International Bureau ofEducationInternational Bureau ofEducation

Overview and Strategy 2002 - 2007

Overview and Strategy 2002 - 2007

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Photo credits:(c) UNESCO, except

where otherwise stated

International Bureau of EducationUNESCOStreet address: 15 route des Morillons,1218 Grand-Saconnex, Geneva, SwitzerlandPostal address: P.O. Box 199, 1211 Geneva 20,SwitzerlandTel.: +41.22.917.78.00Fax: +41.22.917.78.01www.ibe.unesco.org

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International Bureau of Education

UNESCO

Overview and Strategy2002 � 2007

Contents

World trends and educational challenges .............................................................................................................. 7New educational models required ........................................................................................................................... 8How to promote curriculum development processes that improve the quality of education ........................... 8The curriculum as a tool for educational change ................................................................................................ 10Making an international contribution to educational quality .............................................................................. 11Education and the interests of humanity .............................................................................................................. 14The role of the IBE within the framework of the UNESCO medium-term strategy ........................................... 15The IBE strategy of capacity building for curriculum development ................................................................... 19The IBE strategy of disseminating innovations and analysing trends .............................................................. 29The IBE strategy of facilitating and promoting dialogue for policy-making...................................................... 35Country co-operation on curriculum development .............................................................................................. 41Curricula and HIV/AIDS ........................................................................................................................................... 45

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The International Bureau of Education:a field-oriented institute to promote learning for living together

through curriculum development

The International Bureau of Education (IBE) was founded in Geneva as a private, non-governmentalorganization in 1925. In 1929, under new statutes, the IBE extended membership to governments. Ittherefore became the first intergovernmental organization in the field of education. The name of JeanPiaget became closely associated with the organization, which he led for almost forty years. Since1969 the IBE has been an integral part of UNESCO�the United Nations Educational, Scientific andCultural Organization�while retaining wide intellectual and functional autonomy. In 1999 the IBEbecame the UNESCO institute responsible for educational contents, methods and teaching/learningstrategies through curriculum development.The IBE is an academic institute whose activities are directed towards empowering educational ac-tivities in the field.It is at the service of UNESCO Member States, local governments, universities and non-governmen-tal organizations. Its purpose is to help its partners make, assess and develop educational curricula.It focuses on learning to live together.On behalf of the Ministry of National Education, Youth and Sport of the Czech Republic and ofUNESCO, the IBE administers the Comenius Medal. This medal was created in 1992 on the occasionof the 400th anniversary of the birth of Jan Amos Comenius to reward outstanding achievementsand innovations in the fields of teaching and educational research, and to commemorate Comenius�spiritual heritage.The IBE is governed by a Council consisting of twenty-eight Member States elected by the GeneralConference of UNESCO. The Council approves the IBE�s programme and budget proposals, submitsthem to the UNESCO Executive Board and General Conference, and takes steps to ensure the con-sistency and the integration of its priorities and programmes with those approved by the GeneralConference. The Director-General of UNESCO either attends or is represented at the meetings of theIBE Council.The present list of Member States making up the IBE Council can be found on the IBE�s website:www.ibe.unesco.org/

John Daniel, UNESCO's Assistant Director-Generalfor Education, presents the Comenius Medal to

Thomas Ango Bediako (Ghana), 6 September 2001

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From the Director of the IBE

The twentieth century was the century of universal schooling. In 1998, 84% of childrenthroughout the world already attended a school. Investments in education had increasedconsiderably relative to previous decades. In 1990, they constituted between 0.8% and2.2% of the gross domestic product of different countries. In 1998 they rose to a rangefrom 1.3% to 2.5%, although efforts are still necessary to include the excluded. Theinternational community, nations and families have acknowledged the need to makeprogress towards achieving Education for All.

However... is that really a worthwhile aim? During that same century humanity killedmore than 180 million of its members. The genocides, the wars and the terrorist actswere in most cases led by people who had received many years of schooling. On theother hand, without schooling there can be neither development nor equity and socialcohesion. The real question, then, is not whether it is worthwhile to continue strug-gling for Education for All, but rather how to ensure that Education for All contributesto living together in peace, to development and to justice.

One way of achieving such education is to focus on action, capacity building, policydialogue and research aimed at ensuring legitimate and sustainable processes of edu-cational change with a view to improving its contents, methods and structures, mainlythrough curriculum development. The International Bureau of Education is undertak-ing its medium-term strategy with the aim of contributing to this process of improve-ment.

Cecilia Braslavsky

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World trends andeducational challenges

All nations and almost all human beings arenow strongly interdependent. This fact hassharpened and amplified a number of educa-tional challenges. People are expecting edu-cation to provide them with capacities formaking a living, for political and cultural par-ticipation, for analysis, for autonomy, for self-controlled learning and for making responsiblechoices.

Some of these challenges are: lifelong learn-ing and re-learning new knowledge and skills;learning how to live together; supporting di-verse cultural identities and cross-cultural edu-cation. The task of reaching educationallythose who have remained or have becomemarginalized and to contribute to social cohe-sion is a paramount challenge in a world wherepoverty and inequities frequently grow worse.

The needs of democracies and the need forpromoting new ways of participating in publiclife, as well as the challenge posed by vio-lence, all urgently require enormous educa-tional efforts. They require: education for citi-zenship; education that discourages chauvin-isms and intolerance; and education that cur-tails the cognitive, affective, and socio-culturalcomponents of conflicts.

The importance of science and technology inall aspects of life today continues to grow.Science and technology and various issuesarising from them are also a major source ofeducational challenges. We refer to the chal-lenges that arise, for example, from genetictechnology and from the unexpected environ-mental impacts of industrialization. Thus, newchoices are required making it imperative tostrengthen the relationship between scientificand technical development and the ethics ofthe common good. Already, it is expected thateducation should help people to become andremain scientifically literate.

Information and communications technologieshave rapidly changed almost all societies.Public communications media have becomewidespread and more influential. They riskbeing merely expressions of economic inter-ests, and new forms of manipulation. How-ever, they are also becoming potentially moreinteractive and educational. Societies are nowneeding and expecting results from educationsystems, such as a reduction of the �digitaldivide��the capacities for using the informa-tion available through modern media and in-formation technologies.

Education towards responsible choices is alsoexpected to be knowledge-based and ethics-based, and not simply the means of ensuringthe transfer of accurate information.

Photos. Top: UNESCO/World Bank/ChernushBottom: UNESCO/P.G. Scarlandis

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New educational modelsrequired

New ways of looking at education are needed:new root models or paradigms. All the previ-ously mentioned global trends and develop-ments require us to make special efforts tocope with the changes to try and reverse orredirect them, or take advantage of them.What the world presents us with is a set ofnew challenges, even to ways of thinkingabout education. What are the future direc-tions for humankind? What content for edu-cation? What frameworks and strategies forteaching? How and what is one to learn?What new approaches will be equitable andinclusive? What educational structures andsystems are required? What school organi-zation?

The way in which most of the world looks ateducation, the way in which education sys-tems respond to such questions, is still basi-cally a relic of the nineteenth century. Thosevisions have mostly been stretched to theirlimit. New visions are needed. There areencouraging reports of initiatives that inno-vate, that re-shape education, and that reformeducation systems. These must be used as asource of inspiration.

Humanity is newly redefining its own futureand, to fulfil some of the crucial roles in this

process, education must raise standards ofquality and seek new directions. Educationis faced with the need for learners to copewith their own development and with the prob-lems of everyday life, but also it has to suc-cessfully foster conviviality � living togetherin mutual fulfilment in the face of differences.It has to prepare effectively for a shared, sus-tainable future that is based on the values oflife, peace, human rights, collective prosper-ity, inclusion, co-operation, solidarity and jus-tice. It has to develop effective approachesand innovations to attack poverty and to pre-vent war, partly through the integral develop-ment of individual human beings and commu-nities.

It takes empowerment and ownership ofchange to achieve effective approaches andresults. Both unleash people�s potential. Thisis the path to educational innovation that isresponsive, globally and locally relevant, sus-tained, high quality, and creative. Empower-ment and ownership of change can be appliedin the education sector at all levels � fromschool to national and regional bodies � to en-sure that education systems can cope with achanging world. Empowerment and owner-ship of change may also be the key to ensur-ing universal access to education, and to helpguarantee Education for All as a universalhuman right.

How to promote curriculumdevelopment processesthat improve the quality ofeducation

The IBE is concerned especially with the pro-motion of the process of learning through theintegral development of all persons and com-munities.

The major challenge for the IBE is to pro-mote relevant quality education, resulting inlearning to live together, economic and socialdevelopment, social cohesion and peace. TheIBE helps to create some of the required con-ditions and learning experiences for this. Itfunctions especially through the promotion ofpertinent curricula. The IBE uses the defini-tion of curricula both as a set of products andprocesses (see page 10).

Curricula, including syllabi and textbooks, needto be assessed and maintained. Where cur-ricula are only information-centred and basedon knowledge transfer, they may need to berevised. They should give way to more bal-anced curricula, where this would be locallyappropriate. In these, the aim would be toacquire competencies and to satisfy the learn-ing needs of persons, societies and humanity.Such a paradigm shift represents a key chal-lenge for curriculum developers at all levels.

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Where curriculum making and developmentprocesses are top-down, they may need to giveway to a different kind of change process. Assoon as local conditions permit, the curricu-lum making and development processes needto become neither entirely top-down nor ex-clusively bottom-up, but rather, synergistic.

Decision-makers in ministries and educationdepartments, just as much as people takingdecisions at the school and community levels,would be expected to initiate and to contrib-ute to curricula and curriculum implementa-tion work. The contributions from the top andthose from the bottom would be articulatedso that they become consistent and comple-mentary with one another. Organizing wideparticipatory stakeholder involvement andconsultation processes is one of the ways ofenhancing relevance, generating new energiesand a wide sense of ownership that may leadto decreasing conflict and inequity.

What about the general perspective onchange held by social and educational policymakers and curriculum developers? Openoutlooks are required within any geographicalregion. These would be perspectives that areenriched, inspired, challenged or helped bypersons, institutions, theories, research resultsand good practices from diverse parts of thecountry and from other countries, within andoutside the geographical region involved.

