on Campus Issue 1 • February 2013 • For daily updates visit www.uwc.ac.za
Inside SAARMSTE Conference page 2
Exchange and Study Abroad Student Orientation page 3
SANBI HIV Drug Resistance Testing page 9
De Villiers fever hits UWC page 11
Your Source for University News
Transatlantic Partnership Ghent, UWC, Missouri
Rectors, researchers and administrators from the International Relations Offices of the three partnering institutions
R
ectors of the University of the Western Cape (UWC), the University of Missouri and Ghent University have established international partnerships as a way of advancing the future of these institutions. They assembled at a conference addressing the theme, The Importance of International Partnerships, on the 15 and 16 of January 2013, which was aimed at deciding on the foundations for a common strategy between the three universities. During this conference the heads of the universities held a closed meeting, where they gave priority to areas of collaboration in a trilateral arrangement. This involved them seeking to collaborate and to share expertise between the three universities in relation to the following focal points:
• Joint Summer/Winter Schools for Master’s and PhD students • Joint staff and/or PhD training • Libraries: open access and collection sharing • Research networks: joint research projects in focal areas of complementary expertise After their discussions the Rectors and the representatives of the three universities assembled at the library auditorium where the signing of the agreement took place. This collaboration serves as an opportunity for the three universities to affirm their already existing partnerships and to forge newer ones, specifically in the fields of linguistics, urban studies, physics and graduate studies. The collaboration will also work towards strengthening the position of the individual institutions in their respective countries, through a preferential – yet not
exclusive – partnership for international projects, as well as through common initiatives in education, research and institutional management. The Rector and Vice-Chancellor of UWC, Professor Brian O’Connell, stated that “the partner institutions each deliver an active contribution to the collaboration and consider one another as equals. Thereby, they take up the joint commitment to ensure the sustainability of the collaboration network”. In his speech the Rector of the University of Ghent, Professor Paul Van Cauwen, commented on the impact this collaboration could have. “Gathering and sharing information from three different continents could yield amazing results, and the visibility of this trilateral agreement will be seen all around the world,” said Van Cauwen.