Creative Spark Partnership Fund

The partnership is between People 1st International, the Arts and Cultural Development Fund of Uzbekistan, the Silk Road International University in Samarkand and Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh.  

The main focus of the collaboration is to strengthen public/private partnership; and enhance the quality of the enterprise skills required in creative, cultural and tourism education.  

The main aims of the project: 

• To deliver professional development to University lecturers and to strengthen business engagement and international partnership opportunities by working alongside initiatives focused on cultural heritage and tourism development. 
• To exchange of enterprise knowledge between UK and Uzbekistan; a stronger research base provided through the QMU Academic Fellowship; English language ability; strengthening of family businesses; and improved gender equality. 
• To focus on value-added creative products and services, eco-tourism and the social and cultural impacts of tourism for the benefit of graduates.  

The strands and expected outputs: 

1. Co-creation of curricula that is relevant and of high quality; 

Output - Professional Development package for tourism professionals that builds capacity within industry and education, supports public/private partnership and aids HE institutional development 

2. Partnership with industry to ensure youth opportunities and healthy enterprise 

Output – Business solutions supported through an ‘innovation hub’ 

3. Support for macro level education and learning policy that ensures an integrated approach to enterprise skills.   

Output – Quality standards for the design and delivery of enterprise skills.

The project is a collaboration between two UK and two Uzbek partners - London South Bank University (LSBU), ChangeSchool London, Tashkent State Technical University in the name of Islam Karimov (TSTU), National Institute for Fine Art and Design (NIFAD). 

The collaboration mainly focuses on enabling partner HEIs to: 

• Develop stronger in country leadership in promoting and nurturing entrepreneurial activities in their institutions for their students 
• Develop their strategy and plan for their institutions to become entrepreneurial universities 

The aims of the project are: 

• To develop new entrepreneurship content at TSTU and NIFAD 
• To upskill Enterprise Champions from both TSTU and NIFAD to support the development of entrepreneurial hubs at both universities 
• To support enhanced hub for entrepreneurship at TSTU, and to provide a focus within the university 
• To enhance students’ enterprise and entrepreneurship skills, with increased awareness of the opportunities available through creating their own business 
• To increase academic staff skills and knowledge as entrepreneurship educators 
• To create deeper collaboration between UK and Uzbek partners to support longer term exchange of ideas and activities. 
• To maintain engagement between project team and other Creative Spark partners in Uzbekistan: participate in the national policy dialogue on creative entrepreneurship and creative education. 

The expected results of the collaboration: 

• The engagement with 60 students at TSTU and NIFAD to develop business ideas and teams: support 10 ideas to a pre-accelerator programme 
• The development of business incubation and mentoring skills among four identified creative entrepreneurship champions (two each from TSTU and NIFAD)  
• The engagement of staff at NIFAD with Goldsmiths. 

The partnership between University of Central Lancashire (UCLan), and Tashkent Institute of Textile and Light Industry (TITLI), is a knowledge transfer collaboration between two modern Universities based in the United Kingdom and Uzbekistan. 

The main focus of the collaboration is to create a new wave of textile and design entrepreneurs both in Uzbekistan and the UK.   

The aims of the project:  

• To develop existing curriculum frameworks for Textile, Design and Promotion 
• To create a sustainable enterprise centre in Uzbekistan to facilitate industry-led projects delivered by students 
• To enhance of student experiences of global partnership through collaborative design briefs 
• To identify research and knowledge transfer funding programmes to sustain the partnership 

The expected outputs of the project 

A summary of key activities during the first year of the collaboration include: 

• Institutional staff exchange visits (UK and Uzbekistan) 
• Review of academic curriculums  
• Identifying models of centres to deliver enterprise between education and industry 
• Delivering of an Uzbek student ideation workshop for industry facilitated by UCLan 
• Mentorship and coaching to support 10 entries for Big Idea Challenge (student pitching competition) 
• Co-creating business engagement activities for year 2 of Creative Spark Partnership 
• Sharing English learning tools with partners and beneficiaries 

The collaboration between University of Leicester, UK, the Academy of Public Administration under the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan (APA) and Tashkent University of Information Technology (TUIT) was launched in 2019.  

