Monterrey Tech and UNESCO Partner on AI Education Observatory

On March 18, 2026, inside UNESCO House in Santiago, two representatives formalized a partnership that will shape how artificial intelligence enters classrooms across Latin America. Esther Kuisch Laroche, Director of the UNESCO Regional Office in Santiago, and Jorge Azzario, Executive Director for International Continuing Education at Tecnológico de Monterrey, signed an agreement establishing a framework for joint work on AI in education.

The deal includes a financial contribution of US$90,000 from the Mexican university to UNESCO. That money will fund the implementation of the Regional Observatory on Artificial Intelligence in Education for Latin America and the Caribbean. The signing followed months of technical coordination and institutional validation that began in 2025.

This is not merely a press release exercise. The agreement establishes concrete deliverables: generating evidence, developing standards, and formulating public policy recommendations on AI use in education. Technical teams from both institutions immediately held a working session to review the operational proposal for the Observatory's first year. They addressed capacity design, methodological frameworks, and pilot project planning in Chile, El Salvador, and Mexico.

The physical reality of this work matters. Teachers will eventually interact with digital competency frameworks that require them to navigate new interfaces, evaluate AI-generated content, and make real-time decisions about classroom technology. (Nobody wants another "innovative" platform that crashes during parent-teacher conferences.) The agreement explicitly includes ethics in artificial intelligence as a core component of the methodological frameworks being developed.

According to the official UNESCO announcement, the challenge extends beyond incorporating new technologies. The goal is ensuring their use contributes to more inclusive, ethical, and relevant education systems. Kuisch Laroche stated the agreement reflects a shared vision to move from principles to concrete solutions that benefit countries in the region.

Tecnológico de Monterrey brings specific institutional weight to this partnership. Founded in 1943, the university has built an academic and innovation ecosystem ranging from internationally recognized research institutes to recent platforms dedicated to artificial intelligence. Its global collaboration network and experience in continuing education position it as a strategic partner for expanding the Observatory's reach throughout Latin America and the Caribbean.

This agreement operates within a broader ecosystem of partnerships. UNESCO simultaneously strengthened ties with CENIA (Chile's National Centre for Artificial Intelligence) to advance ethical AI development with an education focus. That separate cooperation includes the availability of Latam-GPT, the region's first open large language model developed with its own identity from and for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Latam-GPT will serve as a key tool of UNESCO's new Regional Observatory on AI in Education. The model is designed to support Ministries of Education in coordination with the Regional Education Steering Committee led by UNESCO. This creates an infrastructure where policy, research, and actual software tools align rather than existing in separate silos.

A public-private partnership round table held on March 23, 2026, at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris brought together more than 50 stakeholders from the education ecosystem. The meeting was led by Valtencir Mendes, Head of Education at the UNESCO Regional Office in Santiago. Participants included major technology companies, universities, foundations, and organizations with investments in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The stakeholder list reads like a regional education directory: Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean (CAF), CETIC.br from Brazil, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Fundación Santillana, Universidad del Desarrollo de Chile, Fundación Ceibal from Uruguay, and the International Research Centre On Artificial Intelligence (IRCAI).

Experts from Harvard University and the Independent International Scientific Panel on AI from the United Nations also serve as partners. The Organization of Ibero-American States for Education, Science and Culture (OEI) participates as well. This breadth suggests the Observatory aims to avoid the common pitfall of isolated, underfunded pilot projects that vanish after initial funding cycles expire.

The region faces significant challenges in foundational learning, particularly in reading and mathematics. In this context, the emergence of artificial intelligence in education systems represents a key opportunity to strengthen teaching and learning processes. Its integration, however, requires evidence, clear guidance, and capacity development to ensure effective, ethical, and inclusive use.

The initiative led by UNESCO seeks to go beyond isolated projects. It is conceived as regional infrastructure aimed at generating knowledge, strengthening the capacities of teachers and decision-makers, and promoting the exchange of experiences regarding appropriate AI integration in education. The official launch of this initiative will take place on April 14, 2026, at the headquarters of ECLAC in Santiago, Chile.

UNESCO invites companies and organizations committed to education to join this initiative and explore collaboration opportunities. The email for further information is [email protected]. Whether this translates into sustained funding beyond the initial $90,000 remains to be seen.

The agreement aligns with UNESCO's mandate as a specialized agency of the United Nations system, promoting normative frameworks and public policy guidance for ethical, inclusive, and rights-based artificial intelligence. CENIA's experience in research, technology transfer, and large-scale training will help expand the reach of these priorities across the region.

Mónica Soto Pérez, Chief Operating Officer of CENIA, noted that technological progress must be accompanied by training, responsible frameworks, and multi-sector collaboration. She described the agreement with UNESCO as a strategic step towards strengthening capacity development and the ethical, people-centred adoption of AI in Latin America and the Caribbean.

UNESCO reinforces its commitment to promoting strategic partnerships that facilitate the implementation of policies and programs aimed at reducing gaps, fostering responsible innovation, and consolidating a digital culture grounded in transparency, inclusion, and respect for human rights. The language is precise, but the implementation details will determine actual impact.

Latin America and the Caribbean face a strategic opportunity to build their own vision for the use of artificial intelligence in education, based on principles of equity, cooperation, and regional relevance. The question is whether regional governments will allocate matching resources or treat this as a donor-funded experiment.

Whether the $90,000 commitment from Tecnológico de Monterrey catalyzes broader institutional investment or remains a standalone contribution depends on how effectively the Observatory demonstrates measurable outcomes in the pilot countries. Time will tell if this infrastructure becomes a lasting resource or another well-intentioned initiative that fades after the launch event.

Artūras Malašauskas is an AI Systems Integrator with 20+ years of production-grade web engineering experience. He has designed, shipped, and scaled enterprise Python/PHP systems for logistics, SaaS, and public-sector clients. For the past year, he has focused exclusively on AI integrations: deploying open-source LLMs, building generative media pipelines (image, audio, video), and engineering multi-agent workflows for real production environments. His standard: reproducibility, security, cost-efficient inference—no vaporware. He documents and evaluates emerging AI tooling, separating verified capabilities from marketing noise. Technical editor at: muza-ai.eu, ai-verslas.lt, ai-naujinos.lt Connect on LinkedIn