U.S. Delegations Focus on Educational Exchange Opportunities in Brazil

Sao Paulo

Secretary Alli’s visit to Zumbi dos Palmares College

When a delegation from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) came to Sao Paulo August 29 to seek exchanges and partnerships with Brazilian universities, their arrival coincided with the visit of the Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights in the US Department of Education.  Russlyn Ali, who is also the Associate Director for the White House Initiative on HBCUs, had stopped in Sao Paulo en route to Brasilia where she would attend a steering group meeting of the U.S.-Brazil Joint Action Plan for Racial Equality (JAPER).  Ms. Ali met with education and Afro-Brazilian community leaders to hear how affirmative action programs and policies were working in Brazil and to share the U.S. experience .  At Brazil’s only institution of higher learning for Afro-Brazilians, Zumbi dos Palmares, Ms. Ali discussed with students and faculty the role of her office and the U.S. experience with affirmative action, and solicited their perceptions of the educational experience in Brazil.

The HBCU representatives came eager to learn more about the Brazilian government’s plan to send 75,000 Brazilian students overseas both for undergraduate and graduate studies and committed to developing partnerships with their Brazilian counterparts.  They spent two days in Sao Paulo meeting with four universities to develop cooperative academic ventures in subjects ranging from Biodiversity to Public Policy.  The delegation was an expression of President Obama’s goal of increasing the number of students between Latin America and the United States by creating exchange scholarship opportunities for Afro-Brazilian and African American students.  As they gained a deeper understanding of education in Brazil as well as the common challenges in both the U.S. and Brazil that are being addressed today, they looked forward to developing lasting ties with Brazilian universities and institutions.

As an immediate follow up to the HBCU visit, nine representatives from Brazilian universities have been invited by the State Department to attend the annual HBCU conference in Washington, DC this September after which they will visit several U.S. universities.