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The history of education shows us that the term�curriculum� was originally related to the con-cept of a course of studies followed by a pupil ina teaching institution. The concept of �curricu-lum� was used in the English-speaking traditionas equivalent to the concept of programmed�études. Nevertheless, in recent decades, theconcept of curriculum has evolved and gainedimportance.The term curriculum is mostly used to refer tothe existing contract between society, the Stateand educational professionals with regard to theeducational experiences that learners should andin fact do undergo during a certain phase of theirlives. For the majority of authors and experts,the curriculum defines: (i) why; (ii) what; (iii)when; (iv) where; (v) how; and (vi) with whomthe learning is to take place.The curriculum defines: the foundations and con-tents of education; their sequencing in relationto the amount of time available for the learningexperiences; the characteristics of the teachinginstitutions; the characteristics of the learningexperiences, in particular from the point of viewof methods to be used; the resources for learningand teaching, such as textbooks and new tech-nologies; evaluation; and teachers� profiles.Originally, the curriculum was considered as theproduct of a technical process. In other words, itwas seen as a document prepared by experts, de-

pending on the state of the art of disciplinary andpedagogical knowledge. Nowadays, it is consid-ered both as a product and a process. It is alsoseen as a product and a process that embodies, onthe one hand, a technical or professional dimen-sion, and, on the other, a cultural dimension.Indeed, the curriculum relates to the connectionsbetween the goals of education and everyday lifein learning institutions, schools, colleges and uni-versities. It defines what �counts as valid knowl-edge�. It helps to give meaning to education.With regard to the material expression of curriculain a narrow sense, i.e. the official curriculum ordocuments adopted by the educational authorities,these texts are increasingly flexible and open toteachers� interpretations. One of the results of thisflexibility has been that the notion of curriculumas a product has become more closely linked withthe idea of curriculum as a process. This linkageshapes the formal or official curriculum, but it alsodescribes the implementation.Nowadays, we are thus seeing interesting and com-plex relationships between curricular documentsand a number of processes, such as the curriculummaking, development or implementation pro-cesses, and the various educational, cultural andsocial processes with which the curriculum inter-acts. These interactions need to be studied and tobe used to enhance the quality of education andthe quality of our living together.

The curriculum as a tool for educational changeThe Millennium Development Goals

In September 2000, at the United Nations Mil-lennium Summit, world leaders agreed to a setof time-bound and measurable goals and tar-gets�Millennium Development Goals�whichare to be achieved by 2015: (1) Halve extremepoverty and hunger; (2) Achieve universal pri-mary education; (3) Empower women; (4) Pro-mote equality between women and men; (5)Reduce mortality of children under-5 years bytwo-thirds; (6) Reduce maternal mortality bythree-quarters; (7) Reverse the spread of killerdiseases; (8) especially HIV/AIDS and malaria;(9) Ensure environmental sustainability; (10)Create a global partnership for development;(11) with targets for aid, trade and debt relief.It is the responsibility of all international agen-cies, including the IBE, to help achieve thesegoals.

The work of the IBE overlaps directly withthose goals relating to universal primary edu-cation and HIV/AIDS. The Millennium Decla-ration of the UN Summit also outlined a con-sensus �road map� on how to proceed, with astronger focus on human rights, good gover-

nance and democracy.

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Making an internationalcontribution to educationalquality

Educational quality has to be promoted at na-tional and international levels. The IBE is anactor within UNESCO to facilitate and sup-port, through international collaboration, suchrenewed learning processes, curriculum de-velopment and perspectives on educationalchange. Those three components are inter-dependent and interrelated to many others. Forall of them, the stakeholders of education�including children, parents and communities,as well as teachers and other educators andpolicy-makers�often need new international,open ways of thinking and interacting.

In order to make a significant contribution topersons and societies in today�s world, and inorder to create responsive, locally- and glo-bally-relevant and sustainable education sys-tems, what is required is a concentration onthe satisfaction of educational needs, and avariety of approaches that reach theunreached according to each context.

Self-empowerment among educators and edu-cational decision-makers is necessary. This isthe challenge of mastering the required com-petencies and information so that they canvisualize more options and will be able to for-

mulate and implement them in curricula andin curriculum development strategies. Thismastery, in any country, takes place betterwhen certain factors are present. Amongthese factors are: the easy availability of in-formation on relevant developments else-where; case studies on successful and unsuc-cessful experiences; appraised curriculumdocuments and validated working tools; avail-able analysis of trends using such informa-tion; and the circulation of innovative ideasthat may be locally generated or externallyborrowed.

The inspiration and assistance for curricular

change in any country often comes from othercountries. There is thus the need for in-depthsharing of knowledge and capacities of adapt-ing and using (or rejecting) models from else-where, according to local needs.

Various types of network-related activities arethus useful, and some are already taking place.Networks among professionals and their in-stitutions are a mechanism for facilitating andenhancing such work. IBE networks are in-ternational, and have regional foci and part-ners. They share knowledge and capacities.Some of them are able to act co-operativelyon curriculum development.

Photo Copyright: IOM (c) Wendy Stone 1991

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Photo credits.Above: UNICEF/HQ96-0481/Alejandro Balaguer;Opposite: UNICEF/5386/John Isaac

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Education for All:the six Dakar Goals adopted

by the international community, 2000

1. Expanding and improving comprehensiveearly childhood care and education, especially forthe most vulnerable and disadvantaged children.2. Ensuring that by 2015 all children, par-ticularly girls, children in difficult circumstancesand those belonging to ethnic minorities, haveaccess to and complete free and compulsory pri-mary education of good quality.3. Ensuring that the learning needs of allyoung people and adults are met through equitableaccess to appropriate learning and life skillsprogrammes.4. Achieving a 50% improvement in lev-els of adult literacy by 2015, especially for women,and equitable access to basic and continuing edu-cation for all adults.5. Eliminating gender disparities in pri-mary and secondary education by 2005, andachieving gender equality in education by 2015,with a focus on ensuring girls� full and equal ac-cess to and achievement in basic education of goodquality.6. Improving all aspects of the quality ofeducation and ensuring excellence of all so thatrecognized and measurable learning outcomesare achieved by all, especially in literacy,numeracy, and essential life skills.

The international community has decided to take astrong stand on ensuring education for all within alimited number of years, and to invest in rapidprogress in this direction. Six priority goals havebeen agreed upon at a key world conference inDakar, Senegal, in April 2000, mostly about ensur-ing that everybody goes to school, stays there forthe obligatory period, and satisfies at least the ba-sic learning needs. Attracting and retaining peopleat school depends on a number of factors. Severalstudies* on the development of education world-wide agree in highlighting the facts that:

� it is mainly at school that the majority ofpeople learn reading, writing, andnumeracy and acquire the capacities theyneed for daily life;

� the contents and the methods of educa-tion being used at school are two of thefactors that determine the retention ofstudents in schools.

The activities of the IBE, that is the capacity-build-ing, information sharing, trend analysis and policydialogue work all oriented towards improving cur-ricula and educational policies, contribute to theaccomplishment of the six EFA goals.

Curricular products, as well as curriculum-mak-ing and development processes are essential toimprove the capacities of schools and nations toretain students at school. At the heart of the is-sue of inclusive, relevant, quality education arethe policy-related and curriculum-related ques-tions: what basic educational needs and otherlearnings should one attempt to achieve nation-ally and in diverse local contexts? How shouldthis be done while keeping all the students inschool?

The work of the IBE therefore complements themany contributions of UNESCO and other agen-cies towards the same goals.

* For example: Watkins, K., The Oxfam educationreport, Oxford, UK, Oxfam, 2000; Education now:break the cycle of poverty, Oxford, UK, Oxfam,1999; Organisation for Economic Co-operationand Development, Programme for InternationalStudent Assessment, Knowledge and skills forlife: first results from PISA 2000, Paris, OECD,2001. (Education and skills, p. 235-236.)

The contribution of the IBE to�Education for All�

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Education and the interestsof humanity

While the IBE is statutorily concerned withthe contents, methods and structures of edu-cation, it does not promote specific content,methods or structures, but assists curriculumdevelopment processes and specialists in situ-ations where contents, methods and structuresare being chosen or formulated. However,there is one area in which UNESCO and theIBE are committed to promote specific con-tent. Their strategy and mandate require themto promote universally held values.

In fact, equity and harmony have already se-riously broken down in several areas that areof interest to humanity as a whole. The levelsof commitment of people to humankind havenot undone the damage. The damage includeschildren dying in their millions from hunger anddisease, marginalized illiterate children, pov-erty, degradation of the environment, prevent-able diseases and the continued use of vio-lence. These and a number of other issuesawait sufficient commitment. The reflectionof allegiance to humanity and to our uniqueplanet through major curricular norms andobjectives is long overdue.

Some norms are internationally codified, suchas those in the Universal Declaration of Hu-

man Rights and the Convention on the Rightsof the Child. They need to be promoted andtranslated into practice in schools.

The IBE is working towards their promotionthrough curricula. It also helps to strengthenbasic consensus on the contents andframeworks of education to support theinterests of humanity. The Conclusions of the

forty-sixth session of the InternationalConference on Education, organized by theIBE on behalf of UNESCO, are a goodexample of this. They are a source ofinspiration on policy dialogue, re-inventingeducation and innovation.

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The role of the IBE withinthe framework of theUNESCO medium-termstrategy

The most recent mandate of the IBE was re-ceived from the thirtieth session of the Gen-eral Conference of UNESCO in September1999, and confirmed at the thirty-first sessionof the General Conference in 2001. Its man-date determines that the IBE acts in the area

of contents and methods of education, with aspecial emphasis on curricular developmentprocesses. This mission is embedded in thestrategy of UNESCO, and contributes espe-cially to the priority of Education for All in thetwenty-first century.

The strategy of the IBE is part of the strategyof UNESCO as a whole (see page 16), andespecially that of the Education Sector. Apolicy priority of the IBE in carrying out thisstrategy is to contribute to the Education forAll goals of the international community in-spired at Jomtien and formulated at Dakar (seeboxes on page 13).

