As the Brazilian association for international education, FAUBAI, wrapped up its 38th annual conference, the organisation’s president, José Celso Freire Júnior, shared his goals for Brazil to move from getting involved in global education to setting the program.
This year’s conference theme, Internationalisation for a multipolar world, is main to Freire’s vision for Brazilian global education, which he stated was “well put to be a bridge between different areas in the North and South”.
“Since of the quality of our education and our connections with Africa and Latin America … We can help to construct this new multipolar world,” Freire informed The PIE News.
He highlighted almost all large Brazilian research-intensive universities had links in Africa, which Brazil’s strong ties with other BRICS nations and countries across the Lusophone world made it well positioned to develop new opportunities for global cooperation.
However this will need “changing the significance of cooperation”, stated Freire: “For Brazilian institutions, movement should be a lot more than simply sending students abroad”.
Across the conference, speakers stressed the waning dominance of the traditional ‘big 4’ research study locations, hailing in a new period of the ‘big fourteen’.
This comes as demand for a global education continues to rise, with total international students anticipated to strike 8.5 million by end of the years.
And while leaders are eager to capitalise on the minute, Freire stated Brazil’s “branding problem” implied few outside the region learnt about the scale of the country’s research-intensive universities or what funding they can provide to international talent.
For Brazilian organizations, mobility should be much more than simply sending trainees abroad
José Celso Freire Júnior, FAUBAI
“It’s so uncommon in the higher education landscape that most [international] students do not know they can study in Brazil totally free of charge,” said Freire: “And on top of that, postgraduate students can receive scholarships from both public and private institutions.”
Freire highlighted FAUBAI’s increased involvement with worldwide associations such as NAFSA, EIEA and APAIE, where Brazil was working “to reveal more individuals that Brazil can be an [education] location” and tackle the awareness concern.
While language barriers stay a key concern in Brazil’s internationalisation strategy, FAUBAI has actually developed a tool linking potential trainees with Brazilian organizations offering programs and internships in English, German, Spanish and French– which Freire hopes will “open the door” to Brazilian chances.
And while reasonably couple of universities have built specific internationalisation strategies, Freire said “things are changing”, through nationwide initiatives such as the CAPES program, under which more than 100 organizations need to establish a international strategy.
Together with Brazil’s increased global focus, leaders at the conference stressed the nation’s dedication to inclusivity — the driving factor in structure fair partnerships abroad while also supporting domestic students at public high schools gain access to Brazilian organizations.
“Mobility needs to be more sustainable and better linked to wider institutional goals,” stated Freire, who heads up the internationalisation technique at UNESP– one of Brazil’s largest public universities found in Sao Paolo.
With 99% of UNESP’s global strategy funded by federal and state companies, he emphasised the problem of handling budget plans. “We have 50,000 trainees … We can not discuss inclusion if we are just sending a small number of trainees abroad,” he stated.
But Freire highlighted other international chances available for institutions to develop, including the co-supervision of researchers, joint research study projects and virtual exchange programs.
What’s more, he said Brazilians comprehended the value of internationalisation in the house initiatives — a principle that emerged on several events throughout the conference.