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Marketing and University Communication UW-Green Bay, CL 815 2420 Nicolet Drive Green Bay, WI 54311-7001 (920) 465-2626 E-mail: hildebrs@uwgb.edu Last update: 10/1/07 |
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In
the News Archive - Year:
March 5, 2004 School Zone: By Cynthia Hodnett The first of 10 educators — school district superintendents, officials
from the Baluchistan Education Department, a government school headmaster,
a specialist in community and rural development and a project coordinator
from Islamabad, Pakistan — were welcomed by faculty staff and students
at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay on Monday.
Their visit is hosted by UWGB, which received a $222,945 contract from
the Research Triangle Institute International, a nonprofit corporation
with expertise in education and training.
The institute is administering the Education Sector Reform Action, a
multifaceted, $60 million project funded by the United States Agency for
International Development.
The project took shape after visits to Pakistan by representatives of
the participating American universities, including UWGB. Those visits,
funded by the Research Triangle Institute, enabled the American educators
to determine what the Pakistanis hope to learn.
Fritz Erickson, dean of professional and graduate studies at UW-Green
Bay, cites several challenges facing the system including outdated approaches
to curriculum and instruction, a lack of effective professional development
for educators, a low literacy rate and a high rate of student dropouts.
"The challenge is to help them understand what education in the U.S.
is about," he said. "It's also a chance for us to learn from them."
Bakht Kahn, a government school headmaster, said he hopes to pass along
what he will learn to colleagues in his native country.
"Our country is poor ... there aren't as many resources," Kahn said.
"America is a far more advanced country. We want to learn more regarding
management, motorizing and administration. We want to motivate people
and bring up our educational system just as America has done."
Kahn and others will visit with several local K-12 students and teachers,
school administrators, UW-Green Bay and St. Norbert College students and
faculty, professional education associations, state legislators, and citizens.
More than 500 Wisconsinites will be involved as presenters, mentors, hosts,
and observers of program activities.
Trips to Madison and Washington, D.C., will be planned to teach the
Pakistanis about how education here operates on state and federal levels.
Tuesday, several Pakistanis visited Fallen Timbers Environmental Center
in Black Creek, a hands-on environmental sciences laboratory for six area
public school districts and two colleges.
The educators observed about 30 St. Norbert College students majoring
in elementary education who worked with 125 kindergarten students from
Heritage Elementary School in De Pere. The St. Norbert students asked
the younger students questions and videotaped their answers.
The goal was to show how technology can be used in education, said Krissy
Lukens, instructional technology specialist in the education department
at St. Norbert College.
"It's important for our students to showcase what they do," Lukens said.
UW-Green Bay is collaborating with Eastern Washington University in Cheney,
Wash., on the project, which will host a similar group from Pakistan.
UW-Green Bay and collaborating institutions are part of a large USAID
project consortium which includes the Research Triangle Institute, the
Education Development Center, the American Institute for Research, Save
the Children, World Education, the International Reading Association,
and The Asia Foundation.
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