The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) launched the UNITWIN/UNESCO Chairs Program in 1992 with the aim of strengthening international cooperation between higher education institutions and programs through exchange and constitution of networks. Within this framework, the Polytechnic University of Madrid (UPM) and UNESCO signed, on November 9, 1999, an agreement for the creation of the UNESCO Chair of University Management and Policy of the UPM, based at the Higher Technical School of Mining Engineers of Madrid, and is the first that UNESCO dedicates to university policy.
In 2009, the UNESCO Chair of University Management and Policy at the UPM reached its first ten years of life, in which it has sought to establish itself as an interdisciplinary, critical, reflective, open and rigorous space for study, research and debate. on the main issues and problems of university management and policy.
He team led by Professor Francisco Michavila Pitarch - appointed jointly by the Polytechnic University of Madrid and UNESCO - works to achieve the following objectives:
Goals:
- To become a permanent center for study and advice on university management and policy problems to meet the demands directed to it.
- Promote reflections and debates on the present and future of university education and address issues such as: the social demands to which it must respond and its relationship with citizenship, employment, leisure, lifelong learning, etc.
- Act as a forum for debate on higher education.
Activities:
- Advice, direction and cooperation in studies proposed by Spanish or foreign entities, for the improvement of specific aspects of university education in their respective fields.
- Reflection and communication on reality and university prospects, publication of books, studies and articles in magazines, convocation and organization of seminars, workshops, conferences and meetings, dissemination of results obtained through computer media, etc.
- Cooperation and exchange of experiences and knowledge with different UNESCO Chairs of Higher Education, universities, research centers and entities related to university policy, for the progress of higher education in different regions of the world.
