Developing new networks and research capacity from the legacy of a longstanding international higher education partnership

The Mauritius Institute of Education and the School of Education at the University of Brighton have sustained a 23-year bilateral partnership in postgraduate HE. This partnership has brought together academics at both institutions to deliver an MA Education programme (established 2000) and a Professional Doctorate in Education programme (established 2012) resulting in over 370 graduates. On these courses, students undertake and report empirical research in dissertations and theses. Whilst the partnership is now in a teach-out phase it is important to learn from the legacy of this longstanding partnership.

The aim of the project is to investigate how the knowledge, understanding and skills, developed through the collaborative HE Partnership can be used to critically develop Mauritius Institute of Education's strategic role as a regional and international educational hub. This will be achieved through the following objectives:   

- To document and map the research knowledge and skills developed over 23 years

- To analyse how the corpus of research relates thematically to the UN SDGs for Education

- To scope the potential to use this research knowledge and skills base to develop new regional networks and research capacity

In Phase 1 of the project the corpus of research reports produced from the MA Education and EdD courses are analysed quantitatively to identify the range of subjects, contexts, methodologies and methods studied, in order to understand the nature of the research knowledge, skills and understanding developed over the during of the partnership. In Phase 2 of the project thematic qualitative case studies are developed to explore how these relate to the United Nations targets for securing inclusive and equitable education.