This is being achieved through three basicprogrammes and a number of cross-cuttingprojects or programmes of curriculum devel-opment and education for living together.

As an integral part of UNESCO, the IBE ben-efits from and works through the wide institu-tional network of UNESCO field offices andinstitutes, as well as a number of other rel-evant partners of the United Nations, such asUNICEF, UNAIDS and others.

As a UNESCO institute, the IBE counts onconsiderable functional and intellectual au-tonomy.

Photo: UNICEF/HQ96-0168/Giacomo Pirozzi

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IBE actions in the frameworkof the UNESCO strategy

All IBE activities are contributions to theeffective implementation of UNESCO�s

strategy.Education for All�implementing theFramework for Action

1. Promoting and implementing theright to education: The most accu-rate and agreeable contents and meth-ods contribute to retaining children andadolescents at school.

2. Ensuring gender equality in edu-cation: Gender awareness in cur-ricula and learning experiences areneeded to ensure gender equity.

3. Promoting lifelong learningthrough literacy and non-formaleducation: Lifelong learning is pos-sible if children and adolescents �learnto learn� at school.

4. Improving the quality of education:Updated contents, methods and struc-tures are some of the principal condi-tions to improve the quality of educa-tion. The characteristics of curricu-lum-making and development pro-cesses are strongly linked to the realcurriculum used in the school. TheIBE promotes curriculum making, de-velopment and assessment processesthat provide more chances of owner-ship on the part of teachers and of an

impact in high-quality learning out-comes.

5. Education and HIV/AIDs: The IBEacts as a clearing-house on the con-tents of education for HIV/AIDs pre-vention and promotes themainstreaming of this education.

Supporting the international EFAstrategy

1. Supporting international, regionaland national mechanisms: The IBEassists societies in their reform pro-cesses.

2. Supporting education in countriesin crisis and undergoing recon-struction: One of its foci is action-research on curriculum developmentfor social cohesion in post-conflictsocieties.

3. Facilitating regional and sub-re-gional mechanisms and forums.

4. Facilitating communication andadvocacy.

5. Promoting EFA in selected E9countries (Brazil, India, and Nige-ria).

6. Disseminating information on EFAin PROSPECTS and in its newslet-ter; and

7. Supporting the EFA Global Moni-toring Report and the EFA Obser-vatory through annual thematictrend papers and documents.

Building learning societies:beyond universal primary education

1. Renewing secondary education andscience education: reform in select-ing and organizing contents and therenewal of methods are some of thechallenges that the IBE contributesto addressing in co-operation withother UNESCO institutes and centresand with partner universities. Theforty-seventh session of the Inter-national Conference on Education, tobe held by UNESCO-IBE in Geneva,will focus on youth and education

2. Reforming technical and voca-tional education for citizenship andthe world of work: Curriculum re-form processes promoted by the IBEconcern vocational education, in co-operation with other UNESCO cen-tres and institutes.

3. Supporting teachers and educa-tional personnel in a changingworld: The IBE provides methodolo-gies and tools for school-based cur-riculum development through theempowerment of teachers and edu-cational personnel.

Education and globalization:Interpreting the implications of globaliza-tion for education systems is one of themajor challenges of the IBE�s analysis oftrends and capacity-building activities.

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Individual learnersThe poor & excludedSocietiesHumankind

IBE

Processes ofcurriculumchange

Stakeholders

Capacity building Policy dialogue

Resource bank and observatory of trends

The three basic programmes of the IBE

--Education systems & structures--Formal curricula--Curricula as implemented--Learning

help fulfil

change, develop

political, academic, administrative

review holistically

Diagram of overall strategy of IBE

country or other level

17

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The IBE strategy ofcapacity building forcurriculum development

The curriculum is one crucial component ofany educational process. The IBE�s Capac-ity-Building Programme aims to strengthenthe competences for the management ofcurriculum development among decision-makers, specialists, researchers and practi-tioners. It is guided by an emphasis on edu-cation as learning to live together, and onthe strengthening of social cohesion. Thestrategic aims in this area are:

� To reinforce regional network-ing through collaborative projects.Networking is promoted amongcurriculum specialists who haveleadership, management andoperational functions at variouslevels: national, provincial andlocal.

� To create and support an Interna-tional Network of CurriculumDevelopment Bodies, such asdepartments, institutes and com-missions. This inter-institutionalnetwork is oriented to the sharingof experiences, the dissemination

of research findings and the promo-tion of co-operation

� To enhance collaborative action-research projects. These relate toprocesses of curriculum policychange, including their outcomes andimplementation.

� To support on-the-job training incurriculum development, boththrough the provision of training inthe management of curriculumchange and through collaboration indeveloping training materials. Suchmaterials include comparative case-study-based materials that can beadapted and integrated into existingtraining programmes for curriculumspecialists worldwide.

� To contribute to professionaltraining for young professionalswho expect later to carry out re-search on curriculum issues or tobecome professionally involved incurriculum development processes.The young professionals are trainedthrough internships, short trainingcourses and research programmes incollaboration with academic institu-tions.

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The IBE is engaged in fostering synergy andmutual enrichment among professionals andeducational institutions involved in curriculum-making, research and development. As con-cepts, experiences and best practices areshared, this work fosters skills in this area ofexpertise within individuals and also institu-tional capability within their institutions.

In 1998, the IBE initiated a process of capac-ity-building in the area of curriculum develop-ment involving seminars and workshops in allmajor regions and sub-regions of the world.These activities have helped to document cur-rent trends and needs relative to the adapta-tion, revision and reform of curricula in dif-ferent regions. Specialists and their institutionsexpressed their needs to enhance professionalknowledge, to establish links with more expe-rienced professionals elsewhere, to be grantedaccess to and develop conceptual and practi-cal tools, and to be given opportunities for pro-fessional development.

The capacity-building activities of the Bureauare aimed at addressing these needs and con-tributing to create significant case studies ofcurriculum reform processes in different con-texts, as well as training tools.

The IBE has conducted a survey to identifyspecialists and it maintains a global profes-sional information management service. This

capacitybuilding

Outputs for 2002-2007 of the

CAPACITY-BUILDINGPROGRAMME

� Training modules on cross-disciplinarycompetencies required by curriculum de-velopment specialists.

� Training modules on specific tools usefulduring curriculum development processes.

� 500 professionals will have undergone aprocess of professional upgrading of theirability to manage curriculum developmentin various contexts.

� A world-wide collaboration network amongbodies responsible for curriculum develop-ment.

� A number of young professionals from arange of cultural and linguistic back-grounds, trained by the IBE and originat-ing from most regions of the world, and ableto work in research and action programmeson curriculum development at variouslevels.

� Various other outcomes from sharedprojects of collaboration between the IBEand the networked bodies and experts � theresults vary according to the nature of theproject.

facility serves to identify expertise that is ap-propriate for specific cases.

In the context of such a network of special-ists who practise or study curricular develop-ment, the roles of the IBE include those offacilitator of training and capacity-building,catalyst of information flow, and clearing-house for expertise.

The IBE�s Capacity-Building Programme ismainly supported by the Swiss Confederation.In this Basic Programme, the IBE also co-operates with many other partners (see boxeson pages 21 and 22), and with the Universi-ties of Antioquia (Colombia), Dijon, Nice andGrenoble (France), Bergamo (Italy), Ljubljana(Slovenia), Malta, Pretoria (South Africa),Zurich (Switzerland), and Kent State andSyracuse (United States of America). Threevery relevant local partners are the Facultyof Psychology and Educational Sciences(FPSE) and the University Institute for De-velopment Studies (IUED) of the Universityof Geneva, and the Educational ResearchService (SRED) of the Canton and Republicof Geneva.

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Regional networking andcapacity-building:

selected activities (1998-2002)

AFRICALagos, Nigeria, 12-16 November 2001Strategies for teachers coping with new curricula,organized jointly with the Federal Ministry of Edu-cation of Nigeria and the UNESCO Abuja Office.Nairobi, Kenya, 25-29 June 2001Curriculum development and education for livingtogether : conceptual and managerial challengesin Africa, organized jointly with the Kenya NationalCommission for UNESCO, the UNESCO NairobiOffice, and UNESCO�s Programme of Education forEmergencies and Reconstruction (PEER).Libreville, Gabon, 23-28 October 2000Politique de refondation curriculaire, processus dedéveloppement curriculaire, réalités locales et défisdu XXIe siècle, organized jointly with the Ministryof National Education of Gabon.ASIAVientiane, Laos, 9-13 September 2002Building up the capacities of curriculum special-ists for curriculum reform, organized jointly withthe UNESCO Principal Regional Office for Asia andthe Pacific in Bangkok, the Lao P.D.R. Ministry ofEducation, the Lao P.D.R. National Commissionfor UNESCO. Co-financed by Japanese Funds-in-Trust.New Delhi, India, 11-23 February 2002Management of curriculum change, organizedjointly with UNESCO New Delhi and NCERT.

