Collaboration

SMK University of Applied Social Sciences (Lithuania) is inviting you to participate in the project “Promoting the Diversification of Financing Sources in Higher Education” under a Lifelong Learning Programme, Erasmus Multilateral Projects, deadline January 31^st, 2013. The project priority is Improving governance and funding, therefore the project will analyse the area of governance and funding in several EU countries (including newly joined member countries), and will compare it to other outstanding countries outside the EU that have highly developed governance and funding systems, e.g. USA. The project will provide innovative solutions by adapting and transferring innovative approaches which already exist in well-established Third countries’ private sector.

There is a necessity to create European unanimous funding policy that would increase higher education institutions' (HEIs) capacity to draw in funding from diverse sources (e.g. private sector) and manage resources efficiently. Thus, the project aims at: 1) developing capacities of HEIs’ leaders to attract private funding to higher education; 2) increasing the abilities of HEIs to draw in funding from diverse sources and manage them effectively; 3) assessing and promoting the return to investment in higher education; 4) preparing the catalogue of investment projects in higher education. The main activities to be planned in the project are: 1) selection of best practices and preparation of cases about attraction of private financing to education sector; 2) research of motivation factors for the companies to invest in higher education system; 3) preparation of Guidelines (Higher Education Funding Models) – presenting study outcomes and recommendations for HEIs how to diversify funding mechanisms; 4) training sessions for HEIs’ leaders; 5) awareness raising campaign (round tables and an international conference) – a possibility to develop strong links with associated partners from international organisations, aid agencies and civil society actors.