It is one of the great European successes of Jacques Delors, a name that speaks very concretely to students and certainly the best-known European initiative: the Erasmus project. A look back at the history of the program which was created in 1987 under the leadership of Jacques Delors, then President of the Commission.
2 mins
With our correspondent in Brussels, Jean-Jacques Héry
“ Erasmus, I had the idea even before being President of the Commission. My problem was to convince Mrs Thatcher, I succeeded », he congratulated himself on France 5. The Erasmus program was created in 1987 by Jacques Delors. It allows you to study, carry out an internship or a volunteer mission in one of the 33 participating countries, in the European Union or outside. The objective is to improve and facilitate student mobility in a spirit of cooperation and integration.
Initially, this involves allowing students to complete part of their course in another European educational establishment. Three months minimum, one year maximum. In 1987, the program only had eleven participating countries, but it was already a small revolution: European authorities financially helping students who go on mobility with the famous Erasmus scholarship.
Read alsoErasmus: 30 years of European exchanges
More than 12 million beneficiaries
Over time, the program takes hold and the number of beneficiaries gradually increases. What Jacques Delors welcomed in 2014. “ To tell you, I am quite proud to have created the Erasmus program, but it is part of a larger set of circulation possibilities. I think that it is only the younger generations who, because they visit the world and see how close we are, can find a little freshnessr,” he said at the time.
Thirty-six years after its launch, it is one of the advances that Jacques Delors, who died this Wednesday, December 27, leaves behind him. Prime Minister Elisabeth Borne even refers to it by paying tribute to him on X: “ Jacques Delors, visionary and architect of the European Union, has just left us. A tireless craftsman of an ideal: his entire life was put at the service of peace and European solidarity. I’m thinking of the euro or even Erasmus. »
Now, 33 countries are part of the program, while another 200 are partners in an initiative that no longer only concerns students, since the program has slowly opened up to apprentices and professionals for internships. Since 1987, 12.5 million people have been able to travel, including a million French people.
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