Professor Leonard Wantchekon flew to Ottawa in April 13 to participate in the Smart Global Development Conference, organised by the Aga Khan Foundation Canada, Academics Without Borders and the International Development Research Centre (IDRC). This conference featured Wantchekon as a speaker for the Keynote Session entitled “Unleashing the Power of Universities”, next to Eva Egron-Polak, Secretary General and Executive Director of the International Association of Universities, and Reeta Roy, President and CEO of The MasterCard Foundation. This session addressed, among other topics, access to quality higher education opportunities in the Global South and its role in building an informed and engaged citizenry. Participants highlighted some of the key messages delivered by Wanchekon via twitter, like Alyshea Cummins (@alizex786) who stressed the importance of educating women “having one person educated in the community inspires others to follow, especially when you educate women”. Other tweets focused on the need for institutions to engage with society, like this one by the Humanos Institute (@humanos_inst) “development requires innovation, institutions and local representation”.

In September 2015, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the 2030 Development Agenda, comprising 17 Sustainable Development Goals. The Smart Global Development conference (April 13-14) explored the role of higher education in advancing sustainable development goals. Bringing together leading global experts, thought leaders and practitioners, the Smart Global Development conference aimed to:

1. Examine the critical role of universities in advancing sustainable, inclusive social and economic development.
2. Explore the larger role that universities in the Global South can play in supporting good governance, social justice, culture, and inclusive economic growth.
3. Compare the range of approaches, policies and processes to strengthening higher education capacities in the Global South.
4. Assess current efforts to gather, evaluate and communicate evidence of how investments in higher education contribute to improved development outcomes.

Click here to access the video of the session (keynote conversation starts at minute 29)

The Conference was covered extensively on Twitter, find below some tweets related to Prof. Wantchekon’s participation in the event. For more information use the hashtag #SmartGlobalDev.