IAPM Participated in the ICEF Latin American Seminar

15 Жовтня 2009 09:32

 

The first ever Latin American ICEF (International Consultants for Education and Fairs) Seminar devoted to educational services was held September 30 to October 2 in the largest Brazilian city of Sao Paulo. The Interregional Academy of Personnel Management was also represented at this workshop by George V. Shchokin, IAPM Supervisory Board Chairman, and Ihor S. Piliayev, Provost for International Relations – Director General of the International Open University.

-- Mr. Piliayev, tell us, please, about this Seminar.

ICEF is the largest global company headquartered in Bonn (Federal Republic of Germany)and specialized in providing information and conducting international events in the field of educational services. The main task of the Latin American Seminar was to bring together educational establishments of various regions of the world and Latin American agency firms involved in enrolling students from all over Latin America, who wish to study abroad.

We are aware that Latin America is rather geared to the developed countries of Western Europe, North America, Japan, and Australia; however, the Ukrainian market of educational services represents a very interesting prospect for Latin American students, therefore, we took part in this Seminar. Around 80 educational institutions were represented there, in particular those from Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Spain, New Zealand, Great Britain, and the USA. Over 100 agency companies from around Latin America were among the participants in this event -- from Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Salvador, Guatemala, and other countries.

-- What was the purpose of this Seminar?

The overriding purpose of this Latin American regional seminar on educational services was to bring in contact the educational establishments concerned and agency companies in order for them to enter into appropriate contracts aimed at enrolling students with different educational levels, i.e., starting with high-school, language courses leavers and up to the master’s degree and higher educational levels.

-- You, most likely, made long preparations for this journey.

Yes, this Seminar was preceded by serious preliminary work, that is, we had updated our promotional and information material, in particular, the video about the Academy in English and Spanish. We brought to the exhibition our commemorative brochures issued in English and Ukrainian on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Academy. I would like to note that we took to the Seminar equipment to show our demonstration material to agents.

Long before the start of the Seminar, we had begun active communication traffic with our prospective partners through the special communication network of ICEF, which had organized this Seminar, distributed presentation information about the Academy and specific offers for cooperation. These offers concerned two main areas: first, we hold an interest in inviting as many Latin American students as possible, sc., we seek to expand geographical representation of students from Latin America at the IAPM and to raise their skills, educational level, find the most efficient forms and mechanisms of cooperation; second, we have a project to set up an IAPM’s open education centers in the Latin American region involving leading-edge Internet-based technologies, satellite-aided equipment, application of up-to-the-minute forms of extramural and distance education, to create opportunities for Latin American students in their countries making it possible for them to get education according to the Ukrainian standards, all the more so, as there is a quite numerous Ukrainian community in Latin America. On a conservative estimate, Brazil alone has about 350,000 ethnic Ukrainians. There were several emigration waves from Ukraine and some data prove that their number reaches in fact half a million.

-- Did you have any substantial talks with heads of educational establishments or agencies?

Yes, we held discourse with Deputy Chair of the Ukrainian community in Brazil Mr. Jorge Rybka, who resides in Sao Paulo. We discussed topical issues related to meeting the educational needs of ethnic Ukrainians residing in the territory of Brazil. The Ukrainian community’s representative emphasized their interest in receiving education based on the Ukrainian standards.

During the Seminar, we also had talks with representatives of a number of agency companies from Brazil, Peru, Guatemala, Salvador, Mexico, Chile, and Colombia. These were professional agents specialized in recruiting Latin American students to study abroad, as well as working in other areas of education, including the innovative one; in particular, we handed them over our proposals as to the prospects for opening of IAPM’s open education centers.

In addition to the negotiations with agents, we had an interesting conversation with a representative of the Saint Ignatius Loyola University from the Peruvian capital Lima, as well as talked over opportunities to establish an IAPM’s open education center.

Furthermore, we met with a representative of a college of the city of Dunajvaros (Hungary), who also arrived to participate in the Seminar, and discussed opportunities for cooperation. This college is a private higher education institution. Lately, they got an offing to train bachelors and now are about to consider our proposal for cooperation in training of masters.

-- Did the Latin American negotiators show any interest in cooperation? What did they appreciate in the Academy as in the potential partner?

Most of our partners stressed during the talks the high competitiveness of the conditions the Academy offered for Latin American students, in particular, the opportunities concerning training infrastructure. Indeed, the Academy disposes of an integral complex of educational buildings, dormitories, an information-library and food complexes; it renders cultural, sporting services, ensures 24-hour guarding. Above all, the Academy guarantees high educational standards in conformity with the European requirements, since Ukraine joined in 2005 the Bologna Convention, which provides for creation of a common higher education area in Europe involving other regions of the world as well. Our partners stressed that the Academy’s training and accommodation price offers are very competitive as compared with the offers coming from other regions of the world.

-- What did you discover for yourself in the course of this Seminar?

It should be noted that during the Seminar we heard several presentations, lectures as to the working specifics in the Latin American and, more specifically, Brazilian markets of educational services. We noticed that in Latin America there is a considerable shortage of information on Ukraine and on the entire post-Soviet area in general. In particular, I was amazed when the president of one of the leading Brazilian associations engaged in the sphere of educational services demonstrated the geographical structure of the student cohort studying abroad. Even so remote regions as China, Japan, New Zealand, and Australia were on the list, while neither the CIS region, nor Ukraine were represented, although many Latin American students traditionally studied as far back as in the Soviet times and still study in independent Ukraine. For example, students from Peru, Ecuador are studying at the IAPM under the bachelor and master degree programs; therefore, we immediately noticed this problem and now are aware that the shortage of information on Ukraine really exists. I give accent to the fact that we were the only delegation from an educational establishment not only from Ukraine, but also from the entire former Soviet Union at this authoritative event attended by more than 80 academic institutions from across the world.

We will carry further, more detailed and substantial, negotiations with those partners, who took an interest in cooperation. In sum, we discovered the Latin American region and, due to our participation in this Seminar, have now a solid base of professional agents with whom we will cooperate in all Latin American countries. The Seminar was organized at a high level, in an efficient manner, and we managed to perform a heavy workload over the two days we spent in Sao Paulo.

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