Parliamentary Conference for Education in the Asia Pacific Region, Establishment of the Forum of Asia Pacific Parliamentarians for Education (FASPPED): Day 2

Jakarta, 24-25 October 2008

Rapporteur: Mohammad Reiza

Sultan Hotel
Jakarta, Indonesia

Day 2: Saturday, 25 October 2008

09.00 – 10.30
Working Session 4
Venue: Asean Room 6-7

MC, Ms. Jasmine Sagita Rafiq and Leo Mokodompit of Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO open the programmes by greeting the honorable and distinguished guests and participants. They remind the distinguished participants of confirming their flight schedules to the secretariat.

Co-chaired by the Vice President (Nepal) and Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer, Director, UNESCO Bangkok Office, Regional Bureau for Education in the Asia and the Pacific

Presentations by Participants

Participants to share their countries’ success stories, best practices, or trends in the field of Education: primary education, quality education, adult literacy, gender equality, ESD, etc.

1.    EFA: Trends, Prospects and Challenges in Pakistan
Presented by Professor Ahsan Iqbal, Member of National Assembly of Pakistan, Former Minister of Education

He firstly elaborates the challenges of our age; from industrial age to information age. Some are fortunate and some are not by having opportunities to have education. The society has one chance to invest in education for sustainable future. The magic of science includes biotechnology and information technology and other technologies that have positive and critical contribution to the societies.

Challenges of changing paradigms: industrial society to knowledge society; how to form social structure to encourage them to be more critical. The future society will work in team, so it is hot to change the children and get used to them to teamwork. The discussion also highlights the importance of education in human development trend and key indicators in South and West Asian countries. It also relates to national security budget. The national net enrolment ratio in primary education and education have slight different in provinces.

In Pakistan the adult literacy ages 15+ is about 50%. Another concern is regarding statistical information of public schools at union council level. It is questioned if education has something to do with gender parity. One of the major issues is that there are not enough numbers of teachers, adequate schools facilities, etc. The key impediments include the lack of political will, governance issue, parallel systems of education, etc. Some key initiatives 2010 outline universal primary enrolment campaign, uniform education system, adult literacy campaign, ethics and values based learning, etc.

The best practices from the private sectors in term of service delivery should be brought up to better the development of education, which could make difference. Best practices in Pakistan did enrolment campaign (success stories); 8 September 1999 on International Literacy Day, there were 876 thousand enrolled. In the Province of Punjab Enrolment Campaign (15-31 August 2008), there were 800 thousand additional students enrolled. Keys to success include ICT development in terms of Internet infrastructure development for computer literacy platform. It has increased the national Internet users as well as the bandwidth availabilities. OTP (Organization, Technology and Public Policies) alignment crisis exist in governance. We have to be proactive to make positive change and to make things happen.

2.    EFA in the Asia Pacific Region
Presented by Mr. Kim, Korean National Assembly (In Korean with Interpreters)

The vision of the programme is to build a society of lifelong learning for the pleasure of learning; of building the future, and of living together. The policy direction: fostering creative learners at all ages of life by linking workplace, expanding military lifelong learning and preparation for the aging society. OECD statistic 2006, Korean lifespan exceeds 80 years by this year. This programme will be integrated with the senior citizen.

Another key direction is to enhance participation and partnership among ‘Lifelong Learning’ (LLL) related institutions for social cohesion by establishing networking among LL cities and institutions and strengthening international partnership and collaboration in LE. Lifelong learning account system manages various learning outcomes of citizens and socially used for academic purposes. LLL cities outline programme of nurturing the cities. Lifelong learning-centered universities support managing model development of universities for adult.

Adult literacy education assist ALE programme and aid operating expenses of non-profit ALE institutions for giving second chances to the project lost timely educational opportunities (20 billion KRW in 2008). Programme for the socially disadvantages groups. The Korean government has been supporting Korean people since year 2001 to get education. Academic credit bank system of lifelong learning has been managed since year 1998. It is my sincere wish, that we can make big difference tomorrow with the values of UNESCO under the umbrella of the UN system. Thank you.

3.    EFA: Trends, Prospects and Challenges in Pakistan
Presented by Ms. Rasyid, Pakistan

Pakistan has been suffering from long period of dictatorship of military. Democracy was the only solutions for all problems. Invasion of other countries prevent children of the country to have education and build civilization. During the process of military rules, we have lost a lot of important people of the country.

Some education development programmes in the country include setting up community learning centers. It does not mean anything, that we have done many things as there are still a lot of people in the country that are under the poverty line and have not been reached by education system. There are a lot of refugees from other countries and they are illiterate, as this has become human problem since the year of 1992 after the war. Thank you.

4.    EFA: Trends, Prospects and Challenges in Nepal
Presented by Mr. , Nepal

There are a lot of problems that the government has to deal with regarding education in Nepal. Some of the key concerns are curriculum, refugees from Bhutan as well as the language of instruction. The importance of education outlines the Dakar framework. Education development also considers the issue of gender equality and capacity building of the teachers on gender sensitivity. There is minimum requirement of the number of female teacher in schools.

Some other aspects are including 7 goals by touching indigenous people to be teachers for indigenous language teaching. Another problem is the untouchables, who are mostly Hindus making of 70% of the country’s population as well as large number of indigenous people. EFA will require model on how to touch these groups.

5.    EFA: Trends, Prospects and Challenges in Iran
Presented by Muhammad Hasan, Parliament of Iran

Sustainable development cannot be achieved without education for all. The current estimate in Iran is 10% of employment and 26% of youth employment. Literacy programme in the country has become a key concern, whether they have certificate according to the national census in 2006. Based on the latest census some of the 11% of the total population are illiterate. About 1.5 million of the people were covered by literacy programme in 2006. The government recognizes that the focus on socio economics and education increase the development of literacy programmes. In addition, providing free education for all has been committed and written in the national decree.

In 2008 there are 1.5 million of high school graduate students and have gone to the university for continuing education. About 3.5 million students are studying in 250 public and private universities. The budget of the government is also allocated for research for the development of education.

6.    EFA: Trends, Prospects and Challenges in Maldives
Presented by Mr. Ahmad Jaffar, Maldives

Primary education in Maldives has relations to home schooling. In the last 5 years the government allocation budget is about 15-20% for education expenses. In 2010, the government will improve the development of ECCE and children with special needs as well as the quality of education. The government will provide basic education for all children in regards of education for all, regardless of disparity. Maldives has achieved the goal of MDGs in education. The national commitment has highlighted the notion of education and the improvement of learning.

In all schools, English language is used and the government provides the schools with learning materials and equipments. Secondary and higher education is free in the government school and books and stationary are provided for free. If a school is not available in one island the children will go to another island for proper education. The emphasis is based on the teacher training to develop various kinds of education to serve the people’s needs.

Questions and Comments

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer says not to wire every school for computers and it becomes mistake. There are successful campaigns and failures and we have to learn about them too. Global campaign should work together with NGOs. Parliamentarians will be very useful to push the political leaders to support education development. In the sufficient length of time, things can get really done.

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer says adult learning that Korea does was presented in an education conference in Seoul 2 weeks ago and this is a best practice that other countries can do.

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer says about refugee’s issue that has become debate on the education of refugees, people coming from other countries. The convention of the child says that countries are obliged to the education of all children. The issue is the political decision that has to be made regarding the language of instruction. It happens also in Thailand with the refugees from Myanmar and Cambodia. This is politically sensitive issue.

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer says that Nepal has become the best practice in the region in terms of language use for education. The country has taken the point to ensure that young children to be literate in their own mother tongue. There will be much autonomy of the country by forming Federal system for the country. Important role of the parliamentarians can be played in this education development with the new system.

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer says that literacy programmes in Iran is similar to Indonesian programme, which is lifelong. Studies have shown in Cambodia, Laos and Bhutan that literacy rate is about 20-25% below the literacy rate. The politicians have been hesitant to show the real figure. So, for the next government, it can be advised that in the next programme the government do assessment of literacy rate of the country and show the factual statistical figure to the public.

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer says that main challenge of Maldives is the number of islands and the availability of education systems. So this is similar to the issue of the Philippines and Indonesia with enormous number of islands and proper education system provided in each Island.

10.30 – 10.45
Coffee Break

Coffee break is provided in the hall.

10.45 – 11.45
Working Session 5
Venue: Asean Room 6-7

Co-chaired by the Vise President (Nepal) and Mr. Maurice Robson, Director of UNESCO Islamabad, Pakistan

1.    E-Learning Policy of the Republic of Korea
Presented by Mr. SUH Sang-kee, Member of the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea

The paper highlights the implementation of e-learning policy, achievements and tasks of the e-learning projects and key success factors. The initial infra phase started from 1996 to 2000 (Master Plan 1); the ICT utilization phase/e-learning phase started from 2001 to 2005 (Master Plan 2); service sophistication/e- learning phase started from 2006 to present (Master Plan 3).

In the achievements and tasks of e-learning projects outline the infrastructure development for e-learning and the use of ICT for teaching and learning. Total of 640 thousand of information sharing have taken place for teaching and learning through the Internet. The new initiative is elaborating digital textbook development that overcomes the limitations of conventional textbooks and to lead educational innovation. Another achievement is the application of ICT in the National Education Information System in the Ministry office. 165 different types of school documents have been transferred to the web across the country at the end of 2007. The fourth achievement is the application of e-learning to higher education. Research Information Service System (RISS) was launched in 1998. Korea Open Course Ware (KOCW) runs since 2007 within and outside the country. The Republic of Korea is currently supporting the development of ICT in 18 developing countries including Mongolia.

The key success factors include the presence of global companies – the world class of ICT. The Republic of Korea can benefit the high speed of the Internet from the private companies. E-learning of the Republic of Korea is to serve as foundation for the future cooperation with other countries.

2.    Government and Private Education in the Philippines
Presented by Mr. Mariano, A Member of the House of Representative of the Philippines

There are about 5,000 private universities nationwide, although most of the students in the country are enrolled in public school. Basic education enrolment is about 21 million out of 90 million of the total population. Students are given some additional courses and being evaluated by the department of national education and given credits. In college there are less than a million enrolled in government universities, funded by the central and local governments. The education system complies 10 year of basic education consist of 6 years basic education and 4 years of secondary education. Both government will start offering pre-school education in the next years and it will become mandatory for all children before entering grade 1.

There are some challenges faced by the country, there are a lot of numbers of students who are out-of school. In the Philippines, education is valued a lot. Skill education development agency will provide education to those who are not finishing college education. The government focuses on the education of Math and English. There are about 80 ethnical languages as many as the provinces, but the national language is Tagalog event though Cebuano is mostly spoken by the people. Another consideration is internal efficiency and effectiveness in running the bureaucracy and the school management system.

The government is also focusing on the improvement of teachers’ quality. Another problem is over enrolment of students in the public schools and for that reason the government contracts the private schools to accommodate those students who cannot be absorbed by the government schools. We are also persuading the government to increase the budget for education.

3.    Education in Samoa
Presented by Mr. Solomo Maleko, A Member of Parliaments in Samoa

There are substantial numbers of colleges in Samoa. There are problems of high school graduate students. Some of them will receive scholarship and study overseas, for example to Fiji. There is a university in Samoa, named National University of Samoa. Gender equality is not a problem in Samoa. Some Catholic schools have special schools for boys and girls. In the work fields, there are more female CEOs than the males. As for teachers, some of them opt to go overseas for higher salary. For this consideration, government develops teachers training by sending them to continuing education so that they can improve the education within the country. I would forward the results of this conference to the Parliaments of the country and do best practices from other countries to improve the education.

Questions and Comments

Mr. Maurice Robson says that introducing and application of ICT in classrooms is very important these days by learning from the experiences of the Republic of Korea. Introduction of ICT has become challenge in terms of the cost and the sophistication.

Mr. Maurice Robson says there are a lot of reasons why to focus on early childhood education by engaging policy reform. Another issue is the private sectors that provide elite education with new curriculum.

Mr. Maurice Robson says that there are difference between larger countries and small island countries like Samoa. The use of ICT will help the country to develop the education. Investment in education sometimes is an investment in some groups’ economy, and this has become a challenge for everyone.

11.45 – 12.45
Working Session 6
Venue: Asean Room 6-7

Co-chaired by the President (Indonesia) and Mr. Ahmed Sayyad, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for External Relations and Cooperation

The printed of draft statutes of FASPPED is distributed to the delegates. Prof. Arief invites Mr. Ahmad Sayyad to explain about the draft statutes.

Draft Statutes of FASPPED (FASPPED Objectives)
Presented by Mr. Ahmad Sayyad

The draft statutes consist of 1 preamble, 3 chapters and 28 articles. Mr. Sayyad leads the participants to go through the draft and welcomes amendments from the participants. Prof. Arief invites the participants to give comments or amendments to the statutes, reads through each part of the statutes.

Preamble

Iran needs more time to read through the Preamble.

No amendment is suggested, preamble is adopted.

Chapter 1: General Provisions (Articles 1-9)

The President reads the Article one by one.

Articles 1-4

No amendment is proposed on Articles 1-4, the Articles are adopted.

Article 5

Maldives outlines the last point of article 5 and asks if teachers’ strike on salary increment included in this point.

Mr. Ahmad Sayyad says it will be included in here.

The Philippines confirms that in the Philippines, school problems will be solved internally first and if the problems are not resolved they will be forwarded to the education government agencies to resolve. Parliamentarians do not interfere this issue due to the difference of power and/or authority.

Republic of Korea outlines the article 5 and proposes to add one or two more points regarding the mission of intergovernmental agencies, especially UNESCO to assist the implementation of this article. Cooperation among regional forum for education development could also be added.

Nepal says that the role of Parliamentarians to act as mediators is rewarding; to take concern or initiative in resolving the crises.

UNESCO Jakarta says that the participants have to come up with the right vocabularies and terminologies to paraphrase the point raised in article 5, to rewrite the sentence.

The President says that the statutes should stay in general perception and the points can be adopted and applied specifically based on country’s condition.

Articles 6-7

No amendment is proposed, the Article 6-7 are adopted.

Article 8

The Philippines mentions that in the Philippines, the country has lower and upper parliaments, it means that there are more than three representatives although only one will have right to vote.

Mr. Ahmad Sayyad says that it is no problem if the Parliaments want to send more than one Parliament, but UNESCO will only cover the travel of one representative and only that representative has right to vote.

Articles 8-9 are adopted.

Chapter 1: General Provisions and 9 Articles are adopted.

Chapter 2: Organisation (Articles 10 – 25)

Articles 10-18

No amendment is proposed, Articles 10-18 are adopted.

Article 19

Indonesian Ambassador for UNESCO proposes to have at least 4 Vice Presidents to represent the regions included in this Forum.

Proposal agreed.

Article 20

The Philippines confirms regarding the line of “for renewable four year mandate;” if it is a person or a country.

Mr. Ahmad Sayyad confirms that the same concern happened in the Arab States last year, so the next Vice Chair will replace the President in case he/she is not re-elected in the Parliament election.

Concern understood.

Article 21-25

No amendment is proposed, Articles 21-25 are adopted.

Chapter 2: Organisation and 16 Articles are adopted.

Chapter 3: Final Provision (Articles 26-28)

No amendment is proposed, Articles 26-28 are adopted.

Chapter 3: Final Provision and 3 Articles are adopted.

Discussion and Adoption

Indonesia proposes to separate South and West Asia and Combine West and Central Asia. The regional distribution becomes: Central and West Asia, East Asia, South Asia, Southeast Asia and the Pacific.

The Forum collects the country names that have adopted the Draft Statutes.

12.45 – 14.15
Lunch

Lunch is provided for the participants and informal discussions among the participants also take place.

14.15 – 15.00
Working Session 6

Co-chaired by the President (Indonesia) and Mr. Derek Elias, Programme Specialist, UNESCO Bangkok Office, Regional Bureau for Education in the Asia and the Pacific

Draft Jakarta Declaration (FASPPED action plan and strategy)

The session is to discuss the draft of Jakarta Declaration on FASPPED. The President invites the participants to recommend introductory remarks, consideration of preamble paragraphs and operational paragraphs.

Mr. Derek Elias reminds the participations of what need to be amended in the draft and invites the participants to give formulation on how to improve the declaration.

Mr. Makarim (the President) reads through the paragraphs and invites consensus of the participants.

Republic of Korea proposes to change the word ‘example’ in the second paragraph into ‘achievement’; and to change the arrangements of the first four paragraphs: acknowledging, aware and having examined.

Proposals of the Republic of Korea are adopted.

Indonesia proposes to include Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) to the sixth paragraph as an emphasis.

Proposal is accepted and paragraph is adopted.

Republic of Korea asks about what progress means in the seventh paragraph.

Mr. Derek Elias says that progress is supposed to be the progress to adjust peace in the society towards the goals of EFA.

Indonesia proposes to use the word ‘success’ instead of ‘progress.’

Mr. Derek Elias proposes the word ‘achievement.’

Amendment adopted.

Pakistan proposes to change the word “see to it” in the tenth paragraph.

Indonesia agrees with the proposal of Pakistan and proposes to use the word of ‘revisit’ instead of ‘see to it’

Bhutan agrees with the proposal of Indonesia and to propose the word ‘review’ to use. “I come to this Forum since Bhutan is a new democratic country and I have to bring back the results of this forum home and to discuss with my fellow parliament’s members.”

Lao PDR concerns on the basic education for all in the tenth paragraph that is perceived differently in every country.

Mr. Derek Elias suggests using the word’ reinvigorate’ and to change ‘be realized’ to ‘to realize.’

Proposal of Mr. Derek Elias is adopted.

Pakistan proposes to include the following in the eleventh paragraph: ‘to foster private partnership and broad base societal support for EFA goals.’

The Philippines proposes to give a new paragraph for the proposal of Pakistan.

The proposal adopted.

Indonesia proposes to use ‘the improvement of the quality of education’ in the twelfth paragraph and to put this as the umbrella of the declaration as the main purpose of this forum is to improve the quality of education in the ninth paragraph.

The President proposes to merge the twelfth paragraph with the ninth paragraph.

The Philippines confirms that quality education is the root of all concerns and he agrees to put it in the first paragraph with only ‘quality of education.’

Pakistan agrees to merge the twelfth paragraph in the ninth paragraph.

Indonesia agrees with the proposal of the Philippines and Pakistan, but still keep the entire paragraph, as it highlights the human dignity.

Proposal adopted.

Pakistan proposes change in the thirteenth paragraph.

Proposal adopted.

Pakistan proposes change in the fourteenth paragraph, to add ethics after  “…peace,”

Republic of Korea proposes to revise the word ‘tolerance.’

Mr. Derek Elias proposes to use tolerance instead of ethics.

Proposal adopted.

Mr. Derek Elias proposes to use the word ‘establish’ to replace the word ‘create’ in the sixteenth paragraph.

Proposal adopted.

Indonesia proposes to include academicians in the seventeenth paragraph and to figure out the sufficient word for it.

Republic of Korea proposes to include the roles of teachers or educators—being mentioned as they have important role in the development of education.

Mr. Derek Elias proposes to include the suggestion of the Republic of Korea and to include academic institutions and/or associations.

Indonesia proposes to put a new paragraph that specifically promotes the important roles of teachers and/or educators as well as law of teachers, security of the profession that the parliamentarians could help.

The Philippines proposes to use the promotion of the development for teachers and educators.

Pakistan proposes the new paragraph ‘to promote the roles of teachers and the development of equality for teachers..’

Mr. Derek Elias proposes to also include educators.

The Philippines agrees with Mr. Derek Elias.

Proposals adopted.

Mr. Derek Elias confirms the word ‘reflect’ and proposes to be changed, in paragraph eighteenth.

Indonesia confirms that the word ‘reflect’ is too strong and proposes to change it.

Pakistan asks a point regarding the legal instruments and to add the word ‘respective national’ before it.

The Philippines proposes to use the word ‘endeavor’ to change the word ‘reflect.’

Pakistan suggests taking out the word ‘relevant’.

Proposals adopted.

The Philippines proposes to use the word ‘endeavor’ instead of the word ‘increase.’

Indonesia proposes to reconsider again whether to include the nineteenth paragraph, as in the previous paragraph regarding budgeting point is already mentioned.

Pakistan agrees with Indonesia but we still have to include the point in particular; and to use the word ‘endeavor’ or ‘strive.’

Mr. Derek Elias proposes to replace the word ‘towards’ with ‘for’

Pakistan proposes to add ‘in respective countries’ at the end of the paragraph.

Republic of Korea comments on the twentieth paragraph on the word ‘democratic traditions’

The President proposes to replace the word ‘democratic tradition’ with ‘democracy’ and add ‘ethics’ after it.

Proposals adopted.

All proposals of the amendments of the draft declaration are adopted by the participants of the Forum.

15.00 – 15.30
Coffee Break
15.00 – 15.45
Drafting Committee
Coffee break is provided in the hall.
The drafting committee members revise the amendments of the draft statutes and declaration for the finalization and distribution (UNESCO).

15.30 – 15.45
Election of the FASPPED Executive Bureau Members

Co-chaired by the President (Indonesia) and Mr. Ahmed Sayyad, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for External Relations and Cooperation

The President invites the participants to give recommendation

The Pacific (Samoa) recommends Samoa to be the Vice President of the Bureau
Southeast Asia (The Philippines) recommends Indonesia to be the President of the Bureau
East Asia (Republic of Korea) recommends Indonesia to be the President and Republic of Korea to be the Vice President of the Bureau

The President gives special time to the participants of the West Asian countries to discuss about their proposal.

South Asia (Pakistan) recommends Nepal to be the Vice President of the Bureau

No representative of the Central Asian countries

The President announces the result of the election:

President: Indonesia
Vice President 1: Samoa
Vice President 2: South Korea
Vice President 3: Nepal
Vice President 4: – (vacant, due to no representative of the sub-region present in the forum)

15.45 – 16.30
Adoption of the Final Report

Mr. Ahmad Sayyad says that the revision of amendments of the draft statutes and declaration is very long to be finished today. The Drafting Committee members will work on that and will later disseminate the final statutes and Declaration to every participant of the Conference.

Prof. Arief suggests that there should be verbal commitment from every participant regarding each working group discussion. The Participants also verbally agree the results of the Members of FASPPED Bureau. All the full report and discussion will be sent to the participating countries for further national discussion.

The President reminds the participants of the report, the statutes and declaration and invites the participants for final comments.

Pakistan suggest that the statutes and declaration to be made important to promote EFA.

The President suggests to make final decision that all participating countries of FASPPED to make national chapter of FASPPED regarding the declaration.

Prof. Arief suggests that instead of using national chapter, the forum use vocal points as the terminology used by UNESCO that can be easily contacted by other respective organizations or individuals.

Lao PDR says that this is too early to discuss about the vocal points establishment.

Maldives mentions that he will be bringing the results of the FASPPED back to the Parliamentarians of Maldives.

