The Question:

After viewing the vast amount of plans for education on your website I have an honest question for UNESCO about UNESCO policies and procedures.

I am of the understanding that the UN and UNESCO and all the other UN agencies are merely a place where countries meet to talk.

I am of the understanding they are not any kind of government in and of themselves. Therefore, I am wondering how UNESCO see themselves as the authority by which our educational standards are set and mandated in for example, the USA, which is a free country?

In other words, what gives UNESCO the authority to control the curriculum of our US schools? My guess would be that UNESCO has NO authority to be influencing the USA schools and that teachers should not do things they know are wrong and are detrimental to a child’s mental health and learning.

 

Thank You.

Interested Party

The Answer:

 

UNESCO’s role is advisory. The plans and policies you can see on UNESCO’s website are collected and made public as part of UNESCO’s knowledge-sharing role. UNESCO functions as a laboratory of ideas and a standard- setter to forge universal agreements on emerging ethical issues.

  
The Organization also serves as a clearinghouse – for the dissemination and sharing of information and knowledge – while helping Member States to build their human and institutional capacities in diverse fields. In short, UNESCO promotes international co-operation among its Member States in the fields of education, science, culture and communication.

More specifically in the case of education UNESCO has a mandate to coordinate international partners, and monitor progress in countries and regions towards the implementation of six  internationally agreed goals to achieve education for all by 2015.  To do that it prepares the annual EFA Global Monitoring Report.

  
www.efareport.unesco.org

In the case of curriculum development UNESCO’s International Bureau of Education (IBE) provides technical assistance to countries. This service is provided upon request.

http://www.ibe.unesco.org/curriculum_dev.htm

 For the question of teachers UNESCO alerts the world to the most serious issue facing the teaching profession today: the acute or impending shortage of qualified teachers. The growing demand for teachers caused by Education for All, combined with an aging

teacher population in developed countries, will create shortages of at least 15 million teachers in the next decade.

UNESCO also encourages Governments to use two international norms:

 
The 1966 ILO/UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Teachers and the 1997 UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of Higher-Education Teaching Personnel. They provide guidelines on how educational authorities, communities and teachers’ associations can improve teacher recruitment, training, working conditions, academic freedom, and security employment (including tenure).

I hope this helps
Best regards,

Ulrika Peppler Barry

Team manager
EFA Global Monitoring Report
tel:33-1-4568 2128
fax:33-1-4568 5641

www.efareport.unesco.org

UNESCO, office 3099
7, Place de Fontenoy
75352 Paris 07 SP, France

 

 

UNESCO is the driving force behind NCLB and a standardized global education that results in illiterate and uneducated students.  Another creation of the United Nations that has crept into our system with the intent to dumb down our young people.  Knowledge is power and UNESCO is determined that todays students have neither knowledge or power.