International Campus

actions to strengthen the international orientation of the university

The Technical University of Cluj-Napoca (TUCN) is one of the Romanian universities that have constantly accessed funds for institutional development (abbreviated FDI in Romanian), through projects in various fields, from the budget allocated to the Romanian Ministry of Education. These funds are given to the most performing higher education institutions in Romania, and their distribution is based on a project competition organized by CNFIS (the Romanian National Council for the Financing of Higher Education). In the field of Internationalisation of Higher Education, the university has carried out such projects since 2016 and is in the process of accessing funds for this year for projects that develop and strengthen its international orientation, seen as a catalyst for major changes and improvements in education, scientific research, innovation and artistic creation. One of these projects is International Campus – actions to strengthen the international orientation of TUCN, which ended in December 2020. The aim of this project was to stimulate the international mobility of teachers, researchers and university students, improving services for students and academia as well as the promotion of the educational offer in languages of international circulation at bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral level.

To achieve these objectives, a series of activities and events were organized: International Information Day: event which took place online and included activities to inform the students about the mobility offer; this event also offered support for the participants and included a presentation of the European University of Technology, the release of ERASMUS Guide and a presentation of the KA107 program. International Student Days and Virtual Welcome Day: these activities helped the international students get familiar with the TUCN environment; over 70 international students and students from the Buddy Network participated. The International Week: at its 3rd edition, the event took place online for 4 days and attracted more than 220 students and representatives of partner universities. Intercultural training Systemic transformation of the university through internationalization TRANSUI: this event gathered 20 students, and it was carried out on the Microsoft Teams platform. International Campus – actions to strengthen the international orientation of TUCN: it provided the appropriate framework for the preparation, organization and conduct of courses: English language course for teachers Teacher talk in English Medium Instruction – course for the development of oral communication skills in the internationalization-oriented academic environment, and English for teaching and research – introductory English course for the development of oral and written communication skills; Fluency in English – English course for administrative and non-teaching staff involved in the relationship with international students, and other workshops to improve skills in a foreign language for students benefiting from outgoing mobility.

Based on three internal competitions, 15 applications were analysed and 5 grants were awarded to support the participation of university doctoral students in prestigious scientific events abroad. Over 50 volumes, monographs, textbooks intended to support the bachelor’s / master’s degree programs in English, French and German were purchased. Mentoring sessions were organized in order to support international students to assimilate difficult subjects, as well as activities in support of the administrative staff of the faculties to optimize the relationship with international students.

The actions of promoting the educational offer were a priority within the project and they were met by participating in 7 virtual international fairs, at which TUCN was present: the fair organized online by ABC Fairs for the Central Asia region (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan ), June 2020; the BeginGroup fair for the Eurasia region (Azerbaijan, Georgia, Ukraine, Belarus), October 2020; the International BeginGroup fair for Central Asia (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan), November 2020, the virtual Study in Europe fair held in Singapore, September 2020; the Romanian Universities fair, organized online in July 2020; Virtual RIUF 2020, April 2020, the Vietnam educational fair, December 2020. Representatives of the International Relations Office (IRO) and Erasmus + Office participated in more than 30 webinars and conferences on internationalization topics organized by relevant bodies such as EUA, EAIE, EUt +, CE, AUF.

The impact of the actions aimed at promoting TUCN’s educational offer was beneficial and successful through the results it produced: the students who benefited from scholarships within the project developed the platform “Catalog online” (online classbook) for international students, the blog International@UTCluj (https://international.utcluj.ro) has been launched to make known to the academic community and the general public the events and actions in which TUCN is involved in order to develop and strengthen its international dimension and orientation, the International Relations Office website has been supplemented with information in German and French (http://the International Relations Office.utcluj.ro/de/index.php), the International Relations Office Instagram page was created, the informative materials specific to the categories of international candidates were updated, by upgrading the brochures and flyers for bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate levels, a video was made to promote the university, designed entirely by international students collaboration with the International Relations Office, new promotional materials with the logos of TUCN and EUt + were released.

The project International Campus – actions to strengthen the international orientation of the TUCN was carried out under the coordination of the Vice Rectorate for International Relations, the implementation team, consisting of members of the International Relations Office (IRO) and Erasmus + Office, who made possible all these actions and results, representatives of the faculties secretariats, teachers from the Department of Modern Languages and Communication, members of the Image and Communication Office, representatives of other offices and departments from TUCN, as well as a large number of international and Romanian students.

International Campus

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