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EDUCATION
FOR ALL IN EUROPE AND NORTH AMERICA UNDER REVIEW AT WARSAW
CONFERENCE (FEB. 6 - 8)
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 Paris,
17 January 2000 - Whether education for all is a reality
in Europe and North America will be examined at a regional meeting
organised in Warsaw (Poland) by the International Consultative
Forum on Education for All, February 6 to 8, with a view to
assessing progress achieved since the World Conference on Education
for All (Jomtien, Thailand, 1990). |
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Some
300 participants including ministers - respectively in charge
of education, foreign and social affairs - and representatives
of non-governmental organisations are expected to attend the
meeting. Six roundtable debates are scheduled: Planning and
Management of Basic Education; Laying the Foundations of Lifelong
Learning; Early Childhood Education and Development; Education
and Work; Education, Poverty and Exclusion; Democratic Citizenship
in the Context of Multiculturalism. A Regional Framework for
Action will be discussed and adopted during the meeting. |
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Ten
years ago at the World Conference on Education for All, 155
countries and some 150 organisations committed themselves to
provide basic education for all and to reduce illiteracy massively.
The time has come to take stock of what has been achieved. Six
regional conferences will make it possible to group national
data for inclusion in a global report which will be presented
at the World Education Forum in Dakar, Senegal (April 26 to
28). By then, regional meetings will have been held not only
in Warsaw but also in Johannesburg (South Africa) in December
1999; Bangkok (Thailand), January 17 - 20; Cairo (Egypt), January
24 - 27; Recife (Brazil) February 2 - 4; and San Domingo (Dominican
Republic), February 10 - 12. |
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Although
the public might assume that education for all is a well-established
reality in Europe and North America, this is not the case. Developing
countries do not have a monopoly on exclusion from education.
Europe and North America also have teachers who have not been
paid for three years, refugee children attending school under
the most precarious conditions, rural schools lacking even the
most rudimentary equipment, inadequately trained teachers, immigrant
children badly integrated into the school system. The failings
of basic education are legion even in rich countries. We know,
for instance, that some 20 per cent of the adult population
in this part of the world have difficulties with reading and
writing. This makes the Warsaw assessment all the more vital. |
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The
International Consultative Forum on Education for All is in
charge of this ambitious evaluation and of those carried out
simultaneously in the other regions of the world. The Forum
is based at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris and is co-sponsored
by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), UNESCO,
the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the United Nations
Population Fund (UNDP) and the World Bank along with a number
of bilateral agencies. |
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