UNESCO World Higher Education Conference 2022

UNESCO World Higher Education Conference (WHEC2022) aims at reshaping ideas and practices in higher education to ensure sustainable development for the planet and humanity.

Barcelona, 18-20 May 2022

In the view of the global health crisis, UNESCO World Higher Education Conference, initially planned to be held in 2021, will take place from 18 to 20 May 2022. The goals and strategic scope of the conference remain, and the new time frame represents an opportunity to deepen and expand our common efforts of knowledge production, policy dialogue, exchange, and networking. UNESCO considers the process of collective construction as the greatest richness of this conference, which aims to become a global conversation nurtured by diverse narratives on higher education.

UNESCO thanks all organisations and individuals that have already expressed interest and are working to collaborate with and substantively contribute to the WHEC and even beyond. We encourage those who have not yet consider engagement to do so and coordinate via the WHEC Secretariat: whec2022@unesco.org

The WHEC will maintain a hybrid format to provide opportunities for broad participation.

Coming soon

About

The 3rd World Higher Education Conference (WHEC2022) will bring together relevant stakeholders to define and prepare a roadmap for a new era of higher education. This roadmap will respond to the challenges faced by humanity and the planet, with special attention to the global disruption created by the COVID-19. It will look at both the higher education systems (norms, policies, structures, stakeholders) and institutions (universities, specialized entities, networks).

UNESCO is organizing the WHEC2022 to offer new knowledge, innovative ideas creative alliances, and produce an enlarged and reinvigorated coalition of the global higher education community in favour of the 2030 Agenda for Development and beyond.

The WHEC2022 is organised by UNESCO with the generous support of the Government of Spain, the regional Government of Catalonia, the City Hall and the Regional Authority of Barcelona and in partnership with GUNi/ACUP.

When and where

The UNESCO World Higher Education Conference will take place from 18 to 20 May 2022 in Barcelona, Spain.

Participate

Information on participation and how to register for the conference will be made available shortly on this webpage.

Please note that you will only be able to do a pre-registration. UNESCO reserves the right to confirmation of the definitive registration, which will be carried out according to the participation criteria established for the Conference (regional representation, COVID measures and others).

All UNESCO Member States will be invited to attend the event and nominate a delegation of up to three, including participants from diverse backgrounds.

Contribute

Organisations and alliances are invited to produce and share knowledge, research, practices or impactful ideas to enhance higher education institutions and systems, locally and internationally. The invitation is open to diverse entities (within and outside the UN system) willing to establish a partnership with UNESCO under the purpose and main themes of the WHEC2022.