The Institutional Educational Project (IEP) is the strategy that permits Colegio Mayor del Cauca comply with its Mission and project, through its Vision, the institutional development, founded on principles and values, clearly indicating a set of purposes that guide its academic administrative future.

The IEP is conceived as a project in continuous construction, especially within an ever-changing society like Colombia, overwhelmed by multiple conditions, which enable its successful fulfillment from continuously adjusting to the historical moment.

The world was seeing the end of a world war; Colombia during this constitutional period was governed by Alberto Lleras Camargo and it was a country amid a very special problem. In spite of this panorama, Colombian women were seeing the possibility of entering the Higher Education offered in the country.

It was the case of Esmeralda Arboleda, born in Palmira – Valle del Cauca, who was the first woman who entered Universidad del Cauca in 1938 to study Law, culminating this purpose in 1943.

This was only one example to state that these courageous women paved the way for Colombian Higher Education to being obligated to start opening its doors to those who not only had the “opportunity” of working and fulfilling their dreams within the household; work that was no less noble, but limiting for the intellectual development of that vast female potential.

These antecedents were the origin of a formidable Legislation. It was through Legislation 48 of 1945 that Colombia’s Colegios Mayores, strategically located, spread from north to south throughout the country and in the vigorously progressive departments and with historical tradition. The Colegio Mayor de Cundinamarca in the nation’s capital city of Bogotá; Colegio Mayor de Antioquia in Medellín, a territory of people who face the future with optimism; Colegio Mayor de Bolívar in the beautiful and historical Cartagena; and Colegio Mayor del Cauca in the noble and colonial city of Popayán. In this same order, they began organizing and initiating their academic lives. The Colegios Mayores were posed as an educational alternative for women in Colombia.

The youngest of the group, Colegio Mayor del Cauca, which in its beginning was called "Colegio Mayor de Cultura Popular del Cauca" , openned its doors to young women in Popayán on 13 November 1967, as an alternative of formal education; although at the time it was not denominated Higher Education, it took in women from the city and broke the tradition of its counterparts in the country by receiving in its first promotion a few males.   

“Colegio Mayor del Cauca has the social commitment of forming individuals with intellectual, ethical, and aesthetic competencies; implementing programs with pertinence for the construction of the region, seeking continuous improvement of processes in compliance of its mission and vision”.

QUALITY OBJECTIVES

• Promote within the community of the University Institution Colegio Mayor del Cauca formation in principles and values.

• Develop academic and administrative strategies to generate competencies through the programs at the University Institution Colegio Mayor del Cauca.

• Maintain constant formation and training of the Public Employees at the University Institution Colegio Mayor del Cauca.

• Continuously improve processes at the University Institution Colegio Mayor del Cauca.