Mr. Ahmad Sayyad says that all revision of the statutes, declaration and report will be finalized in three days time and will be sent to each country.

Pakistan suggests establishing the vocal points immediately to also immediately start the work of FASPPED.

Mr. Ahmad Sayyad says that the establishment of vocal point in each country is very important to carry on the task of national FASPPED, for the time being. The establishment of national chapter can be done after the vocal points have been established.

The President says the establishment of national chapter can be done next year after the establishment of vocal points.

16.30 – 17.00
Closing Remarks

Speakers

1.    Mr. Ahmed Sayyad, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for External Relations and Cooperation

On behalf of the staff of UNESCO Jakarta, Bangkok and Paris, I would like to thank the participants to be with us during the meeting and I thank the team of Prof. Arief Rachman, the Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO. Gratitude is also sent to Dr. Agung Laksono the President of the Indonesian House of Representative for supporting this meeting.

Education is the key for all. Talking about development, there is no progress of development without education. This task of education, we need alliance—a global alliance. Thus, we need the parliamentarians to be in our side to work together and also the other society members. I also thank other UN agency, the World Bank, UNDP, UNICEF because together with them we can do something about EFA. The rapporteur of this meeting will report to the General Director that the participants of this forum is the ambassadors of UNESCO back in their countries’ parliaments.

2.    President of FASPPED (Indonesia)

I would like to also express my gratitude to UNESCO Paris and Bangkok to make this FASPPED possible and fruitful.

18.00
Visit to the Indonesian Parliament House

Participants are required to gather at the Lagoon Lobby at 5.30 p.m. to depart to the House of Representative of Indonesia.

19.00
Dinner offered by the Indonesian House of Representatives (Parliament House)

Delegates are welcome by the staff of the House of Representative and guided to have the House tour from the hall of the General Assembly to the Commission meetings. Dinner is accompanied by live music and dance. Speeches are delivered by Dr. Agung Laksono, the Speaker of the House of Representative and Ms. Rasyid of Pakistan.

Parliamentary Conference for Education in the Asia Pacific Region, Establishment of the Forum of Asia Pacific Parliamentarians for Education (FASPPED): Day 1

Jakarta, 24-25 October 2008

Rapporteur: Mohammad Reiza

Sultan Hotel
Jakarta, Indonesia

Day 1: Friday, 24 October 2008

08.30 – 09.00
Registration of Participants

Staff and youth volunteers of Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO assist the participants to register and receive the Conference kits.

09.00 – 09.45
Inauguration
Venue: Golden Ballroom

MC, Ms. Jasmine Sagita Rafiq of Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO opens the programmes by greeting the honorable and distinguished guests and participants.

Speakers:

1.    Prof. Dr. Arief Rachman, M.Pd., Executive Chairman of Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO

Assalamualaikum. Honorable Dr. Agung Laksono, Mr. Nicholas Burnett, and Mr. Ahmed Sayyad. Thank God the Almighty for giving the opportunity to us to gather in this forum of FASPPED. It is an honor for us that UNESCO has chosen Indonesia to be the host of this conference. The reason of this is the achievement of Indonesian government in education development done by the Parliaments and the Ministry of National Education.

The main objective is to establish FASPEED to reach the target of “Education for All” by 2015, to foster the achievement of EFA in the Asia Pacific region. Besides this Forum we are also having E-9 Senior Official Meeting led by the Minister of National Education The total number of participants of this Forum is 50, among members of parliaments from 22 Asia Pacific countries. During the two-day conference, participants will formulate Jakarta Declaration with FASPPED Action Plan. Now, I kindly request Dr. Agung Laksono to deliver the speech and officially open the forum.

2.    Mr. Ahmed Sayyad, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for External Relations and Cooperation, Representative of the Director-General of UNESCO

Honorable guests: Dr. Agung Laksono and Dr. Arief Rachman, and Nicholas Burnett of ADG/ED. On behalf of the Director General of UNESCO Mr. Koichiro Matsura, I extend appreciation to all distinguished guests of the Forum and all UN agencies’ representatives to present their organizations’ experiences to reflect the commitment and dynamism of the progress of EFA goals. After 60 years of the establishment of the UN and UNESCO, it is how to further consolidate cooperation among countries to enhance the accountability and legitimacy of actions.

There are diverse and significant roles that we can play in the field of education. Practical achievement of UNESCO can be accomplished, with the national education budgets within our own countries and commodities to ensure EFA to be reflected in national legislative and policies. “As the elected representative of the people, forming the world Parliamentarians and associate partners to improve life everywhere through education, science, culture and communication.”

We seek to fully develop our partnership in the Asia and Pacific region by establishing network from this meeting. This forum is to seek partnership, which is called FASPPED. We hope that this Forum will create network and the place for sharing ideas among parliamentarians in education issue for its development at regional and national levels. This network will collaborate with other Parliamentarians from other regions. “I am confident that FASPPED can ensure that the region make Education for All accessible for everyone.” I look forward a fruitful and positive dialogue. Thank you.

3.    Keynote Speech and Official Opening by Dr. Agung Laksono, President of Indonesia’s House of Representative

Bismillahirahmanirrahim. Honorable Mr. Ahmad Sayyad, Mr. Arief Rachman and distinguished guests. Welcome to Jakarta, Indonesia to all conference’s participants. I would like to express my heart-felt gratitude to all participants for coming to this conference. In my capacity of the Speaker of the House of Representative, I appreciate UNESCO for the establishment of FASPPED to play significant role to develop human resources in Asia Pacific Region on EFA. It is expected that Parliamentarians can discuss and exchange information and create mutual support for the realization of EFA in each participating country. I hope that this Forum can be an instrument to discuss EFA and the improvement of education quality in the region.

Indonesia’s concern on education is mentioned in the Preamble of Decree of 1945. In relations to the purposes, education is to develop and optimize the members of the society to be more functional. Nevertheless, education in Indonesia still faces challenges, which needs cooperation. The government is obliged to distribute education for all people for the nation development. People percentage and economics are required to create the critical society to provide students with knowledge and know-how in the society, groups and among nations. Therefore, EFA should be implemented. Indicator of the success of this programme is shown by the increase of students enrolled in the education system and those who completed primary education. EFA can be implemented if we not merely focus on formal education, non-formal and informal education should get proper attention as well.

The approach should emphasize on learn how to learn. Thus, it is natural that Indonesian Parliaments fully support the government’s policies on education for all. Article 1 section 1 says every citizen shall have the right to education. And section 2 says that every citizen should take primary education and the government should support it.

The framework of provision of education in Indonesia is 20 percent of the state budget, in order to meet the need of national education; also 20 percent from the regional state budget. Basically the right to education of every citizen is not only the responsibility of the government but also the Parliamentarians. Education should get more attention these days. We need to provide our young generation for development through education; therefore, we have to be able to realize the goals of EFA without losing the focus on economics and social development.

Education should be organized the best way and to be fairly distributed to all people. Subsequent to the establishment of FASPPED, will face various issues to be handled on education in Asia Pacific region, among them are funding and facilities to run the programmes. Thus, UNESCO needs to support and facilitate this programme. I finally wish that we have fruitful Forum and I formally open the Forum. Thank you.

Participant:

1.    Mr. Nicholas Burnett, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for Education

Group Pictures

Honorable guests and participants take group picture together.

09.45 – 10.15
Coffee Break

Coffee break and refreshment are provided in the ballroom. Meanwhile the key resource people are having Press Conference in another room.

09.45 – 10.15
Press Conference
Venue: Al Coop Golden Ballroom

1.    Dr. Agung Laksono (represented by Mr. Makarim)

Indonesian parliaments perceive that education is an integral factor in the development of Indonesia. Thus the parliament of Indonesia gives priority to education issue to be factors to improve the quality of the nation. Thank you.

2.    Prof. Dr. Arief Rachman, M.Pd.

He gives illustrations and opens and moderates the session, as well as interprets what has been said by the representatives of UNESCO Paris.

3.    Mr. Ahmad Sayyad
UNESCO’s main mission is education. We are inter-governmental organization, which means we work with the Member States. We have to open the door to the civil society and the parliamentarians even though we work mostly with the governments. Former UN Secretary General asked the President of Brazil to open network with all parliamentarians to succeed UNESCO’s programmes. We used to work together with NGO, and UNESCO Clubs in the field of education, science, culture and communication.

With the draft of our budget, we assign those NGOs to implement our programmes. With the parliamentarians, we work together before the international network, with the African Parliamentarians (established in 2002) and the Arab Parliamentarians (established in 2007). This is the third of Parliamentarians establishment. Next year is the establishment of Latin American Parliamentarian for Education. This is a good experience from the parliamentarians in setting up decrees, budgets and policies. Thank you.

4.    Mr. Nicholas Burnett

It is important to engage Parliamentarians on EFA movements, in accordance to MDGs and its major objective to give all children education. The good news is that there is an increase of education distribution for all children. The bad news is that there is a long time to achieve the goals. We have a lot of success like in Indonesia but two third of those who are illiterate are in Asia Pacific region. It is important to achieve all of these and the Parliamentarians’ constituencies are the key of the success. Thank you.

Questions and Comments

Rakyat Merdeka: What about the recent development of education after constant economic crisis; the issue of life skill needs a lot of funding. Referring to the global financial crises, would UNESCO enforce the role of the United States to engage in the future funding?

Mr. Ahmed Sayyad says that we are thinking about the distribution of UNESCO’s budget and through South-South cooperation that can work together in the field of education. This is very important that UNESCO can help the education development that is affected by economics condition.

Mr. Nicholas Burnett says that in this financial crisis there will be force in the government to solve some problems in most sectors especially the sector of education otherwise it will risk the entire generation in the future. From the different angle, for achieving education development, there should be sustainable funding from the donors in this financial crisis.

Mr. Makarim says that this financial crisis is big problem for all nations today. We together struggle to solve this and to prevent the impact on other sectors, especially on education; for example, the force to decrease national budget on education and the financial support from donor countries.

Koran Tempo: the impact of African parliamentarians for education.

Mr. Ahmad Sayyad says that Africa is big continent. The countries have supported the education developments through their parliamentarians. In many countries in Africa, they support the mission of UNESCO and they have become Members of the National Commission for UNESCO to work in the field of competence of UNESCO. In the Arab countries, the Forum of Parliamentarians, the second meeting was held two months ago in Beirut, Lebanon. We thank the establishment of this forum last year because it has created big difference on education development.

The Jakarta Globe: is there any objection of education standard?

Mr. Nicholas Burnett says that every child has right to go to school. We have to recognize that every country is different that makes the content of education is also different. This is very important aspect that it is possible for everybody to have basic education and to get recognition everywhere – from one country to another.

10.15 – 10.30
Setting up the Bureau

Led by Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer and he gives the opportunity to the participants to give recommendations.

Pakistan delegate recommended Indonesia to be the President and Nepal to be the Vice President. The Conference’s participants agree with the recommendation offered by the delegate of Pakistan.

President: Indonesia
Vice President: Nepal
Rapporteur: UNESCO Staff

10.30 – 12.00
Working Session 1
Venue: Asean Room 6-7

Co-chaired by the President (Indonesia) and Mr. Nicholas Burnett, UNESCO Assistant Director-General for Education

1.    An Introduction to EFA
Presented by Mr. Nicholas Burnett, UNESCO’s Assistant Director General for Education

•    The Dakar 2000 Framework for Action and the road traveled since
•    Relevance of EFA goals in view of the global challenges of the day
•    Implementing EFA: Issues and Challenges for legislators
•    Respective roles of UNESCO and of Parliamentarians in promoting and implementing EFA

He first raises the issue of “why Education for all?” He briefly elaborates the Global Commitments: Education for All and Millennium Development Goals, which overlap each other. Six EFA goals and eight MDGs overlap in its practice and have one goal in common, which is education. A record of progress reports that there are more children in primary education: 647 million (1999) to 688 million (2006). He further explains the stronger support system for EFA that outlines political, technical, financial, advocacy and specific partnerships.

What has made a difference is because of political will, strong national leadership. Overcoming inequalities: achievements are uneven across the six EFA goals and across different regions and population groups. There is lack of policies to address learning needs of youth and adults. Furthermore, the parliamentarians are protecting the right to education. Legislative responsibilities and shaping policy ensure that education is adequately distributed to every citizen. There should be strong voices of education.

2.    EFA in the Asia Pacific Region
Presented by Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer, Director, UNESCO Asia Pacific Regional Bureau for Education

•    EFA Status and trends in the Asia Pacific region
•    UNESCO’s regional and country level strategies

The Global Monitoring Report aims to find out the national progress and the Mid-Decade Assessment aims to figure out the sub-national progress on EFA. The GMR and MDA are to prepare policy and recommendations towards EFA. There has been progress in primary education but there are still 26.6 million children that are not in primary school in Asia Pacific.17 million in South and West and 66% of whom are girls.

National enrolment rates have increased but wide geographical difference in EFA progress remains within countries. The major concerns include lack of support for Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE). ECCE programme improves child well-being and prepare children for school but they are not reaching the poorest and most disadvantaged children. The barriers are including geography, poverty, HIV/AIDS status, hidden costs, legal restrictions for migrants and official language used in school.

Persistence of gender inequality exist in 118 countries out of the 188 that have achieved gender parity in primary education by 2005 – Indonesia. There is minimal attention to adult literacy and inadequate quality that are faced by the progress of EFA goals. Only 83% of students reach the last grade of primary education in East Asia and only 76% in South and West Asia. The high cost of schooling also becomes one of the problems. Families are still required to make substantial contribution for the education for their children. Lack of public financing of education is also a consideration to take. Four broad policy priorities for Asia and the Pacific: trained and motivated teachers, effective teaching and learning strategies, learning time, materials and textbooks and healthy and safe learning environments. How to improve the management of education for low system of the society; all the actors must be involved to achieve EFA by 2015. Thank you.

Questions and Comments

India: how to develop and improve the quality of the textbooks of education system.

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer says that it is major issue that the roles of teachers should be rewarding and respected. There should be support from the government and the continuous training for the career development.

Mr. Nicholas Burnett says that the education should use mother tongue or official national language to learn better.

Pakistan: how to develop the level of expansion of education system and enrolment. Another problem is the issue of HIV/AIDS that UNESCO has to consider as well as ICT progress to better the evaluation and monitoring programmes.

Mr. Sheldon says that sometime the issue is not dropouts only but also push-outs that come from within the school system.

Mr. Nicholas says that dropout issues have something to do with economics condition.

1.    The World Bank and EFA: Education for Competitiveness and Growth
Presented by Ms. Mae Chu Chang, World Bank, Lead Education Specialist

There has been a great deal of success in the area of access, but access and completion rates alone are not enough. Studies show that quality is, in fact, the key determinant of the impact of education on economic growth. Despite use of access, many students still have low literacy and cognitive skills. She shows the progress of Indonesia and the Philippines on primary education graduates and literacy rates. The graph of education quality distribution shows that the Philippines and Indonesia are slightly different of percentage with 49% and 55% respectively. Conditional-years of education is a minimal factor for growth when education quality is not taken into account. Education quality and economic growth are interrelated.

Key drivers in achieving EFA goals include improved policy environment. World Bank Education Projects worldwide has spent about 27 million. Indonesian students see science, reading and math as very important relative to other countries. “The quality of an education system cannot exceed the quality of its teachers.” Research has shown that what teachers know and are able to do, does improve the academic performance of their students. Together with the government of Indonesia, World Bank created framework of quality of education. World Bank Indonesia work related to improving quality – so called AAA work focuses on teachers quality and some projects including BERMUTU, BOS-KITA and Pipeline SWAp. Thank you.

2.    UNDP and EFA: Integrating Basic Education in National Developing Strategies and Poverty Reduction Strategy
Presented by Ms. Diana Alarcon, UNDP, Cluster Leader, Inclusive Development for Poverty Reduction, Poverty Practice

She highlights the UNDP’s work and UNDP’s strategic role in EFA including the role of the original Convenors of the EFA Global Action Plan. UNDP promotes pro-poor choices and measures in national development strategies and frameworks. Education is key to achieving all MDGs. To ensure development effectiveness it makes sense that MDGs and EFA goals be mutually reinforcing. Through MDG-based national development strategies, UNDP assists over 100 countries to develop MDG-based National Development Strategies (NDGs).

MDGs can be integrated into national development strategies through the office of the President/Prime Minister/Minister of Planning and Finance, MDG Strategy Group and Thematic Working Group. Key assumptions for Education Needs Assessment including: interventions, targets, investment model and financing. Intervention needed to meet Universal Primary Education (UPE) Goal through direct primary education interventions, secondary education interventions and adult literacy programmes. She gives some country reports on the progress of education agenda. Thank you.

3.    UNICEF and EFA: Education for Children in Emergency and Post Conflict Contexts
Presented by Dr. Cream Wright, UNICEF, Education Sector

He gives brief explanation of the first establishment of the Parliamentarians Forum. UNICEF safeguards the need of children on education, so that they can benefit from the quality of basic education. What happens in emergency and post crisis situation? First interest in education is to create spaces for children to learn. Because we work for the need of children like nutrition and safe place, like when Tsunami hit the region.

The leadership of the country – the government should also be taken into account. Parliamentarians also represent the voice of children. It is mostly about fundamental rights of all children. What are we doing if the whole generation loses the access to education? Parliamentarians are seen as strategic partners to struggle for the rights of all children.

Questions and Comments

Pakistan: to have high system shall have merit system. Education has become very critical and that needs to be emphasized through the Parliamentarians. It is very integral contribution that the members of parliaments can give. Another consideration is to support the national evaluation in literacy rate and find out the indicators of its development. The findings can be used to create constituency on literacy, in specific.

Ms. Diana Alarcon says that it is the depolitization of its target. This is one of the efforts in relations to MDGs agenda – the need to improve the role of the office of statistics to find out the opportunity for policy dialogue where parliaments have important role.

Ms. Mae Chu Chang says that Indonesia uses merit basis system; how certification system is done to support the evaluation programme conducted by the government. In fact, that the government of Indonesia has monitored the development of teachers nation wide. To have the data right and to get the data broken down and to disseminate the information are three things to be considered and have been done by the government of Indonesia.

Dr. Cream Wright says that there are things to be considered why teaching should be politisized. Teaching career should not be politisized. Importantly, teachers have lost what they had: respect and status in the society. The segregated data can be managed by statistic office, as this is important. In this case, the parliamentarians play important role. This is evidence base advocacy towards the children rights.

The President, Mr. Makarim thanks the speakers and closes the session and invites the participants to applaud for the three speakers.

12.00 – 14.15
Lunch
Venue: Asean Room 8-9 and Friday Prayer
Venue: Bazzar in Front of Golden Balroom

Lunch is provided for the participants and time given to Muslim participants for Friday congregation. Informal discussions among the participants also take place.

14.15 – 15.30
Working Session 2
Venue Asean Room 6-7

MC invites the honorable and distinguished participants to summon and start the next session.

Prof. Dr. Arief Rachman opens the session and gives the time to the Minister of National Education, HE. Bambang Sudibyo.

Welcome Speech by Prof. Dr. Bambang Soedibyo, MBA, Minister of National Education of Indonesia

Assalmualaikum Wr.Wb. Mr. Bambang Sudibyo greets the honorable and distinguished guests. It is a happy moment that UNESCO has an initiative to have this kind of Parliamentary Forum on how the parliaments could support the requirement of funding for EFA activities, especially after the issuance of national education system and teachers. Indonesia has gone fundamental reforms until the year 2002 when the government has completed the amendment, suggesting that education is the rights to every citizen and human rights.

To ensure that the system is working, serving the people, at least 20% of national budget must be allocated for education. It was decided when Indonesia at the bottom of the nation’s financial crisis. It was hard for the government to meet the requirements for education improvement. The burden is also carried by the parliaments, but starting in 2009, the President of Indonesia decided to allocate 20% of the state budget, together with the Minister of Finance. Having said this, the role of the parliaments is very strategic and important. Without the support of the parliaments, it is impossible for the government to fulfill the constitutional condition on education. There are requirements for teachers before teaching, especially on their education background. The government is upgrading their capacity and certifying them by 2014.

We just finished the Senior Official Meeting of E-9, which includes 9 most populous developing countries that represent the world towards EFA goals in 2015. It emphasizes teacher training to better serve the goals of EFA. The meeting was also to identify projects that can be shared or done together by E-9 countries and to achieve 8 points but not limited to E-9 countries. I wish that you enjoy your stay in Indonesia and during the deliberation of the meeting. Thank you.

Co-chaired by the President (Indonesia) and Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer, Director, UNESCO Bangkok Office, Regional Bureau for Education in the Asia and the Pacific

1.    Lifelong Learning: Non-Formal Education
Presented by Dr. Hamid Muhammad, Director General Directorate of Non Formal and Informal Education, Indonesian Ministry of National Education

•    The EFA agenda calls for a comprehensive approach to learning in which non-formal education is an essential and integrated part. Non-formal education is now playing a major role in facing the challenges of equipping youth with proper life skills.

He firstly elaborates the conceptual framework of comprehensive approach to learning that has been adopted by Indonesia in regards of continuing education and lifelong learning. He shows the average flow rate of cohort student in 20 years and it finds that there is only 26.2% graduate from highs school. The problem is that the country has dropout students or those who are not continuing their education.

Another illustration is on the non-formal education programmes in Indonesia that focuses on literacy education, equivalency education, life skills education and lifelong learning. By the end of next year, the remaining of illiterate people in Indonesia will only be 5% of the total population. Another programme is functional literacy that has three levels: basic, intermediate and advanced. The target that the Ministry of National Education is going to recover is 2 million people and by the end of the programme, everyone who passes the test and they will receive certificate.

Community Reading Centers (CRCs) is a follow-up programme to avoid literate people to become illiterate again. Meanwhile, the equivalency education programme that has three levels: Package A (equal to primary schools), Package B (junior schools) and Package C (high schools). There are actually 3.3 million students dropout annually, 10.01 million full unemployment; while 44% of youth unemployment is high school graduates. Adequate life skills development is for income generating activities. The programme is called income generating training courses and life skills for adults. Another programme is women empowerment education. Another concern is ECCE (Early Childhood Care and Education), which is achieving national target for 2015 by reaching 75% of education progress. Thank you.

Questions and Comments

Pakistan: Indonesia has similar problems to Pakistan. Education has relations to economic development. In spite of those problems, education should be taken into serious account.

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer says that systematic and well-organized programme can be implemented in Indonesia. About monitoring and evaluation on adult education issue, there should be also test to find out that they are already illiterate. Analysis should be done to find out the fact of cohort students.

2.    Literacy as Freedom: United Nations Literacy Decade (UNLD)
Presented by Ms. Maki Hayashikawa, Programme Specialist in Gender and Quality Basic Education, UNESCO Bangkok Office, Regional Bureau for Education in the Asia and the Pacific

•    UNESCO is the lead agency for the UNLD, 2003 – 2012. The UNLD emphasizes the goal of literacy for all people of all ages, in all regions of the world, in rural and urban areas, in school and out-of-school, within families, communities and the work place.

