This axis is referred to in the plural, the futures, because there is not only one, but different trajectories that higher education can follow in the coming years and all of them depend on a careful analysis of history, of contemporary trends, as well as a collective effort of imagination and political action. In this sense, this is a transversal axis to all the others, fulfilling a task of dialogue with each of them, as well as a synthesis of their analyses and proposals. On the other hand, it is also a space for opening up to ideas that have not been raised or are less visible, to emerging themes and to possibilities for the future that remain to be invented.

This axis is made up of two complementary subgroups: 12.1 – The futures of higher education in Latin America and the Caribbean and 12.2 – The futures of higher education in the Caribbean, a division that does not seek to separate, but to add. Considering the singularities of the island region, especially the differences in national language between it and continental Latin America, the CRES have been less present on the horizon of the debates and collective construction of higher education in the Caribbean. In order to overcome this gap and build a rapprochement between Latin America and the Caribbean that goes beyond the denomination, the two subgroups have among their responsibilities to build analyses and proposals for the future capable of underlining the common without erasing the specific, and to build bridges of cooperation in higher education more effective than the barriers and borders that are found along the way.

These are some of the themes guiding the reflections of axis 12:

• Higher education and the future of democracy in our region.
• Towards a better articulation of HE with the rest of the regional education system.
• Redefining the understanding and forms of quality assessment in HE.
• The role of internationalization in regional integration.
• HE in the face of the technological revolution.
• Present and future generations: what young people say about the future of higher education.
• Higher education beyond academic mobility, its relationship with labor mobility.
• Higher education provision for migrants and internally displaced persons and the role of private educational institutions and extraterritorial populations.
• The challenge of privatization of higher education and the need to differentiate between different models of private institutions.

Specialists of Axis 12.1: Amanda Harumy, Executive Secretary of the Latin American and Caribbean Continental Organization of Students (OCLAE); Director of International Relations of ANPG, Brazil; Soraya Smaili, Professor of the Department of Pharmacology of the Paulista School of Medicine of UNIFESP and Francisco Tamarit, Professor at the National University of Cordoba, Argentina and General Coordinator of the Third CRES (2018).

Specialists of Axis 12.2: Cheryl Gibson, Academic Tutor at the Open Campus of the University of the West Indies, Barbados; Dameon Black, Executive Director of the Tertiary Education Commission of Jamaica; Dhana Lazarus, Accreditation Officer of the National Accreditation Council of Grenada; Mercedes González Fernández-Larrea, Professor at the University of Havana, Cuba.

AXIS 12 DOCUMENTS