Shaping the future: new perspectives on Dutch cooperation in post-secondary education and training for sustainable development
On 2-3 July the conference ‘Shaping the Future’ took place in The Hague. The conference was organised by Nuffic on behalf of the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs to discuss the outcomes of the external evaluations of the NFP, NPT and NICHE programmes.
The conference participants were also expected to come up with directions and perspectives for the design of new Dutch programmes for cooperation in post-secondary education and training for sustainable development.
The conference had an international attendance of about 170 participants with representations from ministries, education institutions, private sector organisations and programme administrating organisations.
Highly-rated programmes
In his speech at the conference, the Netherlands Minister for European Affairs and International Cooperation, Dr Ben Knapen, recognised the largely positive conclusions of the external evaluations of the three programmes. The programmes are rated highly by alumni, the quality of education is improving and the education institutions are definitely helping to meet development goals.
The programmes support the development of motivated professionals, but they also have a broader impact. This is what makes these programmes worth keeping.
Following the minister’s speech, the participants discussed the implications of the recommendations of the external evaluations and the suggestions made by the minister. The conference resulted in many new suggestions and recommendations, which the ministry will take into account when designing the successor programmes to the current NFP and NICHE.
Inputs
Inputs for the conference consisted of the reports of the external evaluations, relevant policy documents, commissioned contributions, discussion papers submitted by stakeholder groups and other relevant documents.
Proceedings
The output of the conference consists of a report on the proceedings. In digital form it is published on the websites of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Nuffic. A limited number of printed copies are available. If you would like to receive a hard copy of the Proceedings you can order one from Nuffic using the following order form.
Download the Proceedings(1.4 MB)