The Impactportal was unveiled at the inaugural Made Impact Summit, held at the United Nations in New York on September 1, bringing together education leaders, policymakers and storytellers focused on strengthening the case for international education and exchange.
The partnership combines Studyportals’ reach and expertise in international higher education with Made Impact’s storytelling and movement-building capabilities.
The organisations said the Impactportal will provide a collaborative space to showcase the human, societal and economic impact of international education, student mobility and global talent.
Meanwhile, Studyportals CEO Edwin van Rest will join Made Impact as a co-founding leader of the initiative.
“International education changes lives every day, yet too often its impact remains invisible or difficult to quantify,” van Rest said.
International education changes lives every day, yet too often its impact remains invisible or difficult to quantify
Edwin van Rest, Studyportals
“Announcing this partnership at the United Nations reflects the scale of our ambition. Through the Impactportal, we want to bring together compelling stories and credible evidence from around the world, helping institutions, governments and communities better understand the profound value of international education.”
Chris Arnold, founder of Made Impact, said international education and exchange represented a long-term strategy for maximising human potential and supporting prosperity and peace.
“We want to build a sector-inclusive movement, and therefore partnering with a powerhouse in the education space, Studyportals, with a mission so aligned to ours, is a big win for us, and for the world,” he said.
The Impactportal will become a global repository of stories from universities, students, alumni and partners, enabling them to share experiences and demonstrate the broader effects of international education.
The initiative comes amid significant challenges for global international education as institutions across major markets grapple with compliance squeezes, anti-immigration rhetoric and questions about higher education’s relevance in an AI-driven world.
In response, the partners said the platform will seek to combine personal stories with evidence to build a stronger and more visible narrative around the value of international education.
Meanwhile, the summit followed a storyteller day on Ellis Island, where participants from across the international education sector explored how personal stories can help capture the impact of studying, working and living across cultures.
The two-day program brought together voices from different countries, careers and backgrounds, with discussions spanning human potential, prosperity and peace, as Made Impact works towards its ambition of collecting one million stories demonstrating the impact of international education and exchange.
The focus comes at a time when the sector is under growing pressure to articulate its value beyond student numbers and economic contribution, and to show the wider human impact of international experiences.
