As global higher education confronts shifting economic, demographic, and geopolitical pressures, America’s Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) and African higher-education institutions are reexamining the role of transatlantic partnership in advancing institutional sustainability and shared development. This paper presents findings from original quantitative and qualitative research exploring the perspectives of senior leaders across HBCUs and African institutions regarding contextual realities, sustainability priorities, and partnership possibilities.

Drawing on interviews, surveys, and institutional data collected between 2020 and 2025 from more than 150 educational leaders across over twenty African nations and the United States, the study identifies distinct yet interconnected thematic patterns. HBCU leaders emphasize mission-driven commitments to social justice alongside urgent concerns related to fiscal sustainability, enrollment stability, and curriculum relevance. African leaders highlight postcolonial institutional constraints, foundational educational gaps, labor-market alignment, and the persistent challenge of brain drain.

Across both contexts, transatlantic partnership is viewed as promising, but unevenly prioritized. Financial constraints, relational trust, and concerns about extractive or asymmetrical engagement emerge as central barriers, while student and faculty mobility, joint research, curriculum co-creation, and virtual exchange surface as valued models of collaboration.
The analysis argues that sustainable HBCU–Africa partnership depends on moving beyond symbolic connection toward reciprocal, co-designed institutional strategies grounded in equity, human-capital development, and shared knowledge production. In doing so, the study positions transatlantic collaboration as a future-oriented framework for strengthening global higher education and advancing inclusive educational development.

Authors:
Kelisha Graves, Virginia State University, United States

About the Presenter(s)
Dr. Kelisha B. Graves, Assistant Professor of Education, Virginia State University. Interests: educational leadership, history/philosophy of education, and global comparative education. Current work: international higher education partnerships and educational development.

Connect on Linkedin
https://www.linkedin.com/in/kelisha-graves/

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