Water Facts and Conservation Tips

Did You Know?

• There is about the same amount of water on Earth now as there was millions of years ago.
• Nearly 97 percent of all the world's water is salty or otherwise undrinkable.
• Another 2 percent is locked in ice caps and glaciers. That leaves 1 percent for all our needs.
• Water regulates the Earth's temperature. It also regulates the temperature of the human body!
• The average total home water use for each person in the U.S. is about 50 gallons a day.
• The average cost for water supplied to a home in the U.S. is about $2.00 for 1,000 gallons, which equals about 5 gallons for a penny.
• More water is used in the bathroom than any other place in the home. A dripping faucet can waste up to 2,000 gallons of water a year.

You Can Help Conserve Our Water Resources At school and at home, You can help protect our water resources.

• Turn off the tap in your bathroom while you brush your teeth.
• Take shorter showers. (Get a timer and time yourself.) Don't let the water run constantly while you're washing or rinsing dishes.
• Fill a pitcher with tap water and put it in the fridge, rather than running the tap every time you want a cold drink!
• Clean sidewalks and driveways with a broom--not the water hose!
• Water your lawn in the early morning to avoid evaporation.
• Repair dripping faucets.
• Place a layer of mulch around trees and plants to retain water.
  
  

UN culture agency celebrates life of poet, philosopher and spiritual leader Rumi

6 September 2007 – A demonstration of Sufi dancing, an exhibition of manuscripts, books and paintings, and an international seminar of scholars are among the events being held today by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to celebrate the 800th anniversary of the birth of the poet, philosopher and Muslim spiritual leader Mawlana Jalal-ud-Din Balkhi-Rumi.
UNESCO said it would issue a commemorative medal in honour of the man known also as Rumi as part of the day-long programme being held at its headquarters in Paris. Afghanistan, Iran and Turkey have helped organize the festivities.
Born in 1207 in Balkh in what is now Afghanistan, Rumi is the author of the renowned Mathnawi or “Rhyming Couplets.” After being exiled, he spent most of his life in Konya, which is in present-day Turkey. Since his death in 1273, Rumi has come to be considered one of the greatest Sufi masters.
In a press statement UNESCO said today’s seminar brings together eminent scholars and philosophers from Member States to discuss themes relating to the thought, message and universality of Rumi.
A performance of Sufi dancing by troupes from Afghanistan, Iran and Turkey will also take place, while the exhibition of books, manuscripts and paintings relating to Rumi will remain on display until 14 September.

What should education do for building a world full of love and peace?

416 in Virginia Tech shocked the whole world. Our society needs love and peace, but what should education do for it?I think first we should educate our children to love the current society they live. That is, to educate the children to take responsibility for development of the world, or at least his/her own family. In order to achieve that, children would be taught how to use and create kinds of necessary tools for subsistence in this world. Consequently academic skills become the first thing for children to learn, which give children basic tools, such as calculation and communication, to live in this society.However, paying attention to academic skills doesn’t mean we should ask our children achieve exactly equally and similarly. Just as what Charles W. Eliot said, “promote pupils not by battalions, but in the most irregular and individual way possible.” The highest level of civilization is to respect. As for education, to respect our children is to admit they are gifted differently. That is the first reason for concentrating basic academic skills. A child will not know what interested him, mathematics or history, until he learned basic subjects to some basic extent. So learning broad academic skills will be helpful for children’s choice and for realizing society’s diversity. And the second reason can be expounded borrowing a metaphor. The area of triangular base of a pyramid determines the height the pyramid reach. In this way, a person’s knowledge seems like the area of the triangular base, and his contribution seems like the height of the pyramid: the broader his knowledge is, the more he might contribute to the society. Consequently, it is essential to let children learn broad academic skills.Secondly, children should be educated to love themselves. To wit, children should know what their rights are and how to enjoy their rights, which was also illustrated in “Report of the Commissioners Appointed to Fix the Site of the University of Virginia” .Thirdly and finally, children should learn to love and educate their offspring. Nowadays we are arguing about education and schooling, and in the argument almost everyone knows education should not only include school education, but also include factors from family, community and society. For example, if a child grew up in a society full of discrimination towards minorities, the possibility for him to treat others equally after he grew up would be almost zero. So in this way, environment affects children’s growth greatly. As illustrated in the former example, the child’s consciousness of discrimination probably came from public opinions, even though his school is integrated. Consequently, if we want to get a society without discrimination, it is essential to educate our children to respect and love others; and the starting point to achieve that is that adults should respect and love every other members in the society especially when they are together with their children. That is, any adults should “realize” their responsibility for educating children. Adults in current society cannot achieve that, but we should do our best to let our children achieve that “realization” when they became adults.

