2009 - Jan - Feb - Mar - Apr - May - Jun - Jul - Aug - Sep - Oct - Nov - Dec

2008 - Jan - Feb - Mar - Apr - May - Jun - Jul - Aug - Sep - Oct - Nov - Dec

2007 - Jan - Feb - Mar - Apr - May - Jun - Jul - Aug - Sep - Oct - Nov - Dec

30 January

• Director-General of UNESCO discusses situation in Gaza strip and plans for recovery
  On Monday 26 January, Mr Koïchiro Matsuura, the Director-General of UNESCO, gave a live-interview on the situation in the Gaza Strip to Al-Jazeera TV Channel. Mr Matsuura reiterated his great distress at the civilian death tolls witnessed during the crisis, and emphasized the need to secure rapid access to basic goods and educational services for all children and youth in Gaza.

• Director-General supports the AlFakhoora campaign
  On 26 January 2009, Mr Koïchiro Matsuura, Director-General of UNESCO, relayed his support for the AlFakhoora campaign in a video message. Launched in Qatar on 8 January last, AlFakhoora is an international student solidarity campaign, supported by Her Highness Sheikha Mozah Bint Nasser Al Missned, UNESCO Special Envoy for Basic and Higher Education. The campaign aims to raise awareness about the plight of students in Gaza and to appeal to the international community to raise its voice in insisting that education be protected during the current crisis.
  

22 January

• Exhibition on the World Digital Library Project
  From 20 - 24 April 2009. UNESCO Headquarters, Paris. France. Organized Library of Congress (USA)
  The World Digital Library will make available on the Internet, free of charge and in multilingual format, significant primary materials from cultures around the world, including manuscripts, maps, rare books, musical scores, recordings, films, prints, photographs, archi­tectural drawings, and other significant cultural materials. The objectives of the World Digital Library are to promote international and inter-cultural understanding and awareness, provide resources to educators, expand non-English and non-Western content on the Internet, and to contribute to scholarly research.

16 January

• UNESCO at the 2009 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos: Education Partnerships Vital for Development
  UNESCO will join global political, business and civil society leaders gathered at the 2009 World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland from 28 January to 1 February to highlight the vital role of partnerships in achieving Education for All.

13 January

• Live broadcasting of the inaugural lessons of Collège de France. January 5, 2009
  The courses taught in the Collège de France in the future are online, in audio or video format, at www.college-de-france.fr. In order to better know this option in the French-speaking countries, the Collège de France established an association with the University Agency of the Francophonie. According to this agreement, videoconference debates of the French-speaking virtual campuses (CNF) of the AUF will be organized after the live broadcasting of the inaugural lectures of the Collège de France. The first experience in this sense will be about the inaugural lectures of the chair “Knowledge against poverty”. This chair, recently created, is an annual chair whose first holder is Mrs Esther Duflo, French economist who works in the MIT. The inaugural lecture will be broadcasted live on the Web of the Collège de France, Thursday January 8 , 2009 at 6.00 p.m. (France time). It will be followed, on Tuesday January 13, 2009 at 3.00 p.m. (France time), by a videoconference debate that will involve the CNF of Sofia (Bulgaria), Bamako (Mali), Rabat (Morocco) and Antananarivo (Madagascar). A second videoconference is planned on the occasion of the inaugural lecture of the Chair “Sustainable development” (On March 5, 2009), with the demographer Henri Leridon.

9 January

• Practical on-line survey tool to monitor your projects available for free
  Just a quick note to inform you about the existence of a very practical and free (or a more robust paid version) on-line survey tool which can be potentially used to your benefit in the work you do relating to heritage projects. The Survey Monkey gives you all the tools you need to create your own surveys quickly and easily. Excellent for project evaluation or in project or programme design.

7 January

• Europeana is back online
  Europeana.eu is a collaboration between universities, research institutes and content providers. The site is a prototype, and in the coming year we will be developing it in response to users' feedback and making it operational.

• 27th Meeting of the Regional Coordinating Committee of Cultural MERCOSUR
  Held in the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on December 3 and 4, 2008, the 27th Meeting of the Regional Coordinating Committee of the Cultural Mercosur with the participation of the following countries: Argentine Republic, Federal Republic of Brazil, Republic of Paraguay, Eastern Republic of Uruguay, Republic of Bolivia, Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela, Republic of Ecuador, Republic of Peru, Republic of Colombia and Republic of Chile. Contact: Frédéric Vacheron, Culture Specialist, UNESCO Office in Montevideo fvacheron@unesco.org.uy

6 January

• “House of Arts and Culture” International Architecture Competition Beirut
  This important project has represented our major undertaking of the year. We have completed the works on the concept, the preparation of a scientific and architectural programme, the establishment of contracts with the International Union of Architects (UIA) and the constitution of an International Jury composed of reputed architects and art curators. On the 4th of July, we have launched the International Architecture Competition at the UIA General Assembly in Torino. At this ceremony, the Lebanese Minister of Culture gave a speech on the importance Lebanon gives to this project that will reinforce creativity in the country. Hundreds of architects from more than 60 countries are now registered to the competition and the Jury is expected to meet in Beirut in March 2009.

5 January

• EU/EDUCATION: Developing links in higher education between Europe and Africa
  For the first time, major African and European universities, higher education experts and Erasmus Mundus Alumni students gathered in Brussels on 4 and 5 December to examine ways to strengthen links between higher education institutions in Africa and Europe and increase the mobility of students, researchers and teachers between the two continents. During the conference, the debate hinged on the experience gained from implementing mobility programmes, in particular Erasmus Mundus. From this, participants sought to find ways of making the best possible use of the new phase of the Erasmus Mundus programme (2009 – 2013). http://www.study-in-europe.org/

• EU/EDUCATION: EU increases academic cooperation with North America and Asia-Pacific
  The European Commission is consolidating the longstanding academic cooperation with the US and Canada with the launch in December 1st, of a new round of 24 innovative projects involving universities and training institutions on both sides of the Atlantic. In addition, this year 11 joint curriculum development and student mobility projects were agreed and launched with Australia, Japan, South Korea and New Zealand. All these projects are jointly funded and supervised by the European Commission and the governments in the partner countries. The objective is to promote mutual understanding, transparency and quality in higher education and training, by setting up long-term institutional cooperation at bachelor's and master's level, allowing students from Europe and from the partner countries to have a unique experience studying abroad in a global context...
  To find out more:
  EU-US Atlantis http://europa.eu.int/comm/education/programmes/eu-usa/index_en.html
  EU-Canada http://ec.europa.eu/education/programmes/eu-canada/index_en.html
  EU-Australia, Japan, N.Zealand, S.Korea http://ec.europa.eu/education/industrialised-countries

• EU/EDUCATION: Tempus IV gives € 60 m to university cooperation projects
  The European Commission gave on November 28 its approval to 63 university co-operation and 13 other high quality projects under the new phase of the Tempus programme, selected from 530 applications. All 28 Tempus partner countries are involved, with a total budget of € 60 million. 600 universities from the partner countries and 300 from the EU will participate in these projects.The Tempus programme supports the modernisation of higher education and creates an area of co-operation in countries outside the EU. Established in 1990 the scheme now covers 28 countries in the Western Balkans, Eastern Europe, Central Asia, North Africa and the Middle East. The Tempus projects are based on multilateral partnerships between higher education institutions from the EU and partner countries...