|
Enquiry Abstract What role can lifelong education and schooling play in contributing to a more just, equitable and peaceful world, where there is sustainable economic and social development for all, and an end to poverty? Although current international action to achieve Education for All, Education for Sustainable Development and the United Nations Millennium Development Goals provides a useful foundation for action, this is not sufficient. It is also important to pay greater attention to devising concrete, action-orientated ways of promoting social justice and peace building, through means such as lifelong learning, skills development for employability, values/ethics education, and high quality, relevant educational research, in the light of political realities. The presentation will focus on the work of the United Nations (UN), and in particular UNESCO, which is the specialist UN organization concerned with strengthening and upgrading education and schooling in developing countries, countries in transition and those in a post-conflict situation. Speaker Professor Rupert Maclean is Director of the Centre for Lifelong Learning Research and Development, and Chair Professor of International Education, at the Hong Kong Institute of Education (HKIEd). Concurrent with his appointment at the HKIEd he is also a Senior Research Fellow, Department of Education, Oxford University; Adjunct Professor of International Education at East China Normal University, Shanghai, and at RMIT University, Melbourne; and Counsellor and Special Advisor on Curriculum Development and Reform, Zhejiang Technology Institute of Economy, Hangzhou, China. Before joining the HKIEd in July 2009 Professor Maclean was Foundation Director, UNESCO-UNEVOC International Centre for Education, Bonn, Germany, and UNESCO’s Representative to Germany; Director of Secondary Education in UNESCO Paris; Chief, Asia-Pacific Centre of Educational Innovation for Development, UNESCO Bangkok; and Chief Technical Advisor for a United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) funded project to strengthen and upgrade teacher education throughout Myanmar. He is well known from his numerous international handbooks, books, chapters in books, articles and reports, particularly on skills development for employability, sociology of teachers and teacher education, and the reform of secondary education. His most recent book is the six volume International Handbook of Education for the Changing World of Work: Bridging Academic and Vocational Learning (Maclean and Wilson, 2009, Springer) Professor Maclean has a particular interest in educational research for improved policy and practice, and educational innovation for development, in the Asia-Pacific region. |