United National Literacy Decade (UNLD, 2003-2012) A UN response to the emerging challenge of achieving “Literacy for All.” Broader vision of literacy, literacy at the heart of EFA and priority groups are the three considerations to take to further progress UNLD in the Asia Pacific region. The regional launch was held in Bangkok on 8 September 2003.

At the mid point of UNLD, where do we stand today? The global situation is about 774 million adult illiterates. Women make up 64% in East Asia. In 2005, 72 million children remain out of school. Illiteracy is at the root of exclusion and social inequality. The issues include lack of concrete policies, lack of research evidence to convince more resource allocation, lack of capacity to manage resources effectively, and lack of Management Information System (MIS) for literacy.

A mid-decade implementation report on the International Plan of Action for UNLD was prepared by UNESCO for the UN (June 2008). The challenge persists and remains undiminished. Furthermore, UNLD – the second half (2008 – 2012) shapes the new agenda for literacy and integrates literacy with international target like MDGs. The next 5 years and beyond focuses on making difference: stronger commitment, more effective resources and new resources for literacy. A call for greater political commitment to ‘Literacy for All’ should be done by parliamentarians to their governments. Thank you.

Questions and Comments

Republic of Korea: do you have any useful information or data from the other agencies to evaluate the studies regarding the outcomes and the international collaboration?

Ms. Maki Hayashikawa says UNESCO has collaboration with other UN agencies like UNICEF and UNDP. Mostly, we have worked together with UNICEF that provides data and statistics as well as with UNFPA regarding population.

Pakistan: Is there any mechanism that is used by the UN regarding the indicators of global monitoring report towards the standard data. Sometime one agency has similar or different results from another on the same issue.

Mr. Nicholas Burnett says that there are two types of data: administrative and survey. Administrative data is collected by UNESCO, the Institute of Statistics and is used by other agencies. Another source is survey data that is difficult to compare them across countries in some ways compared to administrative data.

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer gives analogy on how different people have different perception towards one same thing; how we reflect the goals and the satisfaction of the people.

3.    Women and Girl’s Education
Presented by Ms. Maki Hayashikawa, Programme Specialist in Gender and Quality Basic Education, UNESCO Bangkok Office, Regional Bureau for Education in the Asia and the Pacific

•    The 2008 EFA Global Monitoring Report shows that the goal of eliminating gender disparities in both primary and secondary education by 2005 has been missed in a great majority of countries. Women account for 64% of the 774 million adults worldwide who still lack of basic literacy skills. Gender parity in access to schooling is the first step towards gender equality in education.

94/149 countries in the world missed the targets of EFA. MDG review report (2005) on Target 4 “Eliminating gender disparity in primary and secondary education.” Significant progress has been made in girls’ education and gender parity in primary and secondary enrolments. “We have no gender issue here,” some countries would say. Nearly half of the regional countries are at risk of not achieving parity by 2015 in secondary education and primary completion remains a challenge.

Disparities to the disadvantage of boys at secondary education are growing, especially in East Asia and the Pacific. National data hides sub-national disparities. She shows some diagrams on the progress of gender equality education. Education is a feminized profession especially at the lower level. Is parity leading to equality in outcomes? Gender is crosscutting goal 5 and EFA strategy 6. Impact of major global threats on EFA and Gender Equality goal focuses on the rise in poverty, increase in food prices and emergency context.

There are two key messages for the parliamentarians in every Asia Pacific country to be extended to their governments: “gender equality in education is a human right” and “move beyond gender parity to achieve equality under EFA.”

Questions and Comments

Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer shares stories about gender equality in government official members; the distribution of male and female officials.

Pakistan says that there is proportion of about 30% of female representative in the parliaments in the government of Pakistan.

Prof. Arief mentions that in Indonesia, the government has the position of the Ministry of Women Empowerment and women also receive 3% of portion in the Parliamentarian membership.

Pakistan mentions that women should receive protection that is legally formed by law, which is great opportunity for women to get employed.

15.30 – 15.45
Coffee Break

Coffee break is provided in the hall.

15.45 – 17.00
Working Session 3
Venue: Asean Room 6-7

Co-chaired by the President (Indonesia) and Mr. Hubert Gijzen, Director, UNESCO Jakarta Office, Cluster and Regional Bureau for Sciences (represented by Mr. Anwar Alsaid), Moderated by the Vice President (Nepal)

1.    Inclusive Quality Education
Presented by Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer, Director, UNESCO Bangkok Office, Regional Bureau for Education in the Asia and the Pacific

•    UNESCO addresses the education needs of street and working children, learners with disabilities, children of ethnic/linguistic minorities and other vulnerable groups
•    Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE)

He firstly mentions about one-sex school in relations to gender equality and continues with the explanation of the excluded, unreached groups. Who are the excluded? He shows the table of percentages of children with and without disabilities not attending school and sub-national disparities in access to education—the national primary enrolment ratios. The objective of inclusive education is to support ‘Education for All’ by removing barriers to enrolment and learning for those who are enrolled in school but are excluded from learning.

Inclusive policies and practice outlines experiences in different countries in Asia. A school of good quality is a child-friendly school, child-centered and child-seeking. It does not exclude, discriminate against, or stereotype on the basis of difference. The government obligations and the right to education – so called 4 A’s: availability, accessibility, acceptability and adaptability.

Regarding policy-maker and politician “education”; national policy-makers and politicians must become fully committed to inclusive education. Early Childhood Care and Education (ECCE) graph shows where the system is failing—dropout rates by grade in primary education. An inclusive approach to ECCE can offset disadvantage – poverty, emergencies, or special needs – by acting early.

Comprehensive ECCE policies are important to develop EFA. Fostering strong policies for ECCE highlights policy environment and policy elements. Inclusive education is a process. Those excluded from education are often simply not seen. Inclusive education means making visible the invisible and ensuring that all learners fulfill their right to an education of good quality.

Questions and Comments

Indonesia says there are some excluded children in the country. The most difficult thing living with these excluded groups are the data. What is the actual numbers of excluded children in the remote areas or on the country’s borders? Is there any tool that UNESCO has developed to figure this out?

Mr. Sheldon says the government should go down to the bottom system to get the actual numbers and find out how many children are excluded and then get them included in education; and this is not easy to do.

Republic of Korea says that this issue is crosscutting to the protection of human rights as well as cultural diversity protection. Is there any information to deal with issue from other countries regarding this concern?

Mr. Sheldon says that education demands compulsory action from parents to get all parents to send their children to school. Constituency should support children to go to school. Compendium magazine, which was found in Indonesia, highlights equality of opportunities for inclusive education.

2.    National Competency-Based Teacher Standards (NCBTS)
Presented by Mr. Ramos, Department of Education of the Philippines

•    UNESCO mobilizes and assists Member States in designing and implementing viable national teacher policies concerning teacher education and training (pre-service academic programmes, in-service empowerment), recruitment and retention and issues of status and working conditions, and professionalization of the teaching profession
•    Teacher Education was the focus of the E9 Conference which was held in March 2008

Philippine Education for All (EFA) plan 2015 is the Basic Education Sector Reform Agenda (BESRA). There are 5 key BESRA changes as of today. The national competency-based standards outline both traditional and new paradigms. Teaching is a technical process (traditional); teaching is facilitating learning and the qualities of good teaching (new). Teachers should use the NCBTS as a guide to reflect on their current teaching practices.

Furthermore, it is as a framework for creating new teaching practices, as a guidepost for planning for professional development goals and it can be used as assessment too. It makes certain assumptions about improving teaching. Individual teachers have various types and levels of motivations, different capabilities and diverse range of opportunities to teach better.

Seven domains of NCBTS: social regard for learning, the learning environment, the diversity of learners, curriculum, planning, assessing and reporting, community linkages, personal growth and professional development. Each domain influences and is closely related to each other. Each domain is given key question and specific questions for the teachers and some sub-domains’ key concerns.

3.    Education for A Sustainable Future: UN Decade of ESD
Presented by Mr. Derek Elias, Programme Specialist, UNESCO Bangkok Office, Regional Bureau for Education in the Asia and the Pacific

•    The goal of United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014, DESD), for which UNESCO is the lead agency, is to integrate the principle, values and practices of sustainable development into all aspects of education and learning.

Sustainable development cannot be achieved without education for all. Quality education and sustainable development are interrelated to each other and UNESCO has very integral part to carry on this duty. It requires big societal transformation. Rapid changes and economic growth disadvantaged the poor. He quotes the statements of the delegates of Timor Leste regarding sustainable development and education for sustainable development. ESD is global issue that promotes just and sustainable society.

ESD also highlights food security—agriculture and food in an era of growth. Education for understanding linkages, making informed decisions, changing behavior, taking local action and adapting to changing needs. The four ESD Thrust (Agenda 21): basic education, reorienting existing education programmes developing public awareness and understanding sustainability and training. ESD and EFA should strengthen their common linkages.

In addition, universal education goals: developing good relationship with others, self-competence and confidence, etc. EFA and ESD integrate together to achieve quality and relevant learning for just and sustainable society. Quality focuses on 3 dimensions: assessment of leaning performance, condition for teaching and learning and quantity and quality of workforce. Life skill is another of many links between EFA and ESD.

Parliamentarian contribution to ESD; UN DESD International Implementation scheme is to incorporate ESD into national sustainable development. Asia Pacific Member states should incorporate ESD into national development plans. There are messages from Asia Pacific region. “We need to put ESD into the policy agenda to engage other stakeholders and decision makers in ESD, particularly those engaged in EFA” (From South East Asia).

Questions and Comments

Pakistan says that there is a lot of knowledge on ESD – the know-how. How should the teacher develop the children moral integrity? What can kind of module can be developed? UNESCO may share with the Member States regarding the issue of teachers’ capacity in developing moral issue of the students.

Mr. Derek Elias says that it is a very good concern in students’ attitude and behaviors through school or education system. One of the challenges is how to match that soft skill with the curriculum of the school; to make two approaches come together as fundamental challenge.

18.00
Welcome Dinner by the Minister of National Education, Republic of Indonesia
Venue: Golden Ballroom

Cultural Dinner is hosted by the Minister of National Education of Indonesia. Cultural performances are performed during the dinner by Diponegoro School students Jakarta (Javanese Gamelan), students of State High School 8 Jakarta (Rampak Gendang) and students of Saraswati Foundation (Javanese Gong Kebyar).

The MCs, Ms. Jasmine Sagita Rafiq and Mr. Mohammad Reiza of Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO accompanied the honorable guest and distinguished participants throughout the night. Speeches are delivered by the Minister of National Education, HE. Mr. Bambang Sudibyo and the Assistant Director-General for Education of UNESCO, Mr. Nicholas Burnett.

Photo sessions and informal discussion also take place for the delegates with the Minister of National Education and the cultural performers.

International Seminar on Community Learning Centers (CLCs): Day 5

Bandung, 23-27 June 2008

Rapporteur: Mohammad Reiza

Mason Pine Hotel
Bandung, Indonesia

Friday, 27 June 2008

08.30 – 08.45
Preparation for Video Conference

The organizer prepares the videoconference for the next plenary session with Thailand ad Japan

08.45 – 10.30
Plenary 5: Inter Country Cooperation
Venue: Mason Ballroom 1
Moderator: Ms. Anita Priyadharsini

Ms. Priyadharsini greets the participants and explains briefly about the topics of the next plenary and gives the time to Mr. Idris to present his papers regarding experiences on inter country cooperation in the Arab States.

1.    South-South Cooperation: Experiences of CLC in Arab States, by Mr. Hegazi Idris, UNESCO Beirut

Mr. Idris mentions that UNESCO Beirut is the regional office for the Arab States. The south-south cooperation: the case of the community learning centers in the Arab States. This is an old practice of UNESCO, which enables the developing countries to meet the objectives of Dakar EFA goals and the MDGs. South-South cooperation in Arab states outlines the equivalency programmes and second chance educational programmes are used in limited and small cases in Egypt, Sudan and Morocco. NFE is relatively new in the Arab states in comparison to Asia.

It started through exchanges or visits among policy makers and practitioners of several Arab States and Asian countries since 2003. It started in Jordan, Syria and spread to other Arab countries. He shows a CLC manual publication that is written in Arabic. The Arab States took the spirit in Asia and apply it in the region. The political situation and occupations have resulted in as huge number of people living in refugee camps, displaced persons and high level of school dropouts.

The Arab States is unique in many ways including the embrace of very rich and very poor countries. He then gives the education overview in the region that highlights school age children and dropouts. He gives brief elaboration on the practice of CLCs in Lebanon. There are 17 CLCs set in deprived areas and Palestinian Camps.

Furthermore, the Palestinian Camps outlines 4 operational CLCs that integrate cooperation and partnerships with NGOs and UNRWA. He gives a glance overview of CLCs in Syria that was initiated in 2008. There are 10 operational CLCs and targeted to reach 20 CLCs by 2009. He also gives the fact in Jordan that has 13 operational CLCs, which was first initiated in 2003. Egypt just started in 2007 and has already 20 operational centers. The main partners are Adult Education and NGOs. There is a great chance to reach hundreds of CLCs by 2009. UNESCO Beirut has started training and consultations to have the One Classroom School.

The challenges are local community ownership is week; measure of success quantitative and not qualitative. Most activities are time-bounded project activities; and policy linkage and networking with other organizations are narrow. He emphasizes deeper more on the CLCs ownerships, partnerships and linkages. We are hoping that we will have CLCs in Sudan. Thank you and good luck.

Ms. Priyadharsini wraps up the presentation and opens the floor for Q&A.

Nepal asks about the elaboration about the ownership of local people.

Mr. Idris says that there are some factors including the involvement of the community, which will involve financial matters. In reality, there should be top-down approach; from UNESCO to some NGOs to set up a CLC. In the planning of CLC, the initiative should come from the community, not from the government or UNESCO, thus will attract the surrounding community. It should be by the people and for the people. The community should do the management as they used to do it, although they know some donors who could assist them, in order to gain success. Orientation for young people should be undertaken.

Indonesia says that there are refugee centers in Indonesia, there is hesitant for the women to come to the centers. How do you take care of this issue in the Arab States?

Mr. Idris says that the refugee centers have no centers for women nor for men, this is not a separation for them but the centers have activities for both. For example, there is a center for handicaps and another for only women learners.

Mr. Alsaid adds that there are good CLCs in Jordan, Syria and Morocco; the notion of ownership is also influenced by the diversity of economic conditions. The net enrollment and the dropouts rate are different, thus the centers find difficulties to provide the services. We have to see differently from one country to another country in the region. He also wants to know the percentage of Arab refugees in Indonesia

Ms. Priyadharsini wraps up the Q&A session and gives the highlights of the interactive dialogues and invites the second speaker to present his papers.

2.    Regional or National Association, by Mr. Buhai Simanjuntak, CLCs Association in Indonesia

He explains about the establishment process that outlines the formulation of declaration statement and the draft of the declaration. The existence of CLCs as community movements in grassroots levels is the vision of the association; he also explains comprehensively the mission of the association as well as the objectives of the establishment. He shows the organization structure of the association.

The members of the association are more than 5,000 CLCs all over Indonesia. He also mentions the benefits of the association that outline the more access for the CLCs to information they need for running and developing their CLCs. He shows the concept of the CLC restructuring. He shows two pictures of the association activities including training and seminars for the CLCs teachers and managers with the cooperation with other national and international organizations; as well as inviting experts from Indonesia and abroad for the development of CLCs.

The establishment of prison CLCs was the cooperation with the directorate General of NFE of the ministry of National Education. Recently, there are about 600 CLCs in prison throughout the country. The association also integrates advocacy to the national and local governments for the development of CLCs in their areas. Thank you.

3.    Promoting sister CLCs through Video Conference among Indonesia, Thailand and Japan, by Mr. Kiichi Oyasu, APPEAL; and Kyoyama Kouminkan, Okayama; and Thailand

Mr. Oyasu explains briefly about the establishment of CLCs (Kouminkan) Association in Japan. He mentions also about the publicity and awareness standardization that held its 50th anniversary meeting in 2001. They also conduct annual seminar and meeting. Capacity building of Kouminkan personnel are held in the prefecture and city level; external training courses are organized by expert organizations. He shows the publications of the Kouminkan association including the annual reports, reports, monthly magazines and the directory of Kouminkan in Japan.

The society was established in 2003 that has 200 members including scholars, practitioners and administrators. The association also promotes bilateral cooperation and exchanges to multilateral future, also inter country network of Asia, Arab and Africa as well as sister CLCs through the use of ICT. Thank you.

Ms. Priyadharsini invites Q&A but then proceeds to the Video Conference with a Kouminkan – CLC – in Tokyo, Japan. She asks Mr. Edi Rukmana to explain about the mechanism of the videoconference.

Mr. Rukmana mentions that there will be a videoconference with a CLC in Tokyo, Japan and we will be using Skype to connect with them, and Q&A will be allocated with the spokespeople in the Kouminkan.

Ms. Priyadharsini greets the people in Japan, and introduces the participants of the International seminar and asks one of the spokesperson to introduce the staffs of the CLC.

The director of the CLC greets the participants in Indonesia and introduces his staffs who are sitting behind him and asks his staffs to introduce themselves one by one.

The conversation takes place between Indonesian and Japan. The representative of the kouminkan explains further and comprehensively about the history of Okayama and the activities of the kouminkan, which are run by the staffs and the community members. There is also emphasis on younger generation and the local environment. The kouminkan has been trying to collaborate with local schools to create some projects including the Kouminkan Summit. The programmes strengthen the capacity of the local people and community development. Thank you.

Ms. Priyadharsini thanks the representative, Mr. Habu and invites the seminar participants to give questions.

The Philippines asks how the community members can participate in kouminkan activities.

Japan says that kouminkan distributes newsletters to the community to inform them what kind of activities they can participate in.

Nepal asks about the sister relationship with your kouminkan, if you are interested what step that should be taken.

Japan says yes we could, thank you. We are also interested in cooperation with other countries but we need to see the activities in other countries and currently we don’t have any procedures for the cooperation. Probably UNESCO Bangkok can help establish it.

Nepal asks about the supports to the CLCs in terms of financial assistance.

Japan says that the municipalities support the activities of kouminkan.

Mr. Yamamoto adds that the governor owns the buildings of kouminkan in Okayama, so the governments also assist the activities.

India asks about the income generation of the present activities of your kouminkan.

Japan says that kouminkan receive members from the community, so the income generation is also from the activities of the members of kouminkan.

Mr. Yamamoto adds regarding how the CLCs in Japan accommodate the people in the community to have activities.

Pakistan asks about the most popular activity for women in your kouminkan.

Japan says that the kouminkan has project on gender equality seminar and assistance for derived children as well as domestic violence. He then introduces some of the participants of the kouminkan and invites the seminar participants to have a visit to the kouminkan one day. They thank the participants of the seminar to have the fantastic opportunity.

Ms. Priyadharsini thanks the representatives of Okayama kouminkan and thanks the seminar participants

Ms. Tomoko, JICA representing the Ministry of Health

She gives short presentation on MCH Handbook in Indonesia (Maternal and Child Health). She gives the definition of what MCH Handbook is; it is an integration of records and information on MCH and an important health tools for families. The handbook contains maternal health care records and records for neonatal and child health care. She shows pictures of the activities of mothers class on the information of birth preparedness version and child health version.

MCH handbook contributed to the increase of mother’s knowledge, attitude and practices to maintain her own health and the health of her children. The handbook is a tool to improve the quality of MCH services. She shows the diagram of health care providers in the community; also the role of the handbook to improve the performance of the mothers and families. It is also a communication tools between the health care providers to mothers.

The handbook is a tool to integrate various MCH services and can be used anywhere, including Posyandu that provides health services; also in hospitals and clinics. It is a cost-efficient tool; an integration of health care monitoring and health education materials. In average the cost of the handbook is Rp 2,730 per book. She explains about the historical background of the MCH handbook in Indonesia that was initiated in 1993 and was first tested in Salatiga, central Java.

Currently, the government of Indonesia is conducting the second phase of the handbook (2006-2009). Thank you.

Ms. Priyadharsini thanks the speaker and wraps up the presentation and invites Mr. Idris to add some information.

Mr. Idris says that 2 representatives of Morocco that also have concerns in CLCs in the country, came to UNESCO Bangkok and attend this Seminar now. The participants give applause for them.

10.30 – 10.45
Coffee and Tea Break

Coffee break is provided in the hall of the ballroom, some materials are exhibited as well as relevant publications (books, brochures, newsletters, reports and CDs).

10.45 – 12.30
Plenary: Synthesis of the Seminar
Moderator: Mr. Muhammad Dawood Khan
Venue: Mason Ballroom 1

Mr. Dawood greets the participants and introduces himself as the representative of Pakistani National Commission for UNESCO and he introduces the speakers of the session; and gives the time to the speaker.

1.    Policies and Implementation by Mr. Mahfuzur Rahman, Pakistan

Mr. Rahman thanks the moderator and explains briefly about his papers that are the collections of suggestions and opinions of the seminar participants. The policies and implementations and the strategies had been discussed mainly in the plenary session. He gives the summary of the first plenary session and the highlighted issues of the speakers. The summary is the ideas presented by the speakers that identified the deliberation of some issues including the assessment of the literacy situation and learning needs in all countries. Ensuring the quality of institutions and their service delivery, improvement of monitoring and evaluation of CLCs especially within the centers.

Furthermore, the emphasis is also on the diversification of programmes and activities, capacity building and government policies. The challenges are one to mention: the improvement of the facilities. The deliberation of the implementation is to the focus on the access to literacy services and elimination of business discrimination and the advocacy of synergy of formal and non-formal education. The highlight is also to the consideration of CLC’s operational activities that is not only focusing on literacy only but also other areas of life skills development. The factors are including the development of leaning materials and tools, community involvement, the use of ICT and the environment; there are more suggestions from the forum including the development of community partnerships and ownerships in CLCs. The results of the process of the efforts are to follow the process from community participation a to community empowerments. Thank you.

Mr. Dawood sums up the presentation and welcomes comments from the floor.

India comments regarding the concept of literacy that comes up to often, so the trend of lifelong learning should be included.

Nepal comments on the inclusion of mother tongue.

ILO Indonesia comments on the suggestions on the equivalency programme to be put in the recommendation.

Mr. Idris says about the other educations institutions, for example other centers that are not CLCs; how if that kind of centers are adopted as CLCs by the governments.

Nepal comments on the issue of income generation programme integrated in literacy programmes.

2.    Effective Management of CLCs by Ms. Myrna Limm, The Philippines

Ms. Limm outlines the main points of the effective management of CLCs. Quality management of CLCs is the heart of successful and sustainable CLC operations. It entails the need for: planning of CLC activities that is responsive and relevant to the community learning needs; organizing acceptable structure that clearly defines leadership, roles, functions, responsibilities and authorities; directing and managing operation that clearly defines supervision and control; regular monitoring and evaluation that is participative and consultative.

