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UNESCO Project on "Non-Formal Education to Meet Basic Learning Needs of Nomadic Women in the Gobi Desert of Mongolia" Ts. Undrakh |
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia Mongolia is a land-locked country of the Central Asia bordering with Russia in the north and China in the south. It has a vast territory of about 1.6 million square kilometers with scattered population of 2.5 million people. About 47 percent of population live in rural areas. One of the distinguishing features of Mongolians is that from the ancient times they lived in a nomadic way of life. It is estimated that 150.000 households are now nomadic or semi-nomadic. Mongolia's nomadic economy is based on about 30 million animal husbandry (horses, sheep, goats, cattle and camels). In 1990, the country changed peacefully from a centrally-planned to a market-driven economy, and from one-party communist state to a democratic nation. Although many of the hardships resulting from this transition were shared by former communist countries in Eastern Europe, Mongolia faced additional problems of geography, harsh climate, lack of infrastructure, and economic dependency. The impact of it on people's lives, whether in cities or in the countryside, was huge. With regard to literacy, the overall literacy rates were 96 percent in 1990. But at present, the country is facing the risk of decreasing functional literacy caused by the lack of TV, reading materials, poor communication system in the country side. Rebuilding the country's human resources became a top priority with self-sufficiency and creation of employment matters of urgency.
Distance Education Project on "Non-Formal Education to Meet Basic Learning Needs of Nomadic Women in the Gobi Desert" was implemented in Mongolia between 1992 and 1997. It was a response to the special conditions created by political and social changes in Mongolia. The shift from a centralized state-run economy to a market one has required new ways of learning and living for the majority of the population, especially the nomadic people in the countryside. Privatization of livestock resulting from a market economy brought new opportunities, as well new hardships, particularly, for women herders, and created an immediate need for greater self-reliance. A needs assessment survey carried out by the government revealed that learning differently and in a new way had become a matter of survival. Along with UNESCO, the state set about planning a project for the nomadic peoples. The project was launched in 1992 as a tripartite partnership between DANIDA, who funded the project with a grant of US$ 1,7 million, UNESCO, who provided consultancy and technical assistance, and the Government of Mongolia, who granted infrastructure, some resources and the staff. The target group was made up of 15.000 nomadic women in the six Gobi provinces (aimags).
Nomadic women constitute about 45 percent of the Mongolian women. They were identified as the most vulnerable group in the transition period. Their workload was increased, opportunities for leisure were limited, access to education, health care and information reduced. Many of them are single women herders with children and newly-arisen demands were varied and heavy for them. Some skills of women herders, inherited from the ancient time, had been lost during the previous regime, some needed improving, and some were unfamiliar still, such as marketing goods, engaging in private enterprise. Life in the Gobi-Desert is hard with extremes of climate ranging from 40C in summer to -40C in winter, lack of water supply, poor parture for cattles. The Gobi Desert occupies the southern third of the country. With less than one person per square kilometer, the Gobi is the least populated area of Mongolia. It has the poorest communication and transportation system, limited supply of electricity. One of the most important considerations was that women play an important role in the family as they could influence on education of other members of the family, particularly children.
How to meet the women's newly-arisen needs for education, training and information? What is the best way(s) to reach large numbers of rural learners scattered over vast distances with minimal resources of transport, communications and funds? How to create a decentralized system of lifelong learning for people accustomed to centralized planning and control? How to attract, teach and encourage nomadic people for continuous self-learning. To meet these challenges, non-formal education was introduced as the approach and the distance education as the means.
To create learning materials (printed, audio, video and etc.) to meet the Gobi women's new needs. To develop Mongolia's capacity to provide appropriate, adapted non-formal education for its people. To help empower women to make decisions and take actions which would enhance the quality of their lives.
The first step was a needs analysis. It was carried out in three of six Gobi provinces in 1992. Over 140 families were consulted, along with provincial and district officials and community. The purpose of this was to pinpoint basic learning needs and to learn more about the lives of the Women. Preparing the Project had three main tasks: establishing administrative infrastructure and planning the logistics; developing a learning system and materials; and training people for different role. Training to find new approaches to teaching adults which was new for Mongolia. Coordinating committees were set up at national and local levels Print and radio groups were established. (Gobi Women's Project studio at Mongol Radio in Ulaanbaatar, three local radio studios reaching all six provinces were re-equipped.) International consultants were invited from UNESCO, Australia, Denmark, Norway, Great Britain, USA. Workshops for the new Non-formal Education team. Guidelines for teacher-training programme were developed, using a cascade model. 10 teacher-trainers would be trained, then each in turn coached ten teachers in their own districts. Only at this stage 14 Russian jeeps, 240 radios along 25.000 batteries were supplied. The Pilot phase took place from February to June 1995. 1500 nomadic women were selected from 10 selected sums (districts) in six Gobi provinces. A three-day crash course was organized in each district. They received each 5 booklets and radio, batteries, pens and papers, met with their visiting teachers. Two 30 minute weekly radio lessons were broadcast. It's purpose was to test the planned administrative structure, visiting teachers system and learning materials. During the pilot phase, feedback was gathered from questionnaires, field-trips and reports for use in the main phase. The main phase began in January 1996 and finished in December 1996. This time, the programme involved ten times as many women: 15.000 of them aged 15-45, in 62 districts with 620 visiting teachers. The pattern of activity was similar to that of the pilot phase: over 2.000 radios, 40.000 batteries and 23 booklets (16.000-17.000 copies each) were printed and distributed. 30 Russian jeeps were provided for project activities.
Health: family planning, hygiene, health care, nutrition, first aid. Survival and income-generating skills: producing wool, refining camel fleece, making felt, camel saddles, Mongol deels or traditional garments, boots, crocheting, embroidery, baking bread, growing vegetables, using plants and flowers for medical use, converting animal dung into fuel, working with leather, livestock rearing techniques, processing hides and etc. Business skills: price negotiating, planning, production, accounting, marketing and selling products. Literacy and numeracy support: Mongolian fairy tales, mathematics, civics, the environment, current affairs.
Printed materials were a key component of the distance learning system. At the end of the Project 23 booklets on health, income generation and literacy support themes had been produced and distributed. They covered different topics such as family planing, crafts, small business, growing vegetables, civics, environment, literacy and etc. Newsletters, information sheets, teacher's booklets and demonstration materials were also produced locally. Radio programmes based on print materials were produced both centrally and locally. Two programmes: "Sunrise" (covered health, survival, income generation, small business) and "Shortcut" (literacy lessons) were broadcast nation-wide from the capital city. They broadcast 40 lessons on different subjects in 1996 while three local radio stations produced 194 programmes. Visiting teachers: The project trained 620 "visiting teachers" through training workshops for 62 teacher-trainers. Visiting teachers were each responsible for about 15 learners. "Crash courses", workshops, group meetings were an important activity and opportunity for women to exchange with experiences views of life and their needs. This kind of meetings provided much social support, an opportunity for direct contacts and reducing their feeling of being isolated. Exhibitions of local craft production were added to "crash courses", seminars and workshops. Information centers or Non-formal Education centers were established in almost all sums to support learners and visiting teachers. "Traveling boxes" were designed and supplied additional relevant and available reading materials, cassettes with radio lessons.
The Ministry of Education had the overall management responsibility for the project implementation through the National Coordinating Committee (based at the Ministry), provincial (called ACC) and district committees (called SCC). NCC members came from the Ministry of Education, Educational Research Institute, Mongol Radio. Its role was to coordinate the project, monitor progress, control finance and carry out evaluations. The only full-time staff was the Project Coordinator, all other personnel, including Project Director, were part-time. Each of six Gobi provinces had a coordinating committee as did each of the 62 districts. Their members were teachers, doctors, veterinarians, accountants, members of the Women's Federation and etc. Organizational structure Print group National Coordinating Committee Radio group Aimag Coordinating Committees Local radio + print groups in number) Sum's Coordinationg Committees in number) Visiting teachers and teacher-trainerss in number) Monitoring and evaluation took place at central and aimag levels. They were of two types: internal and external. Internal monitoring and evaluation were conducted by NCC and ACC. While experts from UNESCO carried out external monitoring and evaluation.
It was new for Mongolia. There was no non-formal education structure in education system (only one officer at the Ministry of Education). Major difficulties were caused by the lack of experiences in non-formal and distance education activities. Especially, there was very little understanding and experience of designing and preparing distance learning materials. Aside it, the country lacked production capacity. It was hampered by severe shortage of paper. Need for better Coordination. Making a distance leaning system function well is a complex task. For example, late production of some booklets diminished the quality of the learning resources and system. The radio programmes were broadcast as scheduled but sometimes long before learners received the related booklets. Need for teamwork cooperation between groups and individuals of different skills and job-roles. For example, print and radio groups need to harmonize their efforts and collaborate closely to produce well-integrated radio and print materials. Local material producers also need to know central plans in advance so that they can align their materials accordingly. Need to improvement of learning materials quality, including their standards, matching learners' language levels and pre-existing knowledge (though it is to do with diverse target groups) Supporting visiting teachers, in particular with transportation means. The project depended on the goodwill and voluntary efforts of visiting teachers during the present crisis period, but in the long term this may not continue without some incentives. Therefore, their work needs better support from local government. It is regarded that literacy needs be given more priority and developed more strongly. It should be a core issue of the new project due to the fact that many children dropped out of formal schools during the transition period and the risk of decreasing functional literacy.
The Gobi Women Project was the country's first large-scale non-formal education project . It was a significant landmark in the establishment of non-formal and distance education in Mongolia. It has built capacity at the central and provincial level. Non-formal education now has growing attention from education policy makers and planners, and increased support from the Government . It was included into the new Education Law, approved by the Parliament in 1995, that "Citizens can have education through formal or non-formal channels" and "the Government shall provide alternative and open education". The Government approved a National Programme for Non-formal Education for 1996-2000 with the goal of developing non-formal education system. It has also taken up steps to establish a Non-Formal Education Center based on the experiences gained and capacity built during the implementation of the Project. The next step, nation-wide Non-formal Basic Distance Education Project, has been launched to be implemented from March 1997 to 2000 in cooperation with UNESCO and supported by DANIDA finding. The focus is now on family-based learning covering the whole country: women, men, children, with an emphasis on the needs of out-of-school children and unemployed youth. Using distance education as a means, the programme is designed to a variety of learning needs.
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