On January 31st 2022, Universidad de La Salle signed an agreement with Northwestern Michigan College for future collaborations in academics, research and study abroad programs. The partnership was established thanks to the joint project, "Bridging Waterways Across the Americas", financed by Partners of the Americas and ICETEX, an experience through which the academic communities of both institutions are integrated around a vital resource: water. The project will allow comparative environmental studies between the Teusacá Hydrographic Basin in Bogotá, Colombia, and the Boardman River Basin in Michigan, USA, in different phases: virtual learning, bi-directional international mobility, and the opportunity to interact with local communities.
The agreement, in addition to making the project possible and allowing the 12 students involved (6 Lasallians and 6 from NMC) to strengthen human and academic ties, lays the foundations for future collaborations in other fields of knowledge.
The partnership formalization event included other entities that made this institutional liason possible: the Embassy of the United States in Colombia, Partners of the Americas, the ICETEX Internationalization Office, the local communities Progresar Program The Great Teusacá River Basin and the Inland Seas Education Association.
When signing the agreement in the company of Dr. Constanza Hazelwood, Extension Coordinator of the Great Lakes Water Studies Institute - Northwestern Michigan College, our Provost, Bro. Niky Alexánder Murcia Suárez, conveys that "this exercise allows us to grow relationships, products and projects that will generate new, frontier knowledge. Along these lines, the university has worked hard to generate new areas of internationalization and propose opportunities to the different programs, in this case, interdisciplinary where we can dialogue with counterparts in other latitudes”.
