British Council CEO visits HEC to participate in orientation event

Islamabad
The new Chief Executive Officer of the British Council Ciarán Devane on Tuesday visited Higher Education Commission (HEC) here, to participate in the orientation event of 'The UK and Pakistan: Increasing Investment in Research for Higher Education.'
The programme aimed to provide an opportunity to beneficiaries of the HEC-British Council collaborative education and research initiatives to meet the new CEO and benefit from his international experience and proficiency.
HEC Chairman Professor Dr. Mukhtar Ahmed, British Council Pakistan Country Director Peter Upton, and HEC Acting Executive Director Dr. Mansoor Akbar Kundi were also present, besides senior and junior level researchers from Pakistan's higher education sector.
British Council has been working with HEC Pakistan since 2004 with the launch of joint Higher Education Links programme and later on with Phase-II of the same programme in 2006. The programme has been funded by the HEC and managed by the British Council in Pakistan. To date, the British Council has built 50 research and capacity-building links between higher education institutions of Pakistani and UK.
So far, over 160 partnerships under various schemes have been funded in Pakistani universities. Some of the programme on which HEC and British Council have cooperated include Research Partnerships, Leadership, Knowledge Exchange, Capacity Building of Senior Management of Higher Education Sector in Strategic Management, Transnational Education, Quality Assurance for Pakistani HEIs, Scholarships, Policy Dialogues, Talented Research Exchange, Split-site PhDs, and Transforming English Language Skills for Higher Education.
It is pertinent to mention here that 98% of all university vice-chancellors in Pakistan have attended leadership training programmes in the UK, 76% of all current vice-chancellors contributed to policy dialogues/global education dialogues that have been held across the South Asia region, 78,550 researchers and 97,767 students were involved in partnerships, in addition to 688 exchange visits from UK to Pakistan and vice-versa took place.
Speaking on the occasion, Devane said that he was delighted to meet the academic and researcher community of Pakistan. "It is really impressive to see the great work presented by senior researchers which shows how you are bringing together some most important sectors of the society, including academics, industry, students, media, and civil society."
He said that the universities can play a very important role in stimulating and contributing to innovation and social and economic growth of any country. This role is in addition to core missions of teaching and research, complimenting and enhancing these.
"It is very promising to see that the Government of Pakistan has expanding access to higher education and has worked substantially at policy level to improve scientific research activities in Pakistan. It is not simply about commercialisation of science through creation of spin offs, licenses etc. It is so encouraging to see how British Council Pakistan and HEC have worked together to make the Pakistani universities as 21st century universities."