RHODD
DR. DONALD Rhodd, State Minister in the Ministry of Education, Youth and Culture, wants the media to consider partnering with government to promote the 'Education For All' agenda.
Education For All (EFA) is aimed at realising education for all children, youth and adults by 2015. It was first put forward in 1990 at the World Conference on Education For All in Jomtien, Thailand.
According to Dr. Rhodd, a significant number of children are being influenced by the media, particularly cable television and the Internet.
He argued that stakeholders cannot sit back and think that regulatory bodies and blocking devices are going to prevent children from seeing or listening to what they want to or enjoy.
"I firmly believe that our media practitioners and managers are important stakeholders in the effective and efficient implementation of the educational process, and by this token, are very important in achieving Education For All," he said.
Dr. Rhodd was speaking at the 'Building EFA Capacities Among