Bournemouth University: BU welcomes delegates from the British Council in Vietnam
Executives and academics from universities from across Viet Nam and representatives from the British Councilvisited Bournemouth University’s (BU) Talbot Campus on 28 October as part of a UK Inward Mission, week-long programme of networking events that took place across London, the Southwest, and Wales.
The aim of the visit to BU was to support UK-Viet Nam Higher Education partnership development and explore collaboration opportunities for innovation, digital transformation, quality assurance and impact in Higher Education.
The BU Business School and Global Engagement Hub hosted the afternoon event, and Dr Alastair Morrison, BU’s Head of International Partnerships, said: “We are delighted to welcome the British Council delegation from Vietnam to BU, and look forward to exploring opportunities for collaboration between BU and the Vietnamese universities.”
In 2019 Bournemouth University staff and students visited Vietnam for delivering a Global Festival of Learning event as part of a British Council-BU co-funded project for knowledge exchange on University Industry collaboration and development of quality industry-ready graduates. The showcased BU’s strengths in co-creation and co-production with students, Alumni and business partners, which led to the university being invited to join the advisory committee for the UK-Viet Nam Higher Education Partnership network.
Attendees were then invited to take part in discussions that were centred around the following themes:
Graduate employability and global students through exchange/internship
Embedding employability in UK Higher Education – the experience at BU
Careers and employability: the BU Graduate Skills programme
International student mobility as a factor for enhancing graduate employability.
Dr Milena Bobeva, Senior Principal Academic at BU’s Business School who also welcomed attendees of the event, explained the significance of the UK-Viet Nam Higher Education Partnership (HEP), by saying “The UK-Viet Nam HEP is an impactful initiative that supports internationalisation in UK and Vietnamese universities by offering a platform for collaboration that is supported by British Council Viet Nam.
“BU has been a member of the partnership since 2019 and has contributed to innovative projects, developing university-industry links, leadership and governance, quality assurance, research and impact.
“Our own strengths in industry engagement for enhancing graduate employability has been recognised by the Partnership through invited presentations. This has led to future collaboration opportunities and, most of all, learning about Vietnamese HE and culture, and the aspirations of Vietnamese government for the country to become a key global player in the HE landscape.”