This 5th Global Summit will bring together leaders in Student Affairs and Services from across the globe to engage in dialogue on key issues for our work in Higher Education. The summit will serve as a platform for critical discussion and deepening our community of practice that spans the globe, within an international framework and local relevance. There will be opportunities for focused work sessions in regions and times for us to meet as a group virtually. The planned schedule can be found at the registration page. The call for programs will follow in the next few weeks.
This summit’s overarching theme is the Alignment of Student Affairs and Services with Higher Education’s Goals of Social Justice. The topics will focus on four UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): Education, Gender Equality, Reduced Inequalities, and Climate Action, and the 5th focus is SAS in Covid-19 times: keeping the focus on social justice.
As with previous summits, we will produce a position paper, based on the inputs of all participants, that will be submitted for publication in regional publications, the University World News (UWN), and the UNESCO’s World Conference on Higher Education in October 2021.
The summit topics are the following:
- Advance, build and support partnerships, networks and common strategies around the advancement of UN SDGs Quality Education, Gender Equality, Reduced Inequalities and Climate Action across countries and regions;
- Covid-19: What are the common challenges and opportunities experienced by higher education, SAS practitioners and students across different countries and regions. This includes: financial challenges (public disinvestment, student debt, etc.), social challenges (social justice, socio-cultural contexts, etc.), sustainability, indigenous populations, refugees, diversity, and management challenges (upskilling, possible restructures, morale and technology fatigue, collaboration with allies, etc.), GBV and gender asymmetries;
- Covid-19: What kinds of competencies are required to meet the post-Covid-19 context, for SAS and higher education leadership and for practitioners;
- Draft, issue and publish a position paper and action plan, based on the Global Summit, that will advance our shared agenda around the achievement of social justice goals.
One of the goals of the Global Summit is to have many diverse voices from around the world and have wide geographic representation, hence we set a limit to the number of participants per country and region. You are invited to register for the Global Summit 2021. You will be responsible for a registration fee of $75 CAD. The 2021 Global Summit will be virtual with an on-site team of hosts at the University of Toronto. Please RSVP by March 1, 2021 to confirm your attendance. To learn more about this year’s summit please refer to this same website. For information on past Global Summits, please refer to the following website: http://iasas.global/former-summits/
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact Lisa Bardill Moscaritolo at enquiries@iasas.global or at lmoscaritolo@aus.edu. We look forward to your participation in the 2020/21 Global Summit on Student Affairs and Services.