Staff Week: Internationalization on the Agenda

[Article] - Published on November 18, 2024 under International Partnerships, CHARM-EU European University

From November 12 to 14, theUM , hosted partner universities from the Coimbra Network and from the European Charm-EU Alliance for an“Away Week”focused on internationalization. It was an opportunity to strengthen existing ties and develop new collaborations.

International relations or internationalization? François Pierrot, vice president for international relations at theUM, chose to address this question as he welcomed participants to the Away Week(staff week), which took place November 12–14 in Montpellier. He took the opportunity to outline theUM ’s international strategy in its entirety—encompassing both the Global South and the Global West—emphasizing the need to better identify potential partnerships as well as the importance of intra-European collaborations.

Coming from nine countries (Portugal, Lithuania, Ireland, Italy, Spain, Hungary, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and Norway), the approximately 20 participants in this staff week on the theme of internationalization represented the partner universities of the Coimbra Group—a network of long-established, high-level multidisciplinary European universities—as well as the Charm-EU alliance of European universities.

Sharing of Best Practices

Over the course of these three days, partner universities and representatives from the University of Montpellier alternated between insightful talks and presentations on concrete practices related to the concept of internationalization, such as international mobility, welcoming international students, and staff involvement in Erasmus+ projects. Other topics included optimizing the international experience, inclusive education throughopen educational resourcesand innovative teaching tools,and the integration of the Sustainable Development Goals into higher education programs…

Several of these topics were discussed using examples from Montpellier, including the welcome provided to international students at the “UM ” and the “Bienvenue en France” initiative, the hybrid mobility programs piloted as part of the joint master’s degree program led by Charm-EU, or the IDIL educational program focused on interdisciplinary research and built around the pillars of excellence: nourish, care, and protect.

Special meetings, promising fruitful collaborations, were also held with the Faculty of Sciences, the Faculty of Law and Political Science, MOMA, the MS University Institute of Technology (IUT), Polytech, the Faculty of Education, the Béziers University Institute of Technology (IUT), the Nîmes University Institute of Technology (IUT), and others… This can only serve as an asset in developing and strengthening theUM ’s international partnerships within a forward-looking European higher education landscape.