Beijing, China, 27-31 March 2000. Internationalworkshop on the reform in the teaching of scienceand technology at primary and secondary level inAsia: comparative references to Europe. Organizedjointly with the Chinese National Commission forUNESCO. Co-financed by the Deutsche Stiftungfür Internationale Entwicklung.Bangkok, Thailand, 12-16 December 2000Training seminar on capacity-building for curricu-lum specialists in East and South-East Asia, orga-nized jointly with the UNESCO Principal RegionalOffice for Asia and the Pacific (PROAP), the ThaiMinistry of Education. Co-financed by JapaneseFunds-in-Trust.BALTIC SEA REGIONVilnius, Lithuania, 5-8 December 2001Curriculum development for social inclusion, or-ganized jointly with the Ministry of Education andScience of the Republic of Lithuania and the OpenSociety Fund, Lithuania.Copenhagen, Denmark, 18-19 April 2001ICE preparatory workshop on Citizenship Educa-tion: learning at school and in society, organizedand co-financed by the Danish Ministry of Edu-cationSOUTH-EAST EUROPEBohinj, Slovenia, 26-28 April 2002Drafting new curriculum, organized jointly with theCentre for Educational Policy Studies (CEPS), theUniversity of Ljubljana, the South-East EuropeanEducational Co-operation Network (SEE-ECN) andthe Open Society Education Programme of South-East Europe.

capacity buildingSstitre-1 21.02.03, 09:1621

22 capacity building

THE CARIBBEANHavana, Cuba, 15-18 May 2001Sub-regional Seminar on Curriculum Developmentfor Learning to Live Together, organized jointlywith CARNEID (Caribbean Network of EducationalInnovation for Development), the UNESCO Ha-vana Office and the Organization of Ibero-Ameri-can States (OEI).THE GULF REGIONMuscat, Oman, 17-21 February 2001The management of curriculum adaptation for cur-riculum specialists in the Gulf Region, organizedjointly with the Omani National Commission forUNESCO and the Omani Ministry of Education.LATIN AMERICALima, Peru, 25-26 June 2002International symposium on in-service teachertraining, organized by the Ministry of Education,PROFORMA/GTZ (Gesellschaft für TechnischeZusammenarbeit, Germany) and the National Peda-gogical Institute of Monterrico.Lima, Peru, 19-23 February 2002Special workshop on educational reforms in sec-ondary education, organized by the Direction ofInternational Co-operation at the Ministry of Edu-cation of Peru.

Montevideo, Uruguay, 27-29 May 2002Training course on �The city and education: valuefor new citizenship�, organized by the InternationalAssociation of Educating Cities, the Municipalityof Barcelona and the Municipality of Montevideo.Santiago de Chile, Chile, 23-27 July 2001Conference on teacher education from the perspec-tive of the demands of curricular change, organizedby the International Council on Education forTeaching (ICET).Maldonado, Uruguay, 31 July-2 August 2000Los formadores de jóvenes en América Latina:desafíos, experiencias y propuestas, organizedjointly with the Administración Nacional de laEducación Pública (ANEP), Uruguay.Buenos Aires, Argentina, 2-3 September 1999Secondary education curriculum in Latin America,organized jointly with the IIEP-Buenos Aires.THE MEDITERRANEANMadrid, Spain, 9 -11 October 2000Meeting of the Working Group on Evaluating Edu-cational Reforms, organized jointly with the Na-tional Institute for Quality and Evaluation.Valletta, Malta, 22-26 November 1999Organized jointly with the Faculty of Education ofthe University of Malta, the Socrates Office andthe Ministry of Education of Malta.

Continued from page 21

During the live videoconference organized by theIBE on 17 November 2000 between the Palais des

Nations, Geneva, and a panel of teachers fromCampana, Argentina

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23

A customized study-visitfor the National Administration

of Public Education, Uruguay, 2001The National Administration of Public Educationof Uruguay (Administración Nacional de laEducación Pública � ANEP) is engaged in a wideprocess of reform of secondary education in thecountry. They want to be, at the same time, loyalto the very fruitful educational tradition of thecountry and open to new experiences. They areaware of the anomalous impacts that can accom-pany the attempt to transfer a model from else-where without a real awareness of the roots ofthe model in the culture where it originated.

Thus, they requested the IBE to organize a studyvisit to different countries with different modelsof upper secondary education. Jointly with the

Inter-American Bank (Banco Interamericano deDesarrollo) and with the interested team, the IBEchose four different cases of upper secondaryeducation in Europe. The IBE then organized anintensive study visit for the political and techni-cal authorities of the country that are responsiblefor developing a new concept for upper second-ary education in Uruguay.

The selected host countries were the Netherlands,France, Spain (a non-governmental initiative) andScotland. The co-operation of the UNESCO Na-tional Commissions in those countries and of theNGO Columbus was an important component in asuccessful experience. The visit enabled the teamfrom Uruguay to come into contact with a diver-sity of solutions to the challenge of guaranteeingeducation for all young people.

capacity building

Afghanistan:training curriculum developers:an intensive training workshop

conducted in Tehran, Iran,30 September�12 October 2002

An example of national-level training in curricu-lum development was the first workshop for thecore group of Afghan curriculum developers or-ganized as part of the overall UNESCO project ofsupport for curriculum renewal, textbook develop-ment and printing capacity in the Ministry of Edu-cation in Afghanistan. The core group includedparticipants from the Ministry of Education, as wellas from the University of Kabul.This first workshop succeeded in:� Familiarizing the participants with conceptsand current international trends and models ofcurriculum development and renewal, and expos-ing them to concrete experiences of curriculumdevelopment in other countries. As a result, theworkshop created a shared knowledge base incurriculum development among the participantsthat now serves as the foundation for subsequenttraining.� Identifying curricular issues to beaddressed in educational reconstruction inAfghanistan with a view to promoting the qualityof learning. This insight has served to improve thequality of the new curriculum framework, as wellas of the process of designing an appropriateaction plan for curriculum renewal.

The Iranian National Commission for UNESCOkindly hosted the workshop, providing an excel-lent opportunity to strengthen the capacity of thecore team of Afghan curriculum developersthrough study visits to a range of educationalinstitutions in Tehran.Since this first workshop, the IBE, together withUNESCO Kabul and the UNESCO Division of Edu-cational Policies in Paris, with the support of theGerman Government, has been contributing tocurriculum renewal in Afghanistan. It is also co-operating with UNICEF in the field.

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24 capacity building

Linking policy dialogueand capacity building in Brazil

and abroadfor 15,000 participants throughthe use of new communication

technologies - 2001-2003

In the context of follow-up to the forty-sixth ses-sion of the International Conference on Education(ICE, Geneva, September 2001), the IBE and cer-tain partner agencies developed a conceptualframework for the II Telecongresso de Educaçãode Jovens e Adultos (the second Telecongress forthe Education of Young People and Adults). The

major organizing partners were UNESCO BrasiliaOffice and the Brazilian Serviço Social de Indústria(SESI). The University of Brasilia also contributedto the success of this event.

The Congress was then held simultaneously inmore than 200 focal points in Brazil and one focalpoint in Geneva using new communication tech-nologies. The �II Telecongresso� involved morethan 15,000 participants and can be considered asa model of wide-scale promotion of educationalinnovations, best practices and policy dialogue.It should be examined as a possible model for rep-lication in other countries, especially highly-popu-lated ones.

The link to the focal point in Geneva took the formof a video-conference with Brasilia in collabora-

tion with the Summer University for Human Rightsand the Right to Education. The link was estab-lished on 16 August 2002 with the Palais des Na-tions, Geneva. More than 100 young practitionersand researchers from NGOs in more than fortycountries took part. Representatives of EducationInternational and of the Conference of Ministriesof Education of Switzerland joined the panel on�Learning to live together: creating respect for plu-ralism, mutual understanding and peace�.

The central theme of the III Telecongresso deEducação de Jovens e Adultos is related to theWorld Summit on the Information Society, and isone of the major preparatory events of the forty-seventh International Conference on Education.

IBE co-operation

on curriculum development:

Kosovo, 2000-2001Technical assistance in curriculum developmentwas provided to a core team of curriculum special-ists from Kosovo within the framework of an agree-ment among the Department of Education and Sci-

ences of the United Nations Mission in Kosovo(DOES/UNMIK), UNICEF-Kosovo and the IBE.

The main purpose of this co-operation was to ac-quaint members of the newly-established coreteam of curriculum developers with principles, ap-proaches and the methodology required for thedevelopment and management of curriculum de-sign. An intensive training workshop at the IBE in

Geneva, in December 2000, on �Curriculum devel-opment� and an international seminar at Pristina,in May 2001, on �Case studies in curriculum de-velopment: contributions to the Kosovo educa-tion reform� were organized as part of the supportby the IBE for the development of competenciesrequired for the development of a new GeneralCurriculum Framework for Kosovo.

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25

The opening ceremony of the International Seminar for Curriculum Experts in Latin America, Maldonado, Uruguay, 31 July 2000

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26 capacity building

Following the decentralization policies carried outin Argentina, the national education system hasmade some progress towards a more pluralistic andflexible federal system. The schools are supposedto have more autonomy, but principals and teach-ers are not always able to benefit from that au-tonomy.With more than 8.5 million inhabitants, the Prov-ince of Buenos Aires is the largest and mostheavily populated in Argentina. Campana, an av-erage-sized town, enrols approximately 25,000 ofthe almost 4 million pupils in primary and second-ary education in the province. Its economy ben-efited from the wave of Argentine industrialisationfollowing the Second World War and is affectedby the economic recession that began in 1999.From 1994 to 1998 the schools of Campana hadreceived, on the one hand, the usual financing pro-vided by the provincial government and, on theother hand, considerable funding from private lo-cal sources, mainly from the industrial firmSIDERCA/TECHINT. It was believed that theseadditional contributions would lead to the localchildren and adolescents achieving results higherthan the average.As this was not the case, an evaluation was con-ducted to examine the reasons. The Buenos AiresOffice of UNESCO�s International Institute forEducational Planning (IIEP) carried it out and pro-

vided outcomes and suggestions to improveteacher�s participation in curriculum development.The provincial government, the local authoritiesand the enterprise SIDERCA/TECHINT invited theIBE to set up a local network to generate a school-based co-operative curriculum development pro-cess. The process is very successful: local cur-ricular proposals and strategies have been devel-

oped by the concerned teachers and are being usedwith good results. They serve to promote mean-ingful learning processes in all the schools of thecommunity.The IBE expertise used in Campana is now avail-able to be used in further local-based curriculumdevelopment processes led by municipalities andother local authorities.

Photo: UNICEF/Francene Keery

Campana, Argentina: an experience worth replicating

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27

This action-research project aims to improve thequality and effectiveness of accelerated non-for-mal primary education (NFE) for working children.Initially focused on children withdrawn from thecarpet-weaving industry, it is now being extendedto children in the glass and bangle-making area inthe northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. Theproject is being undertaken by an Indian NGO, Ini-tiative for Social Change and Action (ISCA), andsupported jointly by the IBE and the UNESCO of-fice in New Delhi.The first phase has included the review of the stateprimary curriculum and an analysis of primary text-books as part of the training of master trainers. This

process of bottom-up curriculum developmenthas been based on an analysis of the MinimumLevels of Learning (MLL) and competencies inlanguages, mathematics and science curriculumfor grades 1-5. This analysis has served as thefoundation for an accelerated alternative three-year primary track that may allow for themainstreaming of working children into the schoolsystem.The teachers trained in this pilot project are work-ing in NFE schools supervised by civil societiesand NGOs under the guidance of the District ChildLabour Societies of Allahabad, Varanasi, Mirzapur,and Bhadhoi. The teachers are being monitored

by the master trainers who visit and observe teach-ing practice, as well as providing support and guid-ance in the classrooms. Assessment of learningachievement among a sample of pilot schools hasbeen encouraging and serves as a basis for therefinement and extension of the methodology toother schools. The goal is to have this methodol-ogy and training provided systematically by theMinistry of Labour and Ministry of Education,who�jointly with the voluntary organizations,UNDP, ILO, Norad and the Ministry of Social Jus-tice�are sponsoring these NFE schools for work-ing children.

At the first exploratory seminar organized by theIBE in Cuba in 2001, the need to reinforce citizen-ship education in the region was assessed. The firstpart of follow-up activities took the form of a stock-taking evaluation study on national policy andpractice in citizenship education in the English-speaking countries of the Caribbean carried out in2002. The study, to be published in 2003, examinedparticularly the way in which policy on citizenshipeducation is reflected in teacher-training curricula.The results of the evaluation may serve as inputfor a training workshop in Jamaica (2003) with aview to forming a number of curriculum/teacher-education specialists in critical aspects of educa-tion for citizenship. This workshop will be held incollaboration with UNESCO�s Kingston Office andthe University of the West Indies. Among other

institutions involved are the Teachers� College,Columbia University, United States of America, andthe curriculum development departments of theministries of education in the region. The objec-tive of the workshop is to initiate or strengthen atargeted, holistic approach to curriculum develop-ment and the implementation of citizenship edu-cation in Caribbean schools. It is also designed tofoster on-going professional developments andnetworking in the field of citizenship educationamong Caribbean educators. Another outcome willbe the production of training materials on citizen-ship education for curriculum developers andteacher educators. The project also intends todocument a selected number of promising inno-vations on citizenship education in the sub-region.

Collaboration through action-research: citizenship education in the Caribbean

Photo: UNICEF/Francene Keery

Curriculum development for working children in India, 2001-2003

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28 capacity building

Conflict-affected societies:curriculum change and social cohesion

This is an example of a collaborative action-re-search project led by the IBE. It involves the cre-ation of case-studies relating to:Bosnia-Herzegovina, Guatemala, Lebanon,Mozambique, Northern Ireland, Rwanda, SriLanka.There is growing concern among internationaleducationists with the multiple ways in whichschool education relates to social cohesion. Thisis most clearly addressed in debates about the dia-lectical relationship between schooling and vio-lent conflict. A better understanding of the multi-faceted articulations between education and vio-lent conflict are also increasingly informing edu-cational policy and development. Such an under-standing appears so crucial to curriculum renewalthat it is at the heart of educational reform in allsocieties.While the above action-research project in gen-eral is informed by a broad, peace-building ap-proach, the case studies shall adopt a socio-edu-cational approach that traces the processes of thesocial construction of educational knowledge atthe level of official school curricula�from policyformulation to implementation. The main focus ofthese studies is on the factors (social, political,historical and pedagogical) that shape the processof curriculum reform in conflict-affected societies,outlined in detail in a framework developed collec-

tively with the national case study co-ordinators.The documentation of these factors is implicitlyunderstood as contributing to local capacity-build-ing as it informs and reflects the on-going curricu-lum reform, and will be more explicitly elaboratedin the form of training materials designed for cur-riculum developers through a comparative analy-sis of the final case study reports.This action-research project adopts a peace-build-ing approach to education with a longer-term per-spective that seeks to build on local inputs andresources, acting as a catalyst and creating op-portunities for the strengthening of processes ofeducational change already introduced. In otherwords, the documentation of the case studies isto be linked, to the extent that is possible, to pro-cesses of curricular renewal currently underwayin each of the contexts.Upon completion of the case studies, a furtheropportunity to contribute to the reform processhas been envisioned through the development oftraining materials based on a comparative analy-sis of the case studies. In addition to providinglessons learned from the diverse contexts, thetraining materials hope to provide a methodologyto facilitate policy dialogue around contentiousissues in any one context by providing the oppor-tunity for examining the way in which the sameissues are articulated in other contexts. A crucialaspect of this project is the possibility of facilitat-ing the points at which the documentation of thecase studies and the training materials are able to

re-inform and contribute to the on-going curricu-lum change process.The aim is to develop a better understanding ofthe issues that determine legitimate and sustain-able processes of change in the school curricu-lum with a view to enhancing social cohesion. Boththe case studies and the analytical framework de-rived from the case studies shall serve as resourcesfor the design of training materials for curriculumdevelopers. The specific objective for 2002-2003is to produce seven case studies on processes ofcurriculum change in conflict-affected societies.The case studies shall adopt an approach thattraces the processes of social construction of edu-cational knowledge at the level of official schoolcurricula�from policy formulation to implementa-tion. The case studies shall seek to identify thesocial, political, historical and pedagogical factorsthat affect the construction and implementation ofnational and local curricula frameworks. The mainfocus of these studies is on the factors that shapethe process of curriculum reform in conflict-af-fected societies that are outlined in detail in thecollectively developed framework.Some of the IBE�s partners are: the InternationalInstitute for Educational Planning (UNESCO-IIEP);the Social Science Research Council (SSRC); theWorld Bank; the Department for International De-velopment (DfID); the Swedish International De-velopment Co-operation Agency (Sida); and theInstitut universitaire d�études du développement(IUED, University of Geneva).

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29

The IBE strategy ofdisseminating innovationsand analysing trends

One of the three basic programmes of the IBEis the Resource Bank and Observatory ofEducational Trends. The strategic aims of theIBE in this programme are:

� To manage and augment acollection of official and other

curriculum- related documents, andweb links to such materials; as wellas other materials, such as casestudies and research findings,concerning: the structures ofeducation systems; the processes ofcurriculum development and the wayin which their results are actuallyimplemented; together with relatedcases of good practices andinnovations.

� To gather and analyse training andresource materials that will serve tosupport appropriate curriculumconstruction and developmentprocesses.

� To conduct analyses andevaluations of educationalinnovations and curriculumdevelopment processes that willsupport networking-based curriculumdevelopment processes emphasizingeducation for learning to live together,in particular a process-oriented andsocially-inclusive education that fulfilslearning needs and promotes universalhuman values.

� To make available and disseminatematerials created or collected by theIBE, and to disseminate informationabout other recommended or relevantmaterials existing elsewhere.

The Resource Bank. A Resource Bank oncurriculum development has been set up atthe IBE, where paper publications and elec-tronic information is collected, stored anddisseminated. A linked activity is anobservatory of trends in contents andmethods of education for livingtogether. Many projects affecting the

disseminationSstitre-1 21.02.03, 09:1629

30

contents and methods of education havebeen identified. Some of them took place withexternal support, and some were implementedin areas of poverty, exclusion, or special envi-ronmental conditions. The context, descriptionand results of such projects are often unpublicizedor inaccessible outside the country of origin.

� A wide-ranging collection of official andother curriculum-related documents, andweb links to similar materials.

� A set of studies produced on selectedaspects of official intended curricula, aswell as curriculum-making and develop-ment processes.

� Other comparative studies and analysesproduced in line with the existing needsand demands.

� Suitable contributions that complementthose expected from the other UNESCOinstitutes produced within the frameworkof the follow-up to the Dakar Frameworkfor Action.

� The IBE�s existing data banks (e.g. Worlddata on education - CD-ROM and onlinedatabase; Country dossiers; andRelatED - good practices and innova-

dissemination

tions) updated, expanded and increasingly focused on curricular issues.

� Numerous reports, documents, periodicalsand booklets published, including:Prospects, UNESCO�s review ofcomparative education; INNODATAmonographs; Educational INNOVATIONand information, the IBE Newsletter;Educational Practices series - an Interna-tional Academy of Education/IBEproduction; and Trends series (formerlyReports on seminars and meetings).

� Enhanced website system and userinterface.

� Contribution to the EFA GlobalMonitoring Report, to the Report of theUnited Nations Rapporteur on theRight to Education and to gendersensitive issues in the curriculum.

Outputs for 2002-2007 of theRESOURCE BANK AND

OBSERVATORY OF TRENDS PROGRAMME

Thus, some projects end up being of only lim-ited usefulness in demonstrating to otherStates, policy professionals, curriculum devel-opers, educators and others what has and hasnot been done successfully elsewhere. Thislacuna in the storage and distribution of infor-mation represents an unfulfilled potential and

a wasted opportunity for informed curricular andeducational development and reform every-where.

The resource bank manages a collection of therequired information. This work includes: an-ticipating the needs of its users; developing cri-teria for collecting, classifying and analysing it;and ensuring swift access to it. The policy-dia-logue and capacity-building strategies of the IBEbenefit from this information; they also guide it,as developments in these areas highlight miss-ing and useful directions of information selec-tion and information flow.

Three of the major databases of the IBE re-source bank are: World data on education,the Country dossiers and RelatED on casesof innovation. RelatED is the successor to twoprevious databases�INNODATA and Bridge.Information for these is being collected on: cur-rent official documents, including official cur-ricula; curriculum development methodologiesand processes; and innovations related to thebroad theme of learning to live together.

