Finnish education expertise empowering South African academic leaders and professionals
EduExcellence Ltd., a global education service provider of Laurea, Haaga-Helia and Metropolia and the Tshwane University of Technology, South Africa, have signed a strategic agreement to implement innovative learning programmes in various areas of expertise both for TUT´s staff and external parties.
Tshwane University of Technology (TUT) is the largest contact-learning university with 65,000 students in South Africa and a forerunner in higher education in the country. In 2015 TUT started a strategic cooperation with HaagaHelia School of Vocational Teacher Education to train their academic staff on Finnish pedagogy. Since then four groups of academics have been trained in Pretoria and the fifth teacher training programme is on-going. TUT and Haaga-Helia have signed the agreements to extend the Vocational Teacher Education Programme and add the Education Management Masters Programme and the Training of Trainers Programme.
TUT also sealed a strategic agreement with EduExcellence to implement a programme to enhance the competence in Infection Prevention in South Africa. The programme content will be designed and implemented by Laurea University of Applied Sciences. In 2018 Laurea implemented the Intensive Service Design Programme with TUT. The strategic objective of the TUT and EduExcellence is to expand over the coming few years commercial cooperation to various expertise areas provided by Laurea, Haaga-Helia and Metropolia Universities of Applied Sciences.
Prof. Stanley Mukhola, TUT`s Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Teaching, Learning and Technology states that “Education is important in empowering our people. The economy of South Africa is dependent on people who are better educated. Since working with Haaga-Helia TUT has seen an improvement in how our teachers interact with students. Our success rate is improving for staff who have undergone vocational teacher training. We are looking forward to next five years of cooperation.”
Teemu Kokko, President and Rector of Haaga-Helia University of Applied Sciences comments, “Investment in education is the investment in the future. This thinking is the common denominator for our both countries”.
“We and our three shareholder universities are very honoured to be the strategic Finnish education partner for TUT. We are excited to be part of TUT´s story in co-developing South Africa´s education for the future” says Tuija Pulkkinen, CEO of EduExcellence Ltd