The India-U.S. Higher Education Dialogue was held at New Delhi today (17 November, 2014). This Dialogue was Co-Chaired by Mr. Satya N. Mohanty, Secretary, Higher Education, Ministry for Human Resource Development, India and Mr. Richard Stengel, U.S.Under Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs. This was the third Dialogue in a row, after the first one held in Washington in June 2012 and the second one in New Delhi in June 2013.

The Dialogue explored various forms of collaboration between the two countries, especially in the fields of development of community colleges, massive open online courses, student and faculty exchange and skill development. The two sides reiterated the importance of the Higher Education Dialogue to promote enhanced opportunities for student and scholar mobility and faculty collaboration between the United States and India, including our ongoing collaboration on community colleges, improvement of workforce training, expansion of research and teaching exchanges, collaboration on education technology and innovation, and industry-academia linkages in higher education.

A Meeting of Joint Task Force on Community Colleges was also held prior to the India-U.S. Higher Education Dialogue and both the sides affirmed the importance of ongoing community college collaborations to meet Prime Minister Modi’s National skills development goals. The Task Force on Community Colleges discussed a plan for implementation of the recently concluded Memorandum of Understanding signed between the All India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) and the American Association of Community Colleges (AACC).

The U.S. Department of State also announced the launching of the new Passport to India website (http://www.passporttoindia.com) in cooperation with the Ohio State University. The Passport to India initiative encourages young American leaders to seek out study and internship opportunities in India. The new website will serve as a portal to help students identify these opportunities.

Both sides also agreed that accomplishments of alumni from Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) are remarkable, and U.S. and Indian governments are proud of prior collaborations in the development of India’s IITs. It was also agreed that the US side would extend technical cooperation for the development of one of the new IITs in India. Both sides also agreed to further enhance the cooperation for faculty development and discussed to cooperate on India’s Global Initiative of Academics Network (GIAN) to facilitate participation of U.S. faculty to take up short-term teaching and research programmes in Indian Institutions.

Mr. Stengel and Mr. Mohanty expressed satisfaction at the outcomes of the Dialogue and a Joint statement was also issues at the end of the Dialogue between India and the U.S.

Source: PIB