STAFF REPORT KHI: US Acting Consul General Chad Peterson presided over the signing of a Balochistan Consortium
University Partnership Memorandum of Agreement.
The two-year “Building Bridges” partnership links the University of Massachusetts at Amherst with the University of
Balochistan, Sardar Bahadur Khan Womens University Quetta and Balochistan University of Information Technology,
Engineering and Management Sciences.
The partnership will send professors and students from the three participating Balochistan universities to the University of
Massachusetts for summer exchanges in 2017.
The US State Department is providing $864,000 in financial support.
“Building Bridges creates a network of students, teachers and administrators from all three members of the Balochistan
Consortium Partnership to improve participant skills both in and out of the classroom,” said Dr. Peterson.
“It also enhances the quality of education received by students both in Balochistan and at the University of Massachusetts,”
he said.
The programme is geared toward faculty and students in Management Sciences and Entrepreneurship.
“We are excited about working together to build the skills needed to develop business and entrepreneurship curriculums
and advanced training methodologies,” said Mike Hannahan, director of the University of Massachusetts Civic Initiative.
“The key is to come up with solutions that work for Pakistani universities,” he said.
“Another key benefit is that students and faculty from Pakistan will study U.S. culture and government to better enable
them to discuss how to develop cutting-edge management science and entrepreneurship programming,” said Acting Public
Affairs Officer Li Ping Lo.