About the association
StudentSafe Europe
An independent non-profit association, legally StudentSafe Europa, based in Zagreb, Croatia. We work to make safe reporting, independent decisions, protection from retaliation and real remedies part of higher education across Europe — so that using a right does not put a student’s studies at risk.
A right is only real if a student can use it — which depends on who hears a concern, who is kept away from deciding it, and what happens afterwards.
A right is not effective if using it puts a student at risk.
Most academic staff never misuse their position. The problem is structural: the people a student may need to question often hold their assessment, supervision, references and funding. Protection cannot rest on individual courage — it has to be built into the procedure.
Eight of the Standard's twelve safeguards work as one field, because a gap in any one of them is a way through. How the dependency works
A concern is raised
A student’s academic future
Grades, supervision, progression, references, funding, mobility.
- Safe, independent reporting
A route to a body independent of the people involved.
- Protection from retaliation
Speaking up must not cost a student academically.
- Managed conflicts of interest
Anyone with a stake steps aside from deciding.
- Interim protection
Teaching or supervision can move while a case runs.
- Reasonable timelines
Binding deadlines to acknowledge, investigate and decide.
- Reasoned decisions
A written decision that states its reasons.
- Meaningful review
The outcome can be challenged before another body.
- Repair of academic harm
A tainted grade or lost term can be put right.
A reasoned outcome, or a documented gap
These eight of the Standard's twelve are interdependent, not a sequence: a student meets them as one system, or meets the gap where one is missing. Each is scored in the StudentSafe Standard.
How evidence turns into protection
-
Evidence
What each country and university has actually published, article by article.
Evidence base -
Standard
What credible protection must contain, as observable criteria.
Standard v0.1.1 -
Change
A documented gap becomes a specific, adoptable reform.
What we ask for -
Safeguards
Protection becomes ordinary procedure, not a policy statement.
-
Usable rights
A student can act without risking their studies.
What we do now, and what we are building toward
Current work
- Researching rulesNational and university rules, read against the Standard.
- Traceable evidenceSources, locator and gaps behind every finding.
- The StandardTwelve safeguards, versioned in public.
- Correctable findingsProvisional until verified; anyone may challenge one.
- AdvocacyThe Safe to Speak campaign, separate from the research.
Building toward
- Protection across EuropeMechanisms in ordinary procedure, not only where institutions run well.
- Better procedureIndependent decisions, real deadlines, written reasons.
- Retaliation deterredConsequences as concrete as students’ own duties.
- Referral routesOnly where legally and operationally in place.
Direction, not description. StudentSafe Europe does not accept complaints, investigate cases, represent students, or provide legal, psychological or health services.
Independent. Open. Correctable.
Research integrity is what makes any of this usable in an argument with an institution. The campaign never changes a finding.
StudentSafe Europe is the association: legal name StudentSafe Europa, short name StudentSafe, based in Zagreb, Croatia and working across the European Higher Education Area. Academic Safeguard Europe is its research programme, Safe to Speak its public campaign, and the StudentSafe Standard its published framework — earlier versions of which were named the ASE Standard. Registration status, officers and a contact address are not published here because they are not yet confirmed.
- Independent
- No university, government, party or funder controls a conclusion.
- Open
- Sources, method, versions and limits are public. Code MIT, data CC BY 4.0.
- Correctable
- Evidence can be challenged, institutions may reply, errors are fixed in public.
- Neutral
- A finding assumes neither that staff are dangerous nor that a complaint is true.
What this project does not do
StudentSafe Europe does not:
- Rate individual academics, or decide whether an allegation is true.
- Act as a court, police service, inspectorate or disciplinary body.
- Rank universities or countries, or publish any overall score.
- Take complaints through this site, or give legal advice.
- Claim affiliation with the EU, a government, university or quality-assurance agency.
The limits of the research
- A written policy does not prove that it works in practice.
- Not finding a published provision does not prove that no safeguard exists.
- Findings describe documented rules, not the full reality of institutional practice.
Known limitations of v0.1 Why we cannot take individual cases
Privacy
No cookies, no analytics, no tracking, no third-party scripts, no remote fonts, and no personal data in the research evidence base.
Hosting, GitHub and referrer detail
The site is hosted on GitHub Pages. GitHub, Inc. processes technical data such as your IP address to deliver and secure the site, and may keep it in logs. StudentSafe Europe has no access to those logs. Links out send no referrer.
Contributions and correction requests go through GitHub, where GitHub’s own privacy statement, terms and cookies apply. A contributor may use a pseudonymous account.