Luca Lantero and Vera Lucke from the ASEM Education Secretariat (AES) guided the over 70 Senior Officials from 27 Asia-Europe Meeting partners and 8 stakeholders through the programme.
We had keynotes on “Regional and Interregional Cooperation in HigherEducation” by Prof. Daniela Cristina Ghițulică, President of the European Association for Quality Assurance in Higher Education (ENQA) and former Vice-Chair of the European Higher Education Area (Romania), Elisa Petrucci, Co-chair of the European Higher Education Area’s Coordination Group on Global Policy Dialogue and Head of International Cooperation and Policy Development Department at CIMEA, Italy, Christelle Mae Agustin, Programme Officer at SEAMEO RIHED (Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organisation-Regional Centre for Higher Education and Development) and by Dato’ Dr Haji Megat Sany Megat Ahmad Supian, Deputy Secretary General (Policy), Ministry of Higher Education, Malaysia.
It was announced by Michelle Aguilar-Ong, Commissioner at the Commission on Higher Education, that the next Asia-Europe Meeting of Ministers for Education (ASEMME10) will take place in late 2026 in Palawan, the Philippines.
The Chairmanship of the ASEM Education and Research Hub for Lifelong Learning (ASEM LLL Hub) was handed over by Prof. Séamus Ó Tuama, University College Cork, Ireland, to Prof. Wilert Puriwat, President of the Chulalongkorn University, Thailand. The establishment of an ASEM Regional Centre for Central Asia for the Promotion of Lifelong Learning (ASEM LLL Central Asia Centre) based at the L. N. Gumilyov Eurasian National University, Astana, Kazakhstan, was announced together with a National Liaison Office of the ASEM LLL Hub at the Institute for Higher Education Law and Governance (IHELG) in Rome, Italy.
ASEM partners and stakeholders gave interesting updates on their current activities, projects, and initiatives connecting Asia and Europe and the Senior Officials had engaging discussions in three parallel workshops:
- A: “Regional cooperation processes and their role in shaping and transforming Higher Education”
- B: “Lifelong Learning with a focus on Micro-credentials (European and Asian experiences)”
- C: “Mobility and internationalisation as instruments to build bridges between Asia and Europe”
The material of the SOM1 is available here.
Big thank you to the organisers at the Romanian Ministry of Education and Research and the Romanian Erasmus+ National Agency for their warm hospitality (with beautiful cultural performances and delicious lunches/dinners) and for hosting this important meeting on the way to the next Asia-Europe Meeting of Ministers for Education (ASEMME10)!