Organisational Consolidation and Leadership Renewal with the successful convening of the Fifth General Assembly of ASPBAE
As envisaged, the efforts of ASPBAE’s capacity-development efforts in the year were strongly focused on organizational consolidation and leadership renewal coinciding with the Fifth General Assembly of ASPBAE. As in previous Assemblies earlier, this was characterized by a set of face to face and electronic-based processes at country and regional levels.
The Fifth General Assembly was particularly important as it aimed to build strong organizational consensus on the far-reaching changes and developments in ASPBAE’s work as it sought to play a more effective and relevant role as one of the most established regional civil society organizations in the Asia Pacific. ASPBAE’s greater attention to policy advocacy work, its positioning as the principal regional education CSO in the Education for All campaign, had resulted in an expansion in the scale and scope of its work, its constituency and partnerships in a profound manner. The Fifth General Assembly was designed to facilitate organizational reflection on these many changes, build collective consensus on the way forward, and set in place a new leadership cognizant of the new phase in ASPBAE’s historical development and capable of providing the guidance and direction required.
The review of the ASPBAE Constitution provided the arena for discussion and debate on the aims and purpose of the organization, set in its more current realities. The Executive Council proposed ambitious amendments in the ASPBAE Constitution to keep this important document in better step with ASPBAE’s contemporary needs and potential.
National level consultations among ASPBAE members were conducted at various points within 2007-2008 and a Regional Consultation of ASPBAE Voting Representatives was organised on 26-28 August, 2008 in Kuala Lumpur to these ends. The ASPBAE Executive Council closely steered these processes, convening twice in the year (13-16 February, 2008 in Fiji and 29-30 August, 2008 in Kuala Lumpur) to ensure the membership was fully aware of the rationale and purpose behind the proposed changes, able to participate fully and transparently in the debates around these; and to closely track feedback from the membership and align the Constitutional review processes along the stated wishes of the members.
By 5 December, the membership voted overwhelmingly in favour of all the proposed Constitutional amendments, ushering yet another important phase in ASPBAE’s organisational life. ASPBAE will now be known as the Asia South Pacific Association for Basic and Adult Education.
The members also elected a new Executive Council (2009-2012) and created a new Executive Council position: the Immediate Past President.
ASPBAE’s new President is Jose Roberto Guevara, Director of the International Studies Program, RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia. An education activist and trainer, Robbie served in the ASPBAE Executive Council in 1997-2000 and is credited for upscaling ASPBAE’s Environment Education programme and in systematizing ASPBAE’s Basic Leadership Development Course in its early years. The other members of the ASPBAE Executive Council 2009-2012 are:
Member from South Asia (female) : Saloni Singh (Nepal)
Member from South Asia (male) : Dominic D’Souza (India)
Member from East Asia (female) : Yu Jun (China)
Member from East Asia (male) : Takafumi Miyake (Japan)
Member from Southeast Asia (female) : Dina Lumbantobing (Indonesia)
Member from Southeast Asia (male) : Aung Myo Min (Burma/Thailand)
Members from South Pacific (female) : Mua Vermeulen (Samoa)
Member from South Pacific (male) : Timote Vaioleti (Tonga/NewZealand)
Immediate Past President : Sandra Lee Morrison (Aotearoa/New Zealand)
101 accredited member organizations participated in the Fifth General Assembly of ASPBAE.
Sustained efforts to expand the pool of second line trainers and facilitators for transformative adult education in the Asia South Pacific through ASPBAE TIES
Following the ASPBAE Executive’s recommendations on a Multi–centric Initiative on facilitation for Transformative Learning, a Workshop was convened bringing together targeted core trainers to discuss/explore the possibilities of the initiative, the strategies for pursuing it; possible roles and responsibilities towards realizing the initiative; and short term and long term action plans. The Workshop organized in Langkawi, Malaysia from 29–31 May, 2008 brought together twelve (12) trainers – all of whom committed to building the ASPBAE Training Institute for Empowerment and Solidarity (ASPBAE TIES) and to offer time to this collective effort of expanding the pool of trainers on transformative learning approaches in the region.
ASPBAE TIES is envisaged as a ‘community of practice’ which aims to bring together individuals from like-minded education networks, training collectives working with communities and social movements in the Asia Pacific region to consider a sustained and more systematic means to: reflect on the practice of transformative learning towards greater conceptual clarity and knowledge building - rooted in the real-world experiences of the region's social movements and popular tradition, share training resources, competencies, learning spaces and platforms towards expanding the pool of leaders/trainers/facilitators on transformative learning approaches.
The Working Group on ASPBAE TIES met on 24-27 October, 2008 in Port Dickson, Malaysia to further detail out the objectives, and roles of this initiative and to define the plans to operationalise these. As ASPBAE’s Training institute, it seeks to 1) provide professional and specialist advice to ASPBAE on all matters of training and facilitation within a framework that is rights based, gender-just and pro poor/marginalized groups; 2) assist ASPBAE in developing ongoing/generic and customized, demand-driven, need-based trainings; 3) assist ASPBAE in systematically developing and mentoring a second line pool of trainers and facilitators.
The Working Group of ASPBAE TIES have recommended adjustments in the ASPBAE Basic Leadership Development Course to enhance its effectiveness and update its content and design with ASPBAE’s more current priorities. It has also proposed a set of trainings for Facilitation and second-line mentoring targeted to begin in 2009.
Continued capacity-building for adult education NGOs and civil society groups
The development of a wider pool of trainers from among ASPBAE members and constituents, capable of supporting community-based, national, sub-regional and regional capacity-building work in the varied thematic programme priority areas of ASPBAE was pursued vigorously in the period. ASPBAE organised the Basic Leadership Development Course (BLDC) from 26 March–3 April 2008, in Siem Reap, Cambodia. Twenty three (23) participants from twelve (12) countries representing the second-line leadership among ASPBAE’s member organisations attended the training. Robbie Guevara, Sandy Morrison and Taka Miyake were the core trainers for the 2008 BLDC.
‘Educating for a New Future – A Training Kit for Peace Educators in South Asia’ was launched on 1 June, 2008 in Kathmandu, Nepal. It is being widely disseminated and popularised among the members in South Asia and a wider set of users such as teachers and other organizations and networks working in the area of peace and conflict resolution and adult/non formal education. A Working Group was constituted which convened on 3-4 June to discuss the launch of the peace kit in India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, the in-country follow up process, and the envisaged documentation of the uses of the Peace Kit by different groups in the sub-region.
Three (3) country-level Training of Trainers (TOT) on the South Asia Peace Educators Training Kit were organized with member organizations in Hyderabad, India on 25-27 August, 2008 with ASMITA, in Imphal, India on 17-19 December, 2008 with Peace Corps Team Manipur and in Birgani, Nepal on 9-11 November, 2008 with Didibahini. ASPBAE is currently in discussion with GPACC South Asia for the translation of the kit in Sinhala and Tamil.
As part of its Indigenous Education Programme, ASPBAE mobilised its members and education coalitions in developing national policy papers to examine the impact of education policy on indigenous people in Australia, Pakistan, India, the Philippines and New Zealand. It is envisaged that the Synthesis of these policy papers be developed into a lobbying document for CONFINTEA 6. The Community Action Tool (CAT) for indigenous education, set into a popular, user friendly guide on organising with indigenous communities is being printed.
ASPBAE continued to organise training workshops in Papua New Guinea to expand the pool of local researchers and surveyors to undertake the adult literacy surveys in the country. This initiative is envisaged to contribute towards a more reliable and robust database on adult literacy achivements in the country to inform good adult literacy policies.
Leadership & Capacity Building