or 2008, ASPBAE’s leadership and capacity development efforts will remain focused on the twin priorities of: (1) leadership building and capacity-development to support regional and national advocacy efforts of education campaign coalitions and other CSO campaigners to advance the right to education and lifelong learning; and (2) leadership and capacity development of adult educators in innovative, rights-based and gender sensitive adult education practice, in the work of the member organizations and in ASPBAE’s priority themes.

These will be defined cognizant of two key processes in the year: the 5th General Assembly (GA) of ASPBAE and CONFINTEA 6 national and regional preparatory work.

Given the 5th GA, ASPBAE’s capacity-development efforts will necessarily have to be oriented to institutional and movement-building efforts as is characteristic of its General Assembly processes. Alongside this, ASPBAE’s capacity-building work should also enable the mobilization of a credible, strong and effective CSO contribution to the CONFINTEA 6 processes, articulating clear and achievable policy demands and targets.

Another important consideration in ASPBAE’s leadership and capacity development efforts involve the expanded demands on ASPBAE given its wider programmes, the current policy context and spaces; and its greater responsibilities in the global education movement for change. These necessitate the development of a wider pool of trainers and facilitators, capable of taking on these expanding roles in a sustained and ongoing (not one- off) effort.

An integrative rather than thematic-based approach will thus substantially characterize the leadership and capacity-development efforts in the year. The 2008 activities defined in this regard are described as follows:

The ASPBAE Fifth General Assembly processes in 2008 will involve a combination of country-level meetings and processes steered by the accredited ASPBAE members themselves, electronic and face to face consultations on proposed Constitutional amendments and electronic voting on the new ASPBAE Executive Council and Constitutional changes. A Regional Consultation of ASPBAE Members is planned for August 26-28, 2008 to 1) collectively reflect on the ASPBAE current experience and realities and the proposed future directions – with impact on the Constitution and ASPBAE’s strategic plans for the next period; and 2) share information on the CONFINTEA 6 processes and ASPBAE plans in this regard, with a view to inspiring informed CSO action locally for the national CONFINTEA 6 processes. The ASPBAE Executive Council members are expected to participate in this Consultation and will convene immediately after, in a Special Meeting of the Executive Council to discuss the outcomes of the Consultation and its implications on the succeeding governance processes

ASPBAE will organize a Regional CSO Strategizing Workshop for Adult Education Advocacy in July 2008.  This aims to bring together adult education advocates and campaigners; education campaign coalitions and other ASPBAE members to define and agree on: 1) a roll out advocacy and campaign plan for CONFINTEA 6 regional and global processes: core CSO messages, policy asks, targets, planned action defined; 2) strategic directions for an ASPBAE advocacy effort on adult literacy and adult education: defining how to utilize other policy spaces regionally (EFA MDA processes and their follow up, Education Ministers meets etc), globally (UNLD, FTI, EFA HLG and WG) and nationally, especially in high population countries with high adult illiteracy rates; and possible mobilizations and public education during campaign ‘moments’  eg annual Sept 8 Literacy Day, GAW 2009; 3) identification of capacity-development needs to enable the proposed action to include policy work and analysis required. The discussions in this Workshop will build from the education campaign coalitions’ work on Literacy and non-formal education in Indonesia and the Philippines and Literacy Mapping particularly in PNG and the Solomon Islands.

The ASPBAE Basic Leadership Development Course will be organized in March 26 – 3 April, 2008 in Siem Reap, Cambodia. This course would involve some 24 participants from across the region. The Course is designed as an induction programme to ASPBAE, targeting second-line leadership in ASPBAE member organizations.  The different modules of the leadership course which were piloted last year and documented in a Manual of the ASPBAE BLDC, will be employed in this Training. Sandra Morisson and Robbie Guevara are the BLDC 2008 Course Directors with Taka Miyake, ASPBAE EC member as part of the Course Faculty.

In response to the demand for more skills-based training in popular communications, participatory facilitation approaches and use of new information technologies alongside other popular forms for teaching-learning ASPBAE will pilot an ASPBAE Basic Training Course on Facilitation for Transformative Learning building on the earlier Course run by ASPBAE and SEAPCP on education campaigns. In keeping with the strong interest to develop and generate a strong second line leadership, ASPBAE will also prioritise for this Course, those in the ASPBAE membership and staff who have the interest and potential to take on greater facilitation, training and leadership roles in the regional thematic programmes of ASPBAE. A basic but sustained mentoring effort is envisaged for these core ASPBAE trainers/leaders with this Course as one means to shore up competencies. On-the-job mentoring is also envisaged with ASPBAE activities in the year as possible learning platforms.

