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Education Coordination Meeting |
EDUCATION/COMMUNITY SERVICES
MEETING
16 August 2001
Minutes
1. Introduction of participants
and definition of the goals.
Focus on educational needs of IDPs.
2. Introducing the current situation and localizing
the main problems/ number of IDPs/ condition of the school buildings/
providing school materials.
According to information given by the MRC the number of IDPs at the moment
is 54,000, or around 20,000 children from 0 to 18 years old.
The condition of the schools in the war-affected areas is very hard to
assess because the authorities have not been there since the crisis started.
It is expected that reconstruction of the school buildings will be necessary.
The school year will start on 1st of September and all children have to
be included. ID children will go to the local school in the place where
they have been relocated. The schools will register them and inform the
Ministry of education about their number. This will help the organizations
that are interested in helping and providing school materials to this
group of children.
The review of the previous school year in the war-affected areas says
that 22,115 children from grade 1 to 4 and 21,091 children from grade
5 to 8 were included in school.
IDPs who are now settled in student dormitories should be moved to another
location by the 15th of August.
Help in providing school materials will be necessary.
3. Exchange of info with regard to ongoing activities
of the participants and their plans about these issues.
- IRC - at the moment
do not have plans about this issue.
- EP - so far there are
not any educational issues taken over from them, but they may help in
reconstruction of the school buildings.
- Step by step - during
the summer Id-children from the collective centres were visiting the
Children`s Creative Center. This activity can continue from September
and transportation can be provided by Step by Step. Also, it can be
arranged for these children to visit kindergartens in the afternoons.
More data wil be available after Tuesday.
- CARE - not implementing
an educational project but are interested in reconstruction of the school
buildings.
- Save the Children -
are planning to provide school materials and are interested in participating
in the renewal of the schools.
- EU - no educational
projects.
- Embassy of Switzerland -
do not have enough budget for that purpose, but are open for collaboration
next year if they have budget.
- Embassy of Netherlands -
have 2 projects related to education: rehabilitation of 50 schools all
over Macedonia and contribution to the youth development project.
- UNHCR - are present
on the field and are ready to share all their field information with
UNICEF, and hope to support the educational project in UNICEF.
4. AOB
Thanks to all for participating.
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