• Within the framework of the seventh Congress of the Americas on International Education (CAEI), the Inter-University Institute for Educational Research (IESED-Chile) coordinated the conference “Information in higher education from the perspective of educational policies”.

Within the framework of the seventh Congress of the Americas on Education International (CAEI), and with the purpose of reflecting on the upcoming challenges for Chilean State Universities and learning about the Canadian education system, particularly in Quebec City, the Inter-University Institute of Educational Research (IESED-Chile) , organized the conference “Information in higher education from the perspective of educational policies”.

The event also sought to open a discussion on the importance of information for the improvement of educational processes, from the perspective of public policies, regional reality, and academic management.

El Director Ejecutivo del Instituto y académico de la ULagos, Dr. Daniel López Stefoni -who moderated the forum, thanked the IOHE on behalf of IESED-Chile “for giving us the opportunity to hold this academic forum to discuss a topic of great relevance for higher education in our country”.

He recalled that the Institute’s main purposes are research and advanced training in education and that it currently has more than 70 researchers “for the development of collaborative activities between state universities in terms of publications, mainstream, books, scientific meetings, and postdoctoral training,” he said.

He also said that “from 2022, through a thematic project in education, a group of state universities belonging to IESED-Chile, along with reaffirming these commitments of activities, will develop the first consortium doctorate”.

Panelists

The first panelist, Maryse Lassonde, President of the Conseil supérieur de l’éducation du Québec, Canada, described the work of the Council she leads and detailed aspects of the Quebec City education system.

She also highlighted the collaboration agreement signed with IESED-Chile, underlining the common interests of both institutions, including teacher training, educational practices, evaluation, educational policy, governance of schools and universities, quality of educational offerings, and research and higher education.

“We remain open to developing new collaborations with our international partners, as needed. We hope that our exchanges will lead to fruitful collaboration,” she said.

For her part, the Executive Director of the Consortium of State Universities of Chile (CUECH) Alejandra Contreras, referred to the system and the projects of the networks that for several years have been formed by the state universities:

“They are projects that allow us to have concrete results and to advance in the improvement of each institution and in the construction of this system of state universities”. Among them, he specified that the main axes are to build an identity ethos; coordinate student mobility actions; and generate an information system of the system’s actors. We hope to contribute to the state universities so that they, in their management, can follow this path of advanced analysis,” she said.

Finally, she stated that “the newest project, which will start next year, has to do with strengthening the public value of state universities in their relationship with the environment, that is, how universities support the improvement of the quality of life in the territories and the regional public ecosystem”.

The day closed with the round tables “Information needs on the formative processes of higher education in Latin America”, and “National Survey of Student Engagement (ENCE), placing the student experience at the center of university education”.