This presentation outlines the way that one UK university has used internationalisation, namely the internationalisation of the curriculum, the student experience, the student body and the faculty to enhance business engagement and graduate employability,

1. Using internationalisation to drive business
engagement and graduate employability at
Nottingham Trent University
Opportunities and Challenges for Higher Education
Institutions in the Process of Transformation, Kunming
4 November 2014
Professor Nigel Healey
Pro-Vice-Chancellor (International)
Nottingham Trent University

2. Overview
• What is the history of NTU?
• What is the national UK policy framework within which NTU
operates today?
• How does NTU support economic and social development?
• Case study: How does NTU use internationalisation to
support business engagement and graduate employability?
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3. The history of NTU: from vocational college to
university of applied sciences
• NTU founded in 1843 as Nottingham Government
School of Design
• Other vocational colleges (eg, Technology,
Commerce, Education) opened in Nottingham
• In the 1960s, UK government decides to expand
higher education: merged colleges to create new
polytechnics (universities of applied science)
• Trent Polytechnic set up in 1970
• Polytechnics were owned and managed by local
governments; degrees (to PhD) were awarded by
a national agency
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4. The history of NTU: from university of applied
sciences to comprehensive university
• In 1988, the government decided to abolish polytechnics and
convert them to comprehensive universities
• In 1992, the polytechnics were incorporated as independent
legal entities, granted degree awarding powers and became
universities
• Trent Polytechnic became Nottingham Trent University (NTU)
NTU retains its historical commitment to
business engagement and graduate
employability, updated for the 21st
Century
4 November 2014

5. What is the national UK policy framework
within which NTU operates today?
State Private
Mixed
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6. What is the national UK policy framework
within which NTU operates today?
• “Mixed” national policy framework
• UK universities are autonomous, non-for-profit corporations
– Universities own their own land and buildings, employ their own
staff, borrow on their own account
• UK government has public policy objectives for higher
education:
– Research – universities create new knowledge which can be
commercialised by business
– Teaching – universities build a skilled, productive labour force
– Teaching - by widening access to higher education, universities
can reduce unemployment and social inequality
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7. What is the national UK policy framework
within which NTU operates today?
• UK government achieves its public policy objectives for
higher education by “steering” universities:
– Subsidising universities through “arms length” agencies (eg,
tuition, research, business engagement)
– Overseeing quality of teaching and research
– Retaining powers to direct universities (eg, limit tuition fees)
– Promoting competition (eg, National Student Survey)
– Controlling entry to the higher education market
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8. What is the national UK policy framework
within which NTU operates today?
• UK universities remain subject to influence and control by
national government…
• …but they also operate in a highly competitive environment,
competing for faculty, students, research and commercial
funding
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9. How does NTU support economic and social
development?
• Core objectives of a university: creating knowledge
(research) and disseminating knowledge (teaching)
• NTU can support economic and social development by
collaborating with its key stakeholders: government,
businesses and society
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10. How does NTU collaborate with government?
• Research which informs policy: gambling addition
• Teaching which creates opportunity for all: “widening
participation”
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National UK research
audits now include
“impact” assessments

11. How does NTU collaborate with industry?
• Collaboration to commercialise research: advanced textiles
• Collaboration to improve graduate employability:
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12. How does NTU collaborate with
society?
• Collaboration to improve local communities:
Community Volunteering, Schools
Volunteering, NTU Sport Volunteering
• Collaboration to put NTU at the heart of the
city’s culture:
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13. Case study: How does NTU use
internationalisation to support business
engagement and graduate employability?
• NTU retains its historical commitment to business
engagement and graduate employability
• What does this mean in the 21st Century?
Business
engagement:
supporting UK
businesses to succeed
in the global market
4 November 2014
Graduate employability:
preparing graduates to
succeed in the global labour
force
Internationalisation is the key

14. Internationalisation @ NTU
• The objectives of NTU are:
– Teaching - to provide students with an international learning
environment which prepares them to be highly employable global
citizens
– Research – to ensure research is internationally connected to the
best on the world
• Providing an international learning experience means:
– Having an international curriculum (including foreign languages)
– Providing students with a range of outbound mobility opportunities
– Having a diverse, multinational student population
– Attracting international academics and researchers from around
the world
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15. How does internationalisation increase
graduate employability?
• The future will be global:
– Graduates need foreign language skills and cross-cultural
competencies to succeed in a globalised labour force
• The future will be different in ways that we cannot predict:
– Graduates will need to be flexible and adaptable and able to think
creatively and critically
– New international experiences create “ontological shocks” (new
ways of seeing the world)
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16. Using internationalisation to support business
engagement
• Four simple facts:
– The UK is a small nation, which lives by exporting
goods and services
– Its traditional export markets (in Europe and North
America) are growing slowly
– Nottingham has two major universities which attract
international students from around the world (5% of
the city’s population)
– International students come from fast-growing
countries (China, India, Nigeria)
• One conclusion:
– NTU (and the University of Nottingham) can support
businesses by matching export companies with
international students
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17. Using internationalisation to support business
engagement
• The model:
– NTU places students with businesses for long-term
and short-term internships and live
consultancy projects
– NTU places international students with export
companies seeking opportunities in the
students’ home country
• The benefits:
– The international students gain valuable work
experience with a UK company
– The business gets international expertise, usually
combined with discipline-specific knowledge (eg,
international marketing or deign)
– Nottingham has international ambassadors when
the graduates return home
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18. Conclusions
• NTU has a long history (170 years) with a strong tradition of
vocational education
• NTU operates in a mixed policy environment, where it must
respond to government objectives for social and economic
development while competing for students, staff and revenue
• NTU supports social and economic development by
collaborating with its external stakeholders: government,
industry and society
• In the 21st Century, internationalisation is key to supporting
business engagement and graduate employability
• NTU uses its international students to support export
companies seeking new markets
1 November 2014