May 2010


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At home in the world

Director of the International Office at the St Augustine Campus, Sharan Singh, outlines The UWI’s quest to mark its international place.

What was the genesis of the International Office?

From my understanding, the International Office (IO) was started at the St. Augustine Campus as a means of assisting the Campus Principal to engage the international academic community in a more structured manner. Its primary focus was to manage the cooperation agreements and develop collaborative partnerships with academic institutions from around the world. The IO changed leadership approximately five years ago and expanded its core function to include the management of student exchanges and additional forms of international collaboration. The office is now focussing on how the Campus and University will ‘internationalise’ to become globally competitive and sustainable.

Is it a St Augustine entity or is it university-wide in its scope?

This IO is a St. Augustine entity that focuses predominantly on Campus-specific issues. However, this cannot be done in a vacuum and therefore, strong working relationships have been developed with the IO’s at Mona and Cave Hill, the VC’s Office, the PVC Research and other University-wide entities that are also involved in internationalisation.

How has it been received internationally?

Over the past year, the office has been received extremely well. In fact, IO’s at other universities are now looking at ours as a model for conducting their own strengthening and expansion exercises. The strong relationships we developed have led to some interesting collaborations and the stage is set for even greater achievements. We have also become the focal point for engaging the Campus for both international partners and organisations operating in T&T.

What are some of its projects to date?

When the leadership of the IO changed last year, the focus and objectives of the office also shifted as indicated above. The first six months were focussed primarily on strengthening and building systems and processes as well as key internal relationships with other offices and departments. That then allowed us to shift our gaze towards being more entrepreneurial and develop projects that would add value to our Campus as well as demonstrate the positive impacts of ‘internationalisation.’ In addition to strengthening our capability to manage and champion outbound student exchanges, we held a major student exchange fair that has resulted in significant increases in the number of UWI students interested in student exchange opportunities. We have also adopted a theme of ‘global citizenship’ and are promoting this creatively to all UWI students since we feel that this is a substantial way of contributing towards the development of the ‘ideal UWI graduate.’ I strongly believe that by using a creative approach, administrative offices can play a valuable role in the academic process as well.
Another project that we recently launched is the ‘Global Citizenship Dialogues’ where we bring individuals considered to be Global Citizens through their achievements, impact or interests. The primary audience is UWI students and we intend to expose them to a diverse range of individuals so they can see the good, bad and sometimes even the ugly of what it means to be a global citizen. It takes place in the form of a conversation between the guest and myself in a relaxed atmosphere meant to heighten students’ interest and participation. Some other notable projects over the past year include the intimate involvement in the creation of a faculty development scholarship by the Government of Canada, the facilitation of a senior team of administrators from the Campus to participate in the prestigious US Government International Visitors Leadership Programme, the completion of agreements with a range of international partners to develop collaborative programmes and research, the strengthening of working relationships with foreign missions and international organisations in T&T and the participation in a process on behalf of the Vice Chancellor to negotiate a new scholarship scheme to promote south-south movement of post grad students and researchers within and amongst universities from the Caribbean, Africa and the Pacific.

What are projects in the pipeline?

There are too many to mention here but I will list a few that are quite interesting:

  • The creation of a multidisciplinary academic offering in ‘Global Citizenship’ available to all UWI Students as an ‘add-on’ to their current field of study (similar to a certificate or even a minor)
  • The establishment of a working group on internationalisation comprising representatives of all key Campus stakeholders in order to deepen their involvement in the ‘operational’ side of internationalisation
  • The presentation of a paper on ‘Internationalisation of Higher Education in the Caribbean at a major conference on Internationalisation of Higher Education in Canada
  • The development of a volunteering programme for the staff of the IO and for all incoming international students (both short- and long-term)
  • There are some major 50th anniversary surprises in the pipeline... stay tuned!

What do you consider to be its biggest accomplishment to date?

This is a simple one... the increased profile of internationalisation at a Campus-wide level. Through the interesting projects, strong relationships and entrepreneurial approach to promoting the virtues of thinking and acting as a global university, we are beginning to see our colleagues reflect the stance that internationalisation is not just something that ‘those people in the international office do.’

Within the next five years, what would you like most to see it achieve?

Again, this is an easy one as much thought has gone into what this office does and therefore, what our major expected outcomes should be. The primary role of the University and Campus is to produce high quality, competitive graduates and world-class research. If this office achieves anything over the next five years, it should be to ensure that all of the key players—the faculty, administrators, students, staff and even external stakeholders—are committed to ensuring that we produce strong West Indian ‘products’ which can compete at the highest international levels.