Enhancing Governance, Management and Reform in Sri Lankan Universities through Non-Academic Staff Training

Project Reference No: 609871-1-2020-1-LK- EPPKA2-CBHE-JP

The project specifically addresses the problems and inefficiencies in the Sri Lankan higher education system via capacity building of the non-academic workforce. The key aim of the project is to enhance the governance, management and quality, of university education in Sri Lanka by building the capacity of non-academic staff to enhance organizational performance and to support current and future modernization efforts and reforms in higher education. This project is funded  funded with support of the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Commission.

Click here to go to ENACT Project profile on the official EU website

OBJECTIVES OF THE PROJECT

  1. To enhance Sri Lankan Universities ’knowledge and good practice base in the area of governance and management.
  2. To develop jointly with EU partners relevant and feasible training curriculum for non-academic staff.
  3. To improve through training and international exposure the knowledge, skills and attitudes of non-academic staff in the partner SL universities
  4. To create at the participating SL universities sustainable support structures dedicated to the professional development of non-academic staff
  5. To serve as a flagship initiative, providing recommendations applicable to the national higher education system and inspiring other universities to develop adequate strategies and plans for the professional development of their admin staff.

METHODOLOGY

  1. Collaborative development of a training curriculum suitable to the preliminarily identified training needs
  2. Collaborative design and delivery of training for the first cohort of trainees who then act as trainers and multipliers within their institution
  3. Multiplication trainings within the target Sri Lanka universities
  4. Assessment of the trainings in view of fine-tuning the training curriculum
  5. Stakeholder consultation to gather feedback and support
  6. Putting in place the conditions and resources for the uptake of the training program
  7. Disseminating the results in order to encourage exploitation within the Sri Lanka Higher Education System

Important Milestones

MILESTONE 1

Relevant Training Curriculum

– Stakeholder consultation within each institution

– Joint development of training curriculum reflecting the results from the consultation and identified best practices in the areas of Human Resource management, university Administration, financial management, project management, accounting and auditing, soft skills, skills to support and cope with internationalisation and skills to support equality and diversity

MILESTONE 2

At least 45 individuals non-academic staff in Sri Lanka partner universities trained as trainers

– Joint design and delivery of three training workshops based on collaboration between EU and Sri Lanka trainers, hosted in EU universities in order to allow for direct exposure of the Sri Lanka trainees to EU practices in university management and administratioN

– 3 workshops will be organized on the topics identified above

-Training of 4 trainees (non-academic staff members) from each Sri Lanka institution in every workshop in the areas identified above. We expect that around 8 individual non-academic staff members per partner will be trained in the course of the 3 workshops (some overlap of trainees in the 3 workshops should be expected).

-Training assessment carried out in view of improving the training curriculum and the training design

MILESTONE 3

Built institutional and human resource capacity to uptake, promote, develop and support the exploitation of the training curriculum

-Training of 180 non-academic staff within Sri Lanka partner universities

-Developing training resources suitable for training in the above-described areas, finalizing a training curriculum

MILESTONE 4

Integration of non-academic staff training into the overall strategy of the Sri Lanka universities and created sustainable structures to promote it

-Developing, consulting with stakeholders and adopting a Strategy for Non-Academic Staff Development and Training in each Sri Lanka University

-Establishing, staffing and equipping a Non-Academic Staff Development Cell tasked to provide active training and professional development support for non-academic staff in each Sri Lanka university (created as a sub-structure of the Staff Development Centre if existing, or as a new Cell)

-Developing mandate documents and action plans for the Cells

MILESTONE 5

Stakeholder support and exploitation of the ENACT training program and approach Sub-activities

– Dissemination of information to stakeholders

– Final national-level dissemination conference

Scroll to Top