Washington works to boost partnership between African Universities and American Institutions

The U.S Department of State is working to further strengthen the educational partnership between African Universities and the National Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

A statement from the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs reveals that the move is undertaken through an International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) exchange.

The program is being done to support the National Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) Week.

Participants of this professional exchange program include African higher education faculty, administrators, and government officials from a total of eleven countries on the continent.

These are also people who are interested in internationalizing university campuses and strengthening and expanding higher education linkages with the United States’ institutions of higher education. 

Among the activities of the program, participants attended the 2024 Annual National Historically Black Colleges (HBCU) Week Conference in Philadelphia, where they met with leaders and representatives from universities and colleges, including community colleges, in Birmingham and Atlanta, Georgia.

They met to discuss partnerships and nonprofit initiatives within the education sector, best practices in university governance, the legacy of HBCUs, and more. 

The program later concluded in Washington, D.C. with meetings exploring trends in the United States higher education and efforts of the federal government to build international cooperation between educational institutions.

The implementing partner for this International Visitor Leadership Program is the Mississippi Consortium for International Development (MCID), a nonprofit organization that originated from a collaborative endeavor of four Historically Black Colleges in Mississippi.