Presentation of the RED special number: "New challenges, new alliances: universities and in-person and virtual educational ecosystems"

We live in a complex, intense and turbulent time, characterized by widespread inequality and the need for education to progress in an uncertain and changing world. In this context, the joint, collective, collaborative and community work of the different agents with educational responsibilities is critical. Higher education, widely recognized for its educational value, often fails to interact with other socio-educational and community-based agents in the construction and care of the ecosystem, and its model is still characterized by its tendency to be centripetal and bureaucratic. In this sense, the importance of greater flexibility, openness, and connection with society is emphasized, from a conception of universities open to the entire population. The 3rd World Higher Education Conference (WHEC2022), organized and promoted by UNESCO, pointed out the need to create more open, inclusive, equitable, and collaborative higher learning systems to address the challenges of our time. The university's ability to forge alliances in support of the Sustainable Development Goals is key to achieving this major challenge from a perspective of quality education for everyone. Currently, some local and international initiatives are emerging in this direction, but they are still marginal, so this monograph shows studies and good transformative practices, networked work, and connection of the university institution with the entire educational ecosystem and territory, in order to disseminate, inspire, illustrate, and encourage work in this direction.