Final, GDN SAQA 2025 Annual Meeting, Full Colour
GDN Annual Meeting Registration
Sponsorship Opportunities
Convening Call to Action
Oct 19 Decolonizing Recognition Preconference event

Help Create a Network of Networks
Oct 20 – 22, 2026

The GDN Network is pleased to co-host the GDN Annual Meeting in Cape Town, South Africa with the South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA). Our organizations are bringing together stakeholder representatives from over 100 organisations who participate in the GDN Network and gather at the GDN Annual Meeting to share, learn and lead discussions on developing capabilities, policies and technical platforms to improve data exchange and credential portability in support of citizen and learner mobility

Join us at the Cape Town International Convention Center (CTICC2) located in the heart of Cape Town for the Annual Meeting.
 
Ahead of the Annual Meeting, we also invite you to Decolonizing Recognition: Ubuntu — Stronger Together, a GDN Pre-Conference Event taking place on October 19, 2026, from 12:00 PM–4:00 PM at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT) in Cape Town. In partnership with Instructure, the South African Department of Science, Technology and Innovation (DSTI), the Open Recognition Alliance (ORA), and SAQA, this intimate half-day gathering will explore how recognition can become more inclusive, relational, and community-centered.

Featured Speakers

Mr. Divine Edem Kwadzodeh

Secretary General, All-Africa Students Union

Prof. Payal Arora

Professor & Founder, Utrecht University/ Inclusive AI Lab

Tom Wambeke

UN senior executive and Chief of Learning Innovation, ITCLIO

Dr. Keiko Ikeda

Professor and Vice-Director Institute for Innovative Global Education, Kansai University

Mrs Nadia Starr

Chief Executive Officer, South African Qualifications Authority

Dr. Weixing Cheng

Deputy Director-General Center for Student Services and Development, Ministry of Education, P.R. China (CSSD)
Meet Our SpeakersView Full Program

Sponsors

About our Co-hosts

SAQA-LOGO

The South African Qualifications Authority (SAQA) is the oversight body of the NQF and the custodian of its values and quality character. The role of SAQA, as stipulated in the NQF Act, is to advance the objectives of the NQF, oversee the further development and implementation of the NQF, and co-ordinate the Sub-Frameworks. SAQA’s functions are set out in section 13 of the NQF Act.

Final, GDN-Global-Alliance-Logo

The GDN Network is an international, non-profit federated trust located in the Netherlands. It represents a voluntary network of like-minded organizations and individuals that seek to make digital student data portability happen. Its network of thought leaders from around the globe are collaborators who seek to support, advise, and offer innovative changes in the ways we share artifacts of academic learning. The GDN Network seeks common ground in best serving the academic and professional mobility needs of citizens worldwide by bringing together stakeholders in the digital student data ecosystem. It seeks to develop and support best practices and globally accepted standards for safe and citizen-oriented convenings and information exchanges. 

Location

Join us at the Cape Town International Convention Center (CTICC2), located in the heart of Cape Town, for the Annual Meeting

CTICC 2:
Corner of Heerengracht & Rua Bartholomeu Dias,
Foreshore, Cape Town, 8001, South Africa