By Design and by Chance: The Story of One International Partnership

Abstract

Emerging economies are becoming less reliant on funding from foreign agencies. One of the consequences of this is the formation of more self-funded international partnerships offering new models of inter-university partnerships. This chapter offers a perspective on such an on-going collaborative international partnership between two institutions of higher education – one in the United States and the other in India. It describes the context in which the partnership was formed, the manner in which it evolved over time as both partners faced barriers, and challenges to the instantiation of the original vision. Sakamoto and Chapman’s (2010) Functional Model for the Analysis of Cross-border Partnerships is used to analyze and organize the key factors that have played roles in the development and success of the partnership. In addition, the chapter focuses on one component of the partnership activities, the short-term professional development visits to the United States for educators from Indian partner institution. Drawing on participants’ experiences from both sides of the partnership, this chapter presents the expectations, challenges, and opportunities this partnership has offered to members of both universities. The chapter ends with recommendations to establish or improve international collaborative university partnerships.

Citation

Berzina-Pitcher, I., Mishra, P. and Giridhar, S. (2016), "By Design and by Chance: The Story of One International Partnership", University Partnerships for Academic Programs and Professional Development (Innovations in Higher Education Teaching and Learning, Vol. 7), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 159-179. https://doi.org/10.1108/S2055-364120160000007019