The University of Tirana (UT) was founded in 1957 and is still the main university in the country, also in the research area. The University seeks to increase the capacity and experience in Education for Susainability.

The University includes eight faculties, such as humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, economics and medicine and it offers graduate and undergraduate programs. At present, its staff consists of more than 700 teachers and its student body of more than 20 000 students. Since 1992, after the fall of the communist regime, the University of Tirana has started an ongoing process of cooperation, through signing memorandums of support and understanding with many foreign universities, in the Western Balkan, Southeast Europe, Western Europe. The programs have undergone through a new study structure, since the beginning of the implementation of the objectives of the Bologna process, after the ratification of the Bologna Declaration in 2003. UT is committed to be reformed in: curricula adaptation, quality evaluation, financial autonomy, mobility, governance reform including student activities.

Centre of Excellence for Behaviour and Social Change Communication is attached to Faculty of Social Sciences approved by University of Tirana and Ministry of Education. The aim of the Centre of Excellence is promotion of research in social sciences field in Albania. According to the aim Centre of Excellence is focused on:

• Developing and implementing programs of strategic communication that affects the social policies and their sustainability, collective and individual behaviour.
• Raising the access of scientific information, improving the level of knowledge and the capacity building of state institutions and non-governmental structures.
• Developing social research that provide scientific knowledge to assist program designing, impact evaluation, test different theories in the field of social change communication.

Communication for Behaviour and Social Change Program is an approach that is affiliated to universities to assist societies facing different problems of development. The sustainable development is one of those issues not addressed properly academic spheres, institutions and society. Effective Communication in communities and societies integrate specific socio-ecologic context, including proper environments, social services delivery systems, men and women, individuals and families.

The activities of the Centre of Excellence are based on three main pillars:

• Interdisciplinary Master of Science on SBCC;
• Designing and offering accredited training courses for individuals, groups or institutions on SBCC;
• Enforcing and widening the research component focused on SBCC as part of Centre of Excellence.

The collaboration of Centre of Excellence with universities, institutions, in local, regional and international level is realized through agreements of collaboration on different projects, teaching activities and mobility activities for students.

Role of UT in the project:

• Coordinate the mapping exercise in Albania and complete the template
• Assist in the development of an online platform of resources as well as get familiarised and review the online tool.
• Translate project materials into the national language.
• Contribute to the bi-annual newsletters.
• Provide feedback to the Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) framework.
• Contribute to the dissemination and exploitation of the project outputs, outcomes and future network activities.
• Participate and actively contribute to the discussions generated in regional and annual meetings, seminars and conference.

Operational and financial management:

• The project team will coordinate the above administrative and academic project activities.
• Financial administration will be handled by project team who will liaise internally with the institution’s finance department.