Successful Global Collaborations in Higher Education Institutions, 1st ed. 2020

This open access book presents deep investigation to the manifold topics pertaining to global university collaboration. It outlines the strategies King Abdulaziz University has employed to rise in global rankings, and the reasons chosen to collaborate with other academic and research institutes. The environment in which universities currently exist is considered, and subsequently how an innovative culture might be established and maintained to enable global partnerships to be implemented and to succeed is discussed. The book provides an intense focus on why collaboration is a necessary ingredient for knowledge transfer and explains how to do it. The last part of the book considers how to sustain partnerships. This is because one of the challenges of global partnerships is not just setting them up, but also sustaining them.

Prof. Abdulrahman Bin Obaid AI-Youbi is the President of King Abdulaziz University (KAU) since 2016 and a Professor of Chemistry at KAU since 2000. He earned a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from Essex University, UK in 1986. He is also the President of the International Advisory Board (IAB) of KAU since 2015. Throughout his career, Prof. AI-Youbi has been an active researcher in his specialization, a passionate teacher and an academic administrator. He has participated in many research projects and has published more than 150 papers in ranked scientific journals. He supervised many graduate students. He held some Academic Administrative posts such as Chairman of the Chemistry Department, Vice-Dean of Faculty of Science (1992 -1999) , Dean of Faculty of Science (1999-2002), Vice President (2002- 2009), Vice President for the Academic Affairs  (2009-2016), Acting President (2015-2016) (all at KAU), and Acting President of Jeddah University (2015-2016). As President of KAU, Prof. AI-Youbi has devoted his position to strengthening excellence in academics and research, with a dedication to developing an innovative culture. Through President AI-Youbi’s leadership, KAU has remained the top university, not only in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, but also in the Arab World. His current focus is expanding KAU lead, building on its long-standing strengths in education, research, entrepreneurship and the Kingdom Community Services.

President AI-Youbi participated in more than eighty committees, boards, teams and working

groups at the university level as well as at the Ministry of Education level. In particular, he participated in the committees that have established the new universities in the Kingdom, namely, Taiba University, Jazan University, Tabuk University, and the Northern Border University. He also attended many scientific conferences in the Kingdom and abroad.