The Diplomat
The Secretary General of the Organization of Ibero-American States for Education, Science and Culture (OEI), Mariano Jabonero, has received the Honorary Medal of the University of Alcalá de Henares, which recognizes personalities and entities for their work in teaching and research.
The Governing Council of the University of Alcalá de Henares, headed by its rector, José Vicente Saz, agreed on July 21 to award the Honorary Medal to Mariano Jabonero “for his continued defense of the promotion of education and welfare in Ibero-America”. The decoration was awarded during the solemn ceremony of the beginning of the academic year 2022-2023, which was held last Thursday in the auditorium of the University.
This distinction recognizes “those persons or entities that within or outside the university community have distinguished themselves in teaching, research, management or collaboration in the University’s own purposes,” added the University.
Apart from Jabonero, also receiving this recognition were Santiago García Echevarría, Professor of Business Economic Policy and Founding Dean of the Faculty of Economics and Business Studies at the UAH; Amparo Valcarce, Secretary of State for Defense; Jesús La Roda, member of the UAH PAS and member of the trade union section of UGT, as well as the institution Cantabria Labs and the Rodolfo Benito Samaniego Foundation.
Throughout his career, Mariano Jabonero has received important awards in several Latin American countries, such as the Order Alfonso X El Sabio of Spain or the degree of Doctor Honoris Causa from the Open and Distance University of Colombia (UNAD), among others.
Mariano Jabonero’s career has been characterized by his intense work in favor of education in general, and distance education in particular, especially within the Ministry of Education in Spain. In addition, Jabonero has been involved in the defense of educational policies that promote equity and social inclusion of young people and adults, both through face-to-face and distance education modalities.
Jabonero has led the OEI since 2018, in a quadrennium marked by the celebration of the first 70 years of the organization and by the incidence of the coronavirus pandemic that affected more than 180 million students and paralyzed the cultural sector throughout Ibero-America. Last June, the Spanish government ratified its support for the re-election of Mariano Jabonero as secretary general of the organization for the four-year term 2022-2026. The election of the next secretary general of the IEO will take place next November in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, during the XIV General Assembly of this organization, whose regulations provide for the possibility of reelection of the secretary general.
Since 1949, the OEI has been the first intergovernmental organization for South-South cooperation in Ibero-America. It currently has 23 member states and 19 national offices, in addition to its General Secretariat in Madrid. With more than 400 active cooperation projects with public entities, universities, civil society organizations, companies and other international organizations such as UNESCO, SICA, IDB, CAF and the European Union, the OEI represents one of the largest cooperation networks in Ibero-America. The organization currently has 16 million direct beneficiaries throughout the region.
