TIES PROFILE
In this section:
Mexico-U.S. University Ties Program Helps Develop
Jobs and Skills
Mexico-U.S. University Ties Program Helps Develop Jobs and
Skills
 |
|
The University of Notre Dame and the University of
Guadalajara are working with farmers to grow their businesses.
Irving Llamosas, University of Guadalajara
|
GUADALAJARA, Mexico—Rodrigo Zuloaga once made
salsa for his relatives and friends in his home kitchen. Today,
he runs a business that provides salsa to Wal-Mart and other
stores in Puerto Vallarta and Mexico City.
A hot recipe was only one ingredient to his success. Another
was USAID’s $50-million Training, Internships, Exchanges,
and Scholarships (TIES) Program. TIES, which started in 2001,
links U.S. and Mexican universities in finding innovative
solutions to development challenges.
Zuloaga was pursuing a business degree at Universidad Autónoma
de Guadalajara when the university—through TIES—linked
up with the University of Texas at San Antonio to create a
small business development center (SBDC) in Guadalajara.
Zuloaga started a business, Salsas Pita Valle, producing
about 500 jars of salsa and dressing per month. Then he got
involved with the first business development center, the Centro
Mexico Emprende SBDC in Guadalajara, and improved production
to 3,000 jars per month. In the process, Zuloaga learned how
to fulfill the requirements of the Mexican Food and Drug Administration
so his products could be sold in major supermarkets.
“Job creation in Mexico through home-growing local
businesses, greater diversification and formalization of the
economy, and two-way trade growth through linking small enterprises
from both our countries…are some of the key benefits
of establishing a network of university-based small business
development centers across Mexico,” said Robert McKinley,
associate vice president for economic development at University
of Texas-San Antonio.
The first center in Guadalajara helped 96 business owners
draw up business plans. The center’s success led to the
formation of a national network of 34 SBDCs throughout Mexico
and an SBDC association of entrepreneurs who lobby on behalf
of their interests.
The collaboration between the University of Texas-San Antonio
and Universidad Autónoma de Guadalajara is one of dozens
of partnerships between U.S. and Mexican higher education
institutions.
 |
|
Michigan Technological University and the University
of Sonora are training a core of water resource experts
to find solutions for Mexico’s water issues.
Alex Mayer, Michigan Technological University
|
TIES partnerships focus on small business support, energy
efficiency, environmental conservation, rural development,
technology transfer, and workforce training.
For students in the United States and Mexico, TIES also
supports degree programs in business and public administration,
which are backed by the business development centers network.
Also, TIES supports some permanent faculty exchanges between
the countries and plans to award scholarships to more than
750 students and professors in Mexico for U.S. study programs
in natural resources management, coastal management, and transborder
public administration.
Through the community college scholarships component of
TIES, more than 100 scholarships went to students from poor,
rural regions in southern and central Mexico, such as Chiapas,
Oaxaca, Michoacán, and Guerrero.
The first group of scholarship students and teachers who
studied in the United States in 2003 is returning to Mexico
this summer. They will apply newly acquired skills through
community service projects and job placement assistance.
Another 100 scholarships are in the process of being awarded.
Another link, between the University of Connecticut and
the Universidad Autónoma de Baja California (UABC),
is improving education in marine sciences and coastal management
at K–12 and postsecondary levels through student and
faculty training, exchanges, and joint research projects.
The partnership is also promoting collaborative research on
problems affecting coastal resources.
UABC is the only institution on the west coast of Mexico
with the ability to conduct required water and environmental
testing that meets the shellfish sanitation standards agreed
to last year between the U.S. Food and Drug Administration
and Mexico’s Health Department.
“I can now use the water analysis equipment with more
confidence, and [this] in turn allows me to teach my students
with more confidence,” said Edgardo Best Guzmán,
a participant in the Project Oceanology summer institute for
high school teachers. “My participation in this project
has [given me an awareness] of the importance of conserving
our environment and I am passing on these concerns to my students.”
A link between Lamar University and Texas A&M University
in Corpus Christi with the Instituto Technológico de
Saltillo is training Mexican students in modern technologies
of water treatment and helping spur Mexican innovations in
the area.
The project has conducted three short courses for 99 technical
students on advanced water treatment technologies in the towns
of Torreón and Saltillo. It also developed new electrocoagulation
technology that resulted in two Mexican patent applications.
Lamar University, in collaboration with Kaselco, a Texas-based
water treatment company, took the first mobile electrocoagulation
unit into Mexico with the cooperation of Ecolimpio, a Mexican
environmental waste management company in Saltillo. Ecolimpio
subsequently bought the unit, and Kaselco built a new improved
unit for the project. Ecolimpio and Kaselco signed an agreement
for Ecolimpio to market the technology in Mexico and Latin
America.
The initial goal of TIES was to sponsor 35 competitively
awarded university partnerships over seven years. But the
program has already exceeded expectations, and, in only its
third year, has created 46 partnerships.
Back to Top ^
|
