Laureate Summit on Youth & Jobs Addresses Critical Issue of Youth and Social Mobility in Peru
Dr. Condoleezza Rice, former U.S. Secretary of State, with Ernesto Zedillo, former President of Mexico, and Doug Becker, Laureate Founder, Chairman and CEO.
All the way to the highest levels of civic society, Laureate remains committed to being a thought leader in the areas of education, workforce development and community engagement. Starting in 2013, Laureate began hosting “Youth &” events on campuses around the world in order to convene government, academic and business leaders to discuss how the causes of youth, which are so often overlooked by civil society, can be addressed and actions taken to ensure that progress is made.
Since 2013, with the first summit in Spain, these events have been a chance for high-level leaders to dig into issues effecting youth in countries and the larger world. Collaborators with Laureate on these summits have included the Aspen Institute in Mexico, the Inter-American Development Bank and the IFC/World Bank Group. In 2015, Laureate and the IFC/World Bank Group released a study on social mobility in the country as a result of education, representing both organizations commitment to meaningful research in this area.
In 2016, the “Summit on Youth & Jobs in Peru” took place on the campus of the Universidad Peruana de Ciencias Aplicadas (UPC) in Lima and brought together more than 200 government officials, businesspeople, academic leaders and students. The conversation in the panels and plenary session addressed the role of government, the business community and higher education institutions in working together to provide access, quality and career-oriented education for young people. Laureate and the IFC again partnered to release a study on the role of education in social mobility in the country. Leaders like former U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and former President of Mexico Ernesto Zedillo participated, as well as many Peruvian academics and officials, all of whom mixed with Laureate Peru students in the summit’s audience.
“The most important thing to take away from this event is the message of shared responsibility for human development through education,” Dr. Rice said at the event. “One of the advantages of Laureate institutions is that they have multiple ways for students to get an education and they aren’t stuck on what education looked like yesterday and what it will look like tomorrow.”
Convening conversations on issues like civic engagement, employability and the role of business and government in driving change on the concerns of youth is a major part of how Laureate is Here for Good in the communities we serve.
