Do you have source for "EU wants to forbid student exchange between willing parties", or did I misunderstand you and you are trying to say that EU is evil because they don't want to pay for the stuff from EU pocket?
Ironically, "the programme is named after the Dutch philosopher Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam, known as an opponent of dogmatism, who lived and worked in many places in Europe to expand his knowledge and gain new insights, and who left his fortune to the University of Basel in Switzerland.[1] At the same time, ERASMUS is a backronym meaning European Region Action Scheme for the Mobility of University Students.[1]"
Erasmus is an EU program. Why should Switzerland be allowed to take part in it while breaking the rules that all countries taking part in this program are respecting?
Is Switzerland wants to take part in an exchange program with different rules, it should negotiate one with the interested parties (EU and others).
Because the EU should not be a collection of artificially bound yet unrelated policies.
And don't get me started on respecting the EU rules. Let's talk about that once Germany starts paying big fines to the EU for violating its rules on running trade surpluses, shall we?
I quite agree that Switzerland and other countries should start bypassing the EU though. Erasmus is, at least, not one of those things where the EU demands exclusivity.
Actually, the EU is happy to negotiate treaties with countries outside the EU. Conditions usually include free movement of people. If the country negotiating does not agree with these terms, the treaty is void. It can try to negatiate a special treaty, but the EU is not usually inclined to do that, for multiple reasons, not least to avoid setting precedents, to avoid effort duplicity, etc
EDIT: I forgot the main reason, from my point of view. The EU has been built with the person, the human being, at its center, with the idea that we all have the same rights. And one important right is freedom of movement. A union were goods, money and services can freely move, but people are forbidden to do so is not worth the trouble.
Your treaty blueprint for a deal EU-Switzerland is a treaty with a non-European union, with roughly the same surface as the whole Europe, and in one case with a population close to EU's? Also, both areas have much higher GDP than Switzerland, and huge amount of natural resources.
Not sure what your point is, but anyway it seems that the EU has already made up his mind on this matter and requires free movement of people for Switzerland to get access to the economic area.
Look, it's a lack of goodwill. The student exchange could easily stay in place, it would be trivial to set up an agreement and if there are costs the EU would have to bear as a consequence, Switzerland could pay it. There aren't that many students.
But no, that's not what happens. The EU uses this as another bargaining chip, so it has the students and university faculty in its pockets. The strategy is obvious, and anyone who does not look through it is blind. No, don't sell Switzerland out. Autonomy is much more valuable than a couple of financial and contractual bribes.
The exchange program depends on synchronization of university syllabi. Without an institution to synchronize them among universities, having Erasmus is more effort.
Therefore, no, keeping the exchange program without EU membership and free movement is not easy, if possible at all.
