International Affairs Office

What We Do

Cooperation with Other Countries: The Department’s international bilateral relationships are important to education diplomacy and the process of building mutually beneficial and reciprocal relationships between countries in the education arena.

International Forums: The Department benefits from working with multilateral organizations that share an interest in and commitment to education across the globe.

International Education Week: Provides an ideal opportunity to encourage our students to become more globally competent and globally successful through international education and international engagement.

International Visitors: The International Visitors Program is a professional exchange program that seeks to encourage mutual understanding between the U.S. and other nations, and to support people-to-people connections.

Information on U.S. Education and Mobility: The Department provides information to colleagues in other countries about the U.S. education system. It also responds to inquiries from the public concerning academic and professional mobility.

Academic and Professional Mobility

The International Affairs Office houses the U.S. Network for Education Information (USNEI), which was established in 1996 as a central point of contact for information on U.S. education.  USNEI also serves as the designated U.S. information center – or U.S. ENIC – under the 1997 Lisbon Convention on the Recognition of Qualifications Concerning Higher Education in the European Region.  Each signatory country of the Lisbon Convention has an information center, and together these centers compose the European Network of National Information Centers (ENIC network). The ENIC network was formed to implement the Lisbon Convention and to generally promote greater mobility by providing information about a country’s education system and the recognition of foreign academic credentials.

To this end, USNEI/U.S. ENIC responds to inquiries from foreign credential evaluators seeking information about U.S. education and addresses questions from foreign-educated persons wishing to work or pursue further education in the United States.  For example, foreign-educated persons often seek information about the recognition of their degree or how to practice a profession in the United States. IAO also occasionally fields inquiries from U.S. persons who are interested in working or pursuing further studies abroad.

ED Contact

Rafael Nevarez

Rafael.Nevarez@ed.gov 

Resources

• Information on the Recognition of Foreign Qualifications
• ENIC-NARIC Portal: Information related to education in the 55 countries of the Network, including details concerning recognized institutions and how foreign credentials are evaluated.