News from another side of the world Polytech at NAFSA 2018
A few days ago, the annual international conference and exhibition NAFSA 2018 (National Association for Foreign Student Affairs) finished. This year, a large-scale event took place in Philadelphia (USA) in the period May 27 - June 3. NAFSA-2018 was the 70th NAFSA conference. The key theme of the anniversary event was “Diverse Voices, Shared Commitment”.
Traditionally, within the framework of the world conference leading experts in the field of education came to the USA from all continents of the globe to discuss trends in modern higher education, professional development programs and outline new prospects for cooperation and directions of mutual interest.
Leading universities of “5-100 Project” take part in the forum for the fourth time. 15 Russian universities were represented at the joint pavilion of Project 5-100 “Study in Russia”, located in the very center of the exhibition hall. “5-100 Project” representatives joined a busy program of the conference. In total NAFSA-2018 united more than 10 thousand experts in higher education from 3,500 universities and educational organizations and the total number of participating countries was over 100.
Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University was presented by the Head of the International Academic Cooperation Department Ekaterina BELYAEVSKAYA and a senior manager of the Department of International Educational Programs and Academic Mobility Darina KLIMOVA. Delegates from SPbPU had over 100 business meetings with foreign partners, including the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (China), the Brandenburg University of Technology (Germany), the Milan Polytechnic University (Italy) and the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (Spain).
“Attention to Russian universities is growing geometrically and we are very happy with this fact. During the whole week of the exhibition we did not “waste” time at our meetings, they were all very informative and productive: our partners were prepared for negotiations – they had detailed information about our university with specific ideas, questions and proposals, “- Ekaterina BELYAEVSKAYA shared her impressions about the event.
In particular, an important meeting between SPbPU representatives and SPbPU strategic partner the Polytechnic University of Milan (PoliMI) took place within the conference. During the negotiations the parties discussed new areas of cooperation in the field of mathematics and modeling, as well as new materials and additive technologies. SPbPU faculty are planning to visit Milan to develop contacts.
The Head of the International Academic Cooperation Department Ekaterina BELYAEVSKAYA and PoliMI Head of International Projects Service Dora Maria Cornelia LONGONI exchanged copies of a new agreement on student exchanges. Based on the successful development of mobility in recent years, a new agreement between partners extends student exchange quotas - up to 6 students per year for each of the universities. The main lines of cooperation under the new treaty will be three: civil engineering and environmental engineering, applied mathematics and mechanics, energy and electrical engineering.
One of the central events for SPbPU was a meeting with the delegation of Korea University of Technology & Education, KOREATECH. Negotiations resulted in signing the MoU between SPbPU and KOREATECH. Signing the document, Vice-President for International Relations of KOREATECH Mr. Haiwoong PARK emphasized that the strategy of the Government and the President of the Republic of Korea is aimed at strengthening and developing ties with the Russian Federation, therefore launching mobility programs for students and faculty with SPbPU is an important task for his university.
A meeting of the rectors of two universities is planned for the fall of 2018, but in the summer two best students of SPbPU Institute of Physics, Nanotechnologies and Telecommunications will go to South Korea to participate in the international student project Global Capstone Design Project, which is implemented by KOREATECH. During a month, students from two dozen universities in Germany, France, China, India, Italy, Singapore, etc. will work on the specialization projects in the field of Solar Cells Energy developing devices, equipment and technologies working on solar energy. The Head of the International Academic Cooperation Department Ekaterina BELYAEVSKAYA confirmed that KOREATECH students will be very welcome at SPbPU next summer - to implement projects and study on the engineering modules of the International Polytechnic Summer School.
In fact, foreign partners always pay special attention to SPbPU proposals on the educational modules of the International Polytechnic Summer School. Being the largest Summer School in Russia, it gives students from all over the world the opportunity to take such modules as Space Technologies, Biomedical Engineering, Molecular Gastronomy, Urbanistics as well as the traditionally modules in the field of energy technologies, international management and business, economics and the Russian language and culture. Short-term international educational programs of SPbPU are very popular among foreign students - this year the International Polytechnic Summer School will update its own record and will receive more than 700 students from all over the world. Many foreign partners of our university showed interest in this successful practice and summer schools were an obligatory component of negotiations. Within the exhibition manager of the Department of International Educational Programs and Academic Mobility Darina KLIMOVA met with representatives of Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH, South Korea), Verona University (Italy), Chilean University (Chile), Southern University of New Hampshire (USA) and other participants of the conference. “NAFSA is one of the best platforms for networking and business communication in the international education environment, and we are very pleased that SPbPU is its participant. In addition to a significant number of meetings and negotiations, we visited a number of thematic sessions and master classes in international education, and established many new contacts, " she noted.
Peter the Great St. Petersburg Polytechnic University is a traditional participant of such large-scale world-class conferences as EAIE, APAIE and NAFSA. Each conference has its own specifics. The peculiarity of NAFSA is to provide a great opportunity to establish contacts with the universities of North and South America, such as Argentina, Chile, Peru, Mexico, Brazil, which was successfully used by SPbPU representatives, taking into account the Ibero-American initiative of SPbPU.