Academic Partnerships

The UN Secretary-General’s Common Agenda highlights challenges within the multilateral system and identifies the professional skills needed to advance the 2030 Agenda. Increasingly, UN personnel are pursuing academic credentials to enhance their expertise and support global progress.   

Drawing on our established relationships and new connections, system-wide credibility and understanding of the diversity of UN mandates, the Staff College acts as a bridge between the United Nations system and academic institutions. We support Member States’ calls for a more impactful, future-ready UN by equipping personnel, clients and partners with up-to-date and diverse knowledge across priority areas. This approach strengthens coherence, fosters collaboration and helps translate strategic mandates into tangible results.   

We establish partnerships with engaging, dynamic and innovative institutions that are aware of today’s pressing challenges – the need for social change, geopolitical shifts, increased polarization, climate change, demographic changes, regional armed conflicts, digital transformation, just to name a few.    

Whether expanding our network of academic partnerships or building on existing ones, the Staff College is committed to strengthening the relationship between the UN system and leading educational institutions that are contributing to shaping the minds and skills of current and future leaders.

 

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Our partners

These relationships allow the College to build on the research and teaching capabilities of its partner universities, enabling UNSSC to strengthen the rigour of its programmes. Through our academic partnerships, UN personnel and partners can access learning opportunities offered by higher education institutions, keeping them up to date with the latest advancements in matters of leadership, management, sustainable development, and peace and security, amongst other topics, while upscaling their skills to thrive in a professional and competitive environment. 

How to get involved

What are we looking for in an academic partnership?  

As a learning and training institution mandated to serve the staff of the UN system, UNSSC plays a pivotal role as a knowledge broker between UN agencies and academic institutions. We are looking for opportunities that allow UN personnel, clients and partners to acquire knowledge across UN priority topics. We are driven to ensure that our programmes are instilled with up-to-date, diverse and enriching knowledge, experiences and points of views. This can only be achieved through strong relationships with diverse and committed academic partners. 

We are looking for engaging, dynamic and innovative institutions that are aware of today’s pressing challenges – geopolitical shifts, increased polarization, climate change, demographic changes, regional armed conflicts, digital transformation, just to name a few.  

What do we offer? 

As an inter-agency learning provider, UNSSC can serve as a bridge between the UN system and academic institutions, providing access to practical field experience. Through capstone projects and case studies, universities can enhance their student experience and likewise produce relevant insights for development practitioners.  

The UN Secretary General’s Common Agenda identifies the challenges faced by the multilateral system, and outlines the capabilities needed to address the serious problems the world is facing. As the inter-agency learning and training institution of the UN system, UNSSC fosters the learning and capacity development needed to deliver a UN 2.0. Increasingly UN personnel wish to receive academic credentials as part of their learning journeys. UNSSC’s unique UN system-focused learning programmes, combined with certification pathways offered by academic institutions, constitutes an effective way of delivering a UN 2.0 fit for the future.  

You can reach out to the Academic Partnerships at academicpartnerships@unssc.org.

Resources / Useful links

UNSSC’s Academic Partnerships

Executive Master in International Development  

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