Franco-American collaborations: Fulbright delegation hosted at IMT Atlantique

Since its inception in 1946 at the suggestion of the eponymous U.S. Senator J. William Fulbright, the Fulbright program has been the U.S. government's flagship program for international academic mobility. Thanks to Fulbright funding, more than 380,000 recipients from 160 countries have been able to study or do research in another country. The Franco-American Commission is one of the bilateral commissions in the world responsible for administering the Fulbright Program between the U.S. and other countries. Martine Roussel, executive president of Fulbright France and Charlotte Goodwin, in charge of the American programs, led the delegation hosted by IMT Atlantique.

A dozen American universities at IMT Atlantique

Representatives of Boston University, Central Washington University, Florida Atlantic University, GeorgiaTech, University of Houston, The Ohio State University, Sam Houston State University, Lone Star College System, University of California Santa Cruz and the University of Montana all came to France to better understand the organization of the institutions they met, to further internationalize their universities, and to explore the mechanisms of research and partnerships with industry. They expressed their desire to increase the number of doctoral student exchanges and joint research projects, while developing student mobility, including through dual degrees.

Open campuses, international training, cutting-edge research...

Many of these universities share the same concerns as IMT Atlantique in terms of the openness of their campuses, international training, cutting-edge research, etc. They discovered IMT Atlantique's Technological University model, which depends on the Ministry of Industry, and in particular IMT Atlantique's expertise in cybersecurity with a mapping of its strengths on the three campuses. The research conducted by the SUBATECH laboratory was also illustrated by the presentation of the XEMIS and KM3Net experiments. The universities were very interested in the institution's innovative approach: Its ability to participate, federate or initiate an ecosystem from the research work on cutting-edge themes (energy, digital and environmental transitions, health and the factory of the future...) of its laboratories to the recognition by its industrial partners (through industrial chairs, the mechanism of CIFRE theses that represent 25% of the doctoral students, the creation of industrial laboratories up to the alumni network...) and its role in incubation and regional development with the creation of the jobs borne by the 300 incubated startups.

First partner in terms of co-publications

The United States is IMT Atlantique's leading research partner in terms of co-publications produced by its faculty members. And the institution already offers exchange opportunities to its students with GeorgiaTech, University of California San Diego and University of California Irvine. These meetings were an opportunity to explore the possibility of further expanding its catalog of destinations for transfer credits and double degrees with the United States. In this respect, the institutions present in the delegation, such as GeorgiaTech, Boston University, University of Houston, Ohio State University, University of California Santa Cruz, etc., offer attractive destinations with interesting engineering programs.