Our aim is to develop an integrated approach to the ways we promote our international collaborations and programs, but engaging our community directly in the process, building more opportunities for participation in the process.
At the heart of this exciting approach is the launch of a series of networking groups/clubs comprised of members of our students, staff and faculty, and their counterparts from our international institutional and community partners. These participatory groups will not only kickstart individual participation in international dialogues and planning but also serve as a way for our institution to both promote to and learn from our community in the planning of future international programming. This includes building participation on both program planning and evaluation.
The groups will revolve around themes (sustainability, industry collaboration, decolonization) or disciplines (new media, art, design) shared by us and our international counterparts. Our office staff, as well as identified student leaders, will coordinate and organize regular online discussions and networking opportunities in these areas. At all levels (student, staff, and faculty), this will also provide the opportunity to build international peer learning and mentorship connections.
We see this as a chance to keep up the momentum of the enthusiastic partnerships we have built to date, while also ensuring we continue to meet the needs and interests of our community. This initiative will build our capacity to best support more individuals looking to take part in international programming, and will ensure we are making informed decisions on how to best set our program goals and priorities when moving forward.
In addition to this series of networking groups, we will concurrently create and/or update our internal communications to best align with both our new Academic and Strategic Plan and lessons learned from evaluations of recent programming as well as a broader community survey. In tandem, these two integrated areas of work will increase visibility and access to internationalization efforts at OCAD University. We believe this active and unique approach to both celebrating and expanding the work our office has done will increase awareness, access, and participation both at home and abroad.
