Germans keen To Enhance Institutional Ties At CPUT

Germans keen To Enhance Institutional Ties At CPUT

COLLABORATING: Minister Theresia Bauer (centre) of the federal state Baden-Württemberg, with Prof Anthony Staak (left), DVC: Teaching and Learning, and her delegation of higher education officials and CPUT staff.

Strengthening ties with European partners was the discussion point when CPUT recently hosted a German state minister on its Bellville campus.
Theresia Bauer, Minister for Science, Research and the Arts in the federal state of Baden-Württemberg, brought with her representatives from 24 German institutions of higher learning.
“We are looking to intensify our ties with Africa through stronger partnerships with African institutions like [CPUT],” said Bauer, adding that Baden-Württemberg is proud of its status in Germany as the home of innovation.
Prof Anthony Staak, DVC: Teaching and Learning, thanked the state minister for “highlighting opportunities and expressing a willingness to collaborate”.
“Currently many partnerships [with German institutions] concentrate on student and staff exchange programmes, but there is an increasing tendency worldwide towards the development of professional master’s degrees. We can really benefit from the experience of our German partners in this regard,” Staak explained.
CPUT staff made short, but informative presentations to the German visitors. Among them was Prof René Pellissier, Director: Research Technology Innovations & Strategic Initiatives & Partnerships. In sketching an outline of CPUT, she mentioned that internationalisation was increasingly coming into focus at the university, and that in this regard “collaboration with European institutions was very important”.
CPUT was the last of the Western Cape-based tertiary institutions visited by the German delegation. Their next stop is Namibia before they head back to Germany.