Strategic Partnership with Sydney announced
A closer collaboration with UoE and the University of Sydney has been formalised. For both partners it represents an important, strategic partnership– so much so that Sydney is calling it a ‘super-agreement.’
Professor James Smith, Vice Principal International, signed the agreement with Sydney earlier this year, with many initial conversations led by David Weller, the International Dean for South East Asia and Australasia over the last 12 months.
Sydney is ranked top 50 in the world and, like Edinburgh, the University of Sydney has ambitious goals to work with complementary universities around the world, to improve the staff and student experience. Whilst UoE has had a long-standing exchange agreement with Sydney, this new agreement is extensive, covering both an enhanced student exchange agreement and a new research collaboration fund.
Student mobility to increase
As part of the agreement a commitment has been made to increase student exchange to up to an aspirational target of 50 students per year in each direction, which will double what we have in place at the moment. We will be moving towards this target gradually over the next few years.
This will significantly contribute to our strategic aim to provide students with high quality international experiences. Thanks to this agreement, many more Edinburgh students will have the opportunity to study at one of the best universities in the world.
Research collaboration resources
Edinburgh and Sydney have agreed to match-fund a £180,000 collaboration fund that will support 5 new research projects over the next 3 years.
Each project will have to demonstrate tangible outcomes, such as the publication of new papers, application for major research grants or hosting of symposia or conferences.
The first round of the collaborative research fund has already taken place, with 23 applications received from academics across UoE and 5 projects selected. The successful projects have funding to start their projects, and will be expected to evidence activity within 12 months. The academic collaborations with Sydney to date have largely been focussed around medicine and public health, but the new fund will also promote the idea of working with Sydney to colleagues in CAHSS and SCE.
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