ACU EXECUTIVE HEADS CONFERENCE
CYPRUS 22-26 APRIL 2001
Session 10
How do Universities justify their existence?
Education for All: The Challenge for Universities
Sir John Daniel
(Vice-Chancellor, Open University, UK; President, US Open University;
Assistant Director-General for Education, UNESCO)
Colleagues, while we have been at this excellent conference there have been some significant anniversaries. Monday April 23 was Shakespeare’s birthday, St George’s Day and, significantly for me, the 32nd anniversary of the foundation of the Open University.
But today I want to draw your attention to the anniversary of a more recent event that is of great significance to me in my new role at UNESCO and has implications for the universities of the Commonwealth.
I am referring to the World Education Forum that was held in Dakar, Senegal a year ago this week. That forum in Dakar followed a series of important international events, going back at least to the Education for All conference that was held in Jomtien, Thailand in 1990.
Through these events the international community has been trying to get to grips with what some have called the greatest moral challenge of our time, namely the fact that hundreds of millions of our fellow human beings cannot exercise their basic right to be educated.
In the meeting that took place a year ago this week in Dakar, governments, international agencies, non-governmental organisations and other representatives of civil society committed themselves to address the challenge of Education for All with renewed vigour.
Some of our colleagues at this conference were at that meeting in Dakar. I was not, but in my new role as Assistant Director-General of UNESCO for Education I am charged with leading UNESCO’s contribution to the achievement of Education for All. UNESCO has been mandated to coordinate the efforts of all the stakeholders in this great campaign.
I stress that this is not a challenge that UNESCO is undertaking alone. We are working in partnership with the World Bank, UNICEF, the UN Development Programme and other international agencies.
We are also working with governments. First, governments in the developing countries, without whose commitment and engagement their people will not be able to enjoy their right to education. Second, governments in the developed world who are providing bilateral financial and technical help.
Some of those governments in rich countries have made the very strong commitment that no developing country which has a convincing national plan for achieving Education for All - and the clear determination to implement it - will fail for lack of money. One of my tasks is to call in that commitment by ensuring that there are good plans and the will to make them happen.
Then UNESCO is working with NGOs and civil society at both the national and the international levels. NGOs have a very important role in this process because they represent large numbers of people, including parents, and know the reality on the ground. Within this framework I very much want to work with universities because their involvement is critical to the achievement of Education for All in many ways which I will list in a minute.
The previous speakers at this session have set the stage very well. Michael Gibbons has challenged you. Patrick Coldstream has stressed the importance of engagement. I suggest that engagement with the great moral issue of the human right to education is not just an issue for universities in countries where many people do not now receive an education. It is a challenge for all of us.
Paul Davenport has referred to the unfortunate history of development thinking that led the World Bank and others, a decade ago, to denigrate the importance of universities and place exclusive focus on primary education.
Fortunately those days are over. It is now very clear to everyone that none of the goals that were agreed in Dakar a year ago can be achieved without the active involvement of universities in a host of ways.
Let me remind you of the six goals that were agreed last April in Dakar:
First, to expand and improve comprehensive early childhood care and education, especially for the most vulnerable and disadvantaged children. At present, of the 800 million children in the world who are under six years of age, fewer than one-third benefit from any form of early childhood care and education.
Second, to ensure that by 2015 all children, particularly girls, children in difficult circumstances and those belonging to ethnic minorities, have access to - and complete - free and compulsory primary education of good quality.
Progress is being made. The net enrolment rate in primary school, which was under 65% in less developed regions in 1970, had risen to 85% by 2000. However this still leaves 113 million children, 60% of whom are girls, out of school.
It is also estimated that there are another 100 million children who start school but are taken out and put to work in homes, factories or armies before they have learned to read, write and use number. 60% of these uneducated children are in countries in conflict or post-conflict situations – adding to the difficulties.
Third, to ensure that the learning needs of all young people and adults are met through equitable access to appropriate learning and life skills programmes.
Fourth, to achieve a 50% improvement in levels of adult illiteracy by 2015, especially for women, and equitable access to basic and continuing education for all adults.
At present one in four of the adult population of our planet, some 800 million people, have their personal lives and the development of their communities blighted by illiteracy.
Fifth, to eliminate gender disparities in primary and secondary education by 2005, and achieve gender equality in education by 2015, with a focus on ensuring girls’ full and equal access to - and achievement in - basic education of good quality.
Sixth, and finally, to improve all aspects of the quality of education so that recognized and measurable learning outcomes are achieved by all, especially in literacy, numeracy and essential life skills.
That is the agenda for Education for All which will be my daily challenge at UNESCO and with which I ask for your help. While much of the focus is understandably on basic education it is clear that we shall not attain any of these goals without the involvement of universities at every step in the process. Let me give some examples:
First, countries have commited themselves to developing national plans for Education for All by 2002. This process depends crucially on the training of the civil servants and government officials involved and the quality of their interaction with civil society. Universities are involved on both counts. Everything about Education for All involves capacity building.
In many countries this capacity building is having to be done against a backdrop of the simultaneous elimination of capacity by HIV/AIDS. I have been impressed at this conference by what I have learned about how African universities, often led by their students, are addressing the scourge of HIV/AIDS.
Second, implementing national plans for Education for All will require the training of teachers of all kinds on a massive scale. I understand that Nigeria alone needs to train 600,000 new teachers in the next ten years.
This is a challenge to universities to develop and offer new forms of teacher training. The international networks of the Commonwealth and the Commonwealth of Learning will be vital in spreading new ideas and good practice.
Third, Education for All requires coordination and advocacy. Education is both a human right and a benefit to society. Universities should be tireless advocates of the right to education and a source of ideas and research on how to make it a reality.
Universities are also uniquely positioned between governments and civil society. In cases where governments regard NGOs and the organisations of civil society with suspicion, universities can play a mediating role.
Fourth, if you can’t measure it you can’t manage it. Monitoring progress towards Education for All is a vital part of the process. The lead is being taken by UNESCO’s Institute for Statistics, which will relocate to Canada later this year to take advantage of Statistics Canada’s reputation as the world leader in this kind of activity.
But the Institute of Statistics needs help from universities all over the world in creating a supportive network that will help ensure that the data collected has both integrity and relevance. I also see it as vital that we develop qualitative indicators of progress towards Education for All and universities should play a leading role in this.
So, in conclusion, I hope that all Commonwealth universities, whether in developing or developed countries, will ask themselves what they can contribute to this great world campaign to provide Education for All.
Many of your universities have UNESCO chairs and are involved in UNITWIN arrangements. I hope that we can create more UNESCO chairs and twinning arrangements and focus some of them very specifically on advancing one or other aspect of the Education for All agenda.
The destination of Education for All may seem a long way away. But the train is moving and it will be a scandal, in today’s prosperous world, if we cannot work together to give all of humanity the chance to benefit from the pleasures and benefits of education to which we, as vice-chancellors and presidents of universities, have devoted our lives.
Finally, let me say that over my seventeen years as a university head, in Canada, the UK and the USA, I have found the Association of Commonwealth Universities most convivial and useful organisation of peers of which it has been my privilege to be a member.
So although this will be my last attendance at an ACU gathering as an Executive Head I look forward to continuing my contacts with you in my new job at UNESCO. My office has a stunning view of Paris and I hope you will visit me.
Thank you.