On 5 September 2024, Fan Xianrui, a member of the Party Committee and vice president of the Open University of China (OUC), attended the Annual Conference of the China-Africa Consortium of Universities Exchange Mechanism.

At this event, the OUC, Donghua University, and the Open University of Kenya (OUK) signed a trilateral cooperation memorandum of understanding (MOU) to jointly establish the Kenya Open Learning Centre (Future Academy) and the Regional Cooperation Centre for China-Africa Digital Education.

The signing ceremony was chaired by Guan Peijun, vice president of the China Association of Higher Education and former full-time vice-ministerial level member of the National Ethnic Affairs Commission of the People’s Republic of China. Representing their respective institutions, Fan Xianrui, vice president of the OUC; Chen Ge, vice president of Donghua University; and Prof. Caroline Omulando, deputy vice chancellor of the OUK, officially signed the MOU. All parties expressed strong anticipation and confidence in their collaboration. In the future, they are committed to developing both the Kenya Open Learning Centre (Future Academy) and the Regional Cooperation Centre for China-Africa Digital Education into exemplary models of Sino-African educational cooperation, actively contributing to the joint promotion of modernisation and the establishment of a high-level China-Africa community with a shared future.

The establishment of the Kenya Open Learning Centre (Future Academy) signifies a further optimisation of the OUC's strategic plan for overseas learning centres in Africa. It also marks an increase in the pace of construction and innovations in cooperation models, accelerating the university’s international development initiatives. In the future, the three parties will fully utilise digital technologies and capitalise on their individual strengths to develop both degree and non-degree educational programmes. This initiative aims to cultivate urgently needed diverse talented people across the African region and ensure the successful implementation of related projects.

By College of International Education, OUC