Descriptions of numerous relevant and in-teresting programmes and projects in thefield of education have been identified and/or collected by the IBE for its resourcebank. Collecting and disseminating de-scriptions and analyses of them is a way offuelling the processes of reflection and

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31

PROSPECTSUNESCO�s quarterly review

of comparative educationPROSPECTS, UNESCO�s review of compara-tive education, published by the IBE, is the onlyeducational review to appear quarterly in Ara-bic, Chinese, English, French, Russian andSpanish. For scholars in many countries it isthe only source of information on internationaleducational problems available in their nationallanguage.For more than thirty years, the journal hasserved as a platform for the exchange of ideason current and controversial educationalthemes. Unlike other well-known specializededucational reviews in English, French andSpanish, PROSPECTS seeks to give the floorto authors of various geographical origins in abalanced way. In other words, it adopts astrongly international approach, which makesit unique in its domain, dominated by NorthAmerican/European academe.In 2003, the following themes will be discussedon the pages of PROSPECTS:� Curricular change: a global perspective� Education and religion: the paths of toler-

ance� Environmental education: a pillar of sustain-

able development� Euro-Arab dialogue: an educational bridge?Since 2002, the production of the English ver-sion of the journal is carried out by KluwerAcademic Publishers, P.O. Box 17, 2200 AADordrecht, The Netherlands.

dissemination

action at regional and national policylevels, as well as at the level of schools, indi-vidual teachers and of societies themselves.

The Observatory of Trends. The IBE iscarrying out a series of studies on its field ofcompetence that covers trends and patternsin current curricula as regards contents andmethods. They also cover descriptions andanalyses of curriculum development pro-cesses, as well as any other educational inno-vations selected from the resource bank. Inthis work, special emphasis is being given tothose initiatives that are of wide or special in-terest because they have contributed to edu-cation for living together. Three to six studiesa year are being produced at the IBE.

The studies are being linked wherever pos-sible to developments in the capacity-buildingand policy-dialogue programmes of the IBE.

* * *

The Resource Bank and the Observatoryof Trends are facilities intended to respond tothe need, among schools and education ser-vice agencies at various levels from the localto the global, for wider sharing and compari-son of each others� educational practices, es-pecially the innovative ones. Practices may

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32

1. The secondary education certificate andmatriculation examinations in Malta, byRonald G. Sultana. 32 p.

2. The science of thinking, and science forthinking: a description of Cognitive Ac-celeration through Science Education(CASE), by Philip Adey. 40 p. (exists alsoin French and Spanish)

3. Systems of knowledge: a case study ofcurriculum innovation in Malta, by Jo-seph Giordmaina. 40 p.

4. Climbing the ladder: A case study of thewomen�s secondary educationprogramme of Allama Iqbal Open Univer-sity, Pakistan, by Riffat Haque andSyeda Najeeba Batool. 32 p.

5. Curriculum innovation in Portugal: theÁrea Escola�an arena for cross-cur-ricula activities and curriculum devel-opment, by Gertrudes Amaro. 56 p.

6. La pédagogie convergente: sonexpérimentation au Mali et son impactsur le système éducatif, by SambaTraoré. 48 p.

7. Tools of the mind: a case study of imple-menting the Vygotskian approach inAmerican early childhood and primaryclassrooms, by Elena Bodrova andDeborah J. Leong. 40 p.

8. Reciprocal teaching: the application ofa reading improvement strategy on ur-ban students in Highland Park, Michi-

The Educational Practices seriespublished by the IBE and the

International Academy of Education(Series editor: Professor Herb Walberg)

1. Teaching, by Jere Brophy. 36 p.2. Parents and learning, by Sam Redding.

36 p.3. Effective educational practices, by Herbert

J. Walberg et Susan J. Paik. 24 p.4. Improving student achievement in math-

ematics, by Douglas A. Grouws andKristin J. Cebulla. 48 p.

5. Tutoring, by Keith Topping. 36 p.6. Teaching additional languages, by Elliot

L. Judd, Lihua Tan and Herbert J. Walberg.26 p.

7. How children learn, by Stella Vosniadou.30 p.

8. Preventing behaviour problems: whatworks, by Sharon L. Foster, PatriciaBrennan, Anthony Biglan, Linna Wangand Saud al-Ghaith. 30 p.

9. Preventing HIV/AIDS in schools, by InonI. Schenker and Jenny M. Nyirenda. 32 p.

10. Motivation to learn, by MoniqueBoekaerts. 26 p.

11. Academic and social-emotional learning,by Maurice J. Elias. 32p.

12. Teaching reading (provisional title).13. Teaching young children (provisional title).14. Teaching science (provisional title).

gan, 1993-1995, by Carolyn J. Carter(with special assistance from Diane F.Fekete). 39 p.

9. Creating new choices: a violence preven-tion project for schools in Australia, byMaree Sidey (assisted by TheresaLynch). 51 p.

10. Ecole propre�Ecole verte: une voie pourqualifier l�école, mobiliser lacommunauté et protégerl�environnement�une expérienceguinéenne à partager, by Lamine Barry.40 p.

11. The Invention Curriculum: a Malaysianexperience, by Ahmad Mohamad Sharifand Kong Meow San. 36 p.

12. The Attunement Strategy: reclaimingchildren�s motivation by responsive in-struction, by Luc Stevens, Wim vanWerkhoven and Jos Castelijns. 44 p.

13. SIDA saber ayuda: un programainterdisciplinario para la educaciónsecundaria, by Joaquín Pratz. 48 p.

14. El ciclo básico de la educaciónsecundaria: una innovación curriculare institucional: consensos y conflictos,M. Verocai, et al. 2003.

15. Curriculum development for workingchildren (provisional title). 2003.

16. The Campana school network: the caseof local curriculum development. L.Fumagalli and A. Brito. 2003.

INNODATA: the monographs of the IBE

disseminationSstitre-1 21.02.03, 09:1632

33dissemination

be fruitfully shared in the form of educationalcurricula, including both the content, and thepedagogical and institutional frameworks in-volved. The IBE makes these facilities avail-able to help ensure that the international com-munity may sustain a broad, rich flow of suchpublic information. This is being done in thehope that learning processes, curriculum de-velopment processes, and educational per-spectives will thereby be enhanced. Interna-tional agreements on content may eventuallybe envisaged in certain fields of learning, andsuch information flows would facilitate andsupport future decisions on international cer-tification and evaluation.

Educational institutions at all levels frequentlyneed to use relevant information about whatcontent is taught elsewhere, and about whatframeworks and methods are used in teach-ing. When they come to the revision of cur-ricula, they often need to know how such pro-cesses are conducted elsewhere. What ca-pacities were present? What goals and guide-lines were involved? And so on. When relatedcapacity-building activities, such as trainingand organizational development, are underway, these activities too are enhanced by au-thentic information about educational contextselsewhere.

The proper collection and redistribution, bothpro-actively and on demand, of such descrip-tive and analytical information about educa-tional experts, products, change processes andpractices is intended to be useful in the devel-opment of many education systems in theworld. It is also particularly intended as a con-tribution to the annual Education for All Glo-bal Monitoring Report and for the Report ofthe Special Rapporteur on the Right to Edu-cation. By the development of its ResourceBank and Observatory of Trends, the IBEcooperates initially with academic staff of theUniversities of Stanford, United States ofAmerica; Pennsylvania, United States ofAmerica; Jerusalem, Israel; Addis Ababa,Ethiopia; San Andrés, Argentina; and Zurich,Switzerland. The IBE also maintains closeprofessional collaboration with the Associa-tion francophone d�éducation comparée(AFEC), the International Organization for theDevelopment of Freedom of Education(OIDEL), the World Council of ComparativeEducation Societies (WCCES) and other or-ganizations concerned with comparativeresearch on education.

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34 dissemination

The IBE website is attracting more and more users �

The chart below shows total hits to the rich website of the IBE at: www.ibe.unesco.orgVarious resources are made available, including databases, reports, publications, directoriesof links and so on. Many visitors to the site have downloaded the materials they find there.

0

200,000

400,000

600,000

800,000

1,000,000

1,200,000

1,400,000

1,600,000

1,800,000

1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002

'Hits' on the IBE website .

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35

The IBE strategy offacilitating and promotingdialogue for policy-making

The IBE�s third basic programme consistsof facilitating and promoting policy-creatingdialogue on educational, and especially cur-ricular, issues at international, regional andnational levels. The strategic aims in thePolicy-Dialogue Programme are:

� To facilitate and foster dialogueamong policy-makers and otherstakeholders about educationalchange at world, regional, nationaland any other levels, likely toenhance policies, curricular changeprocesses, curricula, and theirimplementation and local adaptation.

� To promote, among policy-makersand other stakeholders, inclusivequality education seen as a processof learning to be, learning to learn,learning to do and especially aslearning to live together, and to helporient curricula to the interests ofhumanity as a whole.

Policy dialogue in the present context is theexchange that takes place among stakehold-ers of education systems with the aim of de-

termining or influencing educational policy.The IBE is stimulating policy dialogue and en-hancing it in the direction of quality educationfor living together. It is seeking also to helporient policies and curricula in the direction ofuniversally shared values. It is seeking to pro-mote curriculum change that is empowerment-based and participatory.

Information by itself rarely leads to policydecisions. A role of policy advocacy based oninspiration and persuasion is required. This

means, in effect, mobilizing the attention ofstakeholders.

