Wales Higher Education visits the world
2009 will see the Wales International Consortium embark on three high profile overseas missions to Canada, China and Libya to encourage international students to choose Wales as their study destination.
In September they will be returning to Canada for their third visit, having been inundated with invitations to tour schools and universities during a visit in 2008. Recruitment from Canada has been extremely successful since the first Wales International Consortium visit to Canada two years ago; in the academic year 2008/2009 the number of Canadian students in Wales more than doubled to almost 300 students. The tour of Canada will visit three locations with students from 11 schools and 1 university participating in the presentations. In addition a representative from UCAS will be accompanying the tour to advise students on application procedures. Simon Biancardi, a Wales alumnus, will also tour with the Wales mission to talk about the impact his education in Wales had on his career. Simon was recently appointed General Counsel to Day4energy, a Vancouver based solar-energy company, Canada’s largest manufacturer of high performance photovoltaic modules for residential, commercial and utility scale installations around the world.
In the Autumn many of the higher education institutions in Wales will be travelling to Chongqing in China to develop further a range of partnerships with universities in the region that have been made possible through a British Council Wales scheme. Universities in Wales have signed Memorandums of Understanding with a range of universities in Chongqing that will see research partnerships, academic links and new bridging programmes being created in the next few years. The November trip will coincide with an IBW Mission focusing on Sustainable Technologies and Nanotechnology. The mission will be exploring the signing of an MOU in Education between Chongqing Municipal Education Commission and the Welsh Assembly Government Division for Children, Education, Lifelong Learning and Skills.
The signing of the Memorandum and the Universities Twinning project is the fruition of the growing relationship between Chongqing and Wales since the signing of a governmental Memorandum of Understanding in 2006 which identified 6 areas of cooperation: economic and trade development; education and training; environment; culture; governance; agriculture. There have since been many trade missions and delegations between Wales and Chongqing. March 2010 will see the fourth Wales Week in Chongqing event, a highly successful event exhibiting the best of Wales business, education, culture and tourism
In December a unique higher education mission will be made to Libya. The visit will involve most of the universities in Wales and will seek to develop the profile of Welsh Higher Education with decision-makers, sponsors and other influence-bearers and cultivate in particular oil companies, ministries, alumni and universities. In 2008/09 there was a 42% increase in students from Libya choosing to study in Wales, with 161 Libyan students currently studying in Wales.
“The WIC Missions planned for autumn 2009 involve almost every higher education institution in Wales and are an example of collaboration at its best. We all work in a very wide range of international markets – there are students in Wales today from about 115 countries – and we understand when it is beneficial to the sector as a whole to present ourselves as a group to national and regional government, companies and sponsors.“
John Phillips, Dean of International Affairs, University of Wales Institute, Cardiff.