Reflections on Five Years of Global Collaboration, from Jenny Dixon
28 July 2026
As Jenny Dixon concludes her five-year term as U21 Provost, we’re republishing this reflection from our 2025 Impact Report to mark her contribution to the network. In it, Jenny reflects on the evolution of U21, the enduring value of trusted international collaboration, and the foundations laid for the network’s future. As U21 begins its next chapter, these reflections provide an opportunity to recognise the significant progress made during her leadership.
Originally posted in December 2025
As 2025 draws to a close, I have been reflecting on the value of international collaboration for U21 members and what the network has achieved in the last few years. Emerging from the pandemic and facing widespread uncertainty about the future of higher education, we took the opportunity to refine our purpose, our commitment to sustainability, develop new policies on inclusive global engagement and, most importantly, craft new strategic plans.
Having inclusive processes so that participants can readily contribute to the development of plans and policies enhances their relevance and value for the membership and adds authenticity. Our use of working groups to craft strategies and policies post-pandemic assisted immeasurably in determining what is important for members and, in turn, shaping a more precise articulation of our purpose and goals.
Trusted relationships and global collaboration
At the heart of any successful global network is the quality of relationships: these matter profoundly and are the glue that holds it together.
At the heart of any successful global network is the quality of relationships: these matter profoundly and are the glue that holds it together. This vitality is key to members staying engaged. Our experience during the pandemic showed the value of long-standing relationships. Subsequent stimulating discussions at the HKU AGM in 2023 on our future affirmed the desire to keep the network intentionally small while at the same time encouraging admission of new members from developing economies to strengthen our diversity.
We have seen impressive bilateral and multilateral collaborations enabled by network members. One example is ACCESS: the Chilean-Swedish research consortium of eight Chilean and six Swedish universities, inspired by our UC Chile and Lund partners, which began in 2015. Another new initiative is the Nature Positive Coalition (NPC), a U21 Grand Challenge Project, conceived in Zurich 2023 at a meeting of our research groups and explored as a feature earlier in this report (pp. 23–25). Developed by a group of U21 research leaders to implement and assess globally standardised methods for ecosystem restoration and biodiversity measurement, the NPC is building a head of steam with 12 partners engaged and will be seeking international funding in the next year. This is an exciting “first” initiative from the Research Leaders group, showing how the network’s huge research power can be leveraged.
We are also seeing a significant momentum in the establishment of Communities of Practice, self-managing coalitions created by members on a wide variety of topics, both professional and discipline based. A common factor across all these groups is a shared enthusiasm to learn from each other and develop leading-edge best practice, grounded in the trusted relationships developed within the network.
Building for the future
As the established global order continues to shift, networks are coming into their own as places where critical conversations can take place amongst trusted partners. We are increasingly seeing the value of the network in bringing its members together at our annual and combined cluster/senior leaders’ meetings to hold these conversations as we encounter the realities of geopolitics, challenging domestic politics, rising nationalism, budget cuts, the climate crisis, the advent of Gen AI and more.
Running a global network is quite different from the task of leading internationalisation in a single institution. Demands of contemporary compliance adds complexity to governance and management roles, bringing additional costs. Behind the scenes we have worked diligently over the last three years to strengthen our governance and compliance foundations. The highly skilled secretariat remains small and nimble, focused on delivering outcomes for its members. A recent investment in communications is strengthening the U21 profile across the network and beyond.
As budgets come under increasing pressure, universities seek value for their investment in networks. Strategic focus and clarity, active engagement of members, good governance and clear communications are essential ingredients for a successful network. At the end of 2025, the U21 network is in strong shape for the future. Finally, I have been immensely privileged to have served as Provost for the last five years. It has been a great joy to have visited all partner universities at least once and experienced first-hand the tremendous array of exceptional institutions that comprise our membership. My leadership as Provost has been very ably supported and enhanced by Jade Bressington and the U21 team; they are a great asset to our network.