San José, Costa Rica, April 27 2018 – The 79th Board of Directors of the Inter-American Organization for Higher Education (IOHE), in San José, Costa Rica, gathered today the regional vice-presidents of the IOHE and the Executive Director of the organisation. The Steering Committee, formed, for the occasion, of the Regional Executive Directors and program directors (IGLU, COLAM, CAMPUS, EMULIES), preceded this meeting of the decision making body of the IOHE.
The convening of the 79th Board of Directors was made possible thanks to the support of the Universidad Técnica Nacional and its president Marcelo Prieto as well as the support of the Consejo Nacional de Rectores (CONARE) whose hosting allowed the Board to work in the best conditions.
These two days were, in fact, an opportunity to review the successes of the previous year, especially the success of the 2017 edition of the CAIE, which took place in Montreal last October. But above all, they served as a reminder of the main areas of work of the 2017-2022 Strategic Plan and to set forth the IOHE projects for the coming year.
It is within this lively context that Dr. José Armando Tavares, President of the Instituto Tecnológico de las Américas (ITLA), proposed the creation of a new program to the members of the Board of Directors of the IOHE : the Inter-American space for Technical and Technological Higher Education (EIESTEC).
“The EIESTEC was launched in 2014 by the IOHE and after a series of four annual meetings, mobilizing the key players in this sector, the arrival of a permanent program within our organization and of a permanent executive directorate, allowing closer follow-up of its activities, will strengthen our actions for this important group within our members,” said Dr. David Julien, Executive Director of the IOHE.
The EIESTEC is a collaborative program that aims to strengthen training, research and innovation in Technical and Technological Institutions (TTI) in the Americas. With a full-time executive directorate, this program will foster the training of a new generation of technicians, while promoting a space that will bring together TTI actors and exchanging best practices, actions and institutional experiences. The EIESTEC will also reinforce the integration and the internationalization of all the higher education institutions (HEIs). This new program, which will enrich the IOHE training offered, has been approved by all Board Members and will be hosted at ITLA, in Boca Chica, Dominican Republic.
Within this effort, the 5th EIESTEC meeting will be held on November 15 and 16, 2018, in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic and we invite all interested parties to contact [email protected] for more information.