Nino Dvalidze

Nino Dvalidze is the Vice-Rector of Ilia State University since June 2014 and together with the Rector, she is overseeing the overall institutional advancement strategy and supporting activities at ISU. Under her capacity, Nino Dvalidze is directing activities for development, foreign relations & internationalization, innovation and entrepreneurship. As the Head of the Office of Development and Foreign Relations at ISU between 2010-2014, she helped to draw the core development strategy of the university and in support of the essential goals for university advancement, she expanded and generated financial support from various donors, stakeholders, and industry partners for key university development projects in different areas. She did substantial work in the direction of institutional development, outreach, strategic initiatives, and fundraising at ISU. Under her leadership, the office team broadened the university’s international reach and raised the profile of ISU schools and departments that resulted in greatly enhanced internal collaboration across academic disciplines, ISU schools and administrative units and international cooperation with HEIs in Europe and the United States, improved donor records and relations attracting funding for more than 50 national and international projects. It was with her and her team’s initiative that Ilia State University has obtained memberships and established partnerships with a number of organizations, networks, higher education institutions and research centers worldwide.
She has been a higher education professional and top manager over 8 years. She joined the dynamic and creative team of higher education professionals in a newly rebranded university – Ilia State in 2009. During this time, she has initiated, developed, and pioneered several institutional development ideas and projects, including social responsibility and innovation and entrepreneurship projects at the University (Iliauni Science Picnic/Maker Faire, Child Development Institute, Young Explorer’s Club Network, Science Café, FabLab Iliauni, Gamelab Iliauni, Technology Commercialization Office (TCO), Zoomout pre-accelerator, etc.). Her responsibilities and career goal to look into the future under my current capacity is to design and launch comprehensive third mission of the university and build up an entrepreneurial and innovative university ecosystem through various new initiatives and upgrade the existing ones for continuous improvement. Her research and professional interests are linked with innovation and entrepreneurship education and institutional ecosystem building. These themes are part of her doctoral dissertation that is focused on the development of the entrepreneurial role of universities in the transition countries – case of Georgia.