Inter-American Organization for Higher Education

We appreciate the participation of our membership in the fourth edition of the MEIN Award, organized jointly with George Mason University (GMU). We received 38 experiences from 24 institutions in 8 countries of the Americas (Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Mexico and Panama).

The evaluation committee selected a total of 20 proposals that were invited to submit a full paper explaining the innovative practice and to present the experience before the international jury at the MEIN Award:

1. Universidad Nacional de Hurlingham (Argentina): Escuela Preuniversitaria de Formación Profesional: “Una práctica educativa innovadora que la Universidad genera para la inclusión de todos y todas”.
2. Universidad Nacional de Mar del Plata (Argentina): Cátedra Colaborativa, una experiencia educativa innovadora para la enseñanza en el campo de la psicología.
3. Universidad Privada Domingo Savio (Bolivia): Aprendizaje e Innovación Educativa la Nueva Cartografía Educativa de la UPDS.
4. Universidad Tecnológica Privada de Santa Cruz (Bolivia): Olimpiadas e9: Formación integral en sostenibilidad a través de actividades lúdicas extracurriculares.
5. Universidade Comunitária da Região de Chapecó – Unochapecó (Brasil): Experience-Based Learning (ExBL): A Pedagogical Innovation in course at UNOCHAPECÓ.
6. Universidade Federal Fluminense (Brasil): Minor in Global Challenges: Inequalities.
7. Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie (Brasil): Extension and social innovation in the classroom, practical experience of the Project IV component of the Design Course at Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie.
8. Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie (Brasil): (de)construct and occupy: reuse as a social aspect and propositional practice.
9. Universidade Presbiteriana Mackenzie (Brasil): Optional Subject: Site Practice: Experimentations.
10. Universidad Andrés Bello (Chile): eGlobal Co-teaching UNAB: Programa Online de certificación internacional en Co-docencia.
11. Universidad de La Frontera (Chile): Clínicas de Asistencia Ambiental de la Universidad de La Frontera: Modelo de Aprendizaje Situado para la Formación Integral de Profesionales.
12. Fundación Universitaria del Área Andina (Colombia): Políticas para la Replicabilidad de la Innovación Educativa por Medio del Modelo Pedagógico “Aula Al Parque”.
13. Universidad Tecnológica de Bolívar (Colombia): Aprendizaje Basado en Desafíos para la Formación de Emprendedores Innovadores: INNOVATON Colombia-Argentina.
14. Universidad Tecnológica de Bolívar (Colombia): Green Business Talks: Glocalizing green business: intercultural education for the entrepreneurship and sustainable development.
15. Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja (Ecuador): Acompañamiento pedagógico, una estrategia para vincular la teoría y la práctica de forma significativa.
16. Universidad Técnica Particular de Loja (Ecuador): Micromomentos pedagógicos: ¿cómo potenciar el aprendizaje colaborativo en programas de posgrado en línea?
17. Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla (México): BUAP modelo de aseguramiento de la calidad de programas educativos, inspiradora de transformaciones en la mejora continua de la educación superior.
18. Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla (México): Ecosistema de Aprendizaje Abierto.
19. Universidad de Guadalajara (México): Sinergia de la red Universitaria (CUCEA, CUCBA, CUSUR).
20. Universidad Metropolitana de Educación, Ciencia y Tecnología – UMECIT (Panamá): Implementación de Aula Invertida a nivel de educación superior enfocado en el aprendizaje basado en proyectos.

• Esperanza Román-Mendoza, Professor of Spanish, George Mason University – GMU (USA).
• Paulo Ivo Koehntopp, Executive director Associação Catarinense das Fundações Educacionais – ACAFE (Brasil).
• Katalina Perera, Academic Director Consejo Nacional de Rectores – CONARE (Costa Rica).
• Fernando Téllez, Dean – Facultad de Ciencias Administrativas Económicas y Financieras, Fundación Universitaria del Área Andina – FUAA (Colombia).
• Altagracia López F., Coordinator Centro de Innovación en Educación Superior, Instituto Tecnológico de Santo Domingo – INTEC (República Dominicana).
• Salvador Hernández Castro, Management and Development Secretary, Universidad de Guanajuato (México).
• María Mercedes Callejas Restrepo, Dean – Facultad de Ciencias Ambientales y de la Sostenibilidad; Directora de la Maestría en Educación Ambiental, Universidad de Ciencias Aplicadas y Ambientales – UDCA (Colombia).
• Marlene Gutiérrez Urzúa, Director Programa de Formación Fundamental, Universidad de Talca (Chile).

• The contest is open to all Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) that are members of the Inter-American Organization for Higher Education (IOHE)
• The educational innovation experience must be current at the time of submitting to the contest.
• The call will be made in two stages: the presentation of abstracts (Stage 1), in which a short list of experiences or projects will be selected whose authors will be invited to send the complete proposal (Stage 2) and present it in front of the international jury.
• The Jury will select the three best experiences or projects presented. Likewise, the Jury may award Honorable Mentions to those experiences that, due to their quality and impact, they consider relevant to the objectives of the Award.
• An electronic publication will be made with all the cases or experiences presented to the jury.
• Participation in the 4th edition of the MEIN Award has no registration cost for the participating HEIs.

The experiences will be evaluated taking into account the following criteria:

• Description of the experience
• Justification and Relevance
• Objectives
• Impact
• Innovation
• Relationship and contribution to the selected thematic axis of the call
• Learned lessons

The 4th edition of the MEIN Award will address the following thematic axes: Sustainability, scalability and replicability in innovation in higher education:

       Sustainability (leadership, policy)

• Overcome the barriers that prevent institutions from getting involved in sustainable innovative development efforts.
• Identify policies that support sustainable educational innovation.
• Strategies, at the individual or institutional level, to sustain innovative research-based projects after the initial funding period has ended.

       Scalability (infrastructure, investment, associations)

• Design considerations that enable effective implementation when innovative technology-based educational projects are scaling.
• Creation of associations and alliances that promote flexible and effective educational innovations.
• Appropriate financing and investment strategies for scalable educational projects.
• Impact of reward and recognition systems to drive scalable innovations.

       Replicability (design, content and ethical issues, impact)

• Strategies that support the use of open educational resources (OER), including studies on attitudes towards the creation and reuse of OER.
• Ethical aspects of digital innovation and its relevance when trying to replicate educational innovation in new contexts or on a large scale.
• Policies that promote the replicability of educational innovation at the unit, program and institution level.
• Designs that have included longitudinal impact data demonstrating successful replication.