Project Background:
The Tecnológico de Monterrey and its network of campuses throughout Mexico is committed to providing quality education, world-class research, and building innovative models for the benefit of society. With the leadership of ITESM’s School of Medicine and the School of Government, the University is building a new interdisciplinary institute for global health training and research with strong links to practice. The fall 2018 DAT helped develop some of the foundational ideas for the new Institute for Global Health Equity (IESG).
The IESG aims to be a global center of excellence that generates health through training, research, innovation and knowledge translation, addressing in an interdisciplinary way the existing inequities in Mexico and the world, based on health as a human right. The IESG aspires to lead in training, research, implementation and public policy development in Global Health and Social Medicine in Latin America, through the creation of integral solutions to address social factors and strengthen health systems with an intersectoral approach, with a preferential option for poor and vulnerable populations.
Definition of Opportunity:
In August 2019, ITESM’s IESG created a partnership with Partner In Health’s sister organization, Compañeros en Salud in Chiapas, Mexico and the International Center for Social Innovation of Tec de Monterrey (Centro Internacional de Inovación Social, CIIS in Spanish) to generate collaborative projects. Compañeros en Salud works in rural Chiapas Mexico to provide quality health care to underserved communities and hopes to serve as an inspiring model to train and accompany health professionals and community health workers, and to deliver quality health care in low resource settings in Mexico and elsewhere. The International Center for Social Innovation (CIIS) is a world-class center that offers an ecosystem apt for social innovation. The CIIS focuses on research and the generation and validation of innovative solutions to social problems. Located in San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, every year, during the summer and winter, the CIIS receives dozens of students from various Tec campuses to work on the resolution of social problems in Chiapas communities. For a 5-week period, the students take various classes and work to generate solutions to social problems in a community. CIIS follows up on the work until the best solutions get implemented. IESG and PIH have deep ties to Notre Dame, and both IESG and PIH have served as clients on DAT projects in the past.
In late November-early December 2019, IESG, CIIS, and CES offered the first-ever immersive global health course in rural Chiapas to Tec students from any discipline at any campus. The five-weeks course was aimed to initiate long-term partnerships with local communities where CES worked and collaboratively address local social issues while training Tec students in the philosophies of accompaniment, program implementation, and global health. Professors, administrators, and communities were excited to see this program unfold. After three weeks of advertising, however, the course offer had to be withdrawn due to lack of interest expressed -- only three students registered to the course.
What does success look like?
That IESG, CIIS, and CES are able to use the lessons and recommendations by the Development Advisory Team to successfully attract talented students interested both in learning about global health and in making contributions to the 2020 summer immersive course in global health.
That after using the partnership framework during the immersive experience in rural communities in Chiapas, a diverse group of stakeholders is satisfied by the experience and work and we can replicate and expand the model in the future. Such stakeholders include people in the villages, CES staff, students, CIIS and IESG administrators, and Tec professors.
Meet the Team:
