Review of 2003 Conference Highlights
Distinguished guests,
Fellow participants,
Ladies and Gentlemen:
The formidable task of summarizing this extremely busy and productive conference and identifying its highlights has once again fallen upon me. I remember reading in the Delors Report on Education for the 21 st Century that a central challenge for education for the future is the ability to balance the explosion of information and knowledge all about us, with the capacity of the individual mind to absorb it. I wish Mr. Delors were here today, so he could see how crucial that balance is, not just for me, but also for all of us. In fact, in a way I wish that each of you would go through the same exercise I have just gone through in the past several hours of sifting through all the plenary speeches, panelist reactions, round tables, individual paper presentations, field visits and informal dialogues that we have experienced. I have been forced to evaluate, internalize, and make my own what I think was most important to me, and I am sure that if you went through the same exercise you would leave Shanghai with much more than a suitcase heavy with conference documents. So please, do not be happy with my summary, but make your own and thus translate what you have seen and heard here into a better and more innovative you. I was told by the organizers to remind you that the success of this conference cannot be measured by how happy you feel about it afterwards, but rather by what specific changes you will make and what impact that will have upon you and your education work when you return home.
And so, to share with you my personal version of what I think are the highlights: In the very first session, we were reminded by UNESCO Director Mr. Shaeffer that the theme of this conference was education innovation. In fact, we were reminded that the concept of innovation was to be applied to sustainable development in day one, to quality of education in day two, and to the revitalization of APEID in day three.
As turned out, each day covered its topic and went far beyond it.
In day one, Mr. Loxley of the Asian Development Bank gave us the broader context of education within a development picture, linking poverty, the role of the family, and economic productivity to the efforts to education more than the one billion youth in Asia . I particularly noted his finding that education quality matters much more in countries less developed, and his pointing out the linkages between parent's status and choices of education for children. Mr. Shaeffer urged us to shape education to meet the challenges of globalization, and suggested three specific roles for education towards this end. Mr. Zhang described the admirable progress in education in Shanghai , and the impact of this progress in the rapid progress of this remarkable city.
In day two, the discussion of innovation for quality education took a very distinct tone. Thanks to the powerful presentations of Dr. Quisumbing and Ms. Keating, the focus was very clearly on education for the all-round and total human development of the individual. Whereas in past conferences quality tended to focus on subject mastery or academic scores, on this day there was a real sense that the value and relationship dimensions of education, "learning to be" and "learning to live together" have been neglected far too long in the overemphasis on information and skills, on "preparing the workforce for the factory floor," as Ms. Keating puts it, or "learning to know and learning to do," as the Delors report puts it. Interestingly this theme was sustained in many other venues, as in the round tables on moral education and on innovative values education, as well as in the individual papers on developing good character in youths and on classrooms as values-based environment.
In day three, both fundamental re-visioning and specific recommendations were made for the revitalization of APEID. Prof. Nakayama recommended using the United Nations' theme of Education for Sustainable Development as an overriding theme, as a "brand" so to speak, to distinguish and characterize its various activities. He also suggested several other recommendations, such as concrete published or electronic outputs for workshops and from Associated Centres. Mr. Spring, whose insights and analogies are always a delight to listen to, enthralled us all, not only with wonderful possibilities of interconnectedness for the future, using Communities of Practice and access to learning objects , but also with the assurance that these wonderful scenarios ("a review of all recent advances in your field in 60 seconds") is not only possible but feasible and within our reach. Ms. Belford urged us to be courageous in evaluating past performances and being prepared to change the way we do things, whether it be changing the frequency and format of APEID conferences, or reaching out to the Pacific, or launching more short term immediate impact projects.
And on the fourth day, we heard about the bold steps forward in the reform of education in Thailand from the Minister, Honorable Pongpol. To me, the highlight of this fourth day was the Raja Roy Singh Lecture, which was to my mind a sterling example of innovative thinking: using Adam Smith's paradigm of division of labour, it is indeed possible to conceive of new and imaginative ways to increase access, improve quality, and yet to do so with less cost. As Sir John Daniel emphasized, this new paradigm is not only possible but indeed imperative, if we are to achieve our EFA and other education goals in the brave new world before us.
I would have liked to present you with my private summaries of the panel reactions, and of the round tables and individual paper presentations that I attended and learned from. But neither my time nor your patience will make that possible.
I would have liked to present you with my private summaries of the panel reactions, and of the round tables and individual paper presentations that I attended and learned from. But neither my time nor your patience will make that possible.
In any case I could not be in many rooms and field sites at the same time, so my experience and my summary would have been necessarily incomplete, and different from yours.
But I think that no matter which sessions and field trips you or I attended, there were a few key ideas running through these past four days, and to me these were the following:
1. There is a sense, given the fast changing times, that innovation and creativity are needed now or more than every before. Many participants in various ways have said this. Ms. Keating said, "To stand still is to be bypassed." Ms. Edna Tait correctly observed that we cannot truly anticipate the nature of the future of our children. Others have said we cannot equip them with the tools of the past.
2. In the onslaught of galloping globalization, "McDonaldisation," as Mr. Shaeffer called it, we must assure a balance in our educational efforts between the global and the local, between understanding and channeling our greater interconnectedness, with a preservation of our national and local identities. Mr. Samuel Lee remind us that balance between holistic and contextual education hinges on recognizing interconnectedness among problems, on critical assessment, on Paulo Freire's "critical consciousness," so vividly illustrated in Ms. Keating's stories of saber-tooth tigers in Africa and Polaris Sno-Cats in Alaska.
