Pod Academy

In 2015, the UN's eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) - broad targets for eradicating poverty and disease and improving worldwide rates of primary education, maternal health and gender equality- will be replaced with newly agreed goals. The MDG approach was a new one for development policy, seeking to focus the attention and efforts of the international community on a clear set of shared targets - but inevitably there were criticisms that some crucial areas had been overlooked. One overlooked area was Higher Education. Now, as the world discusses what should replace the MDGs, the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU) is campaigning for recognition of the fundamental importance of Higher Education for development. A vibrant Higher Education sector is crucial for many reasons, as Jay Kuber of the ACU explains in this podcast.  Firstly, universities undertake research that can inform government policy making; secondly, through their teaching, they also produce the educated men and women needed