Enhancing CPUT’s alumni networks to build global connections for greater social and economic outcomes for South Africa at home and abroad through our smart internationalisation

imperatives strategic

The CPUT Smart Internationalisation Strategy links to ONE SMART CPUT and the Smart RTI Strategy. The RTI Blueprint aims to, ‘unlock the potential of staff, students and partners to excel in research, technology and innovation that offer solutions to the needs of society,’ while focusing on sustainability and technology. The RTI BP also defines the research focus areas denoting the identified strengths and growth areas for CPUT in line with the Sustainable Development Goals and the NDP 2030. These focus areas are integrated in both the T&L and the RTI portfolios to achieve competitive advantage for CPUT.

Much has been written about the quadruple helix model of partnerships. CPUT agrees. Our approach to collaborations and partnerships in internationalisation and in intranationalisation follows this approach, bridging the space between government, business, the social environment and HE. Our collaborators and partners need to fill this space, as delineated in figure 1 below.

It follows that the identification and maintenance of partnerships are viewed as a strategic activity for ONE SMART CPUT and in line with the Government’s support for internationalisation as a way to improve the quality of education and research in the development of partnerships. For the purposes of our internationalisation, we define strategic partnerships as:

‘A collaboration between and among partners to come up with innovations and value for CPUT, its stakeholders and communities through research, technology development, community engagement and knowledge transfer, using the principles of mutuality.’

Academia

Government

Business

Civil Society

Figure 1: Quadruple helix partnership framework employed by CPUT This definition allows for a measure of discernment when evaluating the possibility of a new partnership, and focuses on the strategic relevance in teaching and learning (possibly mobility) and research (possibly research collaborations and policy development). In this, we see opportunities for collaborations across a large domain of possibilities, including, but not limited to staff and student mobilities, external examinations and assessments, research projects, policy development, curriculum development and collaborative degrees.

Strategic partnerships afford the partners the means and pathways to work together towards shared or joint goals benefiting all partners in the short- and long-term. Such partnerships can be between individuals, entities or groups, or across the institution The partners agree on workload and administrative responsibilities, financial aspects, intellectual property, sharing of resources and outcomes.

With regard to the above figure, our partnerships need to be valued in terms of their monetary or non-monetary outcomes in line with the DHET Internationalisation Framework. Examples of the latter are capacity building and assessment activities.

Therefore, strategic partnerships need to be viewed for the potential income, and, alternatively, funding needs to be provisioned for the project to be deployed. Although the focus is on ‘strategic’ partnerships, partnerships that are not deemed to be strategic, i.e. of specified value to CPUT and in line with the university’s strategic imperatives, are or intra-nationalisation between national partners.

also relevant and appropriate. Such partnerships, may be at the individual level and can be upgraded or expanded to institutional level at some point. We have elected to determine tier 1 and tier 2 partnerships.

CPUT foresees two tiers of collaborations in support of our strategic direction as exhibited in the following table. These tiers will also direct the strategic direction towards increasing our strategic partnerships on the African continent, in line with CPUT’s identity.

Internationalisation value

value-added partnerships and capacity development, including grants and third-stream income

Tier 2

Transactional and historical value

Individual, unit, departmental level

Exchange of resources

Possible applications

Student mobility Degree completion Staff mobility Joint/ collaborative degrees

Tier 1

Strategic direction and value

Institutional and long-term

Collaborative work for infrastructure Table 1: Tier 1 and tier 2 partnerships and strategic direction

Research collaboration Postgraduate qualification completion Policy development