At a global level, the major contribution of theIBE in this area is the International Confer-ence on Education. This Conference has beenorganized by the IBE on behalf of UNESCOfor many decades. It was the first and, for along time, the only international gathering ofministers of education, particularly during theperiod 1934�1970. This is a forum where

policy dialogueSstitre-1 21.02.03, 09:1735

36 policy dialogue

The forty-sixth session of theInternational Conference on Education,

Geneva, 5-8 September 2001

�Education for all for learning to live together: con-tents and learning strategies�problems and so-lutions�.This Conference was organized by the IBE on be-half of UNESCO. More than 600 participants, in-cluding 80 ministers of education and 10 deputyministers, from 127 of UNESCO�s Member Statestook part in the debates, together with represen-tatives of nine intergovernmental organizations,thirteen non-governmental organizations and threefoundations.In response to the wish expressed on many occa-sions by ministers at earlier sessions of the Con-ference to enter into a genuine, in-depth politicaldialogue, the IBE Council decided to change thestructure and organization compared to those ofprevious sessions. Consequently, the proceedingstook place as follows: a major introductory debate;two discussion units, each consisting of threeparallel workshops (panels) followed by a plenarysumming-up meeting; a major concluding debate;a closing meeting.A special meeting, chaired by Mr KoïchiroMatsuura, Director-General of UNESCO, tookplace in the morning of 8 September on the themeof the involvement of civil society in promotingeducation for all. That meeting was highly appre-ciated by many participants and was a rewardingpart of the Conference in that it was conducive todialogue and exchanges.Among the innovations marking this session ofthe Conference was the substantial use of audio-visual and information and communication tech-nologies (videos, recording of a television

programme (round-table of ministers) with the as-sistance of the local television station Léman Bleu;presentation of some 100 good practices on theConference�s website; summaries of the proceed-ings accessible on the Internet the following day,etc.). Other innovations were also introduced inthe preparatory phase of the Conference(Netforum, messages of ministers, website). Twospecial editions of Prospects, UNESCO�s quarterlyreview of comparative education, were devoted tothe Conference�s theme.The organization of the Conference was made pos-sible due to many partnerships, in the form of in-tellectual and/or financial contributions made byministries of education, national commissions forUNESCO, research and training centres of severalcountries (Argentina, Canada, Cuba, Czech Repub-lic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Japan,Malaysia, Netherlands, Norway, Spain and Swit-zerland), UNESCO�s Dakar Follow-up Unit, theCommonwealth of Learning, the trainingprogramme for bilingual intercultural education forthe Andean countries (PROEIB-ANDES), theBERUM project (Peru), the University Institute forDevelopment Studies (IUED, Geneva), the City ofScience and Industry (Paris) and the Centre for theStudy of Violence and Reconciliation (South Af-rica). The organization and, more particularly, thesmooth running of the Conference were also madepossible through the active collaboration and sup-port of various UNESCO units (the Education Sec-tor, various institutes, regional offices and otherservices, such as interpretation and public rela-tions).The reactions gathered at the Conference itself andafterwards have been overwhelmingly favourable.Even though there is still room for improvement,

the participants welcomed the innovations and thefact that the proceedings of the session were es-sentially focused on dialogue and exchange. Thedocument Conclusions and proposals for actionwas adopted at the closing meeting. The book ofthe forty-sixth ICE�Learning to live together:have we failed?�has been prepared by the IBEand a CD-ROM containing the Conference docu-mentation is also available. Furthermore, the pro-ceedings of the seminar that immediately precededthe ICE have also been published in book form:Audigier, F.; Bottani, N., eds. Education et vivreensemble : actes du colloque �La problématiquedu vivre ensemble dans les curricula�. Geneva,SRED/FaPSE/IBE, 2002.

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37

Ministers of Education, educational special-ists and others working in the field talk to eachother on issues of quality, equity and inclu-sion�and usually try to reach consensus. TheIBE engages and encourages the academiccommunity and representatives of the civilsociety to take part in the Conference.

The forty-sixth session of the InternationalConference on Education was held in Sep-tember 2001. It was organized and financedby institutions and by countries from the sixcontinents (see box on page 36).

The work of conducting, or stimulating, policydialogue is complementary to the information-supply and the capacity-building work of theIBE. Thus, for example, an education system�sstakeholders must first of all consider certainsituations as problems amenable to a solution,and as being urgent or important enough to beattended to. Often, stories about cause andeffect are used to illustrate a situation in sucha way that it is recognized to be a problem.The IBE supplies case studies for such pur-poses from its resource bank and observa-

tory of trends. Solutions are especially cho-sen that have a reasonably scientific basis,having been analysed and evaluated success-fully elsewhere, and having, if possible, clearand credible explanations of events, costs andbenefits.

As another example of the complementarityof the basic IBE programmes, it has beennoted that political and educational decision-makers who are themselves engaged in policydialogue require certain capacities for con-ducting this dialogue to high standards. Thus,the IBE is currently engaged in a capacity-building programme for participants of suchdialogue, to enhance communication and ne-gotiation skills and other competences requiredby these actors. This programme includescorresponding training sessions, and will beexpanded to cover more competencies andmore actors. In these areas, the IBE is work-ing with the Faculty of Psychology and Edu-cational Sciences of the University of Geneva(FPSE), the Association for the Developmentof Education in Africa (ADEA) and theUniversité d�été des droits de l�homme et dudroit à l�éducation (UEDH). The project ofcapacity building for policy dialogue in educa-tion is supported by the Ministry of ForeignAffairs of France and the Geneva Interna-tional Academic Network (GIAN).

Outputs for 2002-2007 of thePOLICY-DIALOGUE PROGRAMME

� A series of policy dialogue events onmajor controversial issues organized.

� The forty-seventh session of theInternational Conference on Educationheld.

� Reinforced capacities for a number ofpolicy-making teams, with a focus onSub-Saharan Africa and South-East Asia.

� A coherent modular course for capacitybuilding for policy dialogue on educa-tional issues made available.

� A group of young students and researchers trained in capacity building for policydialogue.

Photo: Jean Piaget (1896-1980), the famousSwiss psychologist, Director of the IBE from1929 to 1968, responsible for setting up theInternational Conference on Education

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38

Selections from the Conclusionsof the forty-sixth session of the

International Conference on Education, 2001

21. The development of international co-operative activities to improvethe quality of education for learning to live together for all should bebased on six main principles:� Strengthening the function of the IBE as an observatory oftrends, as well as its role in the development of easily accessibledatabanks and information systems.� Collecting the results of educational research on thedevelopment of contents, undertaking comparative studies at thesub-regional and regional levels, and their worldwide dissemination.� Setting up co-operative networks at the international, regionaland sub-regional levels facilitating the exchange of experience andpromoting joint projects in order to strengthen endogenouscapacities.� Training educational decision-makers in policy dialogue so asto encourage the definition of common objectives, the search forconsensus and the mobilization of partnerships.� Experimenting with new modalities of technical assistanceprovided by bi- or multilateral co-operation agencies, in order toemphasize not only North-South but also South-Southcollaboration.� Strengthening of partnerships between UNESCO and otherrelevant intergovernmental organizations.�

22. The conclusions of the forty-sixth session of the InternationalConference on Education are communicated to the General Conferenceof the Organization in order to be taken into account in the process ofreflection and to reinforce, in the short, medium and long terms, theprogramme of action of UNESCO, the International Bureau of Educationand the other specialized institutes with a view to improving the qualityof education.

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39

From the Director-General of UNESCOPreparations for

the forty-seventh session of theInternational Conference on Education:

I have already asked the IBE Council to begin working on the next ICEand the thematic concerns it should address. One possibility is that thenext ICE will be devoted to deepening our knowledge and understandingof the education/poverty nexus, particularly in terms of how curriculumdesign and teaching/learning practices can be related meaningfully to thestruggle against poverty in all its forms and dimensions.

This agenda could include such questions as the relation between educa-tion and migration; the place of preventive education concerning HIV/AIDS in all types and levels of education; education and social exclusion,with particular attention to youth; and the curricular and pedagogical as-pects of schooling that serves poor communities. The essential contribu-tions of teachers and civil society will continue to figure centrally in ourdialogue.

In the time intervening until the next ICE, I am sure that we will have thechance to deepen and extend our knowledge and understanding of therelationship between poverty and education. Such a theme, by the way,would stay firmly within the framework of UNESCO�s strategic orienta-tion for the period ahead, namely, the humanization of globalization.

Koïchiro Matsuura

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4040 cross-cutting programmes

Diagram of the cross-cutting programmes

Cross-cutting Programmes A, B, C:A. Country co-operation on curriculum developmentB. Curricula and HIV/AIDSC. Other cross-cutting activities

Basic Programme 2.: Resource Bank and Observatory of Trends(on contents, methods, structures, and curriculum development)

Basic Programme 1.: Capacity Building

Basic Programme 3.: Policy Dialogue

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Country co-operation oncurriculum development

In responding to country requests, the IBEundertakes to deliver the materials and infor-mation that are specifically needed by thecountry partner. In assembling these results,the IBE uses elements and modes of actionfrom in its three basic programmes. The IBEcan in this way contribute in a very directmanner to the quality of education in certainpartner countries, provinces and local envi-ronments.

The strategic objective of this programme is:

� To provide advisory services toUNESCO Member States, provinces andlocal governments, at their request, onthe evaluation of existing curricula andcurriculum processes, on undertakingcurriculum reforms, and on designingcurricula and related teaching materials.

The appropriate authorities request the IBEto contribute to the setting up of context-basedcapacities for curriculum development. In acollaborative manner, tailored interventions

then take place that support one another:policy-creating dialogue is facilitated; requiredskills are identified and formed through train-ing and study-visits; and required knowledgeis identified and supplied through documenta-tion of relevant cases and analyses.

In recent years, the IBE has been involveddirectly in curriculum assessment and devel-opment processes with very different char-acteristics in local communities and countriessuch as: Peru, Bolivia, Uruguay, Campana(Argentina), Kosovo, Afghanistan and India(see pages 23-27 and 43).

One of the major country co-operation projectsin this period is the project on relative time-table weights of school subjects jointly heldwith the Gulf Arab States Educational Re-search Centre (GASERC) and its parent body,the Arab Bureau of Education for the GulfStates (ABEGS), with the involvement of thesix Arab Gulf Countries (see page 43).

Some of these activities are conducted ina partnership with UNESCO MemberStates, UNESCO regional and nationaloffices and other organizations and agen-cies both within and outside the UnitedNations system. The IBE also arrangesupon request Customized Intensive TeamTraining with Study Visits. Normally, thisactivity is applicable to cases where the

cross-cutting programmes

Consultation in Kuwait - GASERC and IBE

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4242

Outputs for 2002-2007 of theCOUNTRY CO-OPERATION PROGRAMME

In each case, outputs are agreed between the IBEand the requesting country or entity on the con-duct of direct technical support or intensive teamtraining during study visits.

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43

partner country is faced with a well-de-fined challenge and where the education-re-lated specialists wish to familiarize themselveswith different solutions to similar problems thatother countries have faced.