Send your dreams and projects in your mind share your life style and everything about school life, and get a reward. You can send a letter with a photograph and/or a picture, a drawing or any other material to my e mail adress ( mr.nedim@gmail.com ) then we will publish your post. You will share your dreams with the rest of the World , You will have a chance to realize your projects and even find suporters and You will get a reward of being A Global Student.
Hurry up and be the first gobal student.
Note: Dont forget to send your photo...

The Right to Education

Article 26 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: "Everyone has the right to education. Education shall be free, at least in the elementary and fundamental stages. Elementary education shall be compulsory. Technical and professional education shall be made generally available and higher education shall be equally accessible to all on the basis of merit."
The right to at least a primary education is seen as so important that the United Nations gave it the second highest priority in the Millennium Development Goals, after the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger.
The importance of education is that it creates opportunities and choices for individuals, offering chances to improve standards of living while creating citizens who are skilful, well-informed and equipped to help their country achieve economic and social prosperity. READ MORE....

Primary Education

Millions of children around the world are deprived of the right to education. The result: One out of three children never see the inside of a classroom. UNESCO works with national governments and development partners to achieve universal free primary education and gender equality by 2015.

Early Childhood

Early childhood education has vast potential for human development and is vital to achieving Education for All.As learning begins at birth and continues throughout life, UNESCO’s goal is to assist countries in expanding access to early childhood education, improving its quality and ensuring equity at this vital stage.

Girls education become so critical in Sudan’s Lakes

Girls education in Lakes state as well as the rest of the southern Sudan with the peace has become an important factor for economic and social development. However, with the poverty parents minimize the importance of education and choose early marriage as strategy of survival. But, before the marriage, families prefer keeping girls for cooking food instead of sending them to schools.

