Asian Universities Alliance student competition: Good governance in the 21st century and its challenges
On 17-21 June 2019, Nazarbayev University (NU) hosted the Asian Universities Alliance (AUA) Student Competition for students of the AUA member institutions. The theme of this year’s Competition was “Good Governance in the 21st Century and its Challenges”.
A diverse group of 20 undergraduate and graduate students from the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IIT Bombay), National University of Singapore (NUS), Seoul National University (SNU), and NU participated in the Competition.
– The objectives of the Competition are to help participants enhance their skills in negotiations and in communications within their team and with the wider audience, and leveraging on the strengths of team members to develop the most feasible solution to a policy challenge within a limited period of time. To improve on quality of students’ projects, faculty of the Graduate School of Public Policy (GSPP) provided a series of special lectures on stakeholder analysis, innovations in governance, strategic thinking, and communication strategies, – commented Dr. Weng Tat Hui, the Dean of GSPP.
Teams from HKUST and SNU became the winners of the competition in undergraduate and graduate categories respectively. The HKUST team “Orange” presented the topic of better governance on cross-boundary water resources management in Central Asia. The team R4R from SNU analyzed and presented effective governance measures to tackle refugee issues in host countries through collaborative action from state and civil society.
It is noteworthy that last year, NU “AUA Asia Deep Dive” cultural program gathered together students from Chulalongkorn University, the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, King Saud University, National University of Singapore, Nazarbayev University, Peking University, Seoul National University, Tsinghua University, University of Colombo, University of Malaya, University of Tokyo, and University of Yangon.
About AUA: In 2017, 15 flagship universities of the respective nations from across Asia jointly launched the Asian Universities Alliance (AUA). The mission of the Alliance is to jointly address regional and global challenges, specifically related to higher education and economic, scientific and technological development, by strengthening collaboration among each other.