In this increasingly connected world, higher education institutions and governments are making the most from opportunities to collaborate, with pioneering ideas, such as the UK-India Education and Research Initiative (UKIERI); an initiative we've been supporting this past year.
What is the UKIERI?
Launched in September 2005 by Tony Blair, the UK-India Education and Research Initiative (UKIERI) was designed to encourage a significant change in how the UK and India co-operate through education and research. To do this, the initiative supports collaboration in higher education (including research) and schools. It also supports the development of professional and technical skills.
The UKIERI awards
In January this year the UKIERI awards were announced by Gordon Brown MP (then, Chancellor of the Exchequer), at a special ceremony in India. There, he said: 'I see UKIERI and the awards we are celebrating today as a critical part of strengthening, further still, the ties between Britain and India. Education and research in science and technology is the key to the development of our two countries. These are signs of economic, cultural and political ties between us'.
Support from corporate partners
The initiative has formed productive partnerships with four corporate partners: British Aerospace Engineering Systems (BAE Systems), British Petroleum (BP), GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) and Shell. All these partners are contributing funding and in-kind support to the initiative for up to four million pounds.
How the initiative is supporting academic collaboration
The awards aim to strengthen research and academic ties between renowned centres of learning in India and the UK and will support new collaborations between, for example, Cambridge University's Centre for Cellular and Molecular Biology Hyderabad, Imperial College, with the Indian Institute of Science, Reading University with IIT Madras (Chennai) and Nottingham University with the Industrial Toxology Research Centre, Lucknow. Since 2006, the UKIERI partnership has reached out to a large academic community, awarding 26 research fellowships, 86 travel grants, 30 research awards, ten PhD scholarships, 11 schools cluster partnerships, three professional and technical skills development partnerships and six collaborative programmes.
Recognition from the UK Government
A recent report from the Education and Skills Select Committee has singled out UKIERI as a great success, even though the scheme has only been running for a year. It has been recommended as a possible model for similar initiatives with China. The Committee also mentioned the importance of partnership, collaboration and the promotion of studying abroad. These areas are critical to the work of UKIERI.
Changing perceptions
Gordon Slaven, British Council Director Education, Science and Society, said: 'The whole idea of the initiative was to change the perceptions, both here in the UK and in India, of exchanges being sort of one-way, of Indian students coming to the UK. Very much at the core of this new initiative is the idea of mutuality, that both sides get benefit.' You can see Gordon Slaven talking about UKIERI on the British Satellite News site. You can find out more about our corporate partnerships on our Business supporters site and about our work in this region on our India website.
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