Active exchange and cooperation in research and teaching, internationalization and transfer / Funding provided by the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD)
20 November 2025
Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) and Universidad del Norte (Uninorte) in Barranquilla, on the Caribbean coast of Northern Colombia, celebrate the 50th anniversary of their academic partnership. To mark the occasion, representatives of the two universities met in Colombia in April 2025 and subsequently got together this November in Mainz to lay out new plans for further collaboration in current and future projects. Both universities value their global partnership as a way of finding joint solutions to major challenges of our era, such as in the fields of climate change, migration, urban development, the culture of remembrance, and societal resilience.
Universidad del Norte was founded in 1966 and is today attended by some 13,000 students enrolled in a wide range of subjects. Uninorte is among the best universities in Colombia and maintains deep roots in the Caribbean region of the country. The bilateral interaction with JGU involves exchange on aspects such as innovative learning and teaching, medical training and care in Germany, and the subject of the mental health of students. Furthermore, the universities share their best practice experiences comparing the Alianza 4U, in which Uninorte collaborates with three other Colombian universities, and the Rhine-Main Universities (RMU) alliance between the universities in Mainz, Frankfurt and Darmstadt. The partners intend to continue to enhance and promote their international interaction in all fields.
The two universities have been successful in obtaining funding from the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) for an International Study and Training Partnership (ISAP) in Romance Studies. This will provide JGU students with the opportunity to spend a year at Universidad del Norte while concurrently students of Uninorte will be able to spend a year in Mainz. This will be accompanied by the systematic and regular exchange of lecturers in both directions.
Further funding for exchange between Mainz and Uninorte was also obtained for the first time in 2025 through the Erasmus+ program of the European Commission. The mobility of students and lecturers will be initiated in the philology subjects and in the field of translation studies, linguistics, and cultural studies. The concept is then to be extended to additional subjects and faculties.
"Universidad del Norte and Mainz University have been bound together by over half a century of academic collaboration, and we continue to generate innovative ideas about how we can learn from and with each other," emphasized Professor Stephan Jolie, JGU's Vice President for Learning and Teaching. "Our cooperation in various subjects and faculties consistently encourages new forms of interaction and exchange, partly funded by the DAAD and supported by the German Rectors' Conference, a partner of ASCUN, its counterpart in Colombia."
The Rector of Uninorte, Professor Adolfo Meisel Roca, added: "The fiftieth anniversary of our relationship with Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz is not only a celebration of what we have accomplished, but a commitment to what we will create together in the decades ahead."
And a fine tradition has been continued. As a symbol of their growing partnership, representatives from both universities planted a tree of friendship on the Uninorte campus during a visit of former JGU President Professor Jörg Michaelis to Barranquilla in the early 2000s. Another tree of friendship was planted there in May 2025, when a JGU delegation visited to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the collaboration. During the most recent visit of Universidad del Norte representatives to Mainz, a third tree of friendship was planted on the Gutenberg campus to honor the ongoing cooperation between the two universities.