ISLAMABAD: A three-day University of North Texas-NUML Partnership Culminating Conference marking the end of a 3.5 years collaboration in English Studies was held from 23rd to 25th of May, 2016 at the National University of Modern Languages (NUML), Islamabad. A number of sessions were held on various issues addressed mainly by the visiting scholars from the University of North Texas, USA. The inaugural session was presided over by the Director General NUML, BrigRiaz Ahmed Gondal, Registrar and Project Co-Director, Brig. Aminullah Khan, Dean, Faculty of English Studies (FES), Prof. Dr. SafeerAwan and the partnership’s UNT Project Director Prof. Dr. Masood Ashraf Raja.
The DG, NUML, highlighted the importance of research and spelled out the university’s Research Policy which included incentives in terms of selections for higher service grades and monetary benefits for faculty involved in research. The DG reiterated that it was the research done at universities that guided a country’s different policies.
The Dean (FES) thanked the UNT on behalf of NUML and hoped that more such fruitful partnerships would follow. He noted with satisfaction that 58 NUML MPhil-PhD research scholars visited the University of North Texas , America, whereas around 700 were trained during in-house sessions conducted at NUML main campus and 7 regional campuses.
The session’s concluding remarks were given by Project Director, Prof. Dr Masood Ashraf Raja. He made an impassionate plea for a humanistic view of the issues that Pakistan confronted. He was happy to point out that this partnership was able to break certain stereotypes found in both the American and the Pakistani societies regarding the other. The day’ s second session was conducted by Dr. Raja who presented the University of North Texas’ PhD admission policy. He invited NUML scholars to do their post-doctorate at UNT and offered his help in this regard.
