While 2015 is well underway and we are looking forward to a range of exciting activities, here are just some of the highlights from 2014 for the ACU, its members and its supporters. For more information on what’s happening this year, keep an eye on our news feed and events calendar.

March saw the announcement of the results of the DRUSSA Benchmarking Survey. African universities are gradually introducing new mechanisms to encourage the uptake of research by key stakeholders, according to the results of the exercise, undertaken by the Development Research Uptake in Sub Saharan Africa (DRUSSA) programme which is led by the ACU. Although more needs to be done if these new structures are to have maximum impact, Deputy Secretary General of the ACU Dr John Kirkland underlined that ‘these findings are encouraging – many universities are showing real commitment, and they should be supported in this’.

In the same month, evidence provided by the ACU was published in the report of the House of Lords Select Committee on Soft Power and the UK’s Influence. Titled ‘Persuasion and Power in the Modern World’, the report highlighted the need for the UK government to increase support for international scholarship programmes. In line with our evidence, the report also found that ‘academic and scientific collaboration represents one of the most effective forms of diplomacy’.

In April, the Australia Africa University Network (AAUN) and the ACU hosted the second International Africa Forum in Pretoria, South Africa. The forum, themed around The Power of Partnerships, brought Australian and African researchers, policymakers, and officials together to discuss areas of mutual interest, including the themes of food security, public health, education, and public sector reform.

Later on in the month, the ACU announced the winners of the second round of its Early Career Academic Grants. The scheme, launched in 2013 to celebrate our Centenary, enables emerging academics to attend conferences or academic meetings abroad, offering up to GBP 2,000 per award winner. This round saw 36 grants made to academics from universities in 12 Commonwealth countries, including Kenya, Nigeria, and the United Kingdom. ‘This distinctive programme has attracted a huge response, confirming the number of high quality staff in early stages of their careers who could benefit from the international exposure that they currently lack,’ said Dr Kirkland. Feedback from awardees has been overwhelmingly positive. ‘The ACU Early Career Academic Grant is one of my greatest achievements. It has helped me, to a great extent, in improving my knowledge and experience,’ said Khurram Shahzad from the Riphah International University’s Information Services department.

Also in April, scholarships for postgraduate study in a new range of destinations in 2014-2015 were announced, thanks to the Commonwealth Scholarship and Fellowship Plan (CSFP) endowment fund, managed by the ACU. Up to 15 scholarships were available for students from Commonwealth countries, for Master’s-level study at universities in ten low and middle income Commonwealth countries, including Bangladesh, Barbados, Ghana and South Africa.

In June, the ACU was honoured to host Dr Joan Dassin, founding Executive Director of the Ford Foundation International Fellowship Program (IFP), to speak at an ACU Perspectives event in London, UK. Dr Dassin discussed the impact of higher education opportunities on development leadership and practice. ‘Education itself becomes a very transformative element, not only for the fellows having experienced access to high quality programmes, but for the people and the communities that they work with,’ said Dr Dassin during her talk. You can listen to her talk here, as well as others from the ACU Perspectives speaker series.

In July, the Chevening Scholarships programme – funded by the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) and administered by the ACU – celebrated its 30th anniversary. This milestone followed an official announcement in March that the number of scholarship places in developing countries would be tripled, starting in the 2015-2016 academic year. ‘The increase in Chevening Scholarships for 2015-16 will boost the FCO’s reach and efforts to engage in developing countries and emerging powers,’ an FCO spokesperson commented.

Later in July, the ACU hosted its third joint HR Management and PR Network conference at the University of Glasgow, UK. Covering themes ranging from internationalisation to careers in universities to the use and impact of social media, the event examined the role that HR and PR professionals can and should play in helping to articulate and steer institutional strategies. Delegates took part in lively debates on the competencies required in addressing the challenges facing their universities, as well as the growth of the sector in Asia and the Middle East, the rise in overseas branch campuses, and the increase in competition to attract international students.

Meanwhile, 12 African universities were selected to take part in a new project to support the development of academic staff early on in their careers. The ACU-run project, Structured Training for African Researchers (STARS), aims to strengthen the long-term vitality of research and teaching in Africa by facilitating structured institutional support for the next generation of academics – support that many early career academics feel is currently lacking. The project is now well underway, and features a range of inspiring course modules, prepared by experienced specialist authors from various universities and organisations worldwide.

July was a busy month, and to round it off the Commonwealth Scholarship Commission in the UK held its first ever Farewell Event for Commonwealth Scholars. The event, held in the Locarno Suite at the FCO headquarters in London, featured guest speakers followed by a reception attended by representatives from High Commissions. Commonwealth Scholarships and Fellowships in the UK are funded by the UK Department for International Development (DFID) and administered by the ACU.

In August, the annual Publishers for Development (PfD) conference took place in Oxford, UK, under the theme Research Matters for Developing Countries. The conference, attended by academic librarians, international publishers, development agencies, and scholars, featured a variety of speakers including representatives from the ACU, INASP (International Network for the Availability of Scientific Publications), and DFID. Professor John Wood, Secretary General of the ACU and Chair of INASP, said: ‘It is clear that there are very real barriers preventing academics in the developing world from accessing vital research material. While there is no single solution, events such as the annual Publishers for Development conference, which bring together people from all sides of the debate, bring us closer to implementing practical and workable solutions’. Professor Wood stated that the ACU will continue to work towards facilitating further discussions in pursuit of this agenda.