She gives the brief pictures of the key areas and the discussion points of the issue. First focus is community participation and ownership that highlights the volunteerism of services is prevalent in most CLCs and importance of community participation in decision making for responsive CLC planning as well as the role of women in CLC management as major stakeholders.

Second point is CLC Networking and Linkages that highlights the impact of the government policies in support of CLCs and its continuing presence and visibility, value of government and private sectors (CLCs, NGOs), partnership based on trust and confidence as wel as the role of more advance CLCs in supporting small CLCs big sister and little sister – nurturing and care; and the sharing and dissemination of effective networking and of best practices as a source of learning, ideas and wisdom.

The third point is CLC resource generation outlines the encouragement and promotion of innovative, creative approaches resource generation – adopt a community or CLC and CLCs’ appreciation and being tapped in the rich resources that local communities have (internal resources) over external resources.

The last point is CLC-MIS focuses on the data access security and protection of the CLC-MIS, information needs define CLC-MIS data bank, focusing on both quantity and quality as well as the need to systematically collect, analyze, disseminate, and use relevant and reliable information on CLC activities resources and impact.

The future plans include the intensive capacity building in all areas for concerned partners, more particularly the CLC management committee and CLC effectiveness and efficiency of operations; advocacy and social mobilization for the legitimization of CLC programmes. CLCs are organized by the people, operated and managed with the people and sustained for the people, for their growth and development – empowerment.

Mr. Dawood wraps up the presentation and sums up the highlighted points and opens the forum for Q&A

India comments on management and policy issues; what she would like to propose is the separation of the budget of formal and non-formal education – financial allocation by the government.

Nepal comments on social audit the transparency of resources of the issue.

3.    Quality Learning in CLCs by Mr. Chej Shrestha, Nepal

Mr. Shrestha presents the results of the quality learning in CLCs. A promotion of life skills in CLCs; UNESCO has dived the life skills into three main areas: literacy skills, generic skills and contextual skills. Life skills that are promoted by CLCs outline vocational skills and improving quality of life, etc. The challenges are narrowly focused programmes, coordination with different stakeholders, no national framework for life skills learning, lack of resources, ineffective linkage and network as well as monitoring and evaluation. The recommendations include some highlights from the participating countries and international organization – UN agencies.

Another point is the use of ICT in CLCs. The major findings are community planning and development – community database, ICT for poverty alleviation using accounting and websites as well as linkages and networks. There are different uses of ICT in CLCs such as database management of the learners, developing learners’ specific and area specific materials and to reduce illiteracy elapse rate. The challenges are intensive facilitation for project implementation, mainstreaming ICT in literacy programme and gender issues – the access and use of ICT for the women, which is very limited as well as the location of the center, flexibility in time and recruiting women animators. The future plans are the expansion of the project to other CLCs.

Furthermore, he explains about primary health care and HIV/AIDS. The emphasis is on the enhancement of the competencies in delivering information. Challenges are to include prisons as high potential site of drugs distribution, which in turn sustain HIV/AIDS transmission, capacity development for educational staffs in delivering guidance and assistance on HIV/AIDS prevention education. The future plans include different cooperative projects at the national programmes against HIV/AIDS.

The final point is mother tongue literacy programmes that focus on mother tongue education that can help learners to learn faster and with confidence. The issues outline political will, legislation, linguistic support, relevance, etc. the challenges are to include the lack of clear national policy, community support for sustainability. He shows a diagram of the transition from mother tongue to national language. He gives some recommendations that include a qualitative research on the transition from language 1 to language 2 needs and UNESCO should help the establishment of network for this particular issue. Thank you.

Mr. Dawood wraps up the presentation and gives the floor Q&A session.

Pakistan asks about the achievement of Nepal on literacy programmes that can be adopted for this seminar.

Mr. Shrestha says that Nepal uses mother tongue in education but there is no study on the impact yet.  Presently, there are 2 NGO partners in this pilot project.

The Philippines comment on the teaching methodology on mother tongue, intellectual property rights and collaboration with private sectors for the documentations.

Mongolia comments on the issues of mother tongue that is happening between Mongolian and Kazakhstani.

Mr. Shrestha says that the learners can’t be stopped to learn the mother tongue or the second language. The mother tongue can make the learner learn faster about other languages.

4.    Expanded Vision and roles of CLCs by Mr. Raafat Radwan, Egypt

Mr. Radwan presents the synthesis on the expanded vision and roles of CLCs. The basic issues include the equality and deprived groups, empowerment and certification, accountability and achievement, participation and inclusion as well as monitoring and evaluation. Another issues is the move of EFA and ESD; the move from education to lifelong learning (LLL), inclusive community development.

The challenges include new know how required to deal with new moves, lack of information and knowledge; difficulties to achieve gender equality goal as long as gender disparity still exist, difficulties to encounter the problems and increased labor children. Another point is the need to coordinate changes of formal education with non-formal education, need for different levels of capacity building, need for research and development by research institutes.

The suggestions are: the need to start national consultation to streamline ESD, LLL in both FE and NFE, build prototypes to introduce new concepts in CLCs (test bed), promotion of ESD and LL should start from discussions. ESD is lifelong process that requires increased awareness, the need to define the impact of new trends on CLC functionalities; cooperation with ILO to help eradicate child labor, build inter country network, develop a tool to raise awareness to stop child labor.

Mongolia comments on the points of ESD and LLL.

Nepal comments on the increase of supports of the government to provide CLCs with learning materials.

12.30 – 13.30
Lunch Break and Friday Prayer

Lunch is provided for the participants in the Sport Bar.  The organizer provides cars for those who go for Friday Prayer.

13.30 – 14.45
Future Actions

1.    Introduction to Follow-up Plans

Mr. Kiichi Oyasu of UNESCO Bangkok gives brief explanation of the next parallel session to get the follow-up plans based on the sub-region in Asia; he then gives the time for the participants to group themselves based on the sub-region and start the working group discussion.

2.    Working Groups

Participants are divided into 3 working groups based on the sub region: East and Southeast Asia, South Asia and Arab States throughout the parallel session in the ballroom and partitioned into three areas.

Group 1: Arab States
Chairperson: Syria

There are 6 group members, the chairperson leads the group to discuss the results of the field visit in the previous day and asks them to contribute the group by giving their opinions and suggestions to be wrapped up in the results. The group discusses and takes notes in Arabic language.

The rapporteur takes note of the highlighted points and prepares the presentation of the results for the next plenary session.

Group 2: East and Southeast Asia
Chairperson: Japan

There are 24 group members, the chairperson leads the group to discuss the results of the field visit in the previous day and asks them to contribute the group by giving their opinions and suggestions to be wrapped up in the results.

The rapporteur takes note of the highlighted points and prepares the presentation of the results for the next plenary session.

Group 3: South Asia
Chairperson: Nepal

There are 14 group members, the chairperson leads the group to discuss the results of the field visit in the previous day and asks them to contribute the group by giving their opinions and suggestions to be wrapped up in the results.

The rapporteur takes note of the highlighted points and prepares the presentation of the results for the next plenary session.

14.45 – 15.00
Final Plenary: Sharing Working Groups on Future Actions
Venue: Mason Ballroom 1
Moderator: Mr. Kiichi Oyasu, APPEAL

Mr. Oyasu greets the participants and opens the final plenary session and explains the mechanism of the session and invites the spokesperson for each group to present their results.

Group 1: Arab States
Spokesperson: Mauritania

He starts the presentation of the group discussion and explains the points in Arabic. The interpreter interprets the presentation. He would like to talk about three priorities: building foundation for NFE, building partnership between stakeholders and provide leading role to the NGOs and getting hard political well.

The challenges are the lack of legal, organizational framework for the NFE, shortage in financing education programmes at large and NFE specifically and the need to build the capacities of all participants of NFE. More of the challenges are the lack of information related to NFE, the need for more cooperation and coordination between Arab states and other countries, and the increased number of dropouts from formal education and low quality of the graduates. He mentions more of the challenges including the lack of political supports and the continuity of this support.

The proposed solutions are to encourage government to legalize NFE, to mobilize the financial resources and to build the capacity for the NFE participants. More to propose are the building of information system that is relevant to NFE, to encourage networking and partnership with other institutions and develop joint projects. Thank you and thank you for the five-day seminar that enrich us with new knowledge that we can bring back to our countries.

Mr. Oyasu thanks the presenters and invites the group of East and Southeast Asia to present the group discussion results.

Group 2: East and Southeast Asia
Spokesperson: Japan

He starts the presentation by giving the priorities in the sub-region (brainstorming) that outlines the points of the institutionalization of CLC policy support, capacity building, public awareness, resource, linkage etc. The priorities: institutionalization of CLC policy support, capacity building and life skill programmes.

The policy to strengthen CLC-NFE is to institutionalize, to allocate budget, to integrate MIS, to train the staffs, and to build awareness. Furthermore, there is also consideration on curriculum revision, which highlights the integration of the programme, life skills and the use of holistic approach.

Another point is networking that emphasizes on the national CLC association, EFA committee and CLC conference in the regional or national levels. Thank you.

Mr. Oyasu thanks the spokesperson and invites for comments, but then invites the last group to present the discussion results.

Group 3: South Asia
Chairperson: Nepal

He starts his group discussion results that cover the concerns of the priority areas and actions that outline the networking among NGOs practicing different types of CLCs fro integrating CLC and government programmes, quality improvement of CLC activity implemented by different NGOs, expansion of CLC through strong literacy and equivalency programmes, etc.

The challenges and obstacles are including the advocacy for recognition of equivalency programme, limited resources for scaling up the programme, the lack of strong political commitment, mobilization of community support, the need of financial support from the government and the qualified trainers or teachers.

The strategies are to integrate policy for equivalency and certification, motivation to attend adult literacy class fro women, advocacy for incorporating CLCs in national action plan for EFA, the need for materials in mother tongue and capacity building for teachers and master trainers. Thank you.

Mr. Oyasu invites additional comments from the participants.

Bangladesh says the main objectives of CLCs, the different contexts in different countries; also the benefits CLC can provide to the community members.

Mr. Oyasu concludes the session of the final plenary and gives some highlighted points regarding the previous days sessions. Thank you and he closes the session and starts the next session: closing; and he reminds the participants to fill up the feedback forms.

The participants quickly fill the feedback forms to be submitted again to the organizer – UNESCO Bangkok.

15.00 – 15.30
Closing Ceremony
Moderator: Mr. Kiichi Oyasu

The staffs of UNESCO Bangkok assist Mr. Hamid Muhammad of the Ministry of National Education.

Ms. Darunee expresses sincere gratitude to Mr. Hamid Muhammad for his approval and supports to organize the seminar and the Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO. Also special thanks to Jayagiri, particularly Pak Ade for the hard work. She mentions that UNESCO Bangkok will start a seminar in inter-region in Asia; also the future plans to touch Kouminkan and Japan and set up an association to connect kouminkan and CLCs in Asia and Arab States.

The same time, it is to improve the quality of non-formal education through CLCs, which can give impact on social development and EFA for each participating country, also to improve literacy rate as well as the development of young people and children. Please bring the results of this seminar back to your country and share with the people and policy makers there and apply some knowledge from the seminar.

Mr. Oyasu then invites the representative of the participants from the Philippines.

The Philippines says that throughout the seminar we learn a lot and would like to thank UNESCO Bangkok, Jakarta and the ministry of National Education for the wonderful experiences.

Mr. Muhammad then gives symbolized certificate to her.

Morocco thanks the Ministry of National Education, Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO for the seminar and hopes to see all the participants again in Arab region.

Mr. Muhammad gives the symbolized certificate to him.

Mr. Radwan of Egypt represents the African region and gives a souvenir to Mr. Muhammad.

Mr. Oyasu invites Mr. Hamid Muhammad to deliver his closing speech.

Mr. Hamid Muhammad greets the distinguished guests and on behalf of the government of Indonesia, he expresses his gratitude and happiness for the success of the seminar. He thanks the participants for their active participation and congratulates them for the results of the seminar. He believes that in the five-day seminar participants get chances to share knowledge and experiences and to have time to visit some CLCs in Indonesia.

Face-to-face participation will strengthen participation and collaboration in international community; we are hoping that this discussion will continue to update the development of CLCs programmes in each participation country. There are some issues regarding CLCs including the empowerment of the existing CLCs; only a few CLCs that maintain their centers’ activities. Another point is how those CLCs empower the community, this has something to do with all participants in every country and hoping that what we get from this seminar can be applied in their countries. CLCs get supports from the government, private sector and the community.

Through this closing session, please accept our sincere apology if there was any inconvenience occur during the seminar. Have a nice journey back to their journey. By reciting Alhamdulillah, he officially closes the seminar.

He then gives remembrance – Indonesian dolls to every participant to be brought back to their countries.

The staffs of the ministry of National Education distribute the dolls to the participants.

15.30 – 16.30
Coffee Break

Coffee break is provided in the hall of the ballroom, some materials are also distributed and exhibited, also relevant publications (books, brochures, newsletters, reports and CDs).

16.30 – finished

Buses are provided for the participants to have a city tour in Bandung and shopping in Cihampelas Walk (Ciwalk).

International Seminar on Community Learning Centers (CLCs): Day 4

Bandung, 23-27 June 2008

Rapporteur: Mohammad Reiza

Mason Pine Hotel
Bandung, Indonesia

Thursday, 26 June 2008

08.30 – 10.00
Field Visit Review: Group Discussion

Participants are divided into 4 working groups throughout the parallel session in 2 different ballrooms and in each ballroom partitioned into two groups. Participants are divided based on the field visits they joined the previous day (2 destinations); and each field visit group is divided into two smaller groups discussing the results of the field visit.

Representatives of APPEAL explain the procedures and mechanism of the working groups and ask the groups to highlight and come up with the points of strengths, weaknesses, challenges, suggestions and applications (in their own countries) to be presented in the next plenary session.

The groups choose the group leaders to lead the discussion and a rapporteur to take notes of the working group results – who will present the results during the next plenary session. Flip board is provided for each working group to collect the brainstorming ideas.

1.    Working Group A1 in Mason Pine 2
Chairperson: Sudan
Rapporteur: Pakistan

There are 14 group members, the chairperson leads the group to discuss the results of the field visit in the previous day and asks them to contribute the group by giving their opinions and suggestions to be wrapped up in the results.

The rapporteur takes note of the highlighted points and prepares the presentation of the results for the next plenary session.

2.    Working Group A2 in Mason Pine 2
Chairperson: Uzbekistan
Rapporteur: Mongolia

There are 12 group members, the chairperson leads the group to discuss the results of the field visit in the previous day and asks them to contribute the group by giving their opinions and suggestions to be wrapped up in the results.

The rapporteur takes note of the highlighted points and prepares the presentation of the results for the next plenary session.

3.    Working Group B1 in Mason Pine 3
Chairperson: Vietnam
Rapporteur: Pakistan

There are 12 group members, the chairperson leads the group to discuss the results of the field visit in the previous day and asks them to contribute the group by giving their opinions and suggestions to be wrapped up in the results.

The rapporteur takes note of the highlighted points and prepares the presentation of the results for the next plenary session.

4.    Working Group B2 in Mason Pine 3
Chairperson: India
Rapporteur: The Philippines

There are 12 group members, the chairperson leads the group to discuss the results of the field visit in the previous day and asks them to contribute the group by giving their opinions and suggestions to be wrapped up in the results.

The rapporteur takes note of the highlighted points and prepares the presentation of the results for the next plenary session.

10.00 – 10.45
Coffee and Tea Break

Coffee break is provided in the hall of the ballroom, some materials are exhibited as well as relevant publications (books, brochures, newsletters, reports and CDs).

Some of the working groups are still preparing the report presentation for the next plenary session.

10.45 – 12.00
Plenary: Field Visit Review
Moderator: Ms. Hegazi Idris
Venue: Mason Ballroom 1

Presentations of the groups on field visit review by the representatives of group A1, A2, B1 and B2.

Mr. Idris of UNESCO Beirut gives brief explanation of the session and the mechanism of the session; each group gives general information of the field visits and gives the analysis of their group findings.

1. Working Group A1 Rapporteur (Pakistan)

She mentions about the places that the group visited and gives the findings of the visit. The strengths include the variety of the activities, flexibility of schedule, etc. The challenges of the place are lack of sustainability, government or community balance in supporting the center.

She gives the suggestions including the increase of community involvement and participation, better information on the community and local partners, development and facility building of facilitators and community, the use of ongoing learners as ambassadors to contribute to the center and the harmonization of curriculum both formal and non-formal.

Equivalency should be based on the context, circumstances and condition of the learners and the country of NFE.

In Ariyanti Course, which is a private institution contributing to the capacity building of the public sector.

In Al Karim Mosque is a good initiative to have a religious institution as a learning center, creation of a network of linkages (private, religious and the community), use of ICT as a teaching technique. There should be a creation of model to enable private sector involvement and building up a local association legally recognized to manage the CLC. We were informed that the land was donated, and the mosque is donated to the community and the facilities will be improved.

Mr. Idris wraps up the presentation and gives the time to the chairperson of the group A2 to present the results of the group discussion.

2. Working Group A2 Chairperson (Uzbekistan)

He gives brief explanation of the visits systematically and run through the points to consider for every site visit. SKB Purwakarta, he mentions that the CLC already has already good governance supports and commitments; ECCE is included in the activities. The group suggests keeping the sustainability of the CLC’s activities, improving the teaching manuals and instructions. He also highlights the people empowerment.

Second place has good ownership and strong management; there are also good linkages among the stakeholders, good training and outcomes. On the other hand, there is no connection with rural CLCs

In the last place, Al Karim mosque builds pre-school in remote area. There should be segregation of the two different functions (religious and community), also the legality of the ownership. The visit of Ms. Indonesia also helps to promote the CLC.

Mr. Idris wraps up the presentation and gives the time to group B1 to present their group report.

3. Working Group B1 Rapporteur (Pakistan)

CLC At Thohiriyah, Cianjur district, he mentions about the process and the activities that include the performances of the children, speeches from the district head. He further explains about the visit of the group. The strengths of the CLC outline the community participation, diverse activities, formal support of the government, well institutionalized of equivalency programme and accessibility. The challenges include the poor facilities, space and environment, lack of stronger government supports and better involvement of the learners.

There should also be separation of the arrangement of the technical and non-technical sides and age groups. The groups give some suggestions including the appropriate time and curricula, more involvement of the government, local people and children; to enlarge the environment and the space. Some incentives are also required to cater better marketing for the income generating activities (self financing). There should be integration of the young children into formal education system, more training for teachers and the managements and synergy between formal education and the CLCs. There is no common plan for every country regarding this particular CLC.

Mr. Idris wraps up the presentation and gives the time to the next rapporteur to present the group discussion results.

4. Working Group B2 Rapporteur (The Philippines)

The place is in Cianjur – correctional facility. She mentions that there are women cooking traditional vegetables to be sold in the markets. There are facility buildings that are good; CLC has organized classroom activities compared to other CLCs, learning atmosphere showed learners well engaged, many vocational skills development. There are also motivated inmates, library and information center, and lots of equipments for vocational programmes. The CLC also receives support from the government also NGOs.

The challenges of the CLC and the facilities, which outline the need of better spaces fro more freedom to move around, to improve some activities, to clarify the schedules and outcomes for the learning activities. Furthermore, she asks question about what happens to the learners after coming out. There is sustainability and placement for rehabilitation. Self-employment needs better strategies. Other challenges highlight that there is no special place for children; nurses come only once a week. The group gives some suggestions including more coordination with the community, provision of programme on how to use their money earned from the livelihood, visits to other CLCs from comparison studies and the need for greater interactive/learner-oriented programme. Some more suggestion, that there is a need for health services for inmates and the enhancement of the library supports.

Furthermore, the application in other countries outlines the need for programmes in jails or correctional centers, better synergy between formal education and NFE for EPs in developing countries, EPs or CLCs can be adapted for juvenile centers and advocacy for involving social or corporate organizations for rehabilitation of inmates. The feedback on the CLCs highlights if uniform in NFE are free or provided by the government, the CLC is in the town and receives donations from private and government. There are government, private and community CLCs in Indonesia, which is different from other countries.

Mr. Idris wraps up the presentation and opens the floor for comments or questions.

India asks group A about Ariyanti course as a privately-owned CLC; there is a danger in such CLC, as it could charge high tuition fee to the learners, and sidetrack from the main objectives of CLCs.

Egypt comments regarding the incentives to the learners to participate, thus a model should be formulated, regarding experiences in Egypt; another point is income generating activities in a very poor area is a very big challenge, thus to collaborate with other parties. Another point is the synergy of formal and non-formal within the framework of CLCs, there should be continuous monitoring and evaluation to provide more equal opportunity for the poor.

Sudan gives comments regarding Ariyanti course that the training facilitations complement the public sectors; it has contribution to the society.

Uzbekistan comments regarding privately owned CLC also give opportunity to another area of learners, there should be also advice to the UN system to bring CLCs in the main concerns.

Mr. Idris wraps up the presentations and gives main highlights of the field visit results. How can we go towards the development of CLCs through the UN system in the future? He concludes that there are recommendations that will be kept for the forum and for the development of CLCs also for those we have visited during the field visits. We have seen diversities on the management of CLCs from the field visits, which give us more perspectives. He then thanks the speakers and invites the speaker from Japan for his presentation that is supposed to be in the next plenary.

Promotion of Lifelong Learning by Mr. Hiromi Sasai, Japan (the presentation is arranged right after the field visit report)

He gives backgrounds of the presentation that outlines the political economic aspects. The objective is to discuss practical measures for networking and cooperation. The discussion themes emphasize to clarify the meaning of LLL in today’s world; to identify the key points in formulating the recommended learning contents, and to discuss the policies for promoting networking and cooperation.

The results of the meeting outline 5 categories such as the concept of LLL, the LLL policy to practice. He then explains the concept of LLL. The community dimension is as important as individual. Policy makers recognize and promote LLL as the overarching framework for EFA. Cooperation and integration of effort within and across sectors, levels and all Ministries, not only Education, is essential, as is local level initiative and coordination of effort to achieving EFA and other development objectives.

He further elaborates the roles of the governments towards LLL including to give priority to LLL for literacy and basic education for EFA. Learners be given every opportunity to choose between different programmes and between different providers. Teaching and research resources of higher education and research institutions be fully engaged

Furthermore, he explains the contents and methodology related to lifelong learning; which tease out the point that governments together with partner NGOs and other actors nurture an enabling environment, providing resources where necessary, which paves the way for communities to develop flexible and gender-sensitive curricula and content for sustainable and autonomous programmes of LLL. All stakeholders promote indigenous forms of learning that may be supplemented by folk media and new ICT to promote local curriculum and content of functional literacy and life skills education

Finally, he elaborates comprehensively the issue of networking that highlights governments and other influential decision-makers publicly advocate the benefits and necessities of working together across all sectors for creating linkages between different systems of education. Besides that, there should be development of stakeholders; regional and international organizations prepare effective platforms for sharing best practices. Thank you

Mr. Idris wraps up the presentation and invites the participants to have lunch break.

