To advance the cause of global education by bringing together the best educators, with international business and foundations, to complete multinational educational project.
Overview
This initiative has been launched by a group of senior educators within Europe who have worked and networked together over a number of years on educational projects. The initiative is called ‘The Education Foundation of Europe’ but the reality is that the group wishes to build an NGO that can reach out globally to effect real changes in education by:
1. Knowledge transference
2. Knowledge comparison
3. Cross-fertilization and pollination
4. Innovation and technology
The foundation will achieve these missions by:
1. Carrying out education projects based on international partnerships
2. Educational knowledge transference and comparison, to and from, developed and developing nations
3. Cross-fertilization and cross-pollination across national boundaries
4. Combine the efficiencies of business with the genius of experienced educators
The management board of the foundation will identify areas in education that can be advanced by the completion of targeted projects. Calls will be made internationally to educators, businesses, institutions etc. to create partnerships and submit projects that answer the calls.
The proposals will be evaluated against the Call brief and the most appropriate projects with the best chance of a successful conclusion and the highest impact will be funded.
Challenges
There are rapid and increasing changes in education today due to;
1. The intervention and need for technology
2. Globalization leading to increasing competition
3. Funding and prioritization pressures
4. Growing inequality of access to and resources for education
5. Increasing pressure for a highly trained, specialized and professional workforce
These needs are not equally evident in every country but every country faces these challenges in differing degrees.
Government struggles with pressured budgets to face these challenges and many educators often have the will, but not the means, to contribute effectively.
One of the directions that some governments, have tried to harness the pent-up genius and experience of their educators, is by creating politically driven, project-based, initiatives.
Why Educational Projects?
International projects are laboratories where it is possible to learn, to experiment, and to produce a number of exportable procedures. They allow educators from a multitude of backgrounds and skills, to pool their knowledge and experience, and close the gaps missing in education with practical and real products and resources that have relevance across educational systems.
The foundation will create calls for projects that will benefit education systems globally and even the teachers and educators involved as partners in projects.
As the projects will be completed internationally they will expand the normally parochial vision of the partners. This will allow them to increase their ability to educate for the greater globalised world, to teach the new rules of the game.
Educational projects that have thrown off the financial and political constraints of a particular Department of Education budget will open the possibilities for innovation, development and experimentation, impossible to imagine for tied centres.
Projects will be designed to contribute to a sharing of resources, so that not only wealthy schools or developed countries can participate in innovation, introduction to new learning methodologies and experimentation. Every year calls will include knowledge transference and partnerships with developing nations.
Education Project Themes
There is almost no limit to the available project themes and areas that could be attractive for international education projects.
The primary subject areas for projects can include:
Knowledge transference - from developing nations to less advantaged nations. This can include comparisons of knowledge between differing education systems and then repackaging and manipulating the knowledge in to a format that has relevance for differing less-developed systems.
Knowledge comparison – due to the competitive nature of education much effort is being employed within each educational jurisdiction on researching and building knowledge. Some of this information is being replicated in multiple jurisdictions. Projects can be designed that bring together competing streams to compare, contrast and conclude.
Cross-fertilization and pollination – the potential for educators from diverse countries to be involved in projects together over a period, will permit the best ideas and practices from all education systems to be exchanged
Innovation and technology – use of technology in ways that increase impact and creating fertile ground for innovative advances in education
To support this initiative please write to Joel Josephson. You can download the full document from http://www.world-education-database.org/About.htm
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