Early childhood education platform for international partnership

The College of Education has signed an agreement with the Principals Academy Inc., a commercial partner with Singapore’s Ministry of Education, to deliver a Bachelor of Education focused on early childhood education.

The agreement is the seventh to be signed by the college in the past year, and the first to see the College of Education teaching students in Singapore in a block delivery mode.

It enables an initial cohort of 20 Singaporean early childhood education teachers to study with Massey for one year as they upgrade their diplomas to Bachelor degrees.

College of Education Pro Vice-Chancellor Professor James Chapman says this number is expected to grow significantly with future cohorts.

Professor Chapman says the agreement is significant for the college and a milestone in its strategy to increase international engagement beyond its already successful short-course programmes.

“Singapore is a very competitive market for international universities and we are pleased the college has been selected to teach early childhood education; it speaks very highly of our lecturers’ skill and expertise in this area,” he says. “Our research and teaching in the area of early childhood education is world-leading and we are delighted that our staff will be able to work with the sector in Singapore to develop their skills in this area.”

Teaching will be through a mixture of blended learning using the University’s world-leading online study portal – Stream – and face-to-face teaching provided in block courses by College of Education academics.

Since the beginning of last year, the college has focused on developing its international links and in the past 12 months it has signed Memoranda of Understandings with Ministries and tertiary education providers in Indonesia, Cambodia, Singapore, Vietnam, Thailand and the Philippines.

194 international students have come to New Zealand to study or participate in education short courses, or visit with the purpose of establishing links with leading researchers within the college

The agreements will generate commercial outcomes as well as providing staff with experience working with international students and teaching colleagues.