3. Values education was a theme that ran through many presentations. It was also evident in the way it translated into innovations in many of the field sites we saw in Hangzhou and here in Shanghai . Two lessons seemed to stand out, aside from that fact that is vitally important for the future of society: First, it must and can be done, and there are many efforts, case books, pilot projects, and networks, that will attest to this in response to skeptics who say that this is beyond the competence of education and indeed of education assessment. Second, it can and must be done, not only in the cognitive area, but also in the affective and action areas, indeed not only n the classroom, but in the entire atmosphere, culture, and behavioural patterns of the school and the school system as a whole. Again we saw this in the happy faces of the children and enthusiasm of their teachers in the field visits.
4. Technology by itself will not lead to innovation, but innovation and creative minds can utilize technology beyond what we can today imagine. Throughout human history, it is not fundamentally technology that has changed mankind, but the determination, passion, and creativity of inventors and innovators that have unleashed the changes. And that is more true today than ever, as we look at the possibilities for education innovation, and for revatalisation of APEID; to paraphrase Carl Sagan, the greatest discoveries of this twenty-first century are going to be the discoveries of how use, not abuse, the discoveries of the twentieth century, for equity, and harmony, for peace and prosperity for all. I return to Mr. Spring's presentation; the wonderful possibilities he described - instant access to information, ready virtual communities of colleagues around the world in constant conversation, allowing the innovations in the air to come to the ground and reach us everyone, indeed Education Innovation for All - may sound like wishful daydreaming, but they are in fact within reach. Whether or not they will become realities will not depend on the technology or the machines or even the resources - they are already there; they will depend on the motivation, desire, enthusiasm, and resolve of human beings, of us all, of APEID Associated Centres, and of the APEID Secretariat.
5. Finally, and this is my last point. I agree with Mr. Spring that there is no lack of innovations in the air. You and I, working in our respective countries, may not be aware of all of it, or even of most of it yet, but this conference has given us wonderful insights, and great hope that indeed things are changing and innovations are multiplying. We see it in APEID itself, which has innovated by bringing this conference here to Shanghai , and changing its format to include field visits. We see it more dramatically in this admirable country: We heard Vice Minister Zhang trace the remarkable route education has taken in China and how progress and prosperity followed closely behind. We saw first hand, and with some envy, the innovations in Shanghai and Hangzhou , and those of us who have been long time visitors of this country continue to marvel at the amazing pace of progress, unparalleled in the world. We have seen APEID Associated Centres working here, as we heard from Mr. Wang about the inter- and intra-networks in his Shanghai Xuhui Education Bureau, with hundreds of innovation and research projects involving more than 1,000 teachers. We heard about innovation at the individual school level, about the innovative Beijing Jinshuan High School form Mr. Fan.
We heard about reform and innovation in other countries as well. From Mr. Rung and later from the Minister Pongpol himself, we heard about Thailand streamlining its education governance structures, focusing on local initiative, completing a 12-year cycle, and significantly raising teachers' salaries. In the round tables and paper presentations, we heard about fundamental curriculum reform in the Philippines, basic education innovation in India, and innovations in education and the law in Malaysia, breakthroughs in on-line learning in Deakin University in Australia, and the sharing of educational research throughout the region through APERA we learned, not only the theory, but also the practice, several other innovative approaches, including improving student learning by understanding the physiology of how the brain works; those fortunate enough to attend this roundtable would probably agree that is was as enjoyable as it was enlightening.
Finally we saw innovation and heroism in individuals. I have already cited the potential contribution of Sir John Daniel to our way of thinking represented by his insightful address. We have also recognized the individuals in the Japanese National Commission who throughout the years have not only supported APEID but also continued to urge ever greater relevance and productivity and innovation by APEID. We have saluted a true living education hero in our midst, Mr. Wang Chengxu, who has devoted the bulk of his 93 years to helping bring out the best in UNESCO and in education in China . Finally, although we did not give them a plaque, we saw and admired the countless teachers and administrators of Shanghai and Hangzhou , and recognize their pivotal role in the development of their societies.
Ladies and gentleme, let me conclude. When we first arrived here, we were warmly welcomed, and urged to enjoy the fall weather in Shanghai . Indeed it was beautiful. I will remember the agreeable temperature, the pleasant boat ride on the West Lake , and the warmth of everyone who helped us and made this so memorable. As I am no longer with UNESCO, I can no longer thank you all on behalf or the organizers, but as an ordinary participant, I would like to thank on your behalf our hosts in Shanghai and Hangzhou, the Chinese National Commission and UNESCO Bangkok for all they have done to make this a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
But in a way, I do not feel like it is fall or autumn here in Shanghai, I feel more like it is spring, as I see all the innovations here, and elsewhere, blossoming and coming to flower all around me. The world sometimes feels like it is winter, with our problems of environmental degradation, polarization between rich and poor, ethnic violence, terrorism, AIDS and SARS. But this conference tells me that spring is around the corner, and the winter of this world will come to an end if we continue to encourage the many flowers of innovation in our education sectors to blossom, and eventually produce individuals and societies for a summer of peace and prosperity, of total development for all. It is up to each of us in this room, the gardeners in the orchards and field of education, to nurture these flowers of innovation throughout the spring, and make our dreams of a wonderful summer come true.