On the other side of the world, students from 19 Commonwealth countries came together at the University of Nottingham Malaysia Campus in Semenyih for the fourth ACU Commonwealth Summer School. The School focused on the topic of global food security and participants discussed one of the most pressing questions of our time: can we feed a growing world? The week-long experience reconfirmed the truly international and unifying character of ACU events, bringing together 36 students for a week of workshops, keynote lectures and field trips. Shomira Sanyal, a postgraduate student from India, left the School with strong memories and life-changing lessons: ‘What a spectacular week it’s been. I had the privilege of interacting with so many people from diverse backgrounds, countries, ideas – only to believe in expanding my own horizons. I have learned a lot from all of them and intend to carry it further, wherever I go’. 

Also in August, the ACU held its annual Strategic Management Programme workshop at Edith Cowan University, Australia. The Strategic Management Programme offers a unique and cost-effective opportunity for participating universities to compare their key management processes with a range of other institutions. This evaluative process helps identify areas for change, assists in setting targets for improvement, and identifies a range of actions to help achieve new goals. The 2014 Programme looked at ethical governance, quality management, and student support.

September started with the Going Beyond 2015 conference in Islamabad, Pakistan, hosted by COMSATS Institute of Information Technology (CIIT). The event, inspired by the ACU’s ‘The world beyond 2015 – Is higher education ready? campaign, aimed to raise awareness in Pakistan of the role that higher education plays in the development of societies. It brought together representatives of Pakistan’s leading public and private universities, UN agencies, the British Council, and the ACU. The conference was preceded by a live two-hour web chat, co-hosted by the ACU, CIIT and the Commonwealth Students Association, which invited followers to further consider the interplay between higher education and international development.

Later in the month, three new executive heads were appointed to the ACU Council with immediate effect. Dr David Atkinson (President of MacEwan University, Canada), Dr Amit Chakma (President and Vice-Chancellor of Western University, Canada) and Professor Rajesh Chandra (Vice-Chancellor of the University of the South Pacific, Fiji) will serve until 31 July 2016.

In October, we launched ACU Measures, a new online service  enabling member universities to benchmark their performance in a range of non-academic areas against other institutions across the Commonwealth. Emma Falk, the Research Officer at the ACU who is leading the project, said ‘Universities increasingly require the most up-to-date information in order to build strategy for future success. ACU Measures is a tool that has been designed to help our member universities to not only interrogate the latest data, but to customise their searches and run personalised queries that give them the most useful comparisons for their own institutional contexts. It is not intended as a ranking tool, but instead to help institutions examine, compare, and contrast their current systems and practices’.

October also marked the first anniversary of the ACU’s The world beyond 2015 – Is higher education ready? campaign. By mid-October, we had gathered over 115 submissions from around the world, all reflecting on the role higher education can and should play in enabling all countries to achieve the United Nations’ new development goals when they are decided in September 2015. Furthermore, we had the pleasure of announcing that the ACU will present findings from the campaign to education ministers from across the Commonwealth at the 19th Conference of Commonwealth Education Ministers (CCEM) in June 2015, providing us with a unique platform to put higher education at the forefront of discussions about the Post-2015 development agenda. 

The Marshall Scholarships programme, funded by the FCO and administered by the ACU, also had a very special anniversary to celebrate in 2014. To mark its 60th year, the first of four scheduled Marshall Alumni lectures took place in Cardiff, Wales, in October. The lecture was held by 1975 Marshall Scholar Professor Dr Douglas A. Melton, current Xander University Professor at Harvard and an investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. Dr Melton is also a co-director of Harvard's Stem Cell Institute and Co-Chair of the Department of Stem Cell and Regenerative Biology at Harvard. The First Minster of Wales awarded Professor Melton with a Marshall Medal for his long-standing contribution to British-American relations through science. The lecture was held in the presence of the First Minister of Wales, Rt Hon Carwyn Jones AM, the Vice-Chancellor of Cardiff University, Professor Colin Riordan, and the Chancellor of Cardiff University, Professor Sir Martin Evans. Watch the lecture here.

In November, the six winners of the 2014 ACU Titular Fellowships were announced. The Fellowships, awarded to academic staff at ACU member institutions and funded by the ACU’s Development Fellowships Fund, aim to enable universities of the Commonwealth to develop the human resources of their institutions and countries through the interchange of people, knowledge, skills and technologies. The 2014 winners originated from Canada, Pakistan, Malaysia, Australia and Nigeria and were awarded for a wide variety of outstanding academic contributions, ranging from research into breast cancer in women of African ancestry to accounts reconciliation solution, aimed at improving financial management processes.

The end of the year saw our Annual General Meeting (held on 4 December in Stellenbosch, South Africa) and the launch of the ACU’s first Member Community. The ACU Engage Community provides a space for members to come together and discuss their work in community engagement, share their initiatives and intentions, and debate the future of higher education. Professor Shaun Pather, head of strategic initiatives at Cape Peninsula University of Technology in South Africa and Chair of the ACU Engage Community, underlined the significance and need for a more active engagement between universities and their communities: ‘There is a cycle of carrying out research in communities, but when results come out they are not shared and often solutions are not directed back to those communities due to various challenges. We are looking at working as a catalyst for university engagement with communities, an engagement that provides solutions.’ Read articles and news from the Engage Community, and follow it on Twitter at @ACU_MC.