Collaborations in higher education institutions are seen as a viable way to enhance an institution’s brand, curriculum, financial/ economic, and network reach.
Here are 3 useful tips to consider for your plan to have an international higher education partnership.
Define who, why, what, how
Define the purpose of the partnership. Ask your team the following questions:
- Why is the partnership proposed?
- What are the goals of the partnership?
- How will the goals be achieved?
You must fully discuss the questions above to determine your best course of action. Of course, plans can be flexible but knowing what you want out of the partnership will ensure that you will achieve them. Once you have identified your purpose and goal, you can now find a suitable partner!
In this exploration stage, you can discuss your goals and plans with your future partner. Since you are targeting an international higher education institution as a partner, be sure to communicate your plans in a succinct and simple way to avoid any miscommunication.
Also, do prior research on your target institution’s culture to ensure that your way of communicating with them is appropriate. Remember, maintaining a mutually respectful atmosphere is vital in partnership building!
Build your goals together, have a plan on how to achieve those and identify risks that may come along the way. Once you are all set, you can draft an agreement where all of these are laid out.
For example, if you are a small private educational institution that is interested in growing and having an alternative revenue source, you can invest in having a partnership with a school based in a known international student sending country such as India and the Philippines.
In that example, you will offer the international students in the sending country a pathway for a transnational kind of education. Aside from offering transnational education with partner schools, you can also offer your partner institutions curriculum licensing agreements.
You can start to draft an “articulation agreement” once you and your partner international higher education institution have agreed on your partnership terms.
The articulation agreement is where both of your goals, your shared vision and mechanics are stated. This should have your “who”, “why”, and “what”. This agreement will be the basis for the operational “how” of your partnership.
Know and apply the 12 characteristics of a successful partnership
In the early stages of your road to have an international higher education partnership, while you are still figuring out the who, why, what, and hows of it, you can refer to 12 characteristics of a successful collaboration according to author David Chou. The following will help you with your international higher education partnership journey:
- Involve top-level leadership in decisions
- Develop programs that are grounded in the needs of the community
- Create an effective public relations campaign
- Establish clear roles and responsibilities of each partner
- Employ strategic planning and develop long-term goals
- Utilize effective management and staffing structure
- Ensure that shared decision making, and local ownership occur
- Provide shared recognition and credit for all personnel involved
- Commit resources that are appropriate and well-timed
- Provide intensive technical assistance
- Create formal written agreements
- Are patient with the change process and gradually expand the involvement of others
The listed characteristics above can help you build a mutually beneficial international higher education partnership. Partnerships do not happen overnight and should not be a short-term engagement.
Signing the articulation agreement does not end your communication with your partner international higher education institution.
Have a dedicated international partnerships management staff
Having an in-house international partnerships management staff can help in information gathering and dissemination of your partnership goals. They can also ensure that partnership goals are known by your academic and administrative staff so they should not see partnerships as a threat to their job security.
For example, your local professors should not see visiting professors from partner schools as their replacement. Having an international partnership is no easy feat but with preparation and having a dedicated in-house team or core group, your institution can make it!
However, the primary role of an education institution is to teach according to Chou.Your academic and administrative staff can focus on their own organization mandated roles. If you have an existing marketing staff, you can delegate international partnerships management to them since this can be considered a form of marketing.
Aside from forming an in-house international partnership management team, you can opt to outsource most of the partnership work to educational management institutions. Educational management institutions can help you in jumpstarting your international higher education partnership journey.
They can help you in the exploratory stage of your journey. With their market knowledge, they can guide you to identify your who, why, what, hows in no time. Furthermore, they already have a network of eligible and fully vetted international partner institutions that you can form partnerships with.
Outsourcing most of the international higher education partnership work will help you focus on school administration and academic development. Furthermore, this will help you speed up your journey towards your international higher education partnership finish line!
Bibliography
- Chou, D. (2012). Building a successful partnership in higher education institutions.
- International Journal of Information Systems and Change Management, 6(1), 84-97. 10.1504/IJISCM.2012.050350
- Eddy, P. (2010). Partnerships and collaborations in higher education. School of Education Book Chapters.
- https://scholarworks.wm.edu/educationbookchapters/38?utm_source=scholarworks.wm.edu%2Feducationbookchapters%2F38&utm_medium=PDF&utm_campaign=PDFCoverPages
- Evers, N., & Lokhoff, J. (2012, June 5). 4 steps for creating sustainable academic partnerships. European Association for International Education.
- https://www.eaie.org/blog/4-steps-for-creating-sustainable-academic-partnerships.html