Higher education student and staff mobility projec..
Higher education student and staff mobility project
Start date: Jun 1, 2014,
End date: Sep 30, 2015
PROJECT
FINISHED
2014/15 saw a new challenge for Northumbria University as this was the first exchange year following a significant restructure of the University and its departments - many of the Faculty exchange teams had changed, and there were staff changes in the International Development Office too. The University now has 4 Faculties (Business & Law, Engineering & Environment, Arts, Design & Social Sciences, and Health & Life Sciences. All mobility is supported via the Exchanges & Study Abroad team in the International Development Office.
An increase of just over 50% was planned for SMS, following an increase in the promotional activities carried out by the Faculties and central services. We achieved an increase of 50% from the previous year, bringing us to just 3 students under the planned number.
Given the feedback we had received from previous students on the difficulty of securing EU traineeships, we submitted a slightly lower number of SMP mobilities - however, we managed to achieve the same number as in the previous academic year.
We estimated an extra 10 STA mobilities as the Faculty academic staff are now being included more in international opportunities, and many are starting to use contacts in the partner Universities to help improve their research profile. We were able to recruit to all of the available STA mobilities.
Every year we have applied for a small number of STT mobilities, but have never managed to fill them. For the first time we have sent two staff out to attend a partner's International Staff Training Week and use the mobilities we had been granted. Following the University restructure there is a greater emphasis on staff development in order to support people in their new roles and enhance employability, and the STT scheme will support this extremely well. In addition we can support our partners by promoting their International Training Weeks.
We have seen an increase in the number of students applying for the widening participation grant (for disadvantaged students), which is encouraging as it shows that the exchange programme is no longer being seen as only available to students from a more affluent background.
The purchase of the MoveON4 mobility software is helping to increase the visibility of the study exchange programme, as well as provide more information about the opportunities available to students. The use of technology and social media platforms is also helping to increase both visibility and information to prospective and current students.
Faculties are now changing their programme structures to enable more students to be able to undertake at least a semester on study exchange. Year-long modules are being changed to semester-based. All programmes within Newcastle Business School now offer the possibility to study up to 18 months outside the UK (with the exception of Accounting, due to accreditation issues), and all programmes within the Faculty of Engineering & Environment are able to spend half of all of their sandwich year on study exchange.
These changes, plus others in the other two Faculties, should mean that in the long term we can further increase participation in the exchange programme, both in the EU and worldwide, and in areas and programmes that were previously unable to participate.
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