Guayaquil, Ecuador, October 19, 2018 – The 80th Boards of Directors and the 38th General Assembly of the Inter-American Organization for Higher Education (IOHE) were held in Guayaquil, in Ecuador.
The convening of these two majors meetings was made possible thanks to the support of the Universidad Católica de Santiago de Guayaquil and its rector Lino Mauro Toscanini Segale whose hosting allowed IOHE members to work in the best conditions. Dr. Jamil Salmi facilitated various activities enabling members and IOHE leading authorities to draw on current trends in Higher Education to revisit the priorities under the 2017-2022 IOHE Strategic Plan.
A positive review of 2018
2018 has provided many Higher Education institutions (HEIs) from Latin American and Caribbean the opportunity to meet and take stock of a century of dreams and hard work dedicated to the improvement of higher education systems within all countries.
Although the Regional Conference for Latin America and the Caribbean (CRES 2018) succeeded in mobilizing a record number of participants in Cordoba last June and in developing an ambitious work plan that still have to be operationalized, this meeting also raised divergent views on the future of higher education in the Americas.
The coordination of efforts of players from all sectors must continue to be strengthened It is within this context that the relevance of the IOHE, focused on the future and motivated to forge links between all the regions, is much greater and continues to increase its impact and position itself as the only association that allows for the grouping of HEIs and their partners from several sectors from all countries of our great continent.
Second year of operations under the strategic plan IOHE 2017-2022
The IOHE continues to meet its commitments and involves its members and partners in various initiatives. Therefore, it continues to attract more and more members. This year, 22 new members joined the Organization.
In addition, the terms of three Regional Vice-Presidents, namely Brazil, Canada and the Caribbean, have come to an end this year and since April, their council has been renewed:
- A new vice-president for the Brazil Region (Universidade Mackenzie) was elected at the FAUBAI meeting last April;
- The Canada Region supported the re-election of the current Vice-President (University of Ottawa) for a second term;
- And the Caribbean Region maintained the Vice Presidency in the Dominican Republic and entrusted a first mandate to the rector of the l’Instituto Tecnológico de las Américas (ITLA).
Still positioning itself as a reflective and action-oriented Inter-American forum and as a strategic ally of HEIs, the IOHE has been involved in numerous strategic discussions with key partners including ILO-Cinterfor, NIEA, ICETEX, FLACSO, RECLA, FAP- ALCUE and IESALC-UNESCO.
“One of the most important impetuses in the coming years will be to grow this common space with the purpose of consolidating the legacy the IOHE has built in the Americas. We need to advance even more in the consolidation of synergies between the institutions that make up the Organization to build a space “without borders across the Americas” ”, said Dr. Óscar Garrido, president of the IOHE.
Solicited and dynamic programs
The IOHE Board of Directors met in April in Costa Rica and voted in favor of the creation of a new institutional program. Coming together every year since 2014, and having a permanent coordination committee since last year, the Inter-American Space for Higher Technical and Technological Education (EIESTEC) has therefore been formalized as the IOHE’s fifth program and hosted by ITLA, in the Dominican Republic, which also provides the staff for the executive management.
The five IOHE programs thus operate at full capacity. An overview of their main activities for 2018 as well as key highlights related to each of them are available in the Executive Director’s Report.
IOHE looking forward to CAIE-2019 Colombia
The sixth edition of the Conference of the Americas on International Education (CAIE) will be held in Bogota, Colombia, from October 23 to 25, 2019. Thanks to the joint efforts between the IOHE Secretariat, the CAIE Secretariat and our vice-presidency for the region of Colombia, a collaboration agreement was signed with the Association of Colombian Universities (ASCUN) last March and a first group of twenty universities are committed to support the project.
The arrival of the new Colombian government in August allowed the start ofnegotiations with the new government authorities and a mission to Colombia is scheduled for next week. CAIE representatives were also present at NAFSA and EAIE to promote and position the CAIE as the benchmark for a single platform at the continental level.
In this context, the call for proposals for CAIE-2019 will be launched on November 22nd during a first webinar and we invite all the IOHE member universities to check the CAIE website and submit their application, to ensure not only their presence at this event, but especially their participation in the academic program. Besides the CAIE’s visual identity has been redesigned since the Conference did not have a logo like other events of this nature.
“It is with great emotion that we held our meetings in Guayaquil, Ecuador, where I was confirmed in my role in 2015 by this same General Assembly during the CAIE-2015 in Quito. The IOHE remains more relevant than ever in its role of bringing together all the countries of the continent and all types of institutions. In this context, the CAIE-2019 in Bogota will be focused on innovation and multisector work. Theses reflections are most promising“says Dr. David Julien, Secretary General of the IOHE.