The emphasis here is on supplying to a teamof curriculum-related specialists or decision-makers the information and guidance requiredfor self-training. International team-visits arepart of the learning programme. The IBE fa-cilitates visits by a national curriculum reformteam to institutions�often in Europe�wherethe team can interact directly with the pro-

tagonists and contexts of educational policies,programmes and innovative projects. Theseare selected in each case so as to be directlyrelevant and beneficial to the challenges thatthe travelling team faces with the curriculumin its own country.

When the places to be visited are selected,this decision is based on information drawnfrom the IBE Resource Bank of documentsrelated to curriculum development, or on in-ter-agency agreements through which theBureau co-operates with other key institutions.Examples of the latter are: COLUMBUS

Programme of the European Union, the Uni-versity of Geneva, the Ministries of Educa-tion of France, Geneva (Switzerland), theNetherlands, Portugal, Scotland (United King-dom) and Spain, amongst others. To the par-ticipants, the IBE supplies databank materi-als, guidance for the design of interviews andfor observations during field visits, a courierand translators for the visits, briefings andseminars on the transferability of specific in-novations.

cross-cutting programmes

Curriculum reform inthe countries of the Gulf Region

There is a role for the IBE in improving regionalco-operation through mobilization of internationalexpertise in curriculum and time management, as apartner of the Arab Bureau of Education for theGulf States (ABEGS), and the Gulf Arab StatesEducational Research Centre (GASERC).The six countries of the Gulf Region, through theirGulf Co-operation Council, are engaged in a vision-ary process of educational reform � they wish toreform curricula and modernize education systemswithin the perspective of respect for the culturalidentity of the region. ABEGS, based in Riyadh,has been assigned the co-ordination role in thisprocess.

They are implementing a multi-sectoral plan forcurriculum reform, and one project within this ac-tivity relates to time management within schoolcurricula in the countries of the region. The distri-bution of the various subjects, and other factorsrelating to teaching and learning time, is being re-vised for compatibility with quality education andwith the changes being made in school subjectsin the region and the world.At the beginning of 2002, the IBE was requestedto reinforce the regional capability for setting andrevising subject-time allocations in close collabo-ration with GASERC. An action plan for this col-laboration has been agreed upon. It includes thesetting up of a workshop in the Gulf Region, withthe aim of facilitating co-operative decisions on

the part of the Gulf countries, and the strengthen-ing of relevant technical capabilities at the regionallevel.As part of its duties in this action plan, the IBE isproviding case studies on time management andon the impact of time allocation and distributionin the learning outcomes of students. Six specialcases have being chosen together by the partnersinvolved: Germany, Sweden, Japan and Switzer-land, and also the cases of the International Bac-calaureate Organization (IBO) and Home Educa-tion.The set of studies and the methodology to makedecisions on time management by curriculum de-velopers are available for further use as needed inother countries and regions of the world.

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Outputs for 2002-2007 of theCURRICULA AND HIV/AIDS PROGRAMME

� A profile of the required information andinformation flows.

� A functioning clearinghouse with an infrastruc-ture, a team of collaborators and a proceduresmanual.

� Tools for better appraisal of curricular-making,implementation and assessment for HIV/AIDSpreventive education made available.

� A comprehensive series of curricula for HIV/AIDS preventive education made available on-line.

� A set of appraisal documents made availableon-line.

� Improved dialogue and exchange amongpolicy-makers and practitioners on goodpractices in the field of HIV/AIDS education.

The Global Content Bank onEducation for HIV/AIDS Prevention

The main aim of the Global Content Bank on Edu-cation for HIV/AIDS Prevention (GCBEH) is tosystematically document and analyse initiatives informal education (primary and secondary educa-tion, and teacher-training institutes) worldwidedesigned to provide school-based HIV/AIDS edu-cation. This web-based clearinghouse service isintended to provide professionals in curriculumdesign, development and implementation, re-searchers and policy makers with information and

wide and an experts� group of leading profession-als in the field are assisting in orienting the clear-inghouse more closely to the needs of users, andare also a valuable means of acquiring curricularmaterials. The focus of the GCBEH is a web portalwhich features databases of documents, imagesand experts, research reports, updates on relevantmeetings and conferences, news items, etc. Theclearinghouse will also disseminate in printed for-mat, bibliographies, syntheses of research, guide-lines for curriculum development, etc., to institu-tions and individuals not having access to theInternet.

documentation to support their work in this keyeducational area. The GCBEH aims to provide acomparative perspective of curriculum develop-ment and practice in the various disciplinary ar-eas through which education pertaining to theHIV/AIDS epidemic is taught. In close collabora-tion with other international as well as nationalinstitutions working in this field, it seeks to iden-tify good or promising educational practices whichmay be replicated in other settings.

Responses to a questionnaire sent by the IBE toseveral hundred educational institutions world-

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45

t ti

Curricula and HIV/AIDS

More prevention and educational work onHIV/AIDS is needed. The IBE has set up aprogramme on HIV/AIDS curricula thatdraws upon the resources and modes of ac-tion of all the three basic programmes of theIBE related to capacity building, documenta-tion and the analysis of trends, and policy dia-logue. The strategic aims of this programmeare:

� To gather and appraise curricula forHIV/AIDS prevention at the primary andsecondary levels of formal education aswell as at teacher-training institutes

� To provide access to research findingsand other materials that enablecurriculum developers and others in themost affected countries�and in countriesthreatened by a full-scale HIV epidemic�to be better equipped with skills andknowledge in providing national andregional responses;

� To develop and promote a dialogue onHIV/AIDS contents in school curriculaamong policy makers, curriculumspecialists and practitioners.

The activities under way to reach these aimsare geared towards the provision of informa-

tion-management, knowledge-transfer andcapacity-building services within the areas ofcompetence of the IBE. They are aimed atpreventing HIV/AIDS infection, increasing theself-empowerment of learners at risk, andproviding training to individuals and institutionsthat work on the development and implemen-tation at the school level of educationalprogrammes for combating the disease.

One of the projects under this programme isa curriculum clearing-house for educationalresponses to HIV/AIDS. The IBE Clearing-House for Curriculum Development on Edu-cation for AIDS Prevention is part of theUNESCO Strategic Programme on HIV/AIDS and of the Unified Budget and Work(UBW) plan approved by UNAIDS. It servesto help the interagency team to fight againstHIV/AIDS all over the world

The clearing-house aims at the delivery of theoverall information-management and knowl-edge-transfer service called for by the inter-agency UNAIDS programme and field-levelagencies. Part of the work of the project in-volves evaluating and publishing the results ofcurriculum development processes and cur-ricular contents and methods that have beenused to prevent AIDS or to cope with AIDS-related consequences among various sectorsof the affected societies. The project will or-

ganize and participate in conferences andseminars at the sub-regional, regional and in-ternational levels so that the information ob-tained through the clearing-house is effectivelyexploited in capacity-building.

Once information on HIV/AIDS in schoolcurricula is gathered and well disseminated,and once curriculum developers and educa-tors are well informed and skilful in the com-plex dimensions of introducing HIV/AIDS intoschool curricula, a fruitful dialogue canemerge. This project is aimed at facilitatingpolicy-creating dialogue among curricular andother decision-makers. In this way, the IBEwould support the development of well-in-formed and supportive national and interna-tional policies on HIV/AIDS education.

In this project, the IBE is co-operating closelywith WHO, La Caixa (Spain) and other aca-demic and developmental institutions. The IBEhas provided the first contributions from theGlobal Content Bank on Education for HIV/AIDS Prevention to Nigeria and Brazil, in co-operation with the respective UNESCO fieldoffices.

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The College of FellowsThis is a high-level accompanying academicteam, composed of selected scholars from allthe regions of the world who are involved inIBE projects. The membership of the Collegeof Fellows is renewed each biennium accord-ing to the IBE�s on-going projects and activi-ties.

PROSPECTS: Editorial BoardThe Editorial Board of UNESCO�s quarterlyreview of education�PROSPECTS�is com-posed of specialists in comparative educationand high-level decisions-makers with a stronginterest in comparative studies. Their missionis to contribute to the themes of selected is-sues, to viewpoints, articles on trends and pro-files of world renowned educators who haveinfluenced the history of learning and teach-

ing. They are also involved in assessing unso-licited proposals for articles that have beensubmitted.

PROSPECTS: CorrespondentsPROSPECTS correspondents help to identifyauthors from different countries and regions,and also suggest ideas for themes and articlesfor the different sections of the review.

COMPOSITION OF THE IBE COUNCIL, 2001�2003

1. Angola2. Belgium3. Cameroon4. China5. Colombia6. Côte d�Ivoire7. Cuba8. Czech Republic9. France10. Haiti

11. Hungary12. Indonesia13. Jamaica14. Japan15. Lebanon16. Lithuania17. Malaysia18. Morocco19. Nigeria20. Portugal

21. Republic of Korea22. Russian Federation23. Senegal24. Spain25. Switzerland26. Thailand27. United Arab Emirates28. Zimbabwe

Mr Aziz Hasbi (Morocco), President ofthe IBE Council, 2002-2003

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48

At the beginning of the period 2002-2007, the activities of the IBE werefunded by: the UNESCO regular bud-get; extra-budgetary funds allocated toUNESCO for co-operative work withthe Divisions of Educational Quality,Educational Policies and SecondaryEducation and field offices (for in-stance from the Bildungs-Ministeriumfür Technische Zusammenarbeit(BMZ, Germany) and the Japanese

Funds-in-Trust); institutional allocations from the Swiss Confederation; and theSwedish International Development Agency (Sida, Sweden).Its activities are also funded by the Ministry for Foreign Affairs of France (Directiongénérale de la coopération internationale et du développement), the Arab Gulf Coun-tries, the Geneva International Academic Network (GIAN) and many other sources,depending on the project or activity.Also at the beginning of the period 2002-2007, the IBE counts upon twenty-onepermanent staff members, three high-level consultants on curriculum developmentand planning, a roster of more than 200 high-level consultants on specific thematicissues, five research assistants and agreements to receiveinterns with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Quebec andthe Institute for Leadership Development (Canada), theDeutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD, Ger-many) and other institutions. More detailed and updatedinstitutional information can be found on the IBE�s website:www.ibe.unesco.org

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