Global Minds: Empowering Higher Education Cooperation for Sustainable Development Global Minds (GM) enables Flemish higher education institutions (HEIs) to operate as drivers of change for sustainable development by producing and valorising relevant knowledge and expertise through mutually beneficial partnerships with and between (non-)academic actors in Belgium and partner countries, and by creating a conducive environment for their students, staff and alumni to act as critical global citizens.

VLIR-UOS will contribute to the achievement of sustainable and equitable development by promoting knowledge-driven global partnerships, capacitating skilled individuals that can act as global citizens, and facilitating the valorisation and uptake of relevant knowledge. GM represents a pivotal outcome in that regard, because the impact of an SDG-proof model of higher education cooperation stems in large part from the ability of Flemish HEIs to initiate and facilitate partnerships with actors in Belgium and partner countries through which relevant knowledge can be co-created and valorised.

GM projects focus to varying degrees on educational, research and organisational capacity strengthening of diverse Flemish HEIs. In general, the GM projects of Flemish HEIs are expected to structure as well as monitor their activities and deliverables around six core domains reflecting the key components of higher education institutional capacity: (i) education programmes and methods, (ii) research programmes and methods, (iii) individual capacity strengthening, (iv) outreach and policy support, (v) networks and partnerships and (vi) systems, policies and infrastructure. The Bridging Science-Society (BSS) outcome is created in line with the thematic JSF HES4SD and holds three ambitions high: more connection, valorisation and collective learning. BSS aims at 1) strengthened connections within and beyond the VLIR-UOS community, hereby improving access to and use of academic expertise (uptake of knowledge, applications, services) and facilitating collective learning; and 2) relevant demand-driven scientific (policy) support to enhance the capacity of the Belgian government and other actors in the field of sustainable cooperation. 

The intervention strategy focusses on facilitating connections within and beyond the VLIR-UOS community through exchange platforms, networks and platform-initiated projects, initiatives and events. There are two levels: 
1) BSS within HEfSD, primarily focusing on academic partners, with a distinction between what can be improved within VLIR-UOS in terms of connections, knowledge sharing and uptake, and collective learning, and what can be upscaled to the level of the tJSF HES4SD; 
2) BSS beyond HEfSD, focusing on facilitating connections between HEfSD actors and non-academic public, private and civil society actors, including the Belgian government. The outcome will boost synergy and complementarity and collective learning and provide projects with an evidence base and facilitate mainstreaming transversal and priority themes of development actors, including DGD, but also respond to specific emergencies or opportunities.

The BSS activities include information and results sharing via improved communication channels, dissemination practices and stakeholder engagement, matchmaking and networking, learning and training activities within and beyond the VLIR-UOS community, different types of scientific (policy)support to DGD and other actors in the sector aiming at synergy & complementarity. A selected number of long-term Institutional University Cooperation (IUC) partnerships between a university in a partner country and Flemish universities and university colleges are supported. The specific objective is to strengthen partner universities’ capacity hereby improving their institutional performance in their threefold mission (education, research and service delivery); and enabling them as driver of change for sustainable development.
The project strategy focuses on:
•	enabling a change process within the partner university leading to improved institutional performance via transversal institutional strengthening sub-projects 
•	strengthening educational and research capacities -through different academic-theme based sub-projects- contributing to developmental change at level of the project region/country of the partner university
The IUC partnership project with a duration of approx. 12 years is developed via different cooperation Phases:
•	Phase In (min. 1 year): prep...(+2 characters extra in FundHub text) Short Initiatives (SI) and TEAM projects aim to explore, build and deepen balanced academic partnerships focusing on a specific sustainable development challenge. Through partnerships between teams of researchers/academics/lecturers/specialists affiliated with Higher Education and Science Institutions (HE&SIs) in Flanders and the 17 VLIR-UOS partner countries, the projects seek to strengthen the research and educational capacities and performance of the HE&SIs and create improved conditions for uptake of new and relevant knowledge, applications and/or services by academic, civil society, private and public actors. As such, the projects enable HE&SIs to operate as drivers of change contributing to Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development.

To support these knowledge-driven partnerships, VLIR-UOS launches competitive calls for two complementary types of projects, namely Short Initiatives and TEAM projects. The Short Initiatives are short-term projects (max 2 year) with a limited budget, are easy access and often of an explorative nature. TEAM projects are mid-term projects (max. 5 years), move a step further with a stronger focus on capacity building, often involving PhD trainings, and structural research/educational collaboration with units in one or more partner institutions. SI and TEAM projects are incentivized to adopt a multistakeholder and/or interinstitutional set-up which may involve universities as well as university colleges on Flemish side given their diverse but often complementary roles in higher education.

In general, SI and TEAM projects are expected to structure as well as monitor their activities and deliverables around six core domains reflecting the key components of higher education institutional capacity: (i) education programmes and methods, (ii) research programmes and methods, (iii) individual capacity strengthening, (iv) outreach and policy support, (v) networks and partnerships, and (vi) systems, policies and infrastructure. Through educational networks (ICP Connect), international training programmes (ITP) and scholarships higher education institutions (HEIs) aim to systematically integrate global perspectives hereby creating a supportive, inclusive and networked learning environment in which individual scholarship students, professionals and academics acquire transversal competencies and state-of-the-art knowledge on sustainable development enabling them to become experts and critical global citizens motivated to act as change agents in their network. Nationals residing in the 30 scholarship countries are eligible to apply for scholarships granted within this framework. As such, the projects enable higher education and science institutions (HE&Sis) to operate as drivers of change contributing to Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development.

To support these knowledge-driven partnerships, VLIR-UOS launches competitive calls for two complementary types of projects: ICP Connect and ITP projects. ITP are short-term trainings (max 6 months) with a limited budget and distinguished by topic, dealing with sustainable development topics, transversal competencies for Higher Education (HE) management, transversal or priority themes (see BSS outcome). ICP Connect projects are long-term projects (max. 10 years), with a stronger focus on capacity building and networking. Funding is provided for max. 2 project phases.