The project focuses on the development and delivery of a series of innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship workshops among undergraduate and postgraduate higher education students in Uzbekistan. 

The main aims of the collaboration: 

• Developing and piloting innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship workshops at APA and TUIT, and subsequently diffusing these workshop activities more widely within Uzbekistan through the partnership. 
• Building and deepening the relationship between the project partners to support the longer term sustainability of innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship workshops and courses delivered within and through APA and TUIT. 
• Encouraging the continued two-way exchange of ideas, knowledge and experience of innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship teaching practices, tools and techniques between colleagues within the project partner institutions.  
• Developing the entrepreneurial skills of higher education students within Uzbekistan, with the ultimate aim of equipping and inspiring them to innovate and to establish entrepreneurial ventures.  

The expected outputs of the project 

In year one of the project: 

• Designing and piloting a series of innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship workshops to 50 HE students based in Tashkent and support these students to work in teams to develop a business idea and business plan to launch that idea. 
• Designing and piloting a series of innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship podcasts to an additional 100 students. 
• Working with innovation, creativity and entrepreneurship champions within APA and TUIT to refine the pilot workshops, transferring the relevant workshop skills and knowledge, and seeking to embed and diffuse the workshops within the local partner institutions, both within Tashkent and the regions. 

The collaboration between Goldsmiths University of London, Uzbekistan State Institute of Art and Culture, Bonum Factum Gallery and Arts and Culture Development Foundation and the National Institute for Fine Art and Design.  

The project focuses on three key areas: 

• Developing in partnership a module on Creative Entrepreneurship that draws on content and methodology from the UK, from Goldsmiths and independent UK Creative Industry organisations leading to a subject textbook.
• Using this module to educate staff and students in the potential of Creative Entrepreneurship as both an academic subject within the Creative Industries and as a practical tool for start-up for creative businesses. 
• Developing with partners the advocacy skills to promote Creative Entrepreneurship within Universities and at state level. This is also part of the larger agenda to argue for greater governance autonomy for Uzbekistan Universities. 

The expected outputs of the collaboration:  

• Developing a new university module in Entrepreneurship that fits with the Uzbekistan economy 
• Creating a series of short courses in Entrepreneurship for all staff and students 
• Organising an annual ‘exhibition’ for new creative businesses 
• Designing materials and evolving resources on Creative Entrepreneurship.  
• Widening partner universities’ teaching capacity to include entrepreneurs and practitioners as specialist teachers. 
• Strengthening the existing partnership through evolving activity, both formal and informal. 
• Developing all partners capacity to be advocates of Entrepreneurial Education in university, local and national arenas.  
• Engaging with the evolving agenda of Creative Central Asia 

The results that have been achieved so far: 

• Undertook over 12 independent activities, workshops, seminars, international visits and online engagement, over the last two years. 
• The first draft of an Entrepreneurship Module and potential programme has been developed and translated. 

This partnership links London Metropolitan University with three partner institutions in Uzbekistan: the Ministry of Public Education, the Ministry of Innovative Development and Tashkent State University of Economics (TSUE). Its aim is to introduce young people and students to the creative industries and promote enterprise skills throughout their educational path.

The focus of the collaboration is sharing knowledge and experience with the Uzbek partners as well as empowering them to locally grow enterprise education and promote entrepreneurship mindset. 

The main aims of the collaboration:

• To support the creation of entrepreneurship related content for TSUE’s curriculum 
• To educate students and academic staff about the basic principles of entrepreneurship and their application  
• To disseminate entrepreneurial mindset amongst academic staff to inspire their students and beneficiaries 
• To support the growth of local enterprise education through ongoing support from UK experts and ideas exchange 
• To plan the creation of a centre of excellence to further develop innovation and enterprise in Uzbekistan 

The expected outputs of the collaboration:

• Creating and delivering a new entrepreneurship module in TSUE 
• Delivering a remote introduction to Entrepreneurship course for the partnership and the wider Creative Spark community – this activity also served as a preparation for the Creative Spark Big Idea Challenge and involved an audience of nearly 700 beneficiaries across the 7 programme’s countries and beyond