Our mission is to develop agents of change that impact society through educational and research experiences focused on science and technology.
We have three campuses : The Main Campus in Guatemala City, the Highlands Campus in Sololá, and the South Campus in Escuintla.
UVG is the number one university in Guatemala and the number one private university in Central America, according to QS World University Rankings for the 5th consecutive year. It's also the first Guatemalan university to receive the international Hcéres institutional accreditation .
UVG was founded in 1966 . Since then, it has been focused on offering high-quality academic programs in engineering, sciences, education, creativity, and business, cutting-edge laboratories and facilities, and innovation and research experiences through learning by doing.
We are proud of our students and researchers' accomplishments, such as developing and launching the first Guatemalan satellite, Quetzal-1 —named after Guatemala National Bird— built by around 100 UVG members. UVG has been the leader of aerospace research in Guatemala, which has led us to participate in other space missions such as Artemis 1 and Space Biofilms .
Our teams also contribute to environmental research, discovering new plants and animal species like the salamander Bolitoglossa Qeqom , promoting biofuel production, and innovation in different areas.
¡We believe that the best innovation contributions to society come from diverse teams and from turning great ideas into reality!
Our Research Institute has ten study centers focused on environment and biodiversity, health, food and agriculture, biotechnology, informatics, archaeology and anthropology, biochemistry, education, industrial process, economic growth, and the multidisciplinary Center for Lake Atitlán Studies. UVG is the private university with the highest scientific production in Central America.
In 2020, we opened the Center for Innovation and Technology (CIT) on the Main Campus. CIT is a 50,000-square-meter facility with laboratories, libraries, makerspaces, and classrooms, set to be an innovation and entrepreneurship ecosystem where different key actors interact to create local solutions to problems based on society's demands.
Recently, UVG started the Sustainable Alliances for Innovation, Investigation, and Entrepreneurship (ASPIRE) . The project focuses on developing a world-class, replicable model for higher education institutions to address local and regional development priorities through a co-creative, community-engaged approach to research, teaching, innovation, and entrepreneurship.
