Coimbra Group introduces Working Group on Global Partnerships
18 December 2023
The social responsibility of universities requires their active engagement with global cooperation issues and challenges. Universities have a unique duty to face the poly-crises in the world in an effective and sustainable way. We cannot do this in isolation, we must connect: to each other as universities, and to the world outside of our university.
Therefore, the Coimbra Group (CG) has decided that the existing Working Group “Development Cooperation” will continue under a new name ‘Global Partnerships’, with a redirected approach and focus. The activities of the Working Group will align with global and European policies dealing with actual challenges in global partnerships, especially the SDGs and their implementation in education, research and innovation.
The academic world plays an important role as promoter of a broad and solid approach to global cooperation, based on the issues of capacity strengthening, the promotion of a global citizenship education and the implementation of a participative approach to research and for global partnerships.
The goals of the Global Partnerships Working Group are threefold:
1) To contribute to the advancement of institutional university capacities through the strengthening of inter-academic mobility projects and a renewed focus on the implementation of joint study paths.
2) To stimulate research on capacity strengthening, cooperation models and evaluation. Scientific research is a strategic tool in support of tackling complex sustainability issues. We support local solutions to global challenges, valorizing local knowledge, improving intercultural communication, strengthening innovation through partnerships, based on mutual learning and an interdisciplinary perspective.
3) To contribute to the training of future leaders and to the empowerment of universities.
The Coimbra Group
Founded in 1985 and formally constituted by Charter in 1987, the Coimbra Group is an association of long-established European comprehensive, multidisciplinary universities of high international standard committed to creating special academic and cultural ties in order to promote, for the benefits of its members, internationalization, academic collaboration, excellence in learning and research, and service to society. It is also the purpose of the Group to influence European education and research policy and to develop best practice through the mutual exchange of experience.
— Global Partnerships Working Group
December 2023
Coimbra Group introduces Working Group on Global Partnerships