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Published: February 5th 2008
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Workshop Dais
At the beginnign--during the welcomes and introductions. Lovely flowers! Tuesday
Today was the International Workshop on Community Development through Continuing Education, at which two of us were speakers. It was a full day and we received information from representatives of the:
Centre for Adult, Continuing Education and Extension of University of Kalyani, about their literacy programs;
National Institute of Technical Teachers Training and Research about the governments soon-to-be released vocational education scheme that sounds very positive--includes interaction between the technical training and the world of work, with a move towards competency-based programs and a plan to include those students with little or no past formal education;
Indian Institute of Cerebral Palsy, about disability training programs, both for clients and professionals, family, general citizens;
Globsyn Technologies, a private eduction firm that JU Adult and Continuing Education has subcontracted with to offer a one-year certificate course in employability skills to graduates of JU;
Manovikash Kendra, about mainstreaming of students;
University of Manitoba, Canada, about Aboriginal Focus Programs--India has numerous tribes that they want to try and incorporate in the educational system; and
JU's Department of Adult and Continuing Education and Extension about the wide variety of their programs (some of which I've already described
Central Library
took a picture on my way back from lunch. earlier in the week).
Some items from my notes that reflect the kinds of obstacles these and other educators are trying to work through:
=Poverty is not just income, there are a wide variety of deprivations that need to be improved (health care, sanitation, etc);
=One speaker didn't see University research as able to support social change; economic change?
=India has the largest number of university graduates. She also has the largest number of
unemployed and
unemployable university graduates;
=there are 37,000 villages in West Bengal; 20,000 have a population of less than 1,000;
=have a long history (since 1862) of partnerships with NGOs, especially as they work to combat literacy;
=34%!o(MISSING)f the world's adult illiterates are Indians (310 million);
=22%!o(MISSING)f women have completed 10 years or more of education;
=218,000 literacy centers cover about 1%!o(MISSING)f the targeted population;
=Less than 40%!o(MISSING)f graduates in India get jobs.
Enough of that fun stuff!! Time to go shopping and to another home for dinner--this time the Registrar and his family were our hosts. This is the same family who so graciously took us to the Hindu wedding our first week. This time we stopped by
a mall (yes, Hillary, they have real malls). Didn't buy anything but saw a different portion of society walking about. Numerous small businesses, several right swank places, and a big department store (looked very familiar except for the style of the clothing).
Had a great dinner, including a nice vegetable mixture, a couple fish dishes, more bread that wasn't naan but similar, fresh veggies, rice, Jack Fruit (new to us) and a great custard for dessert.
Tomorrow, a general strike has been called. This means rickshaws and most taxis won't run, restaurants and stores will be closed--general shut down. This happens periodically and will last for 24 hours. Fortunately, we didn't have anything particular planned for off campus tomorrow. Unfortunately, one of our exchange partners has a large seminar that is supposed to begin tomorrow--I hope some folks will still be able to make it in for that.
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Pat
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Food
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