Partnership in Action UNESCO's Educational Activities in The Europe Region 1998 - 2000

* Education for All Assessment 2000
Education for all has moved up on the priorities of governments and its importance for sustainable development is recognized throughout the world. The World Declaration on Education for All, adopted by World Conference on Education for All (Jomtien, Thailand, 1990), has influenced education profoundly during the past decade and provided the framework for UNESCO’s programme in basic education.

The EFA Assessment 2000 was launched in July 1998 with an aim to help countries to identify both problems and prospects for further progress of EFA, and to strengthen their capacity to improve and monitor the provision and outcomes of basic education. Some 179 countries set up National Assessment Groups which collected quantitative data focusing on eighteen core indicators and carried out case-studies to collect qualitative information. Ten regional advisory groups were set up and training workshops were organized in all regions. In the same vein, much progress has been made in implementing a series of thirty surveys, including capacity-building at regional and national levels on monitoring learning achievement and conditions for teaching and learning, as well as fourteen global thematic studies on key education issues. The overall synthesis was considered by the World Education Forum in Dakar (26-28 April, 2000).

The Dakar Forum adopted a new Framework for Action for the development of basic education in the beginning of the twenty-first century. The Framework outlines a forceful strategy for education for all, based on the results of the EFA 2000 Assessment and the Regional EFA Meetings, as well as deliberations at the Forum. The Framework for Action will be widely disseminated in different languages to all governments and communicated to the several United Nations development conferences and special sessions of the General Assembly scheduled later in 2000 and 2001, notably on population, women, social development and children, as well as to the Millennium Assembly and the Millennium Summit.

The Europe Region preparatory conference for the Forum was organized in Warsaw, 6 to 8 February 2000, by the International Consultative Forum on Education for All, comprising UNDP, UNESCO, UNICEF, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the World Bank.

The Warsaw Conference, attended by forty-three countries, adopted a Framework for Action reflecting the will of the Europe Region. The regional Framework recommended three levels of action: in each country, in the region and globally.

For each country, the regional Framework recommends that basic education provide ‘key skills, used as personal development tools including a first vocational initiation, the culture, values and abilities that are needed for social cohesion, sustainable development, … and for the exercise of participatory and responsible citizenship in a democracy.’ To achieve this, it also emphasizes the need to fight against functional illiteracy, a considerable and persistent problem in all countries, including the most developed.

On the regional level, information sharing is encouraged and given the "needs for further improvements in education systems, particularly in hard hit economies of Central and Eastern Europe, enhanced flows of financial assistance are merited and should be provided". The Framework recommends ‘significant increases of assistance to education’ and urges regionwide efforts to combat the exclusion of many adults from learning opportunities.

At the global level, the Framework states: ‘Education must be allowed to play its key role for lasting development in the context of globalization and by respecting the responsibilities for each country’.

Unequal access to existing education provision was a major source of concern in the assessment reports on twenty-nine countries in western Europe and the report on central and eastern Europe covering twenty countries, confirming that basic education is a matter of priority for the whole of Europe. In the west, there was particular worry about the influence of social exclusion on the educational and subsequent professional success of learners while in the east issues of family background, ethnic origin and geographic location were brought to the fore.

* Early childhood and family education
A fresh impetus was given by UNESCO to the further development of early childhood and family education, in order to cater for the developmental needs of young children and to prepare them for further learning. Special attention was given to the promotion of interregional and national networks of institutions, organizations and centres involved in early childhood and family education. In addition to the Averroës European Training Centre launched in 1997, six institutions in other parts of the world, including the National Institute of Family and Children (Budapest), became UNESCO Early Childhood Cooperating Centres. Regional and national capacities for information gathering and analysis were reinforced. The clearing house services were expanded by strengthening UNESCO’s early childhood databases, publication activities and presence on the Internet. Inter-agency discussions have been initiated to mobilize support and forge partnerships for joint actions within the framework of the ‘Strategic Plan’ drawn up by UNESCO for the Early Childhood and Family Education Programmes (2000-13).

UNESCO played a co-ordinating role in organizing in April 2000 in Washington D.C. an inter-agency meeting on early childhood indicators, with the participation of OECD, UNICEF and the World Bank.

The Directory of Early Childhood Care and Education Organizations in Europe and North America was prepared in 1998; support was provided for the publication of the UNESCO/Bernard van Leer Foundation Early Childhood Training Pack in French and of information sheets on early childhood issues in Russian and Turkish.

* Special needs education
Following the World Conference on Special Needs Education, Salamanca, Spain 1994, the concept of inclusive education has become a key feature of the EFA agenda. Thematic studies on inclusive education and case-studies on practices in addressing the needs of marginalized/excluded groups were carried out in several countries. A document and a video on ‘Welcoming Schools’ have been produced to promote inclusive practices across cultures. Small-scale projects have been launched to support widening of access to education of children and youth with special education needs.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, a plan of action for support of teachers was developed and various activities were undertaken. In 1998 and 1999, a series of workshops was organized to improve teachers’ skills to better respond to needs in the classrooms. Since January 1999, UNESCO has been supporting a project for teachers concentrated in two kindergartens in Sarajevo.

The International Special Education Congress 2000, ISEC, will be held at the University of Manchester, United Kingdom, July 2000. The congress will review the progress that was made during the 1990s with regard to the rights of all children and young people to have equal access to education. UNESCO will organize a session at the conference to highlight and discuss developments after the Salamanca conference.

The material ‘Open File on Inclusive Education’ is in preparation. It comprises a series of themes related to the organization and management of inclusive systems of education. A field-testing workshop organized in May 2000 in Portugal involved educational managers and planners evaluating and improving the materials. A training workshop for teacher educators from ten Eastern and Central European countries will be organized in Bucharest in October 2000 to support human resource development for inclusion.

* Education of children in difficult circumstances
The main thrust of the programme as regards the education of children in difficult circumstances aimed at promoting basic educational services in areas affected by war and refugee movements. Examples of recent accomplishments include projects addressing recent immigrants in Israel; vocational training of youth victims of landmines in Sarajevo, psychological and educational needs of working street children in large cities (Bucharest, and Moscow) and support to the Children’s House (Orhei) in Moldova. With UNESCO’s technical support, a European Network on Street Children Worldwide (ENSCW) has been established.

In July 1999, the Hungarian Ministry of Education started, in co-operation with UNESCO, a Programme for educational and social promotion of Roma children. Within the framework of this project, UNESCO supported three pilot projects developed by Hungarian Educational Institutions. Based on the experience of this Programme, UNESCO is supporting a new regional project for the year 2000, in close co-operation with the Hungarian Ministry of Education. The project will involve the participation of Hungary, Romania, Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic, and aims at developing/strengthening active co-operation between these countries in order to promote social integration of Roma children and youth. One of the main activities of this project will be the establishment in Hungary of a Central European Roma Continuous Training and Pedagogical Information Centre. UNESCO is organizing a Regional Workshop to be held in October 2000, where participants from these five countries will exchange their experiences in the field of the education of Roma children.

Within the framework of the six-year special project ‘Enhancement of Learning and Training Opportunities for Marginalized Youth’, projects have been implemented in Georgia and Ukraine, focusing on the development of both empowerment (self-confidence, participation and solidarity) and self-employment. Non-formal distance education policies in the field of basic vocational training have been promoted to reach marginalized and geographically isolated groups. Experience gained from operational projects reveals that basic skills training is a powerful tool to alleviate poverty if linked to potential income-generating activities.