US university to open campus in Mexico, making history

Mexico’s higher education institutions serve more than 2.5 million students, which is about 30% of the university age population. According to ICEF Monitor, by 2020 the government hopes to expand the figure to 50%.

Many others study abroad – there were more than 14,000 Mexican international students in the United States last year – but this number could decline, thanks to a new branch campus of an American university being built in the country.

On 20 February, more than 2,000 leaders in government, education and business gathered to celebrate the planned construction of a new Arkansas State University campus in Mexico.

The event was funded by the Association for the Advancement of Mexican Education, or AIEM, which said it had acquired property for the new development near Queretaro that will also include commercial, residential and recreational components.

AIEM is a formally registered non-profit body involved in all operations necessary to support Arkansas State University’s plans in Mexico: it will finance and build the campus, ensuring that the American university will have no liabilities in the country.

Expected to be open for classes in 2015, the new campus will incorporate the Arkansas State brand and logo as well as the university’s curriculum. Teaching will be in English by faculty approved by Arkansas State.

The first phase of academic space will accommodate up to 5,000 students, with a goal of 1,000 students in the first year.

At the event celebrating the occasion, Queretaro Governor Jose Calzada Rovirosa said this would be the first campus ever of a public US university in Mexico, and was a major milestone.

“This is an example of what we can achieve together, the United States and Mexico, when we combine forces regarding the most valuable things we have: our youth, the future, the progress of the nation,” he said.

Arkansas State University Chancellor Tim Hudson described it as a “historic day for Arkansas State”.
“This will benefit our students and faculty who participate in the project, and create leaders who have an empathetic understanding of different cultures, who are comfortable working in a global environment.”

Looking outwards

For the past few years, Mexican public and private colleges have been forming alliances around the world to provide joint programmes, dual certification and exchanges for students and professors.

Private institutions now churn out 33% of all degrees in Mexico, compared with 14% in 1970, according to INEGI, Mexico's statistics agency.

In May last year, US President Barack Obama and Mexican President Pena Nieto announced the formation of a Bilateral Forum on Higher Education, Innovation and Research.

Through the forum the two governments will encourage broader access to quality post-secondary education for traditionally under-served demographic groups, especially in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields.

They will also expand educational exchanges, increase joint research on education and learning, and share best practices in higher education and innovation.

The two countries have a long history of educational collaboration, says the US Department of State in a release. Each year, more than 18,000 Mexican and US university students study in each other’s countries.

The Mexico-US Commission for Educational and Cultural Exchange oversees the Fulbright-Garcia Robles Scholarship Program, the flagship programme in US-Mexico academic exchanges, through which more than 4,000 Mexicans and Americans have participated in bilateral exchange programmes since 1990.