European Qualifications Framework and the Comparison of Academically-Oriented and Professionally-Oriented Master's Degrees

With the moderating power of the European Qualification Framework (EQF), European higher education has, for some time, been moving in a competence-oriented direction in some educational systems. The EQF is a competence framework that defines standards to all levels of qualification. The framework is set up to facilitate comparison of qualifications and qualifications' levels between and within different national educational systems. In this article, we are using the EQF to set the standards for the comparison between different higher education qualifications. The purpose is to reflect upon the differences of graduates with academically-oriented and professionally-oriented Master's degrees. We approach this problem by asking employers (survey, n=134) and graduates (interviews, n=30) for their opinion of how well the competence of academic and professional Master's degrees fit the objectives of the EQF level 7. Moreover, we are interested to explore how well the EQF lends itself to this kind of a comparison. The particular context for this study is the Finnish dual system of higher education.