Dinka girl without school kept to cook food for family in Rumbek (photo by Manyang Mayom).
Lakes State has an estimate of 93,900km. It has eight (8) Counties with 52 Payams and an estimated population of 1,276,381 million people. About 57% of these are children of school going age. The State has 283 functioning basic schools, most in the open (under trees). Students’ enrollment status, the enrollment standard at 107,384 children (84,384 boys and 22,648 girls) enrolled to schools in the 283 schools (the first wave of registration – April – May 2007). Net figure might changes as enrollment is therefore only 15% of children of school going age. However, this figure might change as enrollment drive continues during the year. The ministry plans to enroll 120,000 additional children to school in 2007.
In Dinka Agar traditionally, Girls are kept at home or cattle-camp to guide children and animals” in Lakes state community girls are still kept for neither generating wealth resources nor sending them to schools. Few girls in Lakes are sent to school by their parents and still those girls in schools are facing difficulties from their age-mate at cattle-camp, telling them that you are already adultery girls who will make no progress in Sudan.
“Early marriages in Lakes also become too much abusing girls educations”.
90% in schools are boys in Lakes while 30% are girls’ underage attending classes with boys, the state minister for education, science and technology H.E. Gordon Maker Abol said that girls’ education in Lakes state must to be encourage with full power of whoever call herself sons/daughters of Rumbek. Let us educate our girls so that we must feet ourselves to the world of coming three generation millennium because it is too late for us now to feet in.
In some areas around Lakes State and one finds that girls are still kept on hard time working and cooking food to their family. Girls in Lakes are not events respected by their own parents at home. Boys in Lakes become most powerful in the community of Lakes presentation since the government of Lakes state was put in action structure in 2005; there is no signal girl that had presented a poem or any concerns for girls to present her right at the front of community in Rumbek Freedom Square.
Women also become new subject to Government of Lakes State presentation as well the State minister for information, Culture, Youths and Sports is only a women presenting in executive State council of ministers and Lakes State Interim Legislative Assembly is only composed with 12 women while other three (3) women from Others Southern Sudan political party, including SPLM eight (8) women members “ Said Mary Barnaba a member of Interim Lakes State Assembly, chairperson of the specialized committee for Information.” The match majority of Girls in Rumbek are under their family control.
Peace in southern Sudan turns people’s thoughts to marriage and investment — both of which traditionally involve giving, or keeping, cows. For the government, the cows are proving too much of a good thing. Parents-in-law are demanding cows promised as bride-price during the long war years, and this together with a sudden increase in ready cash has sent the price of cattle sky high. But the Sudanese are in the habit of keeping — not selling — their cows, and as traders in neighbouring Uganda take advantage of higher prices to sell their cattle into Sudan, the huge influx is creating a trade deficit, encouraging cattle-rustling, and damaging pastures.
The authorities are trying to change people’s attitudes and encourage them to turn to profit-based herding and to sell off surplus cows at regular intervals to make money. It is not an easy task. Through decades of war, cows were one of the few stores of wealth for many people, especially the descendants of pastoralists who lived off their milk, blood or meat and counted a man’s wealth by the size of his herd. "You have to pay cows for marriage, you cannot get it for free or money.
The inflow of cash that peace has brought, combined with a backlog of demand for cows as bride-price, has pushed up prices and reversed a previous flow of cattle out of Sudan to Uganda. Since the January 2005 peace deal Sudanese have imported cows in unprecedented numbers, authorities say.

HIV Risk Behavior

Researchers have found that abstinence only sex education programmes in high income countries do not reduce HIV risk behaviour. Investigators from the Centre for Evidence-Based Intervention at Oxford University conducted a systematic analysis of all published studies looking at the effectiveness of abstinence only education. They failed to find any significant evidence that such initiatives reduce the incidence of sexually transmitted infection or pregnancy, or affect sexual behaviour. The study is published in the August 3rd edition of the British Medical Journal. A review of abstinence only education in developing countries presented to last year’s international AIDS conference reached similar conclusions. As there is no effective vaccine for HIV, behavioural interventions to prevent new infections are essential. One such intervention is abstinence only sex education. This encourages individuals – usually teenagers – to refrain from sexual activity until marriage, or to return to abstinence until marriage if they have already initiated sexual relationships. Abstinence programmes differ in their design. Some have the avoidance of pregnancy as their primary outcome, and therefore focus primarily on vaginal intercourse, whereas others are focused on the avoidance of HIV and sexually transmitted infections and counsel abstinence from all forms of sexual activity including anal, oral and vaginal sex. Abstinence only education does not mention condoms as a method of HIV prevention except in the context of their failure rate. By contrast, abstinence plus education also promote the use of condoms. Investigators focused their attention on abstinence only programmes. They noted that such HIV prevention initiatives were the focus of considerable political interest, particularly in the United States and in countries in receipt of funds from the Presidential Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). The exclusion of broadly-based safer sex initiatives from PEPFAR funding has occasioned intense controversy. However, debates about abstinenc- only education have often occurred without reference to methodologically rigorous evidence. Therefore investigators from Oxford University decided to conduct an “apolitical, up to date systematic review” of studies looking at abstinence only education in richer countries. They hypothesised that such countries would have conditions favourable to abstinence-only education. Investigators searched through 30 electronic databases and the proceedings of conferences to identify randomised controlled trials looking at the biological (i.e. avoidance of HIV or sexually transmitted infections) and behavioural (avoidance of sexual activity) effectiveness of abstinence education. They also expanded their search to include on-going or recently completed studies. A total of 13 studies were identified. All were conducted in the United States. Eight involved ethnically mixed populations, and five had mainly white participants. None assessed outcomes by reported sexual orientation. Reported sexual behaviours were limited to vaginal sex. None of the studies gathered information on anal or oral intercourse. Nor did any of the studies include testing for HIV or sexually transmitted infections, relying on self-report of sexually transmitted infections or pregnancy. None of the studies found that abstinence-only education protected individuals from self-reported sexually transmitted infections in either the short or longer term. Indeed, one study found that adolescents who received abstinence only education had an increased risk of sexually transmitted infections after three and 17 months. Similarly, none of the studies found that abstinence only education reduced the incidence of self-reported pregnancy. The investigators then turned their attention to behavioural outcomes. Five studies assessed the incidence of unprotected vaginal sex. None found a protective effect of abstinence education. Seven studies looked at the incidence of any vaginal sex, and although one study did find that abstinence only education had a positive effect, it had severe methodological limitations as more participants reported having sex in the previous month than ever having had sex. Four studies looked at the frequency of vaginal sex. None found that abstinence only education was effective, indeed one found the opposite. Eight studies examined whether abstinence only education reduced numbers of sexual partners. Yet again, no beneficial effect was observed. None of the studies promoted condom use, and unsurprisingly, there was no evidence that abstinence only education yielded greater use of condoms or more consistent condom use. Nor did abstinence education have any effect on sexual initiation, an issue that was explored in ten studies. One recently completed study did, however, find that adolescents who received abstinence only education were significantly less likely to report vaginal sex. However, the investigators note “these findings are offset by the non-significant findings of ten included trials in out review.” “Evidence from this review suggests that abstinence only programmes that aim to prevent HIV infection are ineffective”, write the authors. They caution, “the generalisability of these results may be limited to the United States.” They suggest that “evidence from this review might inform ongoing assessments of US policy on abstinence only interventions, which have received federal funding since 1981.” The authors of an accompanying editorial write, “when compared with various control groups, there was little evidence that risky sexual behaviour, including sexually transmitted infections, or pregnancy were reduced in adolescents in abstinence only programmes. Abstinence only programmes did not increase primary abstinence or secondary abstinence.” They continue, “in contrast…programmes that promote the use of condoms greatly reduce the risk of acquiring HIV, especially when such programmes are culturally tailored behavioural interventions targeting people at highest risk of HIV.” As a result, the authors believe the US should prioritise “culturally sensitive, sex specific, behavioural interventions that target black and Hispanic patients in clinics for sexually transmitted infections, men who have sex with men, and adolescents being treated for drug misuse who are at highest risk of acquiring HIV.” Reference Underhill K et al. Sexual abstinence only programmes to prevent HIV infection in high income countries: systematic review. British Medical Journal (online edition), August 3rd, 2007. Hawes EH et al. Is there a role for abstinence only programmes for HIV prevention in high income countries? British Medical Journal (online edition), August 3rd, 2007

Global alliance 'to educate all'

Businesses are joining forces with governments and international groups to try to meet a pledge to provide education for all children by 2015.

The Partnerships for Education was announced in Brussels by the World Economic Forum and Unesco.
World leaders have been criticised for failing to meet their promises to provide universal basic education.
In Britain, school pupils are to work with the charity World Vision to help less fortunate children overseas.
Schools linked with the National Association of Head Teachers (NAHT) will take part in a year-long campaign to raise funds to build schools in India and Kenya and provide resources for schools in other places.

League table

The announcement of the Partnerships for Education came as world leaders were criticised by the Global Campaign for Education (GCE) for failing to live up to their promise to fund basic education for every child.
A total of 22 wealthy countries pledged to help fund dramatic improvements to schooling in the developing world.
Around the world 77m children do not go to school. Forty percent of those are in areas affected by war or places where there has been conflict.
The GCE has produced a "league table" of countries' achievements in this area which puts the USA, Italy, Germany and Japan at the bottom.
The UK came fourth from the top, and Tony Blair was said to have "done very well". He was awarded a grade B, while George Bush was given a grade E.
Key organizations in the new partnership include leading World Economic Forum member companies - AMD, Cisco, Intel Corporation and Microsoft - the Education for All Fast Track Initiative (FTI); Unesco as global lead UN agency and the World Economic Forum, through its Global Education Initiative (GEI).
Unesco director general Koïchiro Matsuura said: "Achieving Education for All requires the participation of all.
"Partnerships for Education is a giant step in this direction and we have great expectations for it."

These initiatives of our member companies have demonstrated the synergy and win-win possibilities of using co-ordinated multi-stakeholder partnerships to make more effective use of the resources available in a country to strengthen its education reform process," said the managing director of the World Economic Forum, Rick Samans.
The group says it will pool the skills and resources from the private sector with those of governments and non-governmental organisations.
A spokesperson said: "Over the next few months, the partnership will begin exploring opportunities to work directly with countries to help them implement their education reform plans, in particular by mobilising a range of relevant private sector capabilities."

League table

The report from the Global Campaign for Education said donor countries had to try much harder.

It said: "The donors have slammed the brakes on progress, devastating the expectations of those who dared to dream that no future generation would have to live without the light and hope of education in their lives.
"This means millions of children have missed their chance to go to school due to the poor performance of the Class of 2007."
The UK has pledged to spend £8.5bn ($15bn) in the next 10 years, helping the world¿s poorest countries recruit more teachers, build new classrooms and provide basic materials like books and stationery.
Gordon Brown, Chancellor of the Exchequer, said: "We can be the first generation in history to send every child to school. We will work with every country, charities and international organisations to achieve this goal".
Hilary Benn, the Secretary of State for International Development, said: "This morning millions of boys and girls weren't where they should have been - in a classroom, with a desk and a teacher.
"Governments need the security of long term aid so they can plan their education spending over years not months. That's why the UK is committed to spending £1 billion on global education every year by 2010."

School fees 'barrier for girls'

The biggest barrier to girls' education around the world is school fees, a charity argues.

Save the Children says in a report that 17 of the 25 countries with the most girls not in school still charge fees.

It says another 4.5 million children would go to school if fees were abolished in 13 countries in sub-Saharan Africa, for instance.

The report focuses on girls, who are said to make up 60% of the 100 million children worldwide not being schooled.

Family income

Save the Children says that in Liberia, for example, sending one child to school costs half the average income of £62.

In UK terms this would be the equivalent of a family on an average income of £17,000 spending £8,500 a year for one child's education.

When Uganda scrapped fees in 1997, the number of girls in school more than doubled to three million within three years, it says.

But many countries cannot afford to do this, says the report, which has been published in advance of next week's UN summit.

So it calls on world leaders to make a commitment to achieving the education Millennium Development Goals of ensuring all girls and boys complete a primary education by 2015.

Save the Children's director of policy and communications, Fiona Weir, said: "Giving girls an education is one of the best ways to reduce poverty, malnutrition and HIV/AIDS but unless world leaders act now, they will condemn yet another generation to poverty.

"The UN Summit will be make or break. World leaders must show real commitment to abolishing school fees as a crucial step to making this a reality."

Our Young Learners: giving them the best possible start

An Education Strategy for the Early Years from Kindergarten to Year 4, 2006-2009
FULL TEXT PDF DOWNLOAD

AM I EUROPEAN?

Thornhill School has been working with European partner schools since 2000. Rob Browell describes their Comenius School Project “Am I European ?”
Thornhill School is now in its final year of a three....

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EDUCATED FUTURE

Nowadays people strongly notice that an educated future can be the only solution for a peaceful and happy World. As we vittness during our daily life, uneducated nations or individually people are the source of guilty and problems (generally). In order to build a well-educated future we must change our system and welcome new methods. What about working together with others in other towns and countries ...........