York International and the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization Chair in Reorienting Education Towards Sustainability cordially invite Filipino scholars to attend this year’s Sustainable and Inclusive International Virtual Conference happening on January 20-22, in partnership with the International Association of Universities (IAU), Canadian Commission for UNESCO (CCU) and Okayama University (Japan).

This conference aims “to bring together students, scholars, international mobility professionals and practitioners, policymakers, sustainability experts, and other stakeholders to discuss the evolving status of international mobility in higher education in Canada and globally, critically reflect on where we are now, and to collectively build a future vision of international mobility that is inclusive, innovative, and responsive to the global, sustainability challenges of our times.”

Topics to be discussed in the program will zero in on three main themes – sustainability, inclusivity, and innovation.

Francisco Marmalejo (Education Advisor, Qatar Foundation and Former Global Lead of Tertiary Education, World Bank), Hans De Wit (Professor Emeritus and Distinguished Fellow, Lynch School of Education and Human Development at Boston College), and Lorna Jean Edmonds (former Vice Provost of Global Affairs, Ohio University) will spearhead the first plenary session on the 20^th titled ‘Mobility in Higher Education: A New Vision, Pressures, and Opportunities for Enhanced Programs.”

Meanwhile, on the 21^st and 22^nd, Plenary 2 (Student and Professional Mobility 2030 and Beyond: Transferability of Degrees, Credit Transfer, Refugees, and Immigrants) and Plenary 3 (The Futures of Education) will be managed by the groups of Ethel Valenzuela (Director, Southeast Asian Ministers of Education Organization Secretariat (SEAMES)), Sjur Bergan (Head of Education Department, Council of Europe), and Liette Vasseur (President, Canadian Commission for UNESCO and UNESCO Chair on Community Sustainability: From Local to Global at Brock University) and Dzulkifli bin Abdul Razak (Rector and Past President of the International Association of Universities, International Islamic University Malaysia), Larissa Bezo (President and Chief Executive Officer, Canadian Bureau for International Education CBIE), and Noah Sobe (Senior Project Officer, UNESCO) respectively.

In addition, the 2021 Conference also aims to bring together mobility experts and coordinators responsible for international services and exchange programs, as well as experts in Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) and Global Citizenship Education (GCED) with policymakers and other practitioners and to develop a Toronto 2021 York Declaration on responsible mobility in higher education: while recognizing the importance of international student and research mobility, higher education carries a responsibility to understand their impact in contexts of addressing both globalization and sustainability.

To contribute to the future of international education and sustainability in a new era of global uncertainties (post-COVID-19), to bring forward international mobility discussions beyond student exchange to include innovative and inclusive global learning models and pedagogies, and to develop a strategy for ongoing networking and sharing in research and capacity building within the field that will extend well beyond the Conference are its goals, too.

For interested participants, you may log-in your credentials via https://yorku.moveonca.com/form/5faaf306050331052c752923/eng. The deadline of conference registration is on January 15, 2021.

For more info, you may email any of the following: Wessen Rawazik – Project Officer for York International ([email protected]), Helen Balderama – York International Associate Director, International Partnerships and Programs ([email protected]), Katrin Kohl – Executive Coordinator to the UNESCO Chair in Reorienting Education Towards Sustainability ([email protected]), or Marierose Talla – York International Go Global Projects Assistant ([email protected]).

You may also visit its official website at https://yorkinternational.yorku.ca/sustainable-on-the-go-conference/.