The MSc in Environmental Partnership Management (EPM) aims to build the capacity of graduates to create, manage and deliver partnerships for sustainability.
Partnerships are a major feature of local and global environmental and social governance, and were recently included as a specific objective in the 2016 UN Sustainable Development Goals.
EPM debuted in September 2015 with students from the UK, France, Germany, Nigeria and Hong Kong. A feature of the EPM course is to experience partnerships in practice and the course includes field trips to experience real partnerships as they occur across a range of areas and issues. Recent trips have included visiting community forestry and local economic development initiatives, decision making in local government and coastal management sites.
In addition to field trips, the MSc Partnership Project aims to provide a practical and challenging experience for graduates to apply the knowledge and skills they have developed in partnership research and analysis, management, promotion, negotiation and working with stakeholders. MSc students can be placed in a government, private or community organisaiton to pursue a project; create their own entrepreneurial partnership or undertake a traditional academic dissertation on partnership practice. The current students will be placed in organisations such as DEFRA (UK Government); Scottish Government; Aberdeen Council; and the East Grampian Coastal Partnership.
Projects could include, but are not limited to, conducting a small piece of research; reviewing the performance of a partnership; writing partnership plans and strategies; identifying and enacting reforms; or running and evaluating workshops or campaigns. Graduates can be employed as partnership managers in a variety of contexts including local and national government, the community sector and the private sector. In addition, many opportunities exist for eco-entrepreneurs to establish partnership initiatives for the green economy and drive social and economic change for sustainable development.
For more information on the EPM MSc, see the programme details.