ANUIES and the Promotion of International Cooperation

The National Association of Universities and Higher Education Institutions of the Mexican Republic (ANUIES) is a non-profit organization that groups the country’s 211 most important public and private higher education institutions (HEIs). These institutions, located in the country’s 32 states, serve almost 65 percent of the national enrollment and conduct 90 percent of the country’s scientific research.

Since its creation in 1950, ANUIES has worked with federal education authorities and has been continuously promoting significant changes that higher education requires for its development and growth. During this time, ANUIES has represented the interests of its member institutions before different government levels and agencies. It has conceived and implemented relevant projects, without which it would hard to explain the progress of higher education in our country over the last seven decades.

Regarding academic cooperation, ANUIES’ Institutional Development Plan 2030 establishes as its second strategic objective “To increase academic linkage and exchange among associated institutions to contribute to regional and national development.” This triggers a very intense internationalization agenda with the purpose of integrating an international, global, and intercultural dimension in the aims, functions, and structures of the associated institutions, through the generation and consolidation of collaboration programs that favor the transfer of knowledge, the training of human resources, and the creation of research networks, both nationally and internationally.

The internationalization agenda has included the design and implementation of mobility programs; the development of academic meetings in Mexico and abroad on topics of common interest, such as the Rector’s Summits; the signing of macro and specific collaboration agreements for the benefit of our partner institutions; the diversification of our strategic partners, as well as the publication of academic documents on the internationalization of higher education. This agenda has also included the generation of regional and international alliances through consortia, government initiatives, and networks such as the Latin American and Caribbean Higher Education Area (ENLACES, Spanish acronym); the Ibero-American University Council (CUIB); the French-Mexican University House (MUFRAMEX); the Global University Associations Forum; OBREAL Global; the University of California-Mexico Alliance; and the Technical Council of the University of California, Mexico; and the Technical Council for Knowledge and Innovation (COTECI) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. These alliances seek to promote initiatives to strengthen higher education and internationalization, the regional integration of Latin American and the Caribbean, and the development and consensus of regional positioning documents such as the one presented at the UNESCO World Conference on Higher Education, held in Barcelona, Spain, in May 2022.

ACADEMIC INTERCHANGE PROGRAMS PROMOTED BY ANUIES
Latin American Academic Exchange Program
This program, known as PILA from its Spanish initials, formally began in the second semester of 2018, based on pre-existent bilateral programs between ANUIES, the Colombian Association of Universities (ASCUN), and the National Interuniversity Council (CIN) of Argentina, which decided to form a strategic alliance. The purpose is to promote the exchange of undergraduate and graduate students, as well as academic, research, and administrative personnel from the participating universities and higher education institutions, to enrich their academic, professional, and comprehensive training, as well as to promote the internationalization of higher education and to strengthen the internationalization of higher education.

Exchange residences are last one semester for students, up to 30 days for researchers and academics, and up to 15 days for administrative officers. PILA operates under the principle of reciprocity whereby all host higher education institutions provide housing and board grants to the students, academics, researchers, and officers they receive.

In August 2020, due to the health emergency caused by COVID-19 and the impossibility of face-to-face exchanges, a new participation modality was offered to incorporate virtual exchange among the participating universities: PILAVirtual. Due to the success of this modality, in March 2021, membership was expanded through ENLACES to include university associations and councils of rectors from Chile, Cuba, Nicaragua, Brazil, Uruguay, and Paraguay. PILAVirtual is currently a consortium of nine countries in Latin America and the Caribbean with 255 educational institutions (all the information is available on the microsite www.programapila.lat).

PILAVirtual is managed through a platform developed by the CIN, where participating institutions upload their offer of courses available for academic exchange. Unlike the face-to-face modality, where the student must take all the subjects in one institution, in PILAVirtual, students can take subjects offered by different educational institutions in different countries.

Table 1. Subjects offered in the PILAVirtual program

Country	Subjects offered					Total
	2020-2	2021-1	2021-2	2022-1	2022-2
Argentina	195	817	2125	886	343	4366
Colombia	538	1883	5539	2440	655	11 055
Mexico	456	1434	4037	1884	585	8396
Brasil			185	23	72	280
Cuba			4	0	11	15
Nicaragua			20	10	32	62
Uruguay			63	16	4	83
Paraguay					8	8
Total	1189	4134	11973	5259	1710	24 265

Elaborated by the autor with data from the PILAVirtual management system. Chile is part of the program but its HEIs have not yet offered subjects.

Since 2020, 24,265 subjects have been offered in all areas of knowledge. The subjects available have the instructional design to be taught in virtual mode synchronously or asynchronously. All participating students have a tutor at the host university who supports them during their exchange. At the end of the semester, students receive an academic certificate with their grades, similar to what they would receive if it was a face-to-face mobility.

Another benefit of PILAVirtual is that all institutions in the consortium can postulate students, even if they have not offered virtual courses, since unlike the original mobility program, PILAVirtual does not operate under the principle of reciprocity, allowing more students to participate in these international experiences from home.