12.30 – 13.45
Lunch Break

Lunch is provided for the participants in the Sport Bar.

13.45 – 15.15
Plenary Session 4: Expanded Vision and Role of CLCs
Moderator: Mr. WP. Napitupulu
Rapporteur: Mr. Raafat Radwan
Venue: Mason Ballroom 1

Mr. Napitupulu opens the session by greeting the participants; he introduces himself and the speakers of the session. He then gives the time to Ms. Suzuki to deliver her presentation on the general information of the session.

Brief Introduction to the Session by Ms. Kaoru Suzuki, APPEAL

Ms. Suzuki shows a diagram on the phases of the plenary of the seminar, from plenary 1 – 4.  She emphasizes on the role of CLCs, not only the increasing numbers of the centers in every country. She further explains about Right-Based Approach (RBA) and its emphasis including equality, non-discrimination, attention to vulnerable groups, empowerment, express linkage to rights, accountability, participation and inclusion.

She further elaborates about the gender mainstreaming and right-based approach. According to GMR 2008, gender inequality if a major concerns. Gender mainstreaming is the process of assessing the implications for women and men of any planned actions, including legislations, policies and programmes in any area and at all levels. CLCs programmes should avoid social stigma on gender equality, as CLC can provide the opportunity to become aware and think about gender.

Another aspect is inclusive community development. Inclusion of the marginalized and vulnerable people teases out the groups of people with disabilities, women and girls, indigenous people, etc. Another concern is to the promotion of lifelong learning. Another concern is ESD through CLCs by ensuring bottom-up approach.
Mr. Napitupulu thanks Ms. Suzuki and gives brief introduction of the session and gives the time to Mr. Khampa for his country presentation.

1.    Gender Mainstreaming and Right-Based Approach by Mr. Ruamitr Khampa, Thailand

Mr. Khampa thanks the moderator of the session and greets the participants. He shows the map of Thailand and the region where he lives there. He mentions that he’s been running a pilot project in one province in Thailand that is supported by UNESCO and UNICEF. He mentions about the purpose of the pilot projects. He then gives the definition of right-based approach.

RBA principles: participation, accountability, non-discrimination, empowerment and linkages to human rights standards. He gives the analysis of the situation that was conducted through a series of training for CLC committee members (ToT, initial training, refresher training) and community members’ meetings. He elaborates further about the capacities assessment that outlines the ability of rights holders to claim rights and capacity of duty bearers to fulfill obligations. He comprehensively explains about the programme planning and implementation, monitoring and evaluation that were undertaken.

Furthermore, he shows the diagram of the main activities from the first phase (situation analysis) to monitoring and evaluation. He mentions the results or the outcomes of the project to the beneficiaries that include 8 families, 14 laymen and all students in on community school also that there are 11 CLCs and 64 villages participate in the CLC network. He shows the table of the gender perspective as one of the result of the project. He gives the point of challenges of the project that include right understanding of the participants, completeness and accuracy of information, networks and linkages. Thank you.

Mr. Napitupulu thanks Mr. Khampa and asks the participants about the Q&A session and gives the time to Ms. Saisupaton

2.    Inclusive Community Development by Ms. Sunee Saisupaton, Thailand

Ms. Saisupaton presents the issue regarding capacity building for persons with disabilities. She gives the background of the country based on the national statistics. She explains about the concept of CBR programmes. She shows some pictures of people with disabilities. The committee members are trained. She shows the onion layer of the network of CLCs in sub-district, district and provincial levels in Thailand. She mentions about the centers’ activities including the function as information center. Other services include counseling and referring, promoting self-employment, organizing workshops for PWDs parents and care takers, and organizing special tuition class for PWDs.

Furthermore, she gives general pictures of CLCs in Thailand that are located in village at a house of PWD or office of local government, managed by a committee members of the community and supported by NGOs and governments. She shows a picture of an entrance of a CLC for PWDs also the inside looks of the CLC. She also shows a picture of a disabled boy who is helped by the CLC with some practical therapy for the rehabilitation to support his daily life. She shows another picture of a paralyzed person who is also learning at the CLC, he establishes a CLC at his house and the Ministry of Technology knows about his project and supports his CLC.

The outcomes of the pilot projects: a mechanism to promote disability at the CLC. PWDs perceived as burden has shifted to empower them. Thank you.

MR. Napitupulu thanks Ms. Saisupaton and gives the time to Mr. Yamamoto to deliver his presentation.

3.    ESD through CLCs by Mr. Hideki Yamamoto, Japan

Mr. Yamamoto gives general picture of his presentation and he shows a picture of a fee-paying public toilet that he was involved in Zambia in 1999. He explains the Japanese words for CLC (Kouminkan), which was started in 1949 as the act of social education, to promote adult education, and to prevent war. He elaborates further about the relations between Kouminkan and educational system in Japanese community for lifelong learning.

Another point is regarding sustainable development. ESD was declared at the WSSD in Johannesburg in South Africa in 2002. The core of ESD is beyond environmental education. The educational process includes economic growth, social development and environmental protection. Everyone has the opportunity and benefit for quality education also for sustainable development future. Japanese government proposed the decade of ESD at the UN assembly in 2005. Goals of ESD include the goal of the programme to create global learning space for ESD and UNESCO and other UN agencies as the organization to promote ESD.

He mentions also the relations between curriculum development and ESD, the regional centers of expertise (RCEs) to promote ESD, to organize the programme on sustainable development. An RCE is a network of existing formal, non-formal and informal education organizations. RCEs need to achieve the goals of the UN decade of ESD (2005-2015). He shows the map of Okayama, whose inhabitants are 700,000 and where the community people can participate in the ESD programme.

He further explains about the ESD promotion at Kouminkan and the roles of Okayama University for ESD; higher educational institution, the university does the revision of the curriculum and provides expertise for the local community. He also highlights the points of Kouminkan Summit 2007 that was attended by people from different countries, as well as the agenda of the summit. Okayama Declaration on 1 Nov. 2007 was officially declared that Kouminkan or CLCs is the focal points for ESD.

The challenges and future plans outline the creation of model of ESD at CLCs, international symposium on ESD and the promotion of network of CLCs for ESD. He hopes that the networks built through this seminar are useful for ESD. Thank you.

Mr. Napitupulu thanks Mr. Yamamoto and he reminds that the Okayama Declaration is distributed and invites the floor to ask question.

Uzbekistan asks Thailand regarding the dimension of CLCs for PWDs and its approach to promote inclusive education, is there any policy in Thailand for disabled children.

Ms. Saisupaton says that there is a policy in Thailand that supports disabled children to get equal education, so there is no discrimination. For those who can’t go to normal school, they can go to special schools.

Mr. Khampa says that the focus is on the dissemination of the right-based approach method in the society, which will enable the students to get equal education.

Uzbekistan asks Japan about the components of ESD based on the WSSD in Johannesburg.

Mr. Yamamoto says environment is a good platform of ESD, and that CLCs are good places to promote ESD; that can be translated to the member countries.

Pakistan asks Japan about the condition of CLCs in Japan include PWDs.

Mr. Yamamoto says that Kouminkan in Japan tries to facilitate preventive programmes for the elderly as the population of the senior citizen is very high but CLCs also provide activities for the disabled and the CLCs have some programmes that help them to have some activities.

Ms. Napitupulu gives additional explanation that CLCs in Japan provide learning activities for the elderly people mostly.

Vietnam gives some comments on inclusive education and sustainable development, which need clear identification.

The Philippines asks Thailand regarding gender equality aspect of education in CLCs that has become the challenge for the future plan.

Mr. Khampa says that there is specific purpose of right-based approach, but so far there is no serious issue in Thailand regarding gender issue, so the focus is not so big on that issue.

Mr. Yamamoto says that gender issue is one of ESD items. In Okayama, each Kouminkan has programmes and organize activities related to gender issue.

The Philippines asks a question regarding DESD; the recognition of small issue to be disseminated in the larger group.

Mr. Yamamoto says that the promotion of ESD is not big issue in most countries, so we are looking for the solution.

Sudan asks about the modalities that can be adopted in CLCs in the progress of ESD.

Mr. Yamamoto says that CLCs are now expanded throughout Asia, so the next step is Sub-Sahara Africa this can promote ESD.

Mr. Khampa says that there is 8,577 CLCs in Thailand that synergize formal and non-formal education in Thailand.

Ms. Darunee says that the pilot project of CLCs for the PWD is to encourage the society and become the part of the society not to be separated from the society, to work together for development and community development.

Mr. Oyasu says that ESD is a model or step in CLCs, the development should be organized by the community and own the development process; it is also promoted the development through the community with the involvement of the government. Another point is about human rights, that everyone has right to education. CLCs facilitate to deliver the demands of the community.

Mr. Napitupulu wraps up the presentation and adds that CLCs are not built only for the disabled but also for all people; he thanks all the speakers and the participants and invites for applauses for the speakers.

15.15 – 15.30
Coffee Break

Coffee break is provided in the hall of the ballroom, some materials are also distributed and exhibited, also relevant publications (books, brochures, newsletters, reports and CDs).

15.30 – 16.45
Parallel Session 4

Participants are divided into 4 working groups throughout the parallel session in 2 different ballrooms and in each ballroom partitioned into two groups. Participants are free to choose the working group in which they are interested the most or based on their field of concentration.

Group 1: Gender Mainstreaming and Right-Based Approach
Venue: Mason Ballroom 2

There are 14 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Ruamitr Khampa
APPEAL: Ms. Darunee Riewpituk
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

UNESCO Rabat: Mr. Abdellatif Kissami

Mr. Kissami presents his organization case reports.

Pakistan: Mr. Riaz Ahmed

Mr. Ahmed presents his country case reports.

Indonesia: Ms. Nina Sardjunani

Ms. Sardjunani presents her country case reports

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 2: Inclusive Community Development
Venue: Mason Ballroom 2

There are 15 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Ms. Sunee Saisupaton
APPEAL: Ms. Kaoru Suzuki
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Indonesia: Mr. Djadja Rahardja

Mr. Rahardja presents his country case reports.

ILO Indonesia: Ms. Snezhi Bedalli

Ms. Bedalli presents her organization case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 3: Promotion of Lifelong Learning
Venue: Mason Ballroom 3

There are 12 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. WP. Napitupulu
APPEAL: Ms. Puri Andini
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

India: Ms. Anita Priyadharsini

Ms. Priyadharsini presents her country case reports.

UNESCO Dhaka: Ms. Shareen Akhter

Ms. Akhter presents her organization case reports.

Indonesia: Mr. WP. Napitupulu

Mr. Napitupulu presents his country case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 4: ESD through CLCs
Venue: Mason Ballroom 3

There are 14 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Hideki Yamamoto
APPEAL: Mr. Kiichi Oyasu
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Bangladesh: Mr. Safiqul Islam (DAM)

Mr. Islam presents his country case report.

Indonesia: Mr. Agung Purwadi

Mr. Purwadi presents his country case reports.

17.00 – 18.30
Bandung City Tour and en route to Kampung Daun

Participants are given free time to go around the city for shopping.

18.30 – 20.30
Farewell Dinner

The dinner is hosted by UNESCO at Kampung Daun Resort, Bandung. Live music is performed throughout the dinner. Participants dance and sing together; casual discussions also take place.

International Seminar on Community Learning Centers (CLCs): Day 3

Bandung, 23-27 June 2008

Rapporteur: Mohammad Reiza

Field Visits – Group A
Purwakarta and Bandung, Indonesia

Wednesday, 25 June 2008

08.15 – 09.15
En route to Purwakarta District

A bus is provided for the participants to go to Purwakarta, assisted by the staffs of the Ministry of National Education. Snacks are distributed to the participants for refreshment along the way.

09.15 – 09.45
Welcome by the Mayor
Venue: Pendopo Kabupaten Purwakarta (District Hall)
Focus: Meeting the Head of Purwakarta (Mayor)

Traditional dance performance welcomes the participants before entering the District Hall. The tourism ambassadors of the District also guide the participants to the area.

Inside the hall, traditional foods and cakes are provided in a traditional box (pipiti) made from bamboo. The MC greets the participants and welcomes them to Purwakarta; he also reads the rundown agenda, including speeches.

He then invites the Mayor of Purwakarta, Mr. H. Dedi Mulyadi to deliver his speech, in Indonesian, assisted by an interpreter. Ms. Hasnah Gasim of Indonesian National Commission delivers the second speech for UNESCO. The next speech is delivered by the representative of APPEAL, UNESCO Office Bangkok, Mr. Kiichi Oyasu followed by the representative of the participants, which is delivered by the participant from Sudan.

After the speeches, the Mayor asks the participants to have the refreshments and bring the traditionally made box with them.

The participants join the group photo session with the Mayor in front of the District Hall; then they leave the District Hall to continue the visit to one of Learning Center in the district.

09.45 – 10.15
En route to SKB (Learning Center) Purwakarta

Participants are going to the learning center, which is located in another part of the city and guarded by a policeman.

10.15 – 11.45
Visit to SKB Purwakarta (Purwakarta District Learning)
Focus: NFE Policy, Equivalency Programme, Life Skills and ECCE

The participants are welcomed by the staffs of the SKB (Sanggar Kegiatan Belajar or Learning Center) and given a information book of the LC also guided to see the activities of the learners in the classes, also are given time to take pictures and have dialogues with the learners and the teachers. They also have a look at the language laboratory, Community Reading Center (CRC) and the mobile library.

The participants are then welcomed by the head of the center at the hall and entertained by the learners with cultural performances. The center also organizes exhibition of the products and activities of the learners in the center such as woodcrafts, clothes, foods, ceramics, etc. Refreshments are also provided for the participants while enjoying the performances.

A staff of the district office of National Education for NFE explains the general information of the activities of the learning center. Participants are then grouped to sit among the learners and have dialogues with the learners, assisted by an interpreter.

The final agenda is closing remarks by the head of the LC, representatives of the participants from Morocco (in Arabic with English interpreter) and the participant from Japan. All participants are invited to have group photo session with the learners and staffs of the LC.

11.45 – 12.45
En route to Bandung

Participants are going back to Bandung to have lunch break, when entering the city, the bus is guarded with a policeman.

12.45 – 13.45
Lunch Break at Sederhana Restaurant, Bandung

Lunch is provided in reserved tables for the participants – traditional Indonesian foods from Padang, West Sumatra. Casual conversations among the participants also take place throughout the lunch break. Praying room is also available inside the restaurant for the Muslim participants.

13.45 – 14.00
En route to Ariyanti Course

Participants are going to the course location, which is located just near by the lunch place and are guarded by a policeman.

14.00 – 15.30
Visit to Ariyanti Course
Focus: Community Course

The owner of the course, Ms. Ariyanti, welcomes the participants; she then explains the historical background of the course and brings the participants to her office also guides them to take a look at the activities of the course from the 1st – the 3rd floor of the course building.

The participants are given time to take pictures with the course students and to have dialogues with them. They then proceed to the hall of the course in the 3rd floor to have refreshments and formal gathering. Ms. Ariyanti opens the session and invites the representatives of the seminar to deliver opening remarks; represented by Ms. Darunee Riewpituk of APPEAL, UNESCO Office Bangkok and a delegate from Mongolia. The owner then explains the recent achievements of the students and the course using presentation slides and music background.

Finally, before leaving the course, participants are entertained by a blind singer that can also play piano with two songs. After that, Ms. Ariyanti then awards the country representative with an official placard of the course and a souvenir bag for each participant.

15.30 – 16.30
En route to Parongpong, West-Bandung District

Participants are going to the CLC location, which is located on Al Karim Hill, Lembang highland and are guarded by a policeman.

16.30 – 17.45
Visit to PKBM Al Karim, Parongpong (Community Learning Center)
Focus: Community Participation (Private Sector, Effective use of ICT)

Participants are welcomed by the founders of Al Karim Mosque; the mosque also functions as a CLC for the local community. Refreshments are served, hot drinks and snacks, considering the place is pretty cold. It’s the launching day of the mosque and the owners cooperate with Yayasan Bina Bangsa – YBB (Nation Empowerment Foundation) by inviting Miss Indonesia 2007 and 2008; also some printed media and television stations such as Seputar Indonesia newspaper and MNC TV.

The participants then have a look at the activities of the CLC in its two-storey building. The class in each floor is assisted by one of Miss Indonesia; the participants also have the chance to take pictures with both of them.

After taking a look around the CLC, the participants gather in the open space in front of the mosque; the MC opens the gathering and gives brief introduction of the programme and gives the time to the representative of YBB to explain about this collaboration project and the roles of Miss Indonesia in this event. The speech continues with the explanation of the two founders of the mosque, which say that a religious prominent gave the land to them for that purpose.

The committee of the event then gives the opportunity for Q&A session addressed to the owners, Miss Indonesia and the representative of YBB. The session is closed with closing remarks from the representatives of the participants, which is represented by the participant from Syria.

17.45 – 18.45
En route back to Mason Pine Hotel

Participants are going back to Mason Pine Hotel; the organizer does not provide dinner but the participants are given allowance for dinner and they have free time.

International Seminar on Community Learning Centers (CLCs): Day 2

Bandung, 23-27 June 2008

Rapporteur: Mohammad Reiza

BP-PNFI Jayagiri
Bandung, Indonesia

Tuesday, 24 June 2008

08.00 – 09.15
Departure from Mason Pine Hotel to BP-PNFI Jayagiri

Participants are divided into two groups in two buses provided by the organizer departing to BP-PNFI Jayagiri; and are assisted by the committee members en route.

09.15 – 10.45
Plenary 2: Effective Management of CLCs
Venue: BP-PNFI Hall, Jayagiri
Moderator: Mr. Raafat Radwan
Rapporteur: Ms. Myrna Limm

Mr. Radwan greets the participants and introduces the speakers of the session; he also gives general pictures of what the session will talk about and gives the floor to Mr. Oyasu.

1.    Community Participation and Ownership, by Mr. Kiichi Oyasu

Brief Introduction to the Session, by Mr. Kiichi Oyasu, APPEAL

Mr. Oyasu presents, “Effective Implementation and Sustainability of CLCs that highlights community ownership, political support, resource mobilization, monitoring evaluation, process, network and partnership, programmes and/or activities and capacity building.

He outlines all the factors one by one briefly. Community participation highlights around three areas: audiences, beneficiaries and decision-making. Inter-country study on community participation focuses on the nature and ways of community participation in CLCs. He also mentions about the methods and the process of the study as well as the case studies. He further elaborates the findings of community participation that emphasizes on the different degree of participation towards its local context and capacity of the people. Some factors for active participation are acceptance, attractiveness, satisfactions and leadership.

Another point is about community ownership’s issues that tease out the matter of decisions, which are made by one/group with power, beneficiaries are not involved in the planning and the management process. Some ways to promote community ownership are to avoid one-person show – setting up a committee to consult and manage and to ensure representation, transparency and accountability as well as linkages for collaboration.

Another aspect is external intervention that he elaborates on the pros and cons, which is useful to receive external intervention to initiate and strengthen the functions through linkages and partnership. There is also external agencies’ agenda and priorities. The balance of the community ownership can be done through contextualization, trust and the role of external agencies.

He shows the diagram of community participation and ownership for sustainability of CLC – the continuous process: community participation, empowerment and ownership for sustainable management. There should be synergy with external interventions.

Mr. Radwan thanks Mr. Oyasu for the enlightening presentation that will give contribution for the next presentation. He gives further information on Mr. Oyasu’s presentation and gives the time to Ms. Limm.

2.    CLC Network and Linkages, by Ms. Myrna Limm, the Philippines

Ms. Limm presents, “Strengthening Community Learners through Networking and Linkages.” She takes the case study of the project run in Mindanao, the Philippines. She shows some pictures of the country and gives brief introduction to the country current condition. The national functional literacy rate is about 93.7. Except in conflict areas, schools are almost in all parts of the country. The country is committed to global education for all. The people speak both Tagalog and English. She shows the map of Mindanao and gives brief explanation of the composition of the indigenous people and the nature conditions.

She shows the percentages of children in school in year 2003-2004 for the children aged 6-11, 12-15 and 16-77 years old. The CLCs are the mechanism for NFE or alternative learning for school fewer communities. Everywhere is learning center, which is catering to the learning needs of its target beneficiaries through variety of NFE/ALS delivery modes.

It is also as the reading center and repository for reading materials and learning equipments for the community, a resource center built through the initiative of the community. She shows pictures of the youth activities in the learning center. She mentions about the beneficiaries of the CLCs that are the communities themselves. CLCs provide services to the isolated and poorest communities – center of last resource.

Partnerships are with the government units and agencies, NGOs, Donor, stakeholders that involve also the community. She shows some pictures of the community participation and ownership; CLCs being owned by the community promotes sustainability – from donorship to ownership.

Another approach is using quality and quantity of CLCs services: responsive, relevant, needs based, demands-driven and equal. There should be also participative leadership, transparency accountability and good governance for the appropriate organizational structure and credible leadership. She shows some more pictures about the activities of CLC organic farming done by indigenous people group. She also shows the CLCs organizational structure and management including working committees organized and functioning, regular organizational meetings and clear use of authorities and relationship with communities.

CLC associations enable the community to work together among them; and she shows the CLC association structure. The CLC legitimacy outlines the points of memorandum of understanding (MoU), implementing guidelines, manual of operations and terms of reference. She mentions some issues for the future plans including the intensive capacity building of CLC management council for sustainability. Equality of access will not guarantee equality of success, but the equality of opportunity will not guarantee the equality of results. Thank you.

Mr. Radwan wraps up Ms. Limm’s presentations and summarized the highlighted points and gives the time to Mr. Lamsummang.

3.    Resource Mobilization and Management, by Mr. Chalatit Lamsummang, Thailand

Mr. Lamsummang presents “Resource Mobilization and Management in Community Learning Center.” Globalization. Rapid changes and lack of education opportunity are the crucial backgrounds that will be discussed. The education act of 1999 categorizes education into 3 areas: formal education, non-formal education and informal education.

CLCs in Thailand was established in 1977, which can be set up in different locations in the community and can be located in health center, temple, mosque, primary school and public place; to help the people to get more access to education. He shows some pictures on the activities of CLCs in Thailand. The management of CLCs comes from the people in the community from all sectors (NGOs etc). It is also the center for communication and information. He shows the structure of CLCs in Thailand that outlines the framework, the building, the personnel, the materials, the budget, and monitoring and evaluation.

