International headquarters at Université de Montréal

At the end of its first colloquium, the International Forum of Public Universities (IFPU) has adopted an action plan geared to increase exchanges and partnerships between the 21 member universities.

“Teaching and research can no longer be accommodated within a strictly national context,” explained Luc Vinet, rector of the Université de Montréal, which hosted the inaugural colloquium. “The meetings we held during the colloquium allowed us to determine the challenges facing public universities and the actions we have to embrace if we want to continue to fulfil our role in the development of society, in the context of internationalization.”

In their working sessions, representatives of the IFPU member universities agreed to fit the forum’s actions within a broader policy framework in order to defend the role of public universities on the basis of their defining values.

They also agreed on the importance of promoting the distinctive and innovative aspects of the forum in university communities in order to mobilize the resources needed for new kinds of joint teaching and research activities.

These activities could take the form of international summer or winter schools, international camps, international humanitarian commitments, international doctoral schools, new research partnerships or joint graduate programs related to the priority development focus of member universities. The institutions will also be encouraged to create associations for students from the countries represented in the forum.

The next official IFPU meeting will be held in Europe in 2008. As the seat of the network’s international headquarters, the Université de Montréal will coordinate its exchanges and activities.

About the International Forum of Public Universities
The IFPU grew out of a series of meetings begun by the Université de Montréal in 2004 in celebration of the 125th anniversary of its founding and a seminar held at  the Brussels Free University in 2005. The 21 member universities plan to take part in the creation of new models of collaboration on education, teaching and research. The network’s permanent secretariat is located at the Université de Montréal. A description of the member universities is available online at fiup.umontreal.ca.
The member universities are:

ARGENTINA: Universidad de Buenos Aires
BELGIUM: Brussels Free University
BRAZIL: Universidade de São Paulo
BURKINA FASO: Université de Ouagadougou (associate member)
CANADA: Université de Montréal
CHILE: Universidad de Chile
CHINA: Beijing University
CHINA: Nankai University
CZECH REPUBLIC: Univerzita Karlova v Praze
FRANCE: Université Sorbonne Nouvelle – Paris III
GERMANY: Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg
HAITI: Université d’État d’Haïti (associate member)
INDIA: Jawaharlal Nehru University
ITALY: Università di Bologna
JAPAN: Nagoya University
MEXICO: Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
MOROCCO, Université Mohammed V – Agdal
ROMANIA: Universitatea din Bucuresti
RUSSIA: Lomonosov State Moscow University
SENEGAL: Université Cheikh Anta Diop
SPAIN: Universitat de Barcelona
SWITZERLAND: Université de Genève
UNITED STATES: University of California