The Canadian Bureau for International Education consists of 150 institutions for education in Canada that are part of the development of the strategy for international education in the country and that allowed the mobility of more than 35 thousand students, professionals and academics. One of the priorities in Chile was the partnership with the UFRO.

The Chilean Council for University Rectors (CRUCH), the Canadian embassy and Temuco Univerciudad (“Univercity”) were the hosts of a delegation composed of representatives of eight Canadian universities and technical institutes who are members of the Canadian Bureau for International Education (CBIE). Within their tight agenda in Chile, and within the strategy of international education in Canada, they also visited the Universidad de La Frontera.

The purpose of this visit was to generate new exploratory actions in their fields of interest and development with Chilean universities. For Dr. Pamela Leal, the director of the International Affairs Office of the Universidad de La Frontera, this is an important fact. “CRUCH asked us to organize a space for networking and to be the host of the delegation that includes prestigious universities and technical institutes from Canada. At this moment, the UFRO has several cooperation and mobility agreements with Canadian establishments, but there are also others with whom we are establishing initial approaches,” Dr. Leal said during the work sessions.

The Canadian Bureau for International Education consists of 150 institutions for education in Canada – universities ranked among the top 100 by OECD, such as the McMaster University, one of the establishments with the best development and innovation in research, with a leverage of 325 million dollars per year; or other prestigious universities, such as the Queens University, the Université De Moncton, the Polytechnique Montréal, and the Durham College, that are all part of this bureau for the promotion of international education in the country.

Priscila López, the coordinator of Academic Affairs at the Canadian Embassy in Chile, explained that the mission of CBIE regarding Chilean educational institutions is to “create new cooperation networks in different fields in order to promote applied research and student mobility among teachers and students. The delegation was positively surprised by the level of the Chilean universities and also by the initiatives regarding technical education in our country,” Lopez said about the CBIE that promotes the Emerging Leaders in the Americas Program (ELAP) for scholarships to study at universities of excellence in Canada each year.

In this regard, Karen Dalkie, the director of International Partnerships of the CBIE, said that the bureau is interested in “exploring the cooperation possibilities with Chilean universities (…). Such as the agreement between the McMaster University and the Universidad de La Frontera in the field of medicine, regarding which we spoke with the rector, Dr. Hebel, about the possibility of doing indigenous studies, which is a very developed topic in Canada regarding good practices and assessment,” said the representative of the Canadian Bureau for International Education. Besides the UFRO, the CBIE also has existing agreements with other important Chilean universities in Valparaiso and Santiago de Chile.