CLCs are as provincial learning center that provide basic education, skills development and income generation, information and resource service, health promotion, gender equality, conflict resolution and cultural and heritage preservation as well s indigenous knowledge and technology. He shows some more pictures on the activities of CLCs in basic education and skills developments as well as indigenous knowledge.

Another point is about the resource in CLCs that is help from the government sectors. Resources in the CLCs can be grouped into 3 categories: human resources, materials resources and financial resources. Mobilization of resources can be done through carious activities including cooperation with local organization and fund raising campaign. In total, there are 8,691 CLCs throughout the country. He also gives some suggestions; CLCs should make use of available local resources for the community. CLCs community members are usually the local official leaders. CLCs are lifelong learning center that provides relevant knowledge and information to local people in accordance with the needs of the community. CLCs needs full supports from the stakeholders. It is by local people and for local people. Thank you.

Mr. Radwan wraps up and summarized the main points of the presentation and gives deep analysis out of it. He then gives the time to Mr. Chu for his presentation.

4.    CLC-MIS, by Mr. Shiu Kee Chu, Thailand

Mr. Chu presents, “guide to CLC-MIS (Management Information System for Community Learning Centers). He wants to solicit the helps and the supports of the seminar participants to contribute to the finalization of his CLC-MIS guideline book that was distributed.

CLCs are increasing and spreading throughout Asia Pacific region from quantity and quality. The MIS is improving CLCs management priority, which information is as a key factor; this is to systemize the information collection, analysis, dissemination and the use of CLCs. He refers to the previous presentations that highlighted some important points as the key priority to improve CLCs.

He gives simple background regarding CLCs; the Delors report emphasizes lifelong learning as a main thrust for education in the 21s century, UNESCO published NFE-MIS handbook in 2005; APPEAL initiated CLC-MIS pilot projects in 2006; and Field tests in Indonesia, Lao PDR, Mongolia, Thailand and Vietnam, which are all used to write the guide to CLC-MIS. He then explains how those documents will contribute to the making of the guidelines.

CLC-MIS is to support the planning and management, information dissemination, networking, policy-making and setting quality management standards. It is thought that CLCs have no viable exits, thus the tendency is to support the universities, schools and other formal education institutions. He then shows the diagram of the framework of CLC-MIS that involves partner agencies, learners/facilitators, policy-makers, CLC managers, potential learners and general public. He then shows the structure of CLC-MIS as well as the information benefits of the programme.

He shows the basic functions of CLC-MIS towards its data management (input, process and output). He also elaborates further on the record-keeping at CLCs that outlines the points of CLC general information, learning programme plan, learner registration form, facilitator records, inventories of CLC facilities, equipments and learning materials, programme evaluation sheet, end-off-programme report and programme management summaries.

UNESCO is requesting the supports of all participating countries to look at the CLCs in their own countries and what kind of records form they are using and what point are missing to improve the programme.

He further highlights the CLC-MIS Indicators: complete rate, learners-facilitators ratio, learning material per learner, cost per learner, frequency of use of equipments or facilities, percentage of female learners and facilitators, percentage of distribution of CLC learners by age group, and many more indicators that can be developed and already used in the participating countries.

CLC-MIS outputs highlight the general information, programme management summaries, learners profile and outcome, facilitators or instructor profile and rating, inventory of learning resources and frequency of use, financial statement, programme evaluation summaries and periodicals every year.

For the future plans including to adopt policy and legal framework for CLC-MIS, to mobilizes human, financial, materials and information resources, to standardize CLC record-keeping and reporting, to train personnel in CLC-MIS operation, to begin CLC-MIS operation n pilot CLCs and to gather feedback from spreading CLC-MISs. He finally gives the web resources as references. Thank you.

Mr. Radwan wraps up and sum up the presentation and highlight some important points to consider by the participants of the seminar. He also invites the Forum to give comments.

Pakistan asks about the success of CLCs in any Asian countries; there are recent issues, which CLCs could help the function of literacy of to facilitate life skills development.

Pakistan asks the Philippines about the sustainability of CLCs in every country, regarding the donorship and partnership, how to work on that.

Uzbekistan asks about the guide of CLCs that should include effectiveness and efficiency regarding the management of CLCs.

The Philippines says that there is inequality of financial resources, and some CLCs run the activities with their own funds; because it is very difficult to reach donors. In the Philippines, CLCs do not receive funds from the government, different from some other countries. This is about the resource mobilization from the local community.

Mr. Oyasu says that the programme that can help the issue of literacy is also the focus of CLCs, it is more effective to combine literacy and life skills programme to cater the needs of the learners.

Due to the limited time, Mr. Radwan closes the session and thanks all the speakers.

10.45 – 11.00
Coffee or Tea Break

Coffee break is provided for the participant in the hall. The organizer gives some information on the procedures and the mechanism of the next parallel session, and informs that some of the committee members will assist the participants to get to the parallel session rooms.

11.00 – 12.30
Parallel Session 2

Participants are divided into 4 working groups throughout the parallel session in the 4 different rooms in BP-PNFI area. Participants are free to choose the working group in which they are interested the most or based on their field of concentration.

Group 1: Community Participation and Ownership
Venue: BP-PNFI Hall

There are 25 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Kiichi Oyasu
APPEAL: Ms. Kiichi Oyasu
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Bangladesh: Mr. Mahfuzur Rahman

Mr. Rahman presents his country case reports.

Thailand: Ms. Anyamanie Burakanon

Ms. Burakanon presents her country case reports.

AVV Vietnam: Mr. Truong Quoc Can

Mr. Truong presents his country case reports.

China: Mr. Qin Zhigong

Mr. Zhigong presents his country case reports

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members. The group finishes late fro 30 minutes.

Group 2: CLC Network and Linkages
Venue: Board Discussion Room

There are 16 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Myrna Limm
APPEAL: Ms. Puri Andini
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Thailand: Mr. Ruammitr Khampa

Mr. Khampa presents his country case reports.

Japan: Ms. Taeko Takayanagi

Ms. Takayanagi presents her country case reports.

China: Mr. Li Xiancheng

Mr. Xiancheng presents his country case reports in Chinese but there is no interpreter for the other group members although the presentation slide was written in English.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 3: Resource Mobilization and Management
Venue: Perbangkara Room 1

There are 12 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Chalatit Lamsummang
APPEAL: Ms. Darunee Riewpituk
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Morocco: Mr. Nadir El Habib

Mr. El Habib presents his country case reports.

Indonesia: Mr. Besta Kertawibawa

Mr. Kertawibawa presents his country case reports.

E-Net Philippines: Ms. Cecilia Soriano

Ms. Soriano presents her country case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 4: CLC-MIS
Venue: Perbangakara Room 2

There are 20 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Shiu Kee Chu
APPEAL: Ms. Kaoru Suzuki
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Indonesia: Mr. Heri Martono

Mr. Martono presents Indonesia country case report by using presentation slides.

Vietnam: Mr. Dang Van Huan/Ms. Nguyen Thi Tu Huyen

Ms. Nguyen presents her country case reports.

Lao PDR: Mr. Lamphoune Luangxay

Mr. Luangxay presents his country case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

12.30 – 13.30
Lunch Break

Lunch is provided by the BP-PNFI at the dining room of the office area.

13.30 – 15.15
Plenary 3: Quality Learning in CLCs
Venue: BP-PNFI Hall, Jayagiri
Moderator: Prof. Arief Rachman
Rapporteur: Mr. Chij Shrestha

Prof. Arief greets the participants and introduces his self and the speakers of the session; he also gives general pictures of what the session will talk about and gives information on the story of Bandung and Tangkuban Perahu Mountain.

The organizer gives announcement on the procedures and mechanism of the field trip the next day.

Prof. Arief then gives the floor to Ms. Darunee.

Brief Introduction to the Session, by Ms. Darunee Riewpituk, APPEAL

She presents the findings of the projects related to the next plenary session. Life skills should include generic skills and literacy skills, also the main components (3Rs) of reading, writing, numeracy; CE. She further explains the roles of CLCs: treatment, awareness raising, care and prevention. CLCs can build social stigma, specifically about HIV/AIDS issues.

While, Mother tongue literacy programme has 12 participating countries in the region. The project focuses on capacity building, empowerment and ownership, policy dialogues, Mt materials, quality of life improvement and poverty alleviation towards sustainability. The common issues are political will, technical supports from linguistics experts, etc. The issues will be deeper elaborated during the plenary session. Thank you.

Prof. Arief gives the time to Mr. Devaraj

1.    Effective Use of ICT, by Mr. Devaraj, India

Mr. Devaraj, greets the participant and his presentation will look to the use of ICE related to literacy. He gives the overview of the topic that outlines literacy rate that has become an important indicator of development in India.

Functional literacy required meeting the needs faced in the day-to-day life mostly related to livelihood. Rapid progress in modern ICT is sees as one of the potential tools. He then shows the map of the site area of Kannivadi and gives brief picture of the demographic information of the area as well as the needs of the area.

He explains about the location of the projects that has been undertaken in the country. He gives the figure of the literacy rate in the location. He elaborates the generic constraints in the context of ICT; besides that, he also explains about the needs of men and women – literacy (the differences of both two men and women learners’ needs). The objective is to facilitate the village community to define training and capacity building and literacy programmes that could help them.

Furthermore, he elaborates the approaches, the strategies and activities of the projects that include the facilitation of the learners in the centers; additionally, the centers cater the needs based on the local specific information to the community members.

He shows the phases of the process adopted for the development of the projects starting from the community mobilization and formation to the learning activities; he also shows the process involved in ICT enabled functional literacy.

He mentions about the training offered by the centers. He shows some pictures on the activities of the learners operating the computers and using the telephones. He explains briefly about the training materials and methods. He shows some more pictures of the activities of the centers in using the reading materials. The centers enable the participation of women through role of animators and learning materials developments and learning process as well as sensitizing the family members.

The use of ICT for developing literacy – learning materials is also explained that highlights database management. Three different levels for training and capacity building: animation, women learners and learning materials. He also explains about the dissemination of software materials and process adopted to different agencies for wider use. He mentions about the outcomes and the impact of the projects including the mobility of women to nearby towns, banks and markets have decrease dependence on men; women accessing CLC for getting the information on nutritional deficiency, general health and child care.

He shows some more pictures on the activities of the centers in providing market price details and youngsters and kids operating the computers, children participating in the summer camp at the CLCs. Points to ponder outline the learner centered digital learning materials in CLCs. There are supports from the family and community. He also mentions the challenges in using ICT for literacy programmes as well as the future plans that include the planning to start a community radio for information dissemination. Thank you.

Prof. Arief wraps up the presentation and he gives the time to Ms. Tasbulatova

2.    Promotion of Life Skills, by Ms. Shaizada Tasbulatova, Kazakhstan

Ms. Tasbulatova presents the promotion of life skills in Kazakhstan. She gives the general information on the country, and proceeds with the role of education in strategic documents that outlines the state programme of education development in the Republic of Kazakhstan 2005-2010. In the country, there is 12-year compulsory primary education, which is free.

In the state programme of education development in the Republic of Kazakhstan 2005-2010, education is identifies as the strategic sector. The implementation, outcomes and impact on EFA and socio-economic development are also discussed. The country has now social law for social education or non-formal education; it is integrated in the formal education law. Training for skills development to improve quality of life, including information-communication skills, cultural programmes and income-generation programmes (IGP).

CLC should be interactive but the country can’t be facilitating the development of the projects ad the legal basis in the country is not yet specifically set up, like in some other countries in the region.

In the mining areas in the country, the people have no specific or upgraded skills, in which the government has put special concerns on the area including the social protection. The CLCs organized training so that the people can produce dairy products and they can sell them. From big international companies young people in the country can get employments with high salary. She further mentions the challenges of the country to develop CLCs.

She hopes that UNESCO Bangkok can help the country to develop the CLCs for adult training, as UNESCO Almaty can’t help due to financial concerns of the country. Programmes offered by NGOs and donor agencies are narrowly focused, linked mainly to promoting healthy life style, preventing harmful substances. Few tailor made programmes addressing a wider range of skills.

There is also lack of political supports to adult training and non-formal education; no comprehensive monitoring of quality f training at the national level. The future plans of the country is national strategy for non-formal education that is needed; raising awareness of policy makers, in particular, intangible value of CLCs impact; and wider dissemination of success stories and best practices the field of NFE. Hopefully with the supports of the parliament we could develop the CLCs and can come up with some more success stories.

3.    Primary Health Care and HIV/AIDS, by Mr. Benny Benyamin, Indonesia

Mr. Benyamin presents on the primary health care and HIV/AIDS. He gives the background of the issues; Indonesia is facing an epidemic. The main transmission varies from one part of the country to another. In some parts of Indonesia, HIV is primarily sexually transmitted in other parts through drugs and sexual activities. He shows the map of Indonesia and explains about the provinces with high cases of HIV/AIDS. He gives the estimated numbers of AIDS cases in Indonesia in the last 10 years; he also shows the table of cumulative AIDS cases, death of AIDS cases and AIDS case rate per province in Indonesia in 2007.

He shows another graph on AIDS cases. Primary health care in non-formal education is very crucial to be supported by the family and schools as well as the community itself. He explains further about the primary health care initiative in CLCs, called Posyandu that aims to support the healthy growth and development of children.

One part of Posyandu is providing educational services; it is also a center for socializing the prevention education of communicable diseases. It also supports to prevent community from other issues such as HIV/AIDS, drug abuse, STIs (sexual transmitted infection) and other related issues. He shows the framework of the integration of HIV/AIDS prevention into CLCs.

He elaborates further about the lesson learned and the challenges of the main issue. Due to the limited time, he finishes his presentation. Thank you.

Prof. Arief wraps up the presentation and gives the time to Mr. Shrestha.

4.    Mother Tongue Literacy, by Mr. Chij Shrestha, Nepal

Mr. Shrestha presents “Mother tongue Based Literacy Programme.” Why mother tongue based education: language development, academic development and socio-cultural development. The essential components of mother tongue based literacy programmes are legalization and policy support and relevant curriculum. The legal status and support for minority languages and official recognition for mother tongue based education both formal and non-formal situation.

Relevant curriculum and appropriate teaching and learning materials, curriculum is developed using participatory approaches and with involvement of local community. Another point is coordination and cooperation; cooperating among all stakeholders from planning, implementation, monitoring and evaluation.

He shows the situation of ethnic minority groups in the country; learners from minority language communities are at an educational disadvantage. He outlines also the point of government policies including the constitution of Nepal (1990). Nepal specific EFA goal number 7 highlight that the indigenous people and linguistic minorities have the right to basic and primary education through mother tongue; also to have bilingual education both in primary and secondary educations. He shows the pictures of the curriculum and materials development that emphasizes the need identification, learning objectives, curriculum grid, field-testing and finalization.

He explains also about the programme implementation: village orientation programme, class management committee formation, training facilitators, etc. the outcomes of the programme covers both participants and community levels that include development of textbooks in Tharu language, preservation and promotion of cultural concepts and heritage among the younger generation; also systematic material development process is adopted by local organizations.

The challenges and issues of the programme in the country outlines the financial concerns that can meet the social demands, also the concerns of the transition from mother tongue to national language (he shows the phases of the transition), hoping that both languages can go side by side. Thank you.

Prof. Arief wraps up the presentations and invites the floor to give three comments to the participants.

Sudan asks about the evaluation that is carried out to record the impacts of programme; also the issue of HIV/AIDS regarding its programme control.

Uzbekistan asks about ICT issues and the promotion of life skills (in regards of the active participation of the learners).

Mr. Shrestha says about the impact of the programme in the country; that the country already has permanent evaluation for the evidence towards the evaluation of the programme.

Mr. Benyamin says that the location of the project is only in West Java, so it is not national level, but during the field visit, the participants can have a look at the project. We conduct community analysis that works together with UNESCO. What’s important are the planning and the action, through workshops and seminars by using monitoring and evaluation is respected project site. The local government controls the project where the project is located.

Mr. Devaraj says that the use of ICT in CLCs is very important, we use it in Chennai and Bangalore. The community has to maintain and manage the CLCs. In the past few years, the CLCs receive financial assistance from UNESCO, although the CLCs still need more of that, thus creating linkages with other organization in the area.

Ms. Tasbulatova says that those skills should go together. Generic skills are part of skills development. CLCs will educate the learner multi-subject education, for example, the skills of sewing, will also learn marketing and ICT, in order for the to get employment. So, the learners also develop themselves as well.

Mr. Devaraj says that CLCs give proposal to IBM to get more supports to develop the CLCs.

Prof. Arief thanks the presenters and invites the participants to give applause for the speakers.

Ms. Kaoru gives information on the mechanism of the next plenary and parallel session and informs the participants to collect the materials of the presentation to the organizer in order to be burned in CDs to be distributed at the end of the day,

15.15 – 15.45
Coffee Break

Coffee break is provided for the participant in the hall. The organizer gives some information on the procedures and the mechanism of the next parallel session, and informs that some of the committee members will assist the participants to get to the parallel session rooms.

15.45 – 17.00
Parallel Session 3

Participants are divided into 4 working groups throughout the parallel session in the 4 different rooms in BP-PNFI area. Participants are free to choose the working group in which they are interested the most or based on their field of concentration.

Group 1: Mother Tongue Literacy
Venue: BP-PNFI Hall

There are 20 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Chij Shrestha
APPEAL: Ms. Darunee Riewpituk
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Bangladesh: Mr. AOM Abdus Samad

Mr. Samad presents his country case reports.

Indonesia: Mr. Ade Kusmiadi

Mr. Kusmiadi presents his country case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 2: Promotion of Life Skills
Venue: Board Discussion Room

There are 26 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Ms. Shaizada Tasbulatova
APPEAL: Mr. Kiichi Oyasu
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Vietnam: Ms. Thi Mai Nguyen

Ms. Nguyen presents her country case reports.

Indonesia: Mr. Wartanto

Mr. Wartanto presents his country case reports.

ILO Indonesia: Ms. Arum Ratnawati

Ms. Ratnawati presents her organization case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 3: Primary Health Care and HIV/AIDS
Venue: Perbangkara Room 1

There are 10 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Benny Benyamin assisted by Ms. Mira Fajar of UNESCO Office Jakarta
APPEAL: Ms. Kaoru Suzuki
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Uzbekistan: Mr. Alisher Ikramov

Mr. Ikramov presents his country case reports.

E-Net Philippines: Ms. Rebeca Gaddi

Ms. Gaddi presents her country case reports.

UNODC Indonesia: Ms. Monica Ciupaga

Ms. Ciupaga presents her organization case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 4: Effective Use of ICT
Venue: Perbangakara Room 2

There are 13 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Devaraj
APPEAL: Ms. Puri Andini
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Egypt: Mr. Rafaat Radwan

Mr. Radwan presents his country case reports.

Sri Lanka: Mr. Kusal Dharmarathne

Mr. Dharmarathne presents his country case reports.

China: Ms. Lan Jian

Mr. Jian presents his country case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

17.00 – 18.30
Orientation on field visit

Mr. Edi Rukmana, APPEAL, delivers Field visit preparation and information. Participants are provided with rooms to relax and wash themselves and may also take a look around the area for small walks.

18.30 – 20.30
Welcome Dinner

Dinner and cultural performance is hosted by BP-PNFI, Jayagiri at the Purbasari Hall (outdoor) diner reception. Live music is performed throughout the dinner. Participants dance and sing together; casual discussions also take place.

20.30 – 21.30
Travel back to Mason Pine Hotel

Participants are going back to Mason Pine Hotel and have free time, also to prepare for the field visit tomorrow.

International Seminar on Community Learning Centers (CLCs): Day 1

Bandung, 23-27 June 2008

Rapporteur: Mohammad Reiza

Mason Pine Hotel
Bandung, Indonesia

Monday, 23 June 2008

08.30 – 08.45
Registration

Participants register to the International Seminar assisted by the staffs of the Ministry of National Education.

08.45 – 09.30
Overview on EFA in the Asia Pacific
Venue: Mason Ballroom 1
Moderator: Mr. Sudjarwo

Mr. Sudjarwo opens the session and welcomes the distinguished guests and the international and national participants. He would like to inform the participants regarding the opening of the seminar that will take place at 1 p.m. of the day due to the schedule of Mr. Bambang Sudibyo, the Minister National Education.

He then introduces the participants of the seminar and based on the country and asks them to stand up, so that other participants know them before starting the five-day long seminar; from Indonesia to Mauritania. Some participants just arrived in the morning and they are still having their breakfast; there are also some participants from UNESCO offices from Beirut to Rabat, also other UN agencies.

He then briefly explains the procedures of the next presentation session, he also urges the presenters to keep the time due to the constraints and he gives the opportunity to Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer.

EFA in Asia and the Pacific by the Director of UNESCO Bangkok: Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer

Mr. Shaffer greets the participants and welcomes the fellow from Egypt. He goes through the major finding of the education development referring to the 10 points of Dakar Goals that include expansion and improvement in the quality of education. The global monitoring report is published annually seeing the 2015 goals. Many countries in both Arab and Asian region have done the mid-decade assessments, their commitment to EFA. EFA is not something that educators can solve by their own; there are global factors that influence the results – global trends influence EFA. That will tease out the issue of the economic growth. One global monitoring does to identify country position regarding the education index. Another issue related to the index is gender issue and /or gender parity.

He also explains briefly about the achievements – the progress in ECCE; policies developed regarding the ECCE are also discussed. He also shows the trends diagram of the progress in primary education, he explains the challenges of primary education that include the low school enrollment level among the disadvantaged.

He shows another diagram regarding the issue of gender inequalities that prevails. Improving the quality of education outlines the issue of low level of learning achievements that relates to some backgrounds including socio-economic issues. He also shows the trends of adult literacy by the region; there is still a lot of challenge.

He gives the recent situation of adult literacy, where 101 countries are far from achieving universal literacy and 72 countries will not succeed to 2015. He highlights the data, monitoring and literacy assessment, which has lack of specific data and information on special target groups; in fact the literacy stories are much worse.

The overall progress teases out the coverage of ECCE that has expanded but is still limited to less than half the age group in most countries. Gender Parity Indexes (GPIs) have improved for all indicators, but the lack of inequality is apparent by reduced numbers of girls in higher levels of education and low GPI for literacy.

There should be also attention to early childhood issues, where ECCE will remain outside the reach of most young children unless efforts are undertaken to provide adequate financial resources for all children to participate, higher qualification and better training for educators – teachers.

The percentage of children not in school should be made visible by the Ministry of National education not the percentage of children in school. There should be also promotion of mother-tongue-based multi-lingual education for children from indigenous communities.

Another point to consider is gender equality and social equity that outlines the gains in gender parity that must be built upon and deepened to challenge prejudices and discrimination in order to achieve gender equality. Gender equality should be institutionalized in education institutions. Literacy programmes for youths and adults is another point to consider; the potential prospects highlight the substantial scaling up of learning opportunities.

