The body addressed different student support actions in this contingency period.

With the objective of complying with its operational programming and contributing to optimizing support for the student community of the University of La Serena, the team of the APRENDE and PACE ULS programs managed a meeting of good accompaniment practices with professionals from the Catholic University from Temuco (UCT).

The health crisis that is affecting the country has caused processes that were normal for society to change abruptly, from work, health, social and educational routines, with support work in higher education being no exception. It is for this reason that generating links with other higher education institutions has been fundamental for the house of higher education and in this way rethinking the actions of programs such as PACE and APRENDE ULS.

In this regard, the Executive Director of the APRENDE and PACE ULS Programs, Mg. Viviana Romero expressed her gratitude to the representatives of the different units and programs of the UCT for sharing their experience on support in tertiary education and stated: “We must continue moving forward, giving solid foundations to the path we are forging as a university, our The objective is to continue expanding the support and continue advancing in the accessibility of this support for the student community, adapting to this new reality. I want to thank the professionals who took their time to give us their work experiences. For our team it is very valuable to be able to know the reality of one of the first higher education institutions to implement support actions in higher education, since they are a benchmark for other university campuses”.

On the other hand, the General Director of the UCT Inclusion and Accompaniment Unit, Rodrigo Del Valle, stated: "For us as DGIA of the UCT it was an excellent experience to have the virtual visit of the team of the APRENDE and PACE accompaniment programs of the University de la Serena. This for two main reasons. First, because collaboration between universities is one of the things that can most enhance our work, and improve the contribution that universities with a public mission make to society, showing in this particular case , that this can also happen at a distance. Second, because we are together in the great and beautiful task of continuing to make way in higher education for true inclusion understood from its various areas. I am convinced that more inclusion means better educational quality for everyone, and in that context, the work day was very valuable and productive.

The issues that were addressed in the instance were hand in hand with the new current panorama, reconfiguring the actions of the units and programs of the Catholic University of Temuco and University of La Serena to face the new challenges in the face of this health crisis and the work remote. In this regard, the Director of Academic and Socio-Emotional Support UCT, Josselinne Toirkens, expressed: “One of our concerns is not to neglect our students, we are referred cases of young people who are infected with Covid-19 who need support and we have complex situations, which they escape from the educational; The kids come in because they can't concentrate for a test and you realize that they have serious problems. For this reason, we deal with all types of cases, as well as being more flexible in our procedures since the contingency began.”

It is expected to continue with these meetings between the HEI accompaniment programs in the near future, in order to generate ties and share knowledge for the benefit of Higher Education students.

Written by Daniel Aguayo, APRENDE ULS and PACE ULS Programs.