Tertiary education for indigenous students. A case study on institutional relational proximity

Gaps in access and completion rates in Indigenous tertiary education are widespread and reportedly difficult to tackle. Following a survey of national experiences, with a special focus on Mexico, the paper explores Apuesta de Futuro (AF), a scholarship programme for Indigenous students by the Universidad Popular Autónoma del Estado de Puebla (UPAEP, Puebla, Mexico) where individual educational achievements and community perspectives are intertwined by design. This programme has achieved remarkable completion rates for Indigenous students, above the overall rate for UPAEP students. A possible explanation for AF success is the strong emphasis on accompaniment of AF students, in terms of individual academic support and in promoting development in their communities of origin. As a proxy for accompaniment, the paper longitudinally explores the relational proximity of AF and non-AF students to the university, showing a stronger increase in relational proximity for AF students as compared to non-AF students.