Loh’s India trip with O’Malley may lead to more partnerships

In just six days, university President Wallace Loh and a team of university officials visited eight Indian universities hoping to increase collaboration and create more opportunities abroad for students — and many said the trip was more successful than they had anticipated.

Gov. Martin O'Malley led the 100-person delegation Loh traveled with last week to foster a more globally connected institution and increase both the university's and the state's relationship with India. Loh met with the vice chancellor — the equivalent of a university president — of Delhi University and said the pair agreed to collaborate on innovation and entrepreneurship projects. Additionally, officials from the University of Hyderabad agreed to meet for a conference next year to discuss research endeavors, which may relate to cybersecurity, Loh said.

"There's global mobility of the most talented faculty and students — they just move around the world now," Loh said. "We've begun determining what specific projects we will work on together, and those of course have yet to be defined, but we have this mutual commitment to do this."

Several university officials traveled with Loh, including Vice President for Research Patrick O'Shea, business school Dean Anand Anandalingam, Interim Undergraduate Studies Associate Director James Massey, computer science professor Ashok Agrawala and Office of Technology Commercialization Executive Director Varma Gayatri.

To increase access to educational opportunities at this university, Agrawala — who teaches a computer science class at this university that Indian students can take via video conferencing — said he will expand this offering to more institutions in India.

"We have the strength and the ties, and we want to expose students here to different cultures and figure out how they can benefit from that," he said. "The collaboration we currently have is already on solid footing, so it's just a question now of joint research and what activities we can get started on, and in more areas."

Massey, who visited multiple Indian high schools and universities, said while recruitment efforts were highly successful, additional steps must be taken to connect this university's students with India's top students.

"From the undergraduate admissions perspective, the next step is to build upon these relationships," he said. "Keeping the momentum going is always a challenge, continuing to maintain their interest, but the fact that we took the first step of being able to meet with them is a step for success in the future."

Although Loh initially declined O'Malley's invitation, he said after about 20 Indian university presidents visited this university in October, he felt inclined to go and explore possible opportunities. Loh said after meeting numerous higher education officials, he realized this university's future as an international powerhouse depends on its global partnerships.

"If you were to ask me what is the one lesson I learned, what was the one big insight I gained from this trip, it's that we are involved in a global brain race, meaning we are involved in collaborating with and competing for the most talented minds in the world," Loh said. "An American university that's going to be local and focus on its own little area is going to be behind in this world."

Over the summer, Loh and O'Malley visited China — where the university already has well-established relationships, university and state officials said — and O'Malley estimated the trip, which cost taxpayers $164,000, netted $85 million in business deals, according to The Baltimore Sun. Since O'Malley is the first sitting Maryland governor to visit the country, officials said one of the trip's main purposes was to create results similar to those of the China trip.

"This was an opportunity for us to create those connections and create those ties, even laying the groundwork for future governors, so overall it was an extreme success," said Raquel Guillory, an O'Malley spokesperson. "This is not a one-time trip with the hope that they remember us; we have to nurture those relationships and continue to build on them."

abutaleb@umdbk.com