To foster greater understanding of ANTENA, a capacity building project co-funded by the Erasmus+ program of the European Commission, and to guide respondents in accomplishing the Project Survey, three regional meetings of officials from 61 Philippine higher education institutions (HEIs) were held in June this year.

The meetings were organized to bring respondents under one roof for a speedy and efficient data collection and to make way for an opportunity for partners to conduct information dissemination on the ANTENA Project. 

The survey, under Work Package 1 spearheaded Ateneo de Manila University, is a needs assessment study conducted to expand the initial findings of the ANTENA Project regarding various challenges that cause the low level of internationalization of Philippines HEIs.

The three regional meetings, one each for the Luzon-, Visayas- and Mindanao-based HEIs, were attended by international relations officers (IRO) and academic officials in-charge of international or external affairs from various higher education institutions (HEIs). The events were hosted by ANTENA HEI partners.

The first regional meeting was hosted by the Polytechnic University of the Philippines on June 19, 2019 and was attended by 21 HEIs. The second regional meeting hosted by the Central Luzon State University on June 21, 2019 was attended by 16 HEIs. Finally, the third regional meeting on June 24, 2019 at the Mindanao State University-Iligan Institute of Technology was attended by 21 HEIs.

The meetings enabled the research team to reach the target number of responses. They also served as opportunities to connect the participating HEIs’ international relations officers with the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) for future collaborative projects on internationalization.

Initial results of the study will be presented during the First National Roundtable Discussion hosted by De La Salle University (DLSU) on 15-16 July 2019.