Plenary: The New ARCU-SUR Regional Accreditation Standards

From the Experimental Mechanism for Accreditation of Degree Programs (MEXA) to the current Permanent MERCOSUR Regional Accreditation Mechanism (ARCU-SUR), the voluntary regional accreditation system has been evolving and adjusting to the new demands and realities of the degree programs and the political guidelines of the Mercosur block. In May 2019, the Network of National Accreditation Agencies of MERCOSUR approves the new regional standards for engineering, including Biomedical, Biological, Environmental and Computer Science / Systems Engineering. This required the redefinition of some criteria and the introduction of the concept of “families of degree programs” with common characteristics in the regional standard. This plenary exposes the background of the regional accreditation process, the process of adaptation of the current standards and the novelties and outstanding characteristics of the recently approved standard, which incorporates computer science/systems engineering to all the accredited degree programs at the regional level.