Education Forum for Asia

Education NEWSFLASH

August 2005

IN THE NEWS:  Current News and Events in Education and Asian Society

Government Aid Makes School More Accessible to Minorities

Source:  Xinhuanet

Guiyang, July 29  (by Qin Yazhou, Zhou Yan) Like the other 8 million candidates who took part in this year''''''''s college entrance exam, Chen Wei nervously awaited the news that would determine his future.  After many anxious days, the 18 year old received a matriculation certificate from a top university in his hometown, as well as a document telling him how to apply for a student loan to cover his tuition.  As a minority student from underdeveloped Guizhou Province in southwest China, Chen is given easier access to such a loan.

Chen's father died many years ago, leaving two children. His mother works in Guangdong selling vegetables but makes only about 400 yuan (US $49) a month.  Chen would even have been forced to drop out of secondary school, if it were not for the financial aid provided by his school and the local government in Longshan Village, Majiang County.  He is just one of the over 230 minority children in the village to be able to finish secondary schooling with such financial aid.  Now, loans or grants from the Provincial Government will allow him to continue his education. "My family couldn't have been able to afford my college education," he told Xinhua in an interview. "It costs at least 3,000 yuan (US $370) a year.  We've never had that much money in my family."

Minorities from 46 ethnic groups make up 37 percent of the population of Guizhou Province, one of the poorest in China.  Since 2004, the province has exempted 220,000 minority children from tuition and provided each student with a 200 yuan (US $25) a month food allowance.

"More than 1.3 million children will benefit from the policy this year," said Huang Yan, an official with the Guizhou Provincial Department of Education. "The central and provincial government treasuries will co-sponsor the aid program."  China's Ministry of Education has also been working to ensure minority students have equal access to schools? said Minister Zhou Ji.  "Minority education has always been the focal point of our work."  In 2004, 21.35 million students from minority groups were studying at schools and colleges across the country, up 13.48 percent from 1999 according to Ministry of Education statistics.

China has spent more than 30 billion yuan (US $3.7 billion) in recent years building school facilities for underdeveloped regions.   (Text has been edited)

Guangdong Province to Provide Free Education                                                    Source:  China Daily

Beijing, Aug. 1 -- South China's Guangdong Province plans to allocate money that will goes towards providing a completely free nine-year compulsory education for students throughout the province.  Although for the last 15 years students have not been charged tuition fees, they were still responsible for the cost of textbooks, workbooks, and other study materials.  These expenses have often deterred children from poor families from attending school.

Five counties identified as the most in need will be the first to benefit from the new policy.  Students in these counties will begin benefiting from the program starting the fall semester of this year, sources with the Guangdong Provincial Education Bureau said yesterday.  After the five initial counties, the program will be extended to all rural areas within the province and then eventually to the urban areas.

Preliminary figures from the Guangdong Provincial Finance Bureau estimate that more than 6 billion yuan (US$739.8 million) will need to be allocated for the province to finally implement a cost free education.  This program is simply part of an ongoing effort to further strengthen educational development in rural areas.  The province will allocate a total of 187 million yuan (US$23 million) this year for the development of rural education, of which 100 million (US$12.3 million) will be used to improve educational facilities.         (Text has been edited)

Australia Works with UNICEF in Ongoing Efforts to Support South Asia                                                                                                                                                               Source:  Ausaid  (www.ausaid.gov.au)

South Asia has experienced rapid growth in recent years, but is still one of the world's most disadvantaged regions.  More than 40 per cent of the region's 1.4 billion people live on less than US$1 per day.

Australia is just one of a number of donors working in South Asia.  Australia will therefore focus on delivering its program through regional mechanisms and by working with major multilateral partners, other donors, and NGOs to respond flexibly to major regional issues such as HIV/AIDS, governance reform and people trafficking.

On March 4, 2005, the Australian Government signed a partnership agreement with the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) for a joint South Asia regional program.  This program will focus on education (especially primary education) and health at a regional level, with the potential for activities in specific countries to also be considered.  Australia is also working with the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS to develop an umbrella agreement that will facilitate joint programming of HIV/AIDS activities in South Asia during the period 2005 to 2010.

Australia strongly supports Sri Lanka's post-conflict peacebuilding and economic recovery efforts.  Australia is assisting conflict-affected communities in the north and east of the country through the provision of basic rural services such as water and sanitation, trauma counseling, microfinance, and vocational training.

Peacebuilding initiatives totaling $3.5 million will include $1 million through the United Nations Development Programme, to help rehabilitate small-scale infrastructure in Trincomalee, Batticaloa and Ampara, and $2.5 million through UNICEF to rehabilitate schools, provide 'catch-up' education for conflict-affected children, help young landmine victims, and provide women and children with better access to good nutrition and water and sanitation services.

