Identify the challenges faced by units of information technology in higher education institutions in Latin America and establish a collaborative network to overcome them, was one of the main objectives of a meeting held between a group of directors of these units that were appointment on January 18 and 19 in Santiago, Chile.
Convened by RedCLARA, the meeting involved the participation of six Directors of Information Technologies of National Networks. Besides, in the activity took part Sandra Jaque, Technical Manager at the Chilean National University Network,
REUNA, Florencio Utreras, Executive Director of RedCARA and Carmen Gloria Labbé, Director of innovation and development of RedCLARA.
The participants worked to establish a plan of action to create a Latin American Network of Information Technology Directors. The meeting had among its objectives to establish fields of cooperation between managers, in order to exploit the benefits of ICTs within their organizations.
"This network will complement existing efforts developed by RedCLARA, along with the ones from the NRENs Directors and Technical Managers," explained Jorge Portillo, Director of Informatics at the Universidad Tecnológica of El Salvador (
UTEC), who attended the meeting representing the Advanced Network of Research, Science and Education from El Salvador (
RAICES).
Another central theme was the analysis of the needs and challenges faced by directors to promote the effective use of advanced networks within the academic community institutions.
"Even some of the attendees unknown all the benefits that RedCLARA offers. Our work wikll be focus in disseminate the use of advanced networks within each country, "said Portillo.
The Executive Director of RedCLARA, Florencio Utreras, gave a presentation that led to a dialogue on the challenges of the Director of ICT and the use of networks. Each participant was also able to make a presentation about their work and to present the challenges of their country.
To give continuity to the effort, the IT Directors Network will meet on Friday February 4th 2011 by video conference.
RedCLARA convened a meeting to establish a Latin American Network of Directors of Information and Communication Technologies, in order to look for jointly strategies to overcome the challenges of knowledge society. The meeting was held in Santiago, Chile and was attended by representatives of the partner universities of the local NRENs.