Concerning the face-to-face modality, in the first semester of 2022, mobilities were resumed, and participation was extended to new countries and institutions of the consortium. Since its launch in 2018, PILA has enabled the mobility of 2,204 students and 914 academics, researchers, and university officers who received housing and board grants at the host institution. For season 2023-1,656 grants will be offered (table 2).

Table 2. Housing and board scholarships to be offered in season 2023-1

Country	Undergraduate students	Graduate  students	Academics	Researchers	Managers	Total
Argentina	136	8	31	19	19	213
Mexico	124	6	23	24	11	188
Colombia	142	13	30	19	20	224
Brasil	12	13	0	0	0	25
Uruguay	4	0	0	0	0	4
Paraguay	2	0	0	0	0	2
Total	420	40	84	62	50	656

Elaborated by the autor with data from mobility schemes.

We expect that in the coming years, PILA will incorporate more countries and HEIs from Latin America and the Caribbean.

Interinstitutional Program for Academic Cooperation
This program, known as PROCAI from its Spanish initials, aims to promote linkages, collaboration, research, and the exchange of students, academics, researchers, and officers among HEIs associated to ANUIES. The program follows the General Agreement of Collaboration and National Academic Exchange signed by ANUIES and its member institutions in 1989.

PROCAI operates under a collaboration scheme where participating institutions waive enrollment and tuition fees for students who undertake mobility stays under its coverage. Exchange residences last one semester for students, 15 to 90 days for academics and researchers, and seven to 15 days for university officers. Currently, 56 partner institutions are participating.

Mobility Programs with the Embassy of the United States
Since 2015, ANUIES and the U. S. Embassy in Mexico, in collaboration with the University of New Mexico, have promoted the Seminar on Identity and Community Leadership so that Mexican students belonging to indigenous groups, outstanding for their academic performance, extracurricular activities and leadership both in their HEIs and in their communities, can carry out a summer residence at the University of New Mexico.

The Seminar program lets students approach the structure and processes of the U. S. federal government, including those of state, tribal, and local governments. Students may also gain knowledge on community leadership and its impact on government decisions through sessions focused on community identities and the development of leaders within.

The Seminar is financed from donations by the U. S. Embassy to cover the students’ airfare, housing, and food. The call for applications is published annually in March, and selected students travel to New Mexico in July.

Other programs developed through the alliance with the U. S. Embassy are the Professional Internship Programs for officers of the international affairs offices in collaboration with the State University of New York; the Summer Research Program with the University of Texas at Dallas; and the Summer course Global Risks: Biodiversity, Security and Governance in Latin America offered by the Stanford University and the Autonomous Technological Institute of Mexico.

CAPACITY BUILDING PROGRAMS
Answering a request from the Central American Higher University Council (CSUCA), ANUIES, together with OBREAL Global and its South American Chapter, developed a program to support curriculum internationalization aimed at universities associated with CSUCA, and intending to generate actions to strengthen institutional capacity building in two areas considered as priorities: the use of virtuality in the region’s academic offer, and the development of curriculum internationalization actions.

The program was designed in three phases: the first consisted of making up two focus groups of officers from the international offices and the academic and educational innovation areas to learn about the needs of Central American universities concerning internationalization. The second phase consisted of webinars where best practices from Mexico, Argentina, and Spain on curriculum internationalization were shared.

The third and last phase consisted of a workshop given by ANUIES, the Veracruzana University (Mexico), and the Catholic University of Colombia, aimed at sensitizing and training Central American university managers in the design and operation of a program for Collaborative Online International Learning (COIL) based on the institutional internationalization policies of HEIs and focusing on the process of curriculum internationalization.

In the long term, there are plans to implement a virtual training workshop for teachers to provide them with the competencies and skills to incorporate the international dimension in subjects they teach and to identify international peers to implement courses using the COIL methodology.

In addition, ANUIES provides support and accompaniment to member institutions to fulfill their international programs.

OTHER INITIATIVES TO PROMOTE INTERNATIONALIZATION
With the purpose to achieve reliable information that contributes to the internationalization of Mexican higher education, ANUIES develops various initiatives and publications, such as the Student Mobility in Higher Education in Mexico Report (formerly known as Patlani), with statistics on incoming and outgoing mobility by school year; the Digital Repository for the Internationalization of Higher Education in Mexico, which provides information on current international agreements between member institutions and foreign universities (available at https://repositoriointernacional.anuies.mx/), and the Higher Education System Guide for Embassies and Consulates.

FINAL THOUGHTS
ANUIES will continue developing new international cooperation programs and actions, and expanding the list of our international partners to benefit our member institutions in the Mexican educational system.

We know there are still significant challenges in the way to making these opportunities available for more students and professors. However, developing innovative collaboration programs and incorporating digital platforms in internationalization strategies will allow us to increase the chances and the number of beneficiaries.

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