Australia will continue to provide significant humanitarian assistance to South Asia, a region vulnerable to crises and natural disasters.  Following the December 2004 Indian Ocean disaster, Australia committed $14.5 million in assistance to countries in South Asia including Sri Lanka, the Maldives and the Seychelles.

A small number of existing bilateral aid activities will complement the regional and humanitarian initiatives.  The aid program will also provide scholarships to a range of South Asian countries.

The Asia Foundation Books for Asia Awards 8000 volumes to Cavite, Philippines

Source:  Asia Foundation (www.asiafoundation.org)

Cavite, July 5, 2005  At a ceremony held in Cavite today, The Asia Foundation Books for Asia program and its partner, Sa Aklat Sisikat (SAS), presented over 8,000 volumes of donated books to the children of local schools and to the public school system.  Illiteracy and poverty continue to affect hundreds of millions in the Asia-Pacific region, and a lack of educational opportunities and resources limits those who want to better their lives through education.  This donation will help educators and community groups enhance English language skills, sharpen vocational and research skills, build small business knowledge, and promote literacy among children.

Foundation Representative, Dr. Steven Rood said, the only way we can pave a smooth road where the wheels of trade and commerce may turn unhampered is by addressing poverty that is currently afflicting a majority of Filipino families.  Poverty-stricken communities have to be empowered so that they can become a driving force of economic development; this is where education has to play a major role.

SAS President Ms. Margarita Delgado explains that their partnership with The Asia Foundation demonstrates the importance that the government and Philippine society should be placing on education and literacy.

SAS Reading Programs are integrated in the curriculum of our partner schools, ensuring that the potential of SAS reading corners is maximized.  Books for Asia provides valuable support for our program so that we can reach out to more public schools in the country,” said Ms. Delgado.

With this shipment, Books for Asia has now distributed over 33,000 books to the province of Cavite since 1954.

Putting Words into Action:  Quotes and Speeches from Leaders in the World of Education and Social Development

In April 2000, at the World Education Forum, Dakar, UNESCO drafted The Dakar Framework for Action.  Two years later in 2002, Director General Koichiro Matsuura, in an article published in Le Figaro, comments, the time has come to tentatively take stock of its results.”   The following is an excerpt from a speech published as part of the article in February 2002.

Source:  www.unesco.org

To be sure, much remains to be done to attain the objectives we set ourselves on that occasion.  The Dakar Framework for Action assigned to the international community six goals, two of which are particularly relevant.  The first commits us to ensuring that by 2015 all children, particularly girls, children in difficult circumstances and those belonging to ethnic minorities, have access to a complete free and compulsory primary education of good quality?  The second involves achieving a 50 per cent improvement in levels of adult literacy by 2015, especially for women, and equitable access to basic and continuing education for all adults?

Yet today the number of adult illiterates worldwide still stands at 868 million.  True, illiteracy has significantly diminished in relative terms and should continue to decline.  The percentage of illiterates fell from 30.8% in 1980 to 22.8% in 1995 and should drop to 16.6% in 2010.  But because of the increase in world population, the actual number of illiterates remained astonishingly stable between 1980 and 1995, around 890 million, even if it has declined since then, albeit too slowly.  And over 100 million children of primary school age still do not attend school or simply have no possibility of doing so.

Thus the scale of the task before us is clear.  In the course of generations to come, we shall have to take up the unmet challenges of the 20th century “education for all” and those of the 21st century lifelong education for all and the construction of knowledge societies.  And these challenges concern all societies: even in the richest nations, education systems cannot ensure sustainable literacy among the population.  Studies show that over one-tenth, and more often than not one-fifth, of the population of the industrialized countries is affected by illiteracy, defined as the inability to read and write with understanding a short simple statement in relation to everyday life.

It is more than ever necessary, then, for us to rouse ourselves and take action.  For education for all will only be effectively for all?when it becomes the active concern of all.  Dakar must not be yet another conference? and Education for all must not forever remain an unfulfilled promise?

This is for UNESCO a key task, and I have personally committed myself to making it a priority, for education is a fundamental human right, set forth in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Human Rights Covenants, which have force of international law.  To pursue the aim of education for all is therefore an obligation for States.

Education for all is more than an ambitious objective: it is an ambitious ethic, predicated on human dignity.  Today the notion of literacy is no longer restricted to reading, writing and numeracy: education must also offer access to skills and know-how that enable the individual to take his or her place in society.  Education must also be accessible at all stages of life, so as to give a second chance to the excluded and enable every individual to adapt to a changing world and work environment.  It must give access in the first instance to necessary knowledge, and then make available throughout life - not only in school but also through nonformal and informal education - what Robert Carneiro, in Keys to the 21st Century, calls “antidotes to unlearning”.

We are convinced that this effort will only bear fruit if education for all is integrated in national development and poverty-reduction programs.  For today, the essential link between education, development and poverty-reduction is universally recognized.  This is why the poor and the excluded, particularly women and girls, too often deprived of education, and marginalized groups, should be the main targets of Education for All.

We must stop betraying hope, stop postponing action.  In this respect, there are some heartening signs: I am thinking in particular of the publication by the World Bank a few weeks ago of the list of the first 23 countries to benefit from a fast-track education for all program, these countries alone comprising over half the children worldwide not attending school.  Investing in education is investing in success; it is building our future.  Governments, international institutions, social agencies, NGOs, associations, the private sector, and citizens must join forces in carrying through this undertaking.

In the aftermath of September 11th , we should also reflect on the fact that investing in education means investing in national and international security.  For education, as Jacques Delors has stressed, is founded on four pillars: learning to know, learning to do, learning to be, and learning to live together. Education for all is the best cement of peace, both between and within nations.  But are we ready to pay the price of peace?  To those who complained about the cost of education, Abraham Lincoln was in the habit of replying: “very well, gentlemen, then try ignorance.”

UPCOMING EVENTS

The Asian University Presidents Forum

October 7 - 9 2005.  Pai Chai University, DAEJEON Metropolitan City, Republic of South Korea

The Asian University Presidents Forum is a consequence of non-governmental cooperation among Asian universities, evolving from the Non-Governmental Collaborative Association of Presidents of Chinese and Thai Institutions of Higher Learning set up at Srinakharinwirot University, Thailand, in 2002.  The theme of this year's forum is “Worldwide Strength and Developmental Strategies of Asian Universities'' Education System”  

2005 Asian University Presidents Forum Committee | Youngsub Kwock, (PhD) Director of Committee

Address:  PaiChai University (302-735) 439-6 Doma 2-Dong Seo-gu, Daejeon, South Korea

Phone/Fax : 82-42-520-5876 Email : preforum@pcu.ac.kr

Asia-Europe Classroom International Teachers Conference

September 25-29 2005.  Beijing, China

The AEC was conceived at a brainstorming session attended by secondary/high school teachers and educators from Asia and Europe held in Copenhagen, Denmark, in May 1998.  The original challenge was to harness the potential of Infocomm Technology (ICT) in connecting secondary/high schools of Asia and Europe and construct the framework for a "cyber classroom" that would promote intellectual and inter-cultural exchanges among secondary/high school teachers and students of Asia and Europe. The AEC has since evolved to encourage more active interactions between secondary/high schools in Asia and Europe.  This year's conference is organized in collaboration with the Beijing Jingshan High School, and enjoys the support of the Ministry of Education of China and the European Commission.

Organization Profile

This section highlights an organization or program that is making a difference in the fields of education or social development.

World Education

Founded in 1951 to meet the needs of the educationally disadvantaged, World Education provides training and technical assistance in nonformal education across a wide array of sectors.  Registered as a private voluntary organization, World Education has worked in over 50 countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, as well as in the United States.

World Education contributes to individual growth, strengthens the capacity of local partner institutions, and catalyzes community and national development.  World Education's approach is characterized by a commitment to meaningful and equal partnership that is flexible and evolves over time, and is based on mutual interest and trust.  In its role as catalyst, World Education strives to develop assets such as good health, literacy, numeracy, business and civic participation skills, and access to credit.  World Education promotes local autonomy by partnering with stakeholders to plan and implement their programs for social and economic change, appropriate to the local context and the needs of grassroots constituents.

 Current programs in Asia include the following:

OPTIONS: Combating Child Trafficking and Exploitation through Education

OPTIONS is working with community networks to identify children who are at risk and provide them with support in formal and nonformal interventions appropriate to their individual needs.  Building on the skills of four major partners, (World Education, CARE International, The Asia Foundation, and Kampuchean Action for Primary Education), OPTIONS works in three provinces: Prey Veng, Kompong Cham, Banteay Meanchey, and certain areas of Phnom Penh

The Girls Access to Education (GATE) Program

In 1998, World Education began the Girls Access to Education (GATE) Program by developing a nine-month literacy curriculum that integrates adolescent health and girls empowerment information and literacy training.  While girls learn how to read, write and do basic mathematics, they also learn about basic nutrition, reproductive health, and the consequences of early marriage, early pregnancy, unsafe sex, STIs, and HIV/AIDS.

For more information, visit the World Education website at www.worlded.org/WEIInternet/

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