Four basic area of focus is suggested by the global monitoring report that include trained and motivated teachers, effective reaching and learning strategies, learning time, materials and textbooks and healthy and safety environments. The consideration is to establish more coordinated, harmonized mechanism for the effective monitoring and evaluation on EFA. There should be also partnerships and advocacy among the member countries, between the governments, community, NGOs and the private sector to reach out to the excluded.

There should be encouragements to the community participations by all members in the society specifically young people and children. The five policy priorities are inclusion, quality, literacy, capacity building and financing areas, which should be supported by the national governments and donor organizations and/or agencies.

He looks forward to the results of this seminar, as he can’t stay longer throughout the seminar. He believes that this seminar will make important impacts.

Mr. Sudjarwo summarizes the presentation and gives brief introduction to the next speakers and gives the time to Ms. Muhammad.

09.30 – 09.45
Overview on EFA in Indonesia by the Directorate General of Non Formal and Informal Education of Indonesia: Mr. Hamid Muhammad

Mr. Muhammad greets the participants and gives introductory openings of his presentation on the mainstreaming of EFA and ESD in national development in the framework of the government of Indonesia. He gives the timeframe of the programme that starts from 2000 to 2025. There are national development planning, long-term pan (RPJO) and medium-term plan. He shows the comprehensive diagram on the phase of EFA and ESD national action plan.

He also shows another comprehensive diagram of EFA Coordination Forum that involves inter-governmental institutions including the ministry of Finance. The task force towards the programme implementation enforces coordination or harmonization, advocacy or socialization and monitoring or evaluation. He then explains the EFA targets in Indonesia (Indonesia Strategic Plan on Education). This outlines some issues including early childhood care and education, free and compulsory primary education of good quality, learning and life skills, literacy and basic and continuing education, gender disparity and/or equality and quality of education.

Referring to the issue brought to Mr. Shaeffer previously, he mentions that the government of Indonesia, in its annual report on education, shows both percentages of children who enroll and not enroll to the education system.

He continues explaining the point of ECCE in Indonesia that highlights the EFA goals, the issues and the action plan, which include the promotion of a One-Roof K-6th grade system. Furthermore, he elaborates deeper about the compulsory basic education, which provides governmental subsidy for school operational cost (BOS) to support complete undertaking a 9-year Compulsory and towards a free Basic Education by 2008 and improves the access to primary and JSS through establishing new schools, new classrooms, and school rehabilitation; to reach the unreached.

He further explains about the issue of life skills that implements life skill education to serve poor and disadvantaged such as relevant courses that fit the needs of rural unemployed youths to improve their entrepreneurial skills and competencies. He continues his explanation on literacy programme and gender issues.

Regarding the quality of education, he outlines the Dakar goals; the action plan of the issues will include the setting up laws of regulations and setting up quality management institutions, to enhance the standardization, quality assurance, accreditation and certification in order to ensure the quality.

Another point he teases out is the promotion of EFA through CLCs; that emphasizes on the disseminating of information, learning activities and the action programme in the entry system that works towards the work reference to accommodate the delivery system.

Finally, he explains about the CLCs and other NFIE institutions role in achieving EFA targets; he mentions some institutions such as Community Learning Center (CLC) or PKBM, House of Learning Activities (HLS) or SKB, college (institutional courses), ECE institutions and social organizations and/or foundation (SOF).

He hopes that during the field visit later on the participants can see the works to provide services to the local communities in Indonesia. Thank you.

Mr. Sudjarwo wraps up the presentation and offers the participants for Q&A session and reminds them of the time constraints; but then he proceeds to the next session of the introduction to the Seminar. He also invites applause from the forum for both speakers. He then invites Ms. Darunee for her presentation.

09.45 – 10.15
Introduction to the International Seminar

Overview on UNLD (United Nations Literacy Decade), LIFE (Literacy for Empowerment), CLCs Agenda, schedule and arrangements by APPEAL: Ms. Darunee Riewpituk of UNESCO Office Bangkok

She greets the participants and she right away starts her presentation. She begins with the issues of education and literacy outline. She explains about the excluded, which are mostly those in higher poverty rates, where literacy tends to be lower.

She mentions also about he challenges that include the lack of concrete policies, the lack of planning and implementation of post-literacy and CE for neo-literates in several countries and the lack of research evidence to convince more resources allocation as well as the lack of the management of data and information.

She introduces the concept of United Nations Literacy Decade (UNLD, 2003-2012) that outlines the key action areas including the development of policy environment, capacity building, programme modality, research, community participation, monitoring and evaluation. Now, is already the mid-decade assessment, as the programme started in 2003, which is to be submitted in June 2008.

Literacy for Empowerment (LIFE) is the next point she discusses. It is designed as a framework to accelerate the UNLD process to contribute to achieving EFA and MDGs. It aims to reinforce national and international commitments to literacy also partnerships among the stakeholders. The programme is divided into three phases.

Furthermore, she explains about the Community Learning Centers (CLCs) in Asia Pacific Regions and Arab States. There are 23 countries in Asia and Pacific and 8 countries in Arab region participate in this CLC programme. She gives brief definition of what CLC is. She also identifies the target groups as well as the location of CLCs; CLC activities use holistic approach towards community development. She then shows a video on CLC functions also the diagram of CLCs that enforces integrated approach to cooperate with various organizations – both governments and NGOs.

She gives the findings of the study – the strengths that teases out the point of individual and community development and the integration in the EFA national action plans. She mentions also the challenges of the programme that include the sustainable activity of CLC in the long run, the potential of the locals to help with the intervention of the experts. She mentions also about the effective implementation and sustainability that include community ownership and political influence.

She then explains briefly about the flow of the seminar, the plenary and the parallel sessions and the topics each plenary will talk about. She runs through the agenda of the seminar. She suggests the participants to divide themselves during the field visit, not to group themselves with their country peers. She also hopes that in the last day, the seminar can come up with future action plans. She hopes that the participants can learn a lot during the seminar. Thank you.

Mr. Sudjarwo wraps up the presentation and thanks Ms. Darunee for the explanation of the seminar and invites the participants to have coffee break.

10.15 – 10.30
Coffee and Tea Break

Coffee break is provided in the hall of the ballroom, some materials are also distributed, also relevant publications (books, brochures, newsletters, reports and CDs).

10.30 – 12.15
Plenary Session 1: Policies and Implementation
Moderator: Ms. Anwar Alsaid, UNESCO Office Jakarta
Rapporteur: Mr. Mahfuzur Rahman
Venue: Mason Ballroom 1

Mr. Alsaid greets the participants and gives brief introduction to the first plenary as well as the speakers of the session. He gives the time to Ms. Darunee.

Brief Introduction to the session by APPEAL, Ms. Darunee Riewpituk

She explains about the procedures of the first plenary on Policies and Implementation. She mentions the key elements for institutionalization of CLCs that outline the legislation and policy, national CLC guidelines, structure, etc. She also mentions about the literacy assessment that teases out the lack of specific data and information.

She mentions also about equivalency programmes that is designed as alternative education programmes, which is more flexible in terms of time and venue. There are 12 countries join the equivalency programmes in Asia and Pacific. She then gives the time to the four speakers to start with the presentation that will touch upon the four topics.

Ms. Alsaid then introduces the four speakers and the topic of their presentations, he also reminds of the time constraints and gives the time to the first speaker.

1.    NFE Policy and CLCs by Mr. Dang Van Huan and/or Ms. Nguyen Thi Tu Huyen (Vietnam) of the Ministry of Education

Mr. Dang presents “the Report on Non-Formal Education and Community Learning Centers Development in Vietnam.” He mentions the member of his groups. He proceeds with the situation on the development of non-formal education in Vietnam that sees the state regulation system, which monitors the development of NFE in Vietnam.

He mentions some of the national regulations including the Prime minister’s decision number 112/2005/QD-TTg dated 18 May 2005 on building a learning society pointed out that NFE is an important part and a key factor in building learning society and that learning society across the country is based on the pathways between NFE and formal education system.

The education law of 2005 affirms that national education system is composed of formal and non-formal education system. He also mentions the key statistics of NFE and CLCs in Vietnam. Up to date, Vietnam has 8,355 CLCs across the country. There are more than 10 millions people attend literacy education programmes.

He then explains about the development process of CLCs in Vietnam in recent years. Developing CLCs in Vietnam is a significant policy of Vietnamese government to build Learning society from grassroots level. Ministry of Education and Training in cooperation with provinces promote the socialization process and international cooperation with UNESCO and others to develop CLCs model in the whole country.

In general, CLCs develop rapidly in the northern areas but facing many difficulties in remote and mountainous areas due to the lack of resources. The key functions of CLCs are to organize literacy and post-literacy classes to reduce illiteracy rate and to organize equivalency classes to complete the primary and lower education systems.

He mentions that the achievements of CLCs are important contribution to the universialization process and illiteracy reduction of the country.

He then shares some experiences and solution for the effective development of CLCs. Due to the poverty, the resources for the CLCs and very limited especially in remote and mountainous areas CLCs lack of learning equipments, learning materials and funding for their activities. The country has received supports from UNESCO to develop CLCs in the areas of Mekong Delta River. CLCs managers, facilitators, teachers are not officially trained and facilitated.

He further mentions the key point in raising the effectiveness of the activities in CLCs that include the socialization in CLCs developments. He also proposes some solutions on how to develop the projects in Vietnam; financial resources are mobilized from central government, local authorities, entrepreneurs, NGOs, social organization and individuals to support the activities and developments of CLCs.

He would like to propose supports from international organizations also other UN agencies. Thank you. He welcomes the participants to see the team to ask further about the programme in Vietnam.

Ms. Alsaid wraps up the presentation and gives the time to Mr. Pandey.

2.    National CLC Guidelines by Mr. Sushil Pandey (Nepal) of the Ministry of Education and Sport

Mr. Pandey greets the participants and thanks UNESCO for giving time to him to present CLCs projects in Nepal. He firstly gives brief overview of Nepal (the area, religion, people, language and national finance condition). He gives the figure of the CLCs in the country that consists of the government (505 CLCs), UNESCO (24 CLCs) and private sector (100+ CLCs). Budget in education is about 17% of annual budget where 1.67% I for NFE budget. He shows the map, the geographic condition of Nepal. There are five development areas in the country and 75 districts.

He shows another figure on the illiteracy by age and sex in Nepal; also the diagram of the educational structure which is governed by the Ministry of Education and Sport. He mentions the concept of CLC in Nepal, which is understood as a local education forum. The background of the CLC in Nepal; was established in since 1980 has been started as Village Reading Center (VRC). He also mentions about the functions of CLC in the country.

He comprehensively explains about the policy document for guiding CLC that overall aims in education sector towards poverty reduction. Policy actions that are taken including various developmental programmes and education activities are conducted in the VRCs to cater for the needs of the people.

He also mentions the strategies of the project as well as the objectives of CLC establishment that include the creation a common forum for the local people. He shows the key concepts of the CLCs that integrate four key issues.

He mentions also the steps for setting up CLCs in Nepal; in national level will employ some steps including the development of criteria for the establishment o CLC. In the community level, there is creation of community awareness, formation of CLC management committee. He shows another diagram of CLC in literacy programmes that engage gender equality.

The main function of CLCs is as the household (HH) survey for the formation of village education plan (VEP). He shows some pictures of CLCs activities that enforce income generation activities. He also mentions the network and coordination in national and district level that involve different ministry offices and international funding agencies. He explains the outcomes in both quantitative and qualitative point of views. The lesson learned is that highly involvement of community. The challenges faced are to include different organizational and management structures and inadequate human and financial resources as well as the inadequate issue of provisions and sustainability.

He mentions the future plans and directions of CLCs in Nepal that each village development committee and municipality ward will have one CLC and the emphasis on capacity building of CLCs members. Thank you.

Mr. Alsaid thanks the presenter and gives the time to Indonesia to present the country report.

3.    Synergy of Formal and Non-Formal Education by Ms. Ella Yulaelawarti, PhD. (Indonesia) of the Ministry of National Education

Ms. Ella begins her explanation with the equivalency education in a non-formal education programme. She mentions the characteristics of the programme that outlines open education system, the curriculum and standard, the delivery system, and the assessment or the certification.

She mentions the advantages of equivalency programmes (EPs) that widen the access to achieve education for all (EFA). She further mentions the objectives of the synergy between formal and non-formal education that enables school dropouts or programmes leavers because of valid reasons such as economic issues.

She shows the diagram of the synergy between formal and non-formal education and its effects in the university, community and employment, which is based on the Minister Regulation no 14/2007 of content standard.

She gives the differences of curriculum in both formal and non-formal education that emphasizes on same minimal academic competency. She further elaborates the learning materials and the methodology of both systems.

She also mentions about the credit-transfer through prior learning assessment (PLA) or placement test (PLT) also the target beneficiaries of transfer programme that include the unemployed out-of-school youth and adults. She gives examples of the projects in practical work in the kitchen, interpersonal communication and in the tourism industry. She mentions also about the portfolio assessment – a comprehensive document is collected by the learner and assessed by the Equivalency Package B Provider for credit and certification.

Furthermore, she shows the diagrams of the outcomes and impacts on EFA and socio-economic development, the growth of EE graduates in year 2003 – 2006, the link between NFE and FE. She also mentions about the skills required for providers or CLCs that include to set goals and identify learning outcomes in order to clarify their own learning expectations. She also briefly mentions the challenges for CLCs that include the allocation of resources. The future plan is to strengthen the policy of EP the following issues that should be taken into consideration (budget, partnership, capacity building and ICT). Thank you.

Mr. Alsaid wraps up the presentation and gives the time to Mr. Chu.

4.    Literacy Assessment: An Overview by Mr. Shiu Kee Chu (Thailand) of AIMS-UIS, UNESCO Bangkok

Mr. Chu thanks for the time to present his report. He teases out the issue of the reach the unreached. He mentions about the source of literacy statistics in a common scenario. Most literacy data come from population censuses, some household and labor force surveys also collect literacy data. The literacy statistics is called “Reported literacy statistics.” The issue is multidimensional.

There are other possibilities. There are specialized sample surveys that use an assessment tool (based on cognitive testing models) to test individual’s skills level. He shows the diagram of the sources of literacy data: in depth data on literacy skills and people’s background related to the literacy measures.

He also mentions the current issues in literacy statistics. Like other statistics, literacy statistics also have many data issues: definition, availability, timeliness, comparability over time and across population subgroups and quality of the data. The question is: how meaningful and reliable is the literacy statistics. He mentions the emerging trends and gives some examples of literacy issues such as one in Cambodia.

Which literacy skills are assessed and how? He further explains about the UIS programme on LAMP (Literacy Assessment Monitoring Programme) initiative that aims to define and measure a spectrum of literacy skills. Another aspect is literacy module for household surveys, which was initiated by AIMS in Asia to serve as a monitoring tool for literacy initiatives.

He more elaborates the key features of literacy module that captures the literacy environment within households and local communities. The literacy modules consist method and instruments that cover the identification particulars and the questions divided into 4 blocks. So, where are we no? Experts from the Asia pacific region reviewed the module and the manual. Sri Lanka has actually used the module fro the Sri Lankan MDGs. He mentions the relations between LAMP and literacy module, which are actually two very different tools; the literacy module is not a substitute for LAMP.

Some final thoughts will be given to the participants to be discussed during the parallel session of the seminar. Thank you.

Mr. Anwar Alsaid informs that due to the limited time there will be no Q&A session but the participants can give questions to the speakers throughout the seminar session and invites the participants for lunch.

Mr. Oyasu informs about the time constraints and the venues for the next session of lunch and the opening ceremony; and reminds the participants to come back at 1 p.m. for the opening.

12.15 – 13.00
Lunch Break

Lunch is provided for the participants in the Mason 2 Ballroom.

13.00 – 14.00
Opening Ceremony
MC: Ms. Dewi Hughes
Venue: Mason 2

Traditional music assists the participants while waiting for the minister to come.

Ms. Hughes invites applauses from the floor for the international seminar. She welcomes the distinguished guests; and gives the time to Mr. Muhammad to deliver his opening remarks.

Welcome Remarks

1.    Directorate General of Non-Formal and Informal Education of Indonesia: Mr. Hamid Muhammad

Mr. Muhammad greets the Minister and the distinguished guests and all the participants of the International Seminar. He welcomes the participants and the resource people also thanks to UNESCO for giving the opportunity to organize the seminar that was supposed to be organized in Nanjing, China but due to the earthquake, the programme is move to Indonesia.

The objectives of the seminar is to share experiences and to explore future action plans regarding CLCs issues towards Sustainable Development for Learning society. The total numbers of international participants are 81 people from Asia Pacific and the Arab states, while the Indonesian participants are 34 people representing government institutions and international NGOs. He requests the Minister to deliver the opening address. Thank you.

Ms. Hughes bridges the time by giving the time to the representative of the Government of West Java, Mr. Dadang Dali to deliver his opening remarks.

2.    Representative of the government of West Java, Mr. Dadang Dali

First of all he forwards the apology of the Governor to the Minister for not being able to attend the seminar and deliver the speech by himself, before reading the opening remarks by the Governor.

“He welcomes the Minister and other distinguished guests to Bandung, and thanks the organizer to choose Bandung as the Venue of this International Seminar. This is the pride of the people of Bandung to host this kind of international event. The government has determined the direction of the people of West Java towards education for all, employment opportunity and capacity building as well as the reform of bureaucracy.”

“The government focuses on the affordable education towards poverty eradication. According to the government budget and the participation of the community, the provincial government will synchronize the programme of the central government. We request full supports from the central government to develop our education system. Through this international seminar, we hope the participants could produce results to the contribution to the development of education system in the region. He hopes that the seminar can go smoothly and can get very fruitful results.” Thank you.

Ms. Hughes gives the time to Ms. Sheldon Shaeffer.

3.    Director of UNESCO Bangkok: Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer

Mr. Shaeffer welcomes and greets the Minister, Mr. Bambang Sudibyo also the participants of the international seminar on CLCs. CLCs have been around for very long time. The concept of CLCs, in fact does not spread only in Asia but also in Africa, which have been mainly focusing literacy and equivalency programmes as well as education for sustainable development.

We have seen in the previous session, that CLCs can help us to achieve the Dakar goals towards the global programme of EFA. It is very important to see CLCs in both rural and urban areas to transmit social issues such as agriculture. He thanks the center of non-formal education. He gives some historical background when he was working in Indonesia years ago, specifically in community learning center – community education. He also thanks the Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO and other UNESCO offices to take part in the seminar.

He is sorry for not being able to join through the entire programme and he is certain that the results of this seminar, which is useful not only for Indonesia but also for other countries. Thank you.

Ms. Hughes gives brief introduction to “Mobil Pintar” that facilitates the community education and gives the time to the Minister to deliver his speech.

4.    Minister of National Education of Indonesia: Mr. Bambang Sudibyo

Mr. Bambang Sudibyo greets the distinguished guests and thanks God, the Almighty for giving the opportunity for all of us to gather in this international seminar on CLCs. He hopes that the seminar will give results that benefit all the participating countries.

This issue is not only important to Indonesia but also all participating countries. Non-formal education is significant for Indonesia because this is one of the key elements of the education development in the country. There are over 300 hundred thousands of schools and about 2,800 universities nation-wide. Due to this factual condition and the geographic situation in Indonesia, both formal and non-formal educations in Indonesia are very important.

He elaborates further about “Package A” that is equivalent to primary education, “Package B” and “Package C” that are equivalent to secondary and higher educations. Community empowerment center is one main function of CLCs, which equip the learners with life skills education. Within the CLCs, community can be empowered towards education for sustainable development. CLCs are important institutions in the society.

He mentions about his personal condition that employ his parents’ house back in his hometown to be a CLC for the surrounding communities. Due to its flexibilities CLCs accept high participation of the community in rural and urban areas. CLCs have made significant contribution to the primary education to the learners. Prior to the seminar, series of seminars had been conducted in Indonesia, including the 7th E9 Ministerial Review Meeting on teacher training and education; South-South Policy forum on Lifelong Learning; and Regional Preparatory Conference of ICE on inclusive education.

Finally, he wishes all participants to have great time in the seminar and fruitful results. He then invites all the international participants to go to other parts of the country. By Reciting Bismillahirrahmanirrahim, he officially opens the International Seminar on CLCs.

Ms. Hughes thanks the Minister of National Education for the presentation. She invites the international participants to have photo session with the Minister. She also explains the procedures of the next Press Conference.

The photo session is organized in 3 phases due to the big numbers of the seminar participants.

14.00 – 14.30
Coffee Break

Coffee break is provided for the participant in the hall of the Ballroom, while the Minister and some relevant resources attend the Press Conference in Parahyangan Room.

Press Conference: Community Learning Center
Venue: Parahyangan Room

Some journalists are already waiting for the Minister for the press conference.

Mr. Muhammad opens the session and introduces the resources of the Press Conference including Mr. Baedowi and Mr. Kiichi Oyasu of APPEAL; he gives the time to Mr. Bambang Sudibyo.

1.    Minister of National Education of Indonesia: Mr. Bambang Sudibyo

Mr. Bambang Sudibyo mentions that it has been several times, Indonesia host international seminars from E9 Ministerial Meeting, Lifelong Learning Forum, Inclusive Education Forum and this seminar on CLCs. Indonesia is an interesting laboratory for learning center. CLCs started in 1998 and reached 5,000 centers throughout the country. It is the center for the community to learn and to be empowered. There are a lot of programme towards literacy that are organized in CLCs. There is also non-formal education for early childhood education also life skills education.

In the future, the functions of CLCs will be improved to reach those who can’t get formal education. Through CLCs, there are a lot of interests that can be facilitated. He welcomes the journalists for questions and answers.

The Jakarta Post says that CLCs serve children who are not getting formal education, how is the percentage of those children who take this kind of non-formal education in CLCs.

The Minister says that the contribution of Package A, B and C are very significant. The role of non-formal education enables to answer the educational problems in the country.

Koran Tempo asks about the issues of cheap textbooks programme is also included in this kind of non-formal education.

The Minister says the cheap textbooks programme will be able to be accessed by all community members and these are the contribution of the national education ministry.

Pikiran Rakyat asks that CLCs could be a solution for the community with low economic level, how about the certification of the programme.

The Minister says that the certificates of those non-formal educations will be equivalent to the formal education’s certificates. There are community members who receive the certificate from the “Package” programme and they could win the municipality election; we can see that non-formal education in Indonesia is real.

Journal National asks the number of CLCs recently is already ideal number, and with this seminar what is your expectation.
The Minister says that there should be more about 1,500 CLCs to be developed to serve the community; not only from the surrounding areas but also the neighboring areas could learn in that CLC. For example, the CLC that I own, it is not only function as a CLC but as the center of the community activities. Our hope is to create this seminar as a sharing knowledge forum, and to benchmark the best practices in other countries.

Koran Tempo asks about the development of non-formal education in other countries and the human resource availability in Indonesia.

The Minister says that the original model is from Japan, and the “Package” model is from Indonesia and is now being used also by other countries. Noon-formal education does not take more attention to formality but capacity and competency to teach in the CLCs. Regarding the requirements, CLCs do not take serious accounts on formality, besides mostly CLCs are owned by the private sectors. The community does everything and the government only facilitates the activities.

Koran Reformasi Total asks about CLCs in its development that moves specifically to morale education.

The Minister says that the importance of moral and ethics educations have become recent trends. The global trend uses education for sustainable development regarding morale education, which also outlines health, minority and multiculturalism, etc. The root of all of theses issues is morale education, and the most important point is religious education, which is the beginning of all strategy of development. The need of the community now is to bring back the significance or central issue of morale education and attitude as well as peace education.

Thank you and Wassalamualaikum.

14.30 – 17.00
Parallel Session 1

Participants are divided into 4 working groups throughout the parallel session in the 4 different rooms in the hotel area. Participants are free to choose the working group in which they are interested the most or based on their field of concentration.

Group 1: NFE Policy and CLCs
Venue: Saguling Room 1

There are 15 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Dang Van Huan
APPEAL: Ms. Darunee Riewpituk
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Lao PDR: Mr. Ounpheng Khanmmang

Mr. Khanmmang presents his country case reports.

Cambodia: Mr. Lang Sophat

Mr. Sophat presents his country case reports.

Afghanistan: Mr. Shafiq Ahmad Qarizada

Mr. Qarizada presents his country case reports

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 2: National CLC Guidelines
Venue: Saguling Room 2

There are 14 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Sushil Pandey
APPEAL: Mr. Kiichi Oyasu
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Pakistan: Ms. Tahira Ahmed

Ms. Ahmed presents her country case reports.

Japan: Mr. Akitoshi Teuchi

Mr. Teuchi presents his country case reports.

Japan: Mr. Hidesige Asano

Mr. Asano presents his country case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 3: Synergy of Formal and Non-Formal Education
Venue: Saguling Room 3

There are 13 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Ms. Ella Yulaelawati
APPEAL: Ms. Kaoru Suzuki
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Mongolia: Ms. Batchuluun Yembuu

Ms. Yembuu presents her country case reports.

Thailand: Mr. Cholatit Lamsumang

Mr. Lamsumang presents his country case reports.

India: Ms. Anita Priyadharsini

Ms. Priyadharsini presents her country case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

Group 4: Literacy Assessment
Venue: Saguling Room 4

There are 21 participants in the working group including the speakers. The moderator leads the session and introduces the three key resources of the group and gives the time to them, one by one and at the end allocates a separate session for Q&A for the group members with the speakers.

Moderator: Mr. Shiu Kee Chu
APPEAL: Mr. Puri Andini
Rapporteur: Rapporteur is to be chosen by the group member to record the results of the working group session.

Indonesia: Mr. Sudjarwo

Mr. Sudjarwo presents Indonesia country case report by using presentation slides.

E-Net Phillipines: Ms. Cecilia Soriano

Ms. Soriano presents her country case reports.

Sri Lanka: Ms. Priyadarshani de Silva

Ms. De Silva presents her country case reports.

Moderator invites questions, comments and suggestions from the members of the group to the three speakers; also sharing experiences, best practices and recent conditions from other participating countries to be brought upon the discussion of the group to be added to the results of the working groups; also engaging interactive dialogue among the group members.

18.30 – 20.30
Welcome Dinner

The dinner is hosted by the Ministry of National Education at the BBQ Court Mason Pine Hotel. Live music is performed throughout the dinner. Participants dance and sing together; casual discussions also take place.

International Seminar on Community Learning Centers (CLCs): Preparation Day

Bandung, 23-27 June 2008

Rapporteur: Mohammad Reiza

Mason Pine Hotel
Bandung, Indonesia

Sunday, 22 June 2008

08.00 – 12.00
Arrival

Arrival of international participants at the airport is assisted by the staffs of Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO and the Ministry of National Education; also the arrangement of their travel from Jakarta to Bandung by land transport. Both local and international participants arrive at the seminar venue in Mason Pine Hotel, Bandung.

13.00 – 17.00
Registration

All participants register and check-in to the hotel, assisted by the staffs of the Ministry of National Education.

17.00 – 19.00
Technical Expert Meeting

Meeting is held in Parahyangan Meeting Room, 2nd floor in the hotel, which will be used also for the press conference on the first day; international experts including Ms. Darunee Riewpituk, Ms. Kaoru Suzuki and Mr. Kiichi Oyasu of UNESCO Bangkok, Mr. Ade Kusmiadi and Mr. Sudjarwo of Indonesian Ministry of National Education and Ms. Hasnah Gasim of Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO.

Mr. Oyasu opens the meeting and teasing out the issue of the preparation agenda including the dinner gathering by the Ministry of National Education, Jayagiri – CLC and UNESCO. Mr. Edi distributes the rundown agenda of the Seminar and they start discussing it. First adjustment is to replace Prof. Arief Rachman of Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO with Mr. Sudjarwo of Ministry of National Education to give the opening remarks.

They scan through the agenda from day 1 to day 5 as well as the welcoming remarks of the first day; also the time constraint adjustment is deeply discussed as Mr. Sheldon Shaeffer, the Executive Director of UNESCO Bangkok has to leave for the airport at 2 p.m.; they arrange the most convenient time for him to deliver his welcoming speech and time to leave the seminar venue to catch the flight.

They then talk about the procedures and the people who will sit for the press conference tomorrow afternoon. Based on the request of the Center of Communication and Public Relations of the Ministry of National Education, the press conference should be organized in a separate room from the seminar room. They proceed with the discussion of the plenary sessions and the working group sessions. Mr. Oyasu requests the organizer to have a look at the meeting room.

Mr. Edi briefly explains also about the rooms for the parallel sessions. Mr. Sudjarwo then leads the discussion to the agenda of the second day. They talk about the adjustment of the times, as there will be a site visit to Jayagiri CLC.

For the third day, there will be a field visit and the participants will be divided into to groups that will visit to two different places.

Ms. Hasnah suggests the division of the participants based on the numbers of the participants from a country, so that they can get two different experiences but Ms. Darunee says that there are participants from China that can’t really speak English, so they have to be in their group.

The Dinner that is supposed to be hosted by UNESCO is moved to the last day as the Farewell Dinner.

Ms. Hasnah asks about the closing session – who will deliver the closing speech.

Mr. Sudjarwo finishes the session and invites the experts to have a look at the room.

Call for A Male Rapporteur

Dear all,

Here I am looking for a male rapporteur (aged 21-24 yo) for an
international conference about education in Bandung, organized by
Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO (KNIU) also the ministry of
National Education.

The criteria is pretty simple, you must have good English
comprehension (listening, speaking, reading and writing), you have a
laptop, you are able to work under pressures and that’s it. The
conference will be taking place from 23-27 June 2008 (next week). If
you live somewhere in or around Jakarta, we go together to Bandung on
Sunday, 22 June from (KNIU) office in Jalan Sudirman; if you live
somewhere in or around Bandung, we might meet there.

We will be covering your local transport, accommodation and meals
during the conference.

Details information I will inform you later when you can meet the
requirements above.

Please let me know if you are interested, also please do send you CV
to unescoclubindo@…

I thank you for your interests.

Regards,

Mohammad Reiza

p.s. you may also contact me personally on 0815 844 722 40 before Thursday, 19 June 2008 at 5 p.m.

Regional Preparatory Conference for the 48th session of the International Conference on Education (ICE) – Asia and the Pacific Inclusive Education – Major Policy Issues in the Asia and Pacific Region – Day 3

Bali, 29-31 May 2008

Rapporteur: Mohammad Reiza

Sanur Paradise Plaza Hotel
Bali, Indonesia

Day 3: Saturday, 31 May 2008

08.30 – 09.15
Registration

Staffs of Indonesian National Commission assist the registration of the conference participants. The opening session takes place in the hotel ballroom 2nd floor.

09.15 – 10.30
Plenary Session 7

Prof. Arief opens the session and informs the rundown agenda of today and gives the time to the chairperson o the next Plenary Session.

Chaired by Ms. Sengdeuane Lachanthaboune

Ms. Sengdeuane greets the participants in Indonesian, “Selamat Pagi,” also she thanks the organizers for the opportunity. She explains the mechanism of the plenary session as well as the presentation time, the rapporteurs of each working group. She then gives the time to the rapporteurs of the groups to present their results.

Report of the six topics by Rapporteurs followed by Q&A

Topic 1: Children with Disability
Rapporteur: Ms. Widya Prasetyati, Indonesia

Ms. Widya greets the participants in Indonesian and she hopes that the summary could cover the voice of each participating country. First point she outlines is public policy that there is a need of identification and assessment tools for enrollment the children with disabilities to the schools. She mentions some points to be the key concerns or point of recommendations of the topic.

Further she gives the approaches that are used including the medical model that may deflect attention from education intervention, which is important for children with disabilities. There is a need to increase awareness and empathy of parents, as they may not fully understand the values of inclusion. Another point is regarding teaching and learning that highlight the pedagogies for inclusive teaching and learning and child centers teaching that should be encouraged in supporting the inclusion of students with disabilities. While, the national standards valued by some countries are considered a barrier to inclusion. Some countries emphasize that support for the child with disabilities in inclusion should be rendered. That’s all the results of the discussion. Thank you.

Ms. Sengdeuane thanks her for the presentation and invites Mr. Budi to present the report on HIV/AIDS.

Topic 2: HIV/AIDS and Health
Rapporteur: Mr. Budi Hermawan, AUSAID, Indonesia

Mr. Budi thanks the chair for giving the time to present. Mr. Budi explains the participating countries in the group discussion and he gives the key issues that come up. He also explains about the strategy possibly used including the developing community counseling board to introduce HIV/AIDS and sex education. He also mentions about parenting programme (helping parents to become more open and warm and embrace family environment). Thank you.

Ms. Sengdeuane thanks Mr. Bui and invites Ms. Jennifer to present her group report,

Topic 3: Minority (ethnic, language, religion)
Rapporteur: Ms. Jennifer Tamarua, Papua New Guinea

Ms. Jennifer thanks for the group contribution. She explains about the key issues that include that parents might not want their children to be influenced by another religion, not accept member of different faith teaching their children about faith issues. She also gives the possible solutions for open dialogue on the subject of religious education between the school authorities. She also touches the linguistic issue and needs. There is choice of language for children in school. Parents have choice of three languages of instruction but may choose one over another.

She gives another example in Aceh about the use of languages; the medium of instruction is Indonesian but they also teach Acehnese. Another example is in India; mother tongue used before formal schooling. English may not be almost a first language for some, whereas in other countries it is definitely not.

She also gives some suggestions and recommendations to consider including the development or adoption of a National Curriculum that will provide flexibility in accommodating the needs of local language; teaching local language at the early stage of education and then bridge into the national of official languages. Finally  there is a need for governments to have legal framework in inclusive education for ethnic, religious and linguistic issues.

Ms. Sengdeuane thanks the rapporteurs and invites the next rapporteur to present.

Topic 4: Migrant Children/Refugees/IDP
Rapporteur: Ms. Sae Kani, ABS, Indonesia

Ms. Sae presents on the social exclusion that cover migrant children, refugee and IDP. Migrant workers’ children are not getting equal access to education. Illegal workers’ children are not having access to education because their parents are afraid to be arrested by the local authority. Illegal status of children should not affect their entitlement to education. During the discussion we were more focusing on external migrant issue but also internal migrant issue like in China, where parents are working in big cities and the children are left behind and don’t get proper education.

About the refugee children in camp school that outlines the psychosocial support for children should be provided in order to adapt their new environment; their mother tongue should be taught and the refugee children should have opportunities to learn host nations’ languages. While the mainstream schools in host nations highlights the issues of refugee children should have equal access to education in host nations in order to avoid bullying and discrimination from other children, teachers and parents, awareness raising and sensitization about refugees should be conducted at schools and in communities. This is also about the process of learning.

Finally about IDP children, as well as civil wars, natural disasters was identified as one of main reason for children to be out of education, i.e. environmental refugees; effective temporary school solutions to be implemented immediately after disaster. Government should coordinate with international agencies for recovering school as son as possible. She gives an example of the case in Aceh after the Tsunami, thus disaster-resilient schools should be built back, as they didn’t get proper education after disaster. Furthermore, there should be more awareness of already existing international frameworks and guidelines about education in emergency. Thank you.

Ms. Sengdeuane thanks Ms. Sae for her presentation that provides recommendations to be considered. She then invites the next rapporteur to present the report.

Topic 5: Social Exclusion
Rapporteur: Dr. Leela, Nepal

Dr. Leela thanks for the time and she mentions of the participating countries in the discussion group. She first explains the social exclusion as the emerging key issues. That outlines the clarification of meaning, scope and coverage of social exclusion, social exclusion in both visible and hidden, social exclusion often leads to discrimination, social exclusion needs to be focused on both schools and be part of ongoing education-both formal and informal education. Another emerging key issues that she highlights are that governments in many countries provide scholarships to the poor and the marginalized students. She elaborates further the impact of war in Afghanistan that many children are not attending schools.

Furthermore, there is also lack of qualified teachers; due to poor economic condition, parents do not want to send their children to the school. In some countries, school age children are supporting parents by working, selling the newspaper, etc. Social exclusion is due to gender discrimination, children do not want to go to school due to non-friendly environment of the school.

She also gives some workable strategies for social exclusion that include awareness about education being a right of the children and responsibility of parents and community; identification of the socially excluded school going children for support (financial) and recognition. Besides that, there should be involvement of parents and community members for supporting excluded children, selection to appropriate income generating programme. Another important point is guidance and counseling for the children as well as proper instruction. That’s all from us and we welcome suggestions. Thank you.

Ms. Sengdeuane thanks Dr. Leela for the presentation and she invites the last rapporteur to present the group discussion results.

Topic 6: Gender
Rapporteur: Ms. Mona Aliana DPHM Alimin, Brunei Darussalam

Ms. Mona thanks the chair and she presents the concerns and issues recognized and identifies in the topic of gender. The first point is the evidence based that include the need for data to give an accurate if not indication of current situation of gender in education specifically and in society in general; research design or structure of questionnaire; sampling in information gathering.

Another point is equity for female students; equity in education for girls as well as boys. Access to education for all the children should they be left behind due to societal or family pressure or systematic infrastructure. Life long education and continuing education are also important. She also mentions about the specific issue in education that outlines the equity in gender in education – approach, enrollment, curricula, teacher, pedagogy, needs to address developmental needs and issues, gender responsive or sensitive schools, management structure, teaching and learning materials, introduction of sexual education, preparation of real life situation.

The other issue is about safety of both genders within education that involves violence in school. National coordination is another point that outlines the point of inter-ministerial or interagency collaboration towards enforcing and implementing existing policy/framework/initiatives/law. She also mention the point of ‘Guru’ that emphasizes in the importance of teacher education the dissemination of information regarding legislation, policies and framework, about current and historic condition.

Another point, she mentions about the global village that touches the issue of sensitivity to gender issues in community, workplace and society towards gender sensitivity. There is also change in culture through understanding; and it should be dynamics between teachers and the students. It should be working within the boundaries of respect of religion and local values. She also mentions about the dilemma of the issue – the crosscutting point. Thank you.

Ms. Sengdeuane thanks the six rapporteurs for working hard the previous night. Then she gives the time to the participants to give comments or questions.

Mr. Bambang Indriyanto of Indonesia appreciates the comprehensiveness of the presentations of the rapporteurs. He wants to learn some good and bad lessons. Unfortunately, to his perspective, he couldn’t get good nor bad examples happen in other countries, so that we know how to solve the problems effectively. He mentions the example of religious teaching in education. The problem is how national policy can facilitate the solution. There are needs for the regulations and policies, and we could discuss in here. The question is how the policy is facilitated.

The Philippines supports the comments of Indonesia regarding some issues of inclusive education. She would like to suggest giving messages in the region. Policy makers might not be able to absorb these comprehensive presentations. She would like also to response the issue of inclusive education towards the goal of EFA. The two concepts will compete gains each other. Another issues are also about class sizes. She also mentions about the issue of HIV/AIDS, the expectation of teachers to deliver sex education. Also the use of mother tongue as the use of language of instruction in classes; there is a need of communication to the policy makers regarding this issue; she mentions the current condition of mother tongue use in the Philippines.

China explains that the country has suffered from various natural disasters; he gives the current condition and fact of the statistical data of the disasters. He outlines the points of DRR and gender. The country needs more donations from international community to support the children to move to safe places that will enable them to study again. I would like to challenge the DRR and Gender education as the key concerns of this conference to the ICE in November.

Thailand gives example of the current condition in her country of education for children with disability. There has been a project since 2004 on that issue. She suggests creating proper function at each level; cooperation among ministries. She also outlines the issue of ICT in inclusive education for children with disabilities. Another point is about the understanding and attitude issues; as well as the government supports in the programme implementation.

Ms. Sengdeuane thanks the six rapporteurs for the presentations and she urges the organizers to take those recommendations and suggestions into account that will support the next ICE in November in Geneva.

Prof. Arief reminds the participants to obtain their attendance certificate and the CD of the materials of the conference; also to check their flight and name at the reception desk. He then invites the participants to give more big applause to the six rapporteurs and invites the participants for coffee break.

10.30 – 11.30
Coffee Break

Coffee break is provided in the hall of the ballroom.

Prof. Arief reminds the participants again of the logistics issues, name spelling, certificate and Conference CD and gives information on the next plenary session

11.15 – 12.15
Plenary Session 8

Prof. Arief opens the session and gives the time to Ms. Clementina to chair the session. He also invites Mr. Johan to come to that stage with them.

Chaired by Ms. Clementina Acedo & Mr. Renato Opertti

Summary and Q&A

Ms. Clementina greets the participants, “Selamat Pagi.” She mentions about the composition of the participants that attend the conference. She gives some remarks of the conference. She would like to express gratitude to the ministry of National Education, UNESCO Office Jakarta, Indonesian National Commission of UNESCO and Prof. Arief Rachman and the team, as well as Ms. Maria Malevri of UNESCO Paris.

There are general remarks from the discussions from the previous parallel session; they are not recommendations to the governments but recommendations to the next conference of ICE in Geneva. She suggests the participants to write down some of their comments regarding the general remarks that have been distributed to the participants, then collect them to Prof. Arief.

She then mentions about the mechanism of the 48th session of ICE in November in Geneva. The conference will be discussing transversal topic within the conference. She also encourages the participants to encourage the Ministers of education to attend the conference and do national plan of the country, and each country sends a national report on the educational system and it should be fitting the topic of the conference: inclusive education. Besides that, it should also refer the global monitoring reports.

Furthermore, she stresses the participants’ countries to recognize educators from different countries in different regions, in terms of research and teachings – contribution to the country. The deadline of this will be in the next coming weeks. She explains further about the detail mechanism of the ICE and closes her general remarks. Thank you.

She invites the participants to give some comments regarding the general remarks.

Helen Keller International, Indonesia says that the document is excellent but the document is too long. She outlines three points: identification, importance of early intervention and collaboration among departments. That’s all the highlights from her. Thank you.

Ms. Clementina thanks for the comments and says that that can be accommodated.

Pakistan says that if he encourages the Minister of the country that would be an inclusion. He thanks the organizers and the governments of Indonesia and Pakistan. He comments on the general report that it is really focused and digested, he hopes that everyone in this hall will be committed. He mentions something about resources and collaboration; south-south, south-north collaboration. Something about resources can be added to the recommendations to the Ministers. He gives some comments on inclusion and exclusion. He congratulates the organizers for the conference organizations, arrangements and hospitality.

Ms. Clementina says that the conference is easy and great; and she invites some more comments.

Afghanistan thanks the organizers of the conference and the participants for the active participation. She gives small comments to give stronger remarks for the next conference; she wants orphan and street children to be included. After this conference, she hopes that the meaning of inclusion to be taken very broad in real life at all level of education as well as in the society.

The Philippines gives comments on the general crosscutting themes to be put forward to the Ministers’ meetings. Another point is curriculum and localization, school and community empowerment, excluded and marginalized from the system and the need to collaborate with other stakeholders. Thank you.

Ms. Clementina invites the last comments.

Ms. Bhaswati Mukerjee of India has some comments to consider. First is about the declaration to be implemented in each country’s government. She gives another comment on the region of Asia that should include also Pacific region, as this is Asia Pacific conference. She also gives comments on the urgent nature or the documents; also comments on migrant children, which should be shared internationally. Thank you.

Ms. Clementina thanks for the comments and identifies the common point raised by India, Pakistan and Afghanistan, which is the resource. She responds also the point of migrant children that the drafting committee will reformulate the general remarks on that point. She would also like to address the comments from the Philippines that will enrich the general remarks of the documents (budget, localization of curriculum, support to the marginalized and community empowerment as well as collaboration). She also says that the terms of monitoring that should be included too. The comments of India will be acceptable regardless of the status that children should be included in education.

Indonesia gives some comments for the next meetings in the future regarding the respect of inclusion; a point of languages that are used. She suggests the provision of the materials in the language of the host country.

Ms. Clemetina says that she encourages the Ministry of National Education and Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO to later provide the materials in Indonesian. She invites the final comment.

Ms. Simon Baker of the experts representative, wants to make one comment on HIV/AIDS issue regarding the point of stigma discrimination, that has become major issue that does not allow children to go to school, that needs to be encountered.

Ms. Clementina thanks for all the comments and also the suggestions for the summary of the outcomes that will be the conclusion of the conference.

Finally, She would like to thank the participants and invites the participants to be the member of the community of practice. So far IBE-UNESCO has 700 experts in 90 countries. She again thanks the Ministry of National Education, Indonesian National Commission, UNESCO Jakarta, UNESCO Bangkok and UNESCO Paris and all the participants for the fruitful conference.

Prof. Arief invites the participants to give more applause for the regional preparatory conference of ICE. He then introduces Mr. Eko Sudjatmiko for the organization and invites Mr. Bambang Indriyanto to give closing remarks.

12.15 – 12.30
Closing Remarks

Mr. Bambang Indriyanto thanks the organizers of the committee for organizing this conference and hopes that this conference will be the benefits of the participating countries also hopes that this conference foster the value of inclusive education. He thanks the staffs of Indonesian National Commission for UNESCO, also the participants for their commitment to inclusive education.

There also many people that have been involved in this conference that he would like to thank to. He would like to see the participants in the 48th session of ICE to discuss further on inclusive education. He thanks again and he says, ‘thank you’ in some languages. Thank you.

Prof. Arief invites the participants to do a little exercise of Senyum, Salam, Sapa, Sabar, Syukur (Smile, Greetings, Say Hi, Passion and Gratitude). He then closes the conference and invites the participants for group photo.

12.30 – 14.00
Lunch

Lunch is provided in Teras Teratai Brasserie, the first floor of the hotel.