To sustain this effort,  ASPBAE recognizes that it may need to  1) broaden the pool of resource persons and trainers to assume these mentoring roles and 2) expand the learning spaces for sustained training/mentoring i.e. community interactions, national events etc. It was also pointed out that the vision to strengthen and expand the pool of adult education leaders and trainers in empowering and transformative learning approaches is a shared goal of other partner education networks such as SEAPCP, KOMAS, PEPE, to mention some. Hence, ASPBAE shall initiate a Multi-centric Initiative on Facilitation for Transformative Learning, bringing together 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 1) share training resources, competencies, learning spaces and platforms towards expanding the pool of leaders/trainers/facilitators on transformative learning approaches; 2)  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. A Working Group meeting to explore the possibility of this initiative is planned for end May 2008.

For further information, please contact Maria Khan at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it and/or Bernie Lovegrove at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .

The ongoing initiatives and commitments within the thematic programmes will be pursued in the year:

• HIV/AIDS Education Programme

ASPBAE in collaboration with the Positive Learning Working Group (PLWG) would continue its focus on HIV/AIDS issues of stigma and discrimination in education. The PLWG’s value addition has been its ability to bring together the education sector and the health –oriented sector in HIV/AIDS work for joint action. This partnership is critical since increasingly, HIV/AIDs activists are realizing that the most strategic responses to HIV/AIDS prevention and support rely significantly on education. Earlier efforts of the PLWG had brought together education advocates and practitioners working on community-based education interventions. In the coming period, PLWG intends to explore stronger interactions with education stakeholders in the formal system – addressing issues of stigma and discrimination in schools and HIV/AIDS prevention and support. PLWG, through ASPBAE are in discussion with Education International and Action Aid International on concrete ways forward in this respect. A joint Capacity-building Workshop on Stigma and Discrimination in Schools is under discussion.

For further information, please contact Maria Khan and/or Suprabha Agarwal at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .

•  Indigenous People’s Education

ASPBAE’s Indigenous Education Programme completed the development of a Community Audit Tool (CAT), aimed at enabling IP communities to assess and develop poverty alleviation strategies. The framework for the CAT was completed, which incorporates earlier piloting efforts. This will be printed in 2008 as a user-guide to aid further and expanded application and use of indigenous communities and educators. ASPBAE will consider inclusion of some of the exercises in CAT in the proposed ASPBAE Basic Training Course on Facilitation for Transformative Learning especially to sensitise the Course to indigenous peoples learning systems and approaches.

In addition Policy Briefs in South Asia, South East Asia and the South Pacific will continue to be developed to assist ASPBAE, national education campaign coalitions and other community-based education groups supporting the right of indigenous people to quality education and highlight indigenous peoples issues in education campaigns and advocacy in the region and globally. The Policy Briefs from India, Philippines and New Zealand are scheduled to be ready by April - May 2008 and Policy Briefs from Australia, Pakistan, Cambodia and Indonesia will be pursued.

ASPBAE in cooperation with the School for Maori and Pacific Development, University of Waikato, New Zealand, will participate in the World Indigenous Peoples Conference (WIPC) on December 7-11, 2008 in Melbourne, Australia. ASPBAE will showcase its experience in indigenous people’s education and the use the CAT, during the WIPC 2008.

For further information, please contact John Shanth Kumar at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .

• Education for Peace and Conflict Prevention

In South Asia, the Peace Educators Training Kit will be widely disseminated and popularised among the members in South Asia and a wider canvass of users such as teachers and other organizations and networks working in the area of peace and conflict resolution and adult/non formal education. Media launches  of the Peace Kit in India, Pakistan, Nepal and Sri Lanka, with the support of ASPBAE partners in these countries are envisaged. A discussion meeting for planning in-country follow up and in country workshops and documentation are also planned for the year.

A compilation of reports of all peace education and conflict prevention workshops organized by ASPBAE and other resources would be undertaken towards developing a resource pool for peace educators from across the region.

ASPBAE will continue to focus on strengthening the sub regional peace educator’s networks and linking them with programmes and activities of other networks such as Global Campaign for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC) and the peace campaigns of focus on the Global South.

For further information, please contact Nasreen Mohammed and/or John Shanth Kumar at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

• Education for Citizenship and Good Governance

The Commonwealth Foundation (CF) and ASPBAE are in a partnership to provide a series of training workshops and capacity building opportunities for community organisers and citizen’s group facilitators in different sub-regions of the Commonwealth over the four year period 2007 to 2010 using the CEAL Guide as a base.

Since the Workshops in 2007 were in South Asia and the South Pacific, the Workshops for the first half of 2008 are targeted for Southern Africa (probably Lesotho) and one in the Caribbean. ASPBAE will be expected to provide training and resource person support for these Workshops. ASPBAE is also in discussion with CF on plans to produce a documentation of the four sub-regional workshops and a report tracking the use of the Guide with possible suggestions on next steps. In the next half of 2008 until early 2009, national follow up CEAL Guide trainings may be envisaged – possibly one each in the South Pacific, South East Asia and South Asia.

For further information, please contact Bernie Lovegrove at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it and/or John Shanth Kumar at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .