The project Tuning Educational Structures in Europe began in May 2001 and developed in the wider context of constant reflection within higher education, demanded by the rapid pace of change in society. But the project is particularly marked by the context of the Bologna-Prague-Berlin process, which has provoked intent debate on the nature of educational structures. This debate is happening all across Europe, at institutional and national level. Tuning aimed to offer a platform for these debates to take place at a European level in the context of higher education.

The Tuning project sought to:
• "Tune" educational structures in Europe, and thereby aid the development of the European Higher Education Area.
• Open up a debate on the nature and importance of subject-specific and general competences, involving all stakeholders, including academics, graduates and employers;
• Identify and exchange information on common subject-based reference points, curricula content, learning outcomes and methods of teaching, learning and assessment;
• Improve European co-operation and collaboration in the development of the quality, effectiveness and transparency of European higher education by examining ECTS credits and other suitable devices to enhance progress.
It did not seek to develop any sort of unified, prescriptive, or definitive European curricula; to create any rigid set of subject specifications designed to restrict or direct the content, delivery or nature of European higher education; nor to end the rich diversity of European education, restrict the independence of academics and subject specialists, or damage local and national academic autonomy.
The creation of a European Higher Education Area was clearly implied in the objectives of Tuning. The changes that are occurring are an opportunity to further enhance quality in European university education.
The Pilot project aimed to enable European universities to make a joint reflection and debate on these issues, enabling comparative analysis, building upon their experience and conferring a European dimension to the undertaking. The project used a discipline-based approach to arrive at understanding and consensus about the nature of degrees and in particular the issue of 1st and 2nd cycles. There were seven Pilot groups, together representative of university studies and methodologies in general, in the areas of Business, Educational Sciences, Geology, History, Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry. In addition, certain other disciplines contributed to the Tuning project as synergy areas: Languages, Engineering, Humanitarian Development, Medical Sciences, Law and Veterinary Sciences.
Tuning is a university-led project. It presents the motivated and generous work of 128 academics from 105 University departments across the length and breadth of Europe (see map on p. 5). The work has been helped by formal consultation via questionnaires, to which a total of 7,125 people responded (comprising 5,183 graduates, 944 employers and 998 academics). This is not to mention the informal teamwork, reflection and debate provoked at the level of departments, disciplines and countries.

Source: http://www.relint.deusto.es/TuningProject/background.asp