Sad to say the up and down communication with my international
contact did not last. I was really excited about getting to learn
more about the Northern Territory of Australia. After over a few weeks of
waiting for her to return my email about the questions in regards to this
assignment I never received a response from her again. I pray that all is well
with her health as I mentioned previously that she had been ill.
So for this reason I was left with the great option of
exploring another resource, UNESCO’s “Early Childhood Care
and Education”. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization seeks to contribute
to the building of peace, the
eradication of poverty, sustainable development and intercultural dialogue
through education, the sciences, culture, communication and information. One of
the organizations main objectives is attaining quality education for all and
lifelong learning.
Exploring the website, there was so much information to review and
discover. Within my search I came across the UNESCO Institute for Statistics which provides cross-nationally
comparable statistics on education,
science and technology, culture, and communication for more than 200 countries
and territories.
One of our major focuses of this course has been quality child care
and educators. In the report Teachers and Educational Quality: Monitoring Global
Needs For 2015 chapter 2 discusses teacher training, qualifications and education quality. The
report discusses that there are two issues that make the development of
cross-nationally comparable indicators of teacher quality difficult, availability
of data and uncertainty about the measurable characteristics of effective
teachers. In a number of countries the
minimum standard for primary teaching is an upper secondary qualification, typically
a specialized program for training teachers which is not designed to lead to
studies completed at a university. The entry standards for teaching vary widely
across countries. In a few countries less
than one-half of their teachers reach the standard.
The report
also distinguishes that many countries that have
set mandates and qualifications
are not meeting them making
it difficult to set cross-nationally comparable. Many
countries that are not meeting
their standards have lowered them to
meet qualifications set. Other countries that are meeting their standards have raised their
qualifications with a negative
effect that appears that they are not
meeting standards. This alone has a
major impact on the fate of our next
generation as countries are continuously
lowering their standards only so
than can meet them. Another reason that research over the past decade suggests that
many developing countries have lowered their standards and qualifications is to
control cost. Many countries are bringing
in large numbers of unqualified or less-qualified teachers or by supplementing
school capacity with teacher aides and community volunteers. This too has had an
effect on
lowering the average qualification and experience level of the teaching force. From
this report it expanded my knowledge to what
type of education children around the
world receive and why it is important to continue
to advocated for equity and equal education for all children.
Reference
