Order CIE Merchandise Click Here		Return to CIE On Campus Activities & Biographies CIE Activities: Fall 2000 - Spring 2001 Spring 2001 Archive Congratulations to Six Master's Degree Graduates Dwight W. Allen at CIE Mali Educators Visit Globalization and Higher Education: Views from the South The Role of Women in Ghana Torture: A Modern Day Plague CIE Congratulates Six Master's Degree Graduates Six CIE members completed their Master's Degree programs this semester (from left to right: Zina Rumleanscaia, Azat Muradov, Mary Lugton, Phoebe McKinney, Silva Kurtisa, & Baktygul Ismailova. They are shown with their advisors David Evans & Gretchen Rossman). The final three Center Meetings were reserved for them to showcase their research in their Master's Project Presentations. Following are their thesis title:   Azat Muradov: A Model of Academic Program Review for Program Improvement. Silva Kurtisa: Evaluating Attainment for Global Education Goals. Phoebe McKinney & Mary Lugton (joint-project): Re-Constructing the Road to Human Rights Education: Potholes, Pitfalls and Possibilities Zina Rumleanscaia: Privatization of Higher Education in Moldova Baktygul Ismailova: Language Policy in Post-Soviet Central Asia Congratulations!!! Dwight Allen Honored by CIE and the School of Education About 40 people gathered at CIE on March 30 to welcome former Dean Dwight Allen who was on campus to participate in the celebrations marking the announcement of the Dwight W. Allen Distinguished Professorship of Education Policy and Reform being established in the EPRA department by a donation from the Gluckstern family. In an informal gathering Dwight reminisced about the process of reform at the School of Education and the formation of CIE as well as talking about some of his current ideas on educational reform. When Dwight Allen accepted the invitation of the University to become the Dean of the School of Education in 1968, he came with the intention of revolutionizing education. By recruiting an ethnically and culturally diverse body of students and new faculty, both of whom he charged as colleagues with the dreaming up and planning of a new School, Dwight succeeded in starting a new era in the history of the School of Education. Dwight made it clear how pleased he was to see that at the Center for International Education "collegiality", "diversity" and commitment to the cause of international education continued to reflect the principles that characterized the original reform of the School of Education. Dwight's comments focused on Educational Reform and Leadership. He made it clear that, if time were turned back and he was again charged with leading the school, that he would repeat many of the strategies he had used previously. He expressed his hope that some day somebody would write a history of the revolution of the School of Education. (For all those interested in educational reform: here is a nice dissertation topic!). "Reform cannot be planned," he said. "It has to emerge from its context". "If you are serious about changing something, you have to change the mix… In American Education Reform, we are stirring the frosting of the cake when we need to make a new cake… Also, the first time you bake a new cake, you can't know what the outcome will be… You need to let it happen". He urged the Center Community not to just think about the problems of the Third World, but also to have its diverse student body engage in educational service in the Amherst community and in Massachusetts. "Provide courses for graduate students on 'global awareness'", he advocated. Dwight also suggested that the Center Community should assist Junior faculty in producing the publications leading to tenure, and that it was faculty's responsibility to mentor students in such a way that they would easily pass their exams. Institutional growth is only possible when leaders are willing to defend their employees and students in times when things go wrong, because only then will students and employees be willing to take risks for the institutions." A lively discussion ensued that was continued over a selection of international foods brought to the event by CIE members. Dwight has recently published an electronic book with Bill Cosby entitled American Schools: the 100 Billion Dollar Challenge and has launched a reform campaign. Details can be found at: http://www.americanschools100b.com/  For those who would like more information about Dwight's current activities visit his web site at: http://www.lions.odu.edu/~dwallen/ Return to Top "The Strength of Ghana depends on the efforts of the Women" Fanny Efua-Dontoh Fanny Efua-Dontoh kept a recent Tuesday meeting enthralled with her presentation on the role which women in Ghana have played. She began by recounting the exploits of a royal princess of Ashante named Yaa Asantewa who led the fight against the British in 1900 after the King and many of the nobles had been exiled to Seychelles. Yaa Asantewa shamed the men into fighting to keep the "golden stool" which embodied the soul of the people out of the hands of the British. Fanny argued that the strength and leadership shown by Yaa carries on to this day as Ghanaian women have exercised key leadership roles in determining the fate of Ghana's political leaders from Kwame Nkrumah to Lt. Rawlins. Fanny talked about her experiences working with the National Association of Ghanaian Women in the 1980s. Two incidents in particular reflected the key role played by women in taking leadership to address problems. The first occurred when, without the support of the government, the women organized a relief operation to deal with the thousands of displaced Ghanaians streaming back home after being expelled by Nigeria. In a second incident, Fanny used the revolt of the market women to illustrate the power that the women had over the national leadership. She argued that the traditional power of the women to "enstool kings" and "destool" them when they misbehaved, carried on to the present day in other ways. Fanny closed her presentation by donating a set of figurines to CIE that represent women in various roles in Ghana along with a miniature royal stool. She received a rousing round of applause from all, men and women alike, despite having roasted the behavior of men in Ghana and elsewhere to a crisp during her talk. Globalization and Higher Education Views from the South Mike Simsik presented a paper at a conference, held in Cape Town, South Africa in March 2001. It was hosted by the Society for Research into Higher Education (SRHE) and the Education Policy Unit of the University of Western Cape (of Cape Town).The conference was a follow-up to the UNESCO World Conference on Higher Education. This conference sought to examine the various manifestations of globalization on systems of higher education (HE) in the South. Various conference themes included issues related to: the impacts of globalization on, and the transitions of, HE in the South; comparative studies between HE systems in advanced vs. less industrialized countries as well as between those in Anglo-speaking and non-Anglo-speaking countries; and the impacts of technology, changing financing levels, and the current tendency toward the marketizing of HE. The paper I presented was entitled: Globalization and its Implications on Development and Environmental Curriculum within the Higher Education System in Madagascar. The paper explores the relationship between higher education (HE) curriculum reforms and their mplications for regional-level development and environmental conservation in Madagascar. The paper also looks at the extent to which HE curriculum prepares Malagasy professionals for the realities they encounter while working in the field on issues related to rural development and environmental conservation. These realities are shaped by a set of conditions (social, economic, political, environmental) that are rapidly changing due to the effects of globalization. These changing conditions result in an increasing gap between the curriculum being taught and that which is necessary in order for Malagasy professionals to adequately address the development and environmental issues they encounter in the field. Ultimately, this gap results in the continual prescription of actions that are out of sync with the realities, and thus, these actions continually fall far short of their goals of poverty alleviation and environmental protection. The paper makes recommendations for potential actions to respond to this situation, especially in light of the current decentralization process that is underway within the Malagasy HE system. Two of the more interesting symposia at the conference included Challenges of Globalization: South African Debates with Manuel Castells; and Higher Education Transformation and the 'Public Good'" The first symposia was facilitated by Dr. Shireen Badat of the Center for Higher Education Transformation, an NGO working on education issues in South Africa. This session focused on the materials produced by a series of seminars that took place last year in South Africa with UC-Berkeley sociologist Manuel Castells and Stanford political economist and educator Martin Carnoy. These seminars facilitated debates with South African scholars, politicians and policy makers. Some of the issues discussed in the session included: the key economic changes brought about by globalization, and some unavoidable implications for the way the state can consequently govern and where the new limits to state power are to be drawn; regional-level development of technology and the capacity of this level to be the loci of knowledge production in an era of globalization; and the confirmation that education, especially higher education, is an indispensable component of successful development in the network society. The second symposium included an excellent paper presented by Dr. Mala Singh of the South African Council on Higher Education. The paper focused on the dominance of the 'market' paradigm in the discourse on the transformation of higher education and the subsequent reduction of comprehensive notions of social responsiveness to a narrow market responsiveness. Such a reductionism threatens the achievement of a range of social purposes and benefits which higher education is supposed to deliver. The social, political, intellectual, moral and cultural dimensions of higher education responsiveness are increasingly under siege when planning for the funding, management and future development of higher education. The paper argues for the re-insertion of 'public good' concerns into the agenda of higher education transformation, especially within initiatives concerned with the renewal of higher education on the African continent. For more information about the conference, including abstracts of all the symposia and papers, please refer visit the conference web site at: http://www.srhe.ac.uk/southafrica/globalHE.htm Return to Top Bringing the School Home Rebuilding Education in Mali On February 22nd, CIE was privileged to welcome a delegation of senior education officials from the Republic of Mali: the honorable Adama Samassekou, the former Minister of Education and current president of the People's Decade for Human Rights Education in Mali; Mrs. Kankou Samassekou, Executive Director of the Malian office of the Federation of African Women Educationalists; and Mr. Youssouf Haidara, National Director of Maternal Languages Education. The Center was also pleased to welcome back two center graduates, Maria Keita and Debbie Fredo, who, with Coumba Toure, were accompanying the delegation as representatives of the Institute for Popular Education in Mali. The purpose of the visit to CIE was twofold–to exchange insights about new ideas in education to stimulate thinking about education in Mali and to share some of the principles behind the rebuilding of education in Mali. During an informal roundtable discussion, participants exchanged many exciting ideas about possibilities for teacher education, drawing from examples in the U.S., as well as from experiences in Guinea, Tanzania, Namibia and Uganda. These included an after school program designed to promote the participation of girls in science through collaborative action research projects, school and college/university partnerships, the teaming of teachers (experienced and novice) and the use of teacher resource centers and other support mechanisms to enhance teacher development. Participants also discussed alternative delivery mechanisms such as the decentralized cluster model used in Uganda. Since the rebuilding began in Mali, the delivery of teacher training has also followed a different course. Mr. Haidara noted that trainee teachers now spend only one year at the TTC before going out into the schools to complete their training while being supported by facilitators from a local "Centre d'Animation Pedagogique." The afternoon panel presentation was well attended. In addition to a strong CIE presence, the audience included students and faculty from the schools of education and public health as well as from the department of anthropology. In his opening comments Mr. Samassekou noted that although the weather outside was cold, the atmosphere at CIE was warm and welcoming, especially for those coming from tropical climates. In setting the stage to talk about rebuilding education in Mali, Mr. Samassekou presented a brief historical review of the three post-independence republics of Mali, and noted that the birth of the third republic in 1991 created an exceptional climate for change. He drew a clear distinction between "reform" efforts in the past, which had been unsuccessful and the current challenge of "rebuilding education" in Mali. Mr. Samassekou outlined the three fundamental principles underlying Mali's approach to rebuilding education: 1. the reconstruction of the learner's identity by introducing the mother tongue as the medium of instruction in the lower grades and pursuing a policy of language convergence in higher grades; 2. linking learning (both content and pedagogy) to real life; and 3. bringing the school home and creating a dynamic partnership between the school and the community. After a lively question and answer session in which members of the audience raised issues relating to the mobilization of community resources, religious resistance to girls' education, generating local financing for education, and the role of private enterprise in vocational education, the Malian guests joined the audience at a reception in CIE in their honor. Return to top Torture: A Modern Day Plague A series of events presented by a team from CIE On March 2nd at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire the campaign against torture inititated by Amnesty International last year provided the inspiration for a series of events. Three African torture survivors tackled the issue from different perspectives. The first presentation was over lunch with 15 students from the War & Peace Studies program. The second presentation was hosted by the local Amnesty Chapter and attended by over 100 activists. The third presentation took place at a dinner organized by World Affairs Council. The event was organized by Tucker Foundation at Dartmouth college, and faciliated by Dr. Mary Comeau. The speakers were Mohamed Ibrahim Elgadi (Sudan), Tsoaledi Thobejane (South Africa), and Yasin Magan (Somalia). The presenations focused on the follwing issues: The Islamic torture school as a distinguished from other politically instigated torture schools either by regimes on the right (Greece, Turkey) or on the left (Cambodia, USSR). The role of community and family in the rehabilitation of the torture victims. Famine as a large scale torture method against the poor in Somalia, and the responsibility of the international community in bringing those responsible to international court. Solitary confinement as a cruel torture method. The dialectic of white racism and black consciouness in South Africa. How one copes with the after-effects of torure. How students can help to support the survivors of torture. See the article on the events from the Dartmouth Student Newspaper http://www.thedartmouth.com/article.php?aid=200103050106 On the same issue, a campaign to boycott BP/AMOCO gas stations to protest the involvement of the campany in the bloody oil war of Southern Sudan was well received by the audiences. Scores of students and activists agreed to participate in this campaign initiated by the Group Against Torture in Sudan (GATS), a Sudanese advocacy group in Philadelphia. FALL 2000 ARCHIVE CIE Retreat at Camp Bement - Fall 2000 Photograph by Jim Troudt Manuel Hernandez Aguilar An indigenous leader from Chiapas, Mexico representing El Pueblo Creyente (People of Faith), Manuel spoke to the CIE meeting about the struggles of his people and the effects of global economic changes on the indigenous communities. His presentation highlighted the effects of NAFTA on the local market for maize and the consequences for campesinos who could no longer sell their corn at a profit. Changes in land ownership have led to the loss of protection provided by communal control of land. The effects of market changes have been compounded by militarization in the form of local militias and the increase in violence that followed. His talk was sponsored by Witness for Peace of New England. Sustainability Ranking for Universities Alberto Arenas The Epic of Gilgamesh -- a parable of man's arrogance toward nature from 5000 BC that foreshadowed current events. In a talk at the CIE weekly meeting Alberto Arenas analyzed the criteria used by US News to rank U.S. Universities and contrasted them with an alternate set of sustainability criteria that would measure the sensitivity of a University to both the social and ecological systems in which it is set. The discussion subsequently focussed on the challenge of changing basic values of students toward a more sustainable life style and the responsibility of a university to promote awareness of the need for such changes. [November 2000] Approaches to Staff Development in Laos           with Mainus Sultan - CIE Meeting , October 2000 School of Education Awards Luncheon Joseph Keilty Scholarship award winners:  Back left - Cole Genge, Vachel Miller & Michael Simsik (not shown) with D. R. Evans, faculty member. Front row - David Chapin Kinsey Scholarship Award Winner - Thanh van Duong. CIE Publications Committee. (left to right) Mary Lugton, editor, Fulgence Swai, sales and marketing; Donna MacCartney, administrative coordinator.     First Tuesday Meeting - Fall 2000 Scenes from CIE's Fall 2000 Reception Faculty-Student Dialogue Muskies & the Motorcycle! Fan & Pan Renewing Acquaintences Anglophone Africa Shares a Moment Roundtable at CIE Fall Reception