A roundtable on the achievements and future collaboration of the Bilateral Forum on Higher Education, Innovation and Research (FOBESII) was held this Tuesday. It was organized by the Foreign Ministry and the U.S. State Department.
The roundtable was chaired by the Mexican Ambassador to the United States, Gerónimo Gutiérrez, and Deputy Assistant Secretary for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Mara Tekach. The U.S. ambassador to Mexico, Roberta Jacobson, delivered a recorded video message to the audience.
Over 50 representatives from academic institutions and research centers attended, as did public and private sector officials from both countries. The participants discussed FOBESII’s achievements since its launch in 2014. They also discussed actions for the forum to take in the future.
The Institute of International Education (IIE), and the American Council on Education (ACE) together with Santander Universities/Universia Mexico, presented their respective reports on academic mobility between Mexico and the United States since the creation of FOBESII.
Among the forum’s main achievements are the signing of more than 115 collaboration agreements between higher education institutions in Mexico and the United States; more than 101,000 exchanges by Mexican students and academics registered with Proyecta 100,000 and a 26% increase in the number of US students in higher education in Mexico from 3,730 to 4,712.
In addition, joint projects and programs in innovation and research were implemented by the National Council of Science and Technology (CONACYT) and the National Science Foundation (NSF), and the Large Millimeter Telescope and HAWC Gamma-Ray Observatory were both built in the Sierra Negra of Puebla. For more information on these and more FOBESII achievements, see: https://goo.gl/27ZTKk
The Wilson Center’s Mexico Institute will publish a report with the roundtable’s results and recommendations in the coming weeks, in order to strengthen and continue the forum’s work.
The Mexican government will look forward to receiving the results in order to continue its commitment to encourage more academic mobility and academic exchanges between our countries as a way of giving impetus to a better understanding between our societies.