DEVELOPMENT OF EUROPEAN HIGHER EDUCATION: CHALLENGES AND GUIDELINES

Introduction. Ukraine's full accession to the European Higher Education Area (EHEA) and the European Research Area (ERA) requires finding priority areas for modernizing Ukraine's higher education, aimed at addressing a number of its weaknesses. The development of sound policies for the modernization of higher education in Ukraine determines the relevance of analyzing the challenges facing universities in the EHEA, identification and consideration in the broad socio-economic context of their development guidelines set out in documents of the European Commission, EHEA and European University Association. This will contribute to improving the quality of domestic higher education and the quality of human capital of the state, the dynamic development of its economy and society as a whole. The purpose of the article is to characterize the challenges and guidelines for the development of European higher education, identified in the documents of the ERA and the EHEA, to improve the quality of domestic higher education. Methods. To analyze the challenges and directions of development of European higher education in the study methods of analysis, synthesis, comparison, systematization of documents used in the ERA and EHEA are applied. Results. Despite the diversity of European universities due to their specific local, regional and national contexts, some common external challenges can be observed:  climate crisis and sustainable development in general;  universities should ensure the study and assessment of the impact of new technologies on society,as well as prepare graduates for labor markets that are changing due to digitalization and new technologies, including artificial intelligence;  radicalization of parts of society that call into question democratic values;  use of misinformation;  the need for exchange and joint creation of knowledge;  constant social disparities and demographic changes;  underfunding;  accelerate change. The new challenges facing modern European higher education determine the new guidelines for its development, the main of which are the following:  the key role of universities in achieving the UN Sustainable Development Goals;  social inclusion in the field of higher education;  digital transformation: hybrid university environment and open science as a movement towards the fifth freedom;  strengthening cooperation: mobility and creation of alliances of European universities;  ensuring effective university governance. Originality. The scientific novelty of the research results is the analysis and summarization of the provisions of the key documents of the EHEA and ERA on the challenges and guidelines for the development of European higher education. Conclusion. The key role of universities in ensuring a sustainable future is for higher education institutions to become centers of positive social change through research, innovation, education and community involvement in order to mitigate and adapt to climate change. Addressing social inclusion in higher education requires providing opportunities for the impartial inclusion of people from all walks of life. The digital transformation of university activities will lead to a hybrid university environment in the future. Universities will be open to both physical and virtual spaces. Large-scale implementation of the practice of Open Science will be ensured in European universities. The initiative to create «European universities» (alliances of European universities) is becoming widespread. An important factor in the development of European universities is to ensure effective university governance, which includes broad involvement, transparency in management decisions, accountability and public access to information.