The details of the arrangement were developed by Karel Frana, associate dean of Mechanical Engineering in Liberec, Calin Stoicoiu, program coordinator of Conestoga's Mechanical Systems Engineering program and Tony Martinek, former dean of Conestoga's School of Engineering Technology. Martinek was honoured by TUL this past October with an Honorary Doctorate in recognition of his work in the development of international exchange opportunities for students.
The exchange agreement with TUL builds on the Transatlantic Exchange Partnership project from the years 2008 - 2011, which linked three Canadian and three EU universities and polytechnics. Conestoga and TUL served as the Canadian and EU project coordinators for that project, through which seven Conestoga engineering students studied and worked in Germany, France and the Czech Republic, while seven engineering students from TUL spent up to eight months at Conestoga, the University of Waterloo and the Southern Alberta Institute of Technology in Calgary.
The academic exchange program is one of a number of cooperative project activities that were developed by Tony Martinek and Rob Evans of Canada's Technology Triangle in response to the visit of seven Czech scientists and engineering managers to Waterloo Region this past spring.