Office of International Affairs (OIA)

Actionable steps:

• Recognize and reward the contributions of our multicultural and transnational communities and acknowledge their unique perspectives.
• Advocate for policies and practices that ensure human rights, equity, equality and dignity for all.
• Continue to be a lead provider of educational services through partnerships, consulting, and made-at-McMaster training programs in support of Global Affairs Canada’s International Education Strategy.
• Strengthen funding and support mechanisms for international students and scholars impacted by conflict, war, and human rights abuses around the world.
• Promote constructive dialogue and self-development opportunities for faculty, staff, alumni and students to help them navigate complex global and local issues. One forum for doing this is the McMaster Dialogues on Global Challenges.

Actionable steps:

• Ensure academic, social and career counselling is student-centred, high-impact, holistic, and culturally and globally responsive.
• Embed diversity, equity and inclusion into all hiring and promotion, and incentivize staff and faculty to engage in activities that address biases.
• Create culturally responsive initiatives that help international students thrive.
• Widen our scope for international recruitment to include students from global regions and countries

Actionable steps:

• Convene a University-wide working group to review and ensure best practices in tracking and reporting student, staff and faculty mobility.
• Strengthen the University’s travel risk management and mitigation processes.
• Increase the number and diversity of students participating in McMaster’s mobility programs (both inbound and outbound), with a focus on under-represented students and diversification of geographical locations.
• Tap new sources for increased internal and external funding for visiting scholars, student mobility bursaries, and fellowships and grants in support of global learning.

Actionable steps:

• Support and sustain faculty efforts to internationalize the curriculum through innovative, forward-looking academic and co-curricular programs that promote a global focus.
• Expand learning and self-development opportunities for faculty members to champion global engagement in their teaching, share international points of view, and facilitate connections with local, national and international collaborators.
• Explore and communicate new avenues for seed funding that will enable members of the McMaster community to realize global learning initiatives.
• Enable individual faculties/departments to build internal capacity and readiness to support and respond to internationalization and global engagement. This includes leveraging international partnerships of the McMaster Library, the McMaster Museum, Nuclear Reactor and many others.
• Enhance our systems to celebrate and reward members of our community who are advancing global learning in their teaching and service.
• Create campus-wide opportunities for cross-faculty dialogue to facilitate knowledge dissemination and foster interdisciplinary international interactions.

Actionable steps:

• Leverage the rich, multi-dimensional strengths of our institution to initiate and pursue collective-action solutions to contemporary world problems in support of the University’s Global Research strategy.
• Spearhead at least five large-scale, high-impact international collaborations that maximize McMaster’s global impact in research, educational exchange/curricular development, or service. The first of such major collaboration is the International Youth Internship Program funded by Global Affairs Canada.
• Advance McMaster’s objectives toward achieving United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals by increasing participation in high-profile international forums and improving measurements to track and communicate our progress.
• Partner with Indigenous members and the McMaster and broader community to identify new – and expand existing – global opportunities that address the lived experiences of Indigenous peoples.
• Cement McMaster’s global stature and promote dialogue on shared local and global challenges by ensuring our list of McMaster Experts is up-to-date and enriched with details about our international efforts.

Actionable steps:

• Expand funding available through the University’s existing grant mechanisms to stimulate new international research and teaching partnerships that align with the University’s Global Research Strategy.
• Ensure the success of complex international partnerships by facilitating approvals and providing key administrative support.
• Incentivize academic and research faculty, including early career researchers, to engage in international activities by ensuring the value of these activities is recognized in the University’s merit, tenure and promotion policies.
• Empower faculty by providing seminars and workshops with funders, information about international grant opportunities, and access to local, national and global connections.
• Ensure student research contributions from the undergraduate to PhD level are seamlessly and effectively integrated into McMaster’s global research agenda, collaborations, and individual Faculty priorities through initiatives such as the OIA Research Internship Program.
• Foster interdisciplinary international interactions.

Actionable steps:

• Leverage existing platforms (i.e. Research Impact newsletter) and resources, including new digital strategies, to engage international audiences, build community and promote international initiatives, partnerships and recruitment.
• Expand opportunities to engage alumni, parents, scholars and donors around the world to learn about McMaster’s work on global issues and act as global ambassadors for the University.
• Expand the participation of faculty and staff in the McMaster Global Ambassador Program.
• Create new fundraising avenues to mobilize our international community to become collaborators and equal partners in our mission to create a truly global university.