The Man Behind the UA's Presence in Mexico

The Man Behind the UA's Presence in Mexico

By Amanda BallardUniversity Relations - Communications
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The UA is fusing innovative binational partnerships with the help of José Lever, director of the University's satellite office in Mexico City.
The UA is fusing innovative binational partnerships with the help of José Lever, director of the University's satellite office in Mexico City.

Since it was founded, the University of Arizona has had deep ties with Mexico. Through its Mexico City office, the UA is developing even deeper partnerships designed to answer important questions that extend beyond physical borders.

The UA is located just 63 miles north of the U.S.-Mexico border, making it easy to focus on research and partnerships in the Sonoran region in northern Mexico. But having an office in Mexico's capital city helps the University extend its international reach even more, according to José Lever, director of the UA's Mexico City office.

"In order to have the University's connections grow and to do proper follow-up, the UA needed to have a permanent presence in the heart of Mexico, which is Mexico City," Lever said.

The UA established an office in Mexico City in 2007 through the College of Science and its dean, Joaquin Ruiz. It was created to help encourage collaboration between the UA and businesses in Mexico. The Office of Western Hemispheric Programs also was established in 2007 and is dedicated to identifying collaborative opportunities between the University and agencies in Canada, Mexico and Latin America.

Collaborative research was a focus of the Mexico City office from the beginning. For example, the office established a binational consortium to research arid lands issues facing both the Southwest and Mexico. The consortium, a partnership between the UA and the National University of Mexico, is funded by Mexico's National Council for Science and Technology, also known as CONACyT, which is the country's equivalent of the National Science Foundation.

In recent years, the office also has increasingly focused on facilitating technology transfer initiatives.

"The interest in tech transfer and innovation has grown dramatically in Mexico," Lever said. "Now there are programs that are fostering this topic, but the groundwork was done by the UA. We really did make an impact."

The University's Never Settle strategic academic and business plan calls for the UA to build partnerships that enhance the University's positive impact not only in the local community, but in the global community as well. The plan also calls for the UA to develop innovative solutions that address the world's grand challenges by expanding research initiatives and external partnerships.

Before joining the UA to help establish the Mexico City office, Lever worked for a decade with CONACyT. He travels to the UA's main campus in Tucson about twice a month, although he makes more frequent trips depending on the projects requiring his attention.

Most recently, Lever attended an Oct. 16 meeting of the Intelligent Manufacturing Initiative for the U.S.-Mexico Border, convened by the U.S. Mexico Foundation for Science as part of the Mexico-U.S. Entrepreneurship and Innovation Council.

The council was formed last year by President Barack Obama and Mexican President Peña Nieto to promote and strengthen cross-border entrepreneurship and innovation. Representatives from multiple U.S. and Mexican higher education institutions, businesses and other organizations attended the meeting, which was co-hosted by the UA's Office of Global Initiatives and the College of Engineering.

The purpose of the meeting was to gather information to identify joint opportunities for intelligent manufacturing in the border region.

"This was a very important meeting," Lever said. "The focus is on what kinds of things we should be doing together in order to foster competiveness of the region. Intelligent manufacturing is part of that."

During the meeting, attendees discussed how human capital, technology and innovation can be developed to increase productivity in the advanced manufacturing sector in the Arizona-Sonora region and throughout the U.S.-Mexico border region.

"This meeting has brought a great deal of momentum to this discussion at a critical time for the region, especially if the manufacturing and innovation ecosystem in Arizona and Sonora wish to capitalize on the nearshoring trend and attract industry that is relocating from Asia to North America," said Justin Dutram, coordinator for academic outreach programs in the Office of Global Initiatives.

"Collaboration between higher education, government and in this case, the manufacturing sector, will make our region more competitive for business growth and attraction," Dutram said. "As the economies of both the U.S. and Mexico and increasingly interdependent, it is important for the UA to contribute to the preparation of the next generation of leaders in both nations, and to support industry with new knowledge from our research and innovation enterprise."

"Manufacturing is a key area in the region's future economy," said College of Engineering dean Jeff Goldberg, who participated in the meeting. "The UA can play a major role in the education and training of a strong workforce. It is not the UA alone. U.S. and Mexican high schools, career and technical education, technical schools and community colleges are also part of the solution, but we should be leading players, as it is a part of our land-grant mission and it is a good opportunity for students."

Lever said that the UA is poised to fuse international partnerships that can benefit the region, the state and the U.S. as a whole.

"The connections with Mexico are just natural," Lever said. "It's our location, it's our heritage. ... We have a significant number of faculty and students that are from Mexico. We have a significant number from faculty working on issues that have to do with Mexico. That's what positions the UA to better understand issues where we can make a very significant contribution partnering with our colleagues in Mexico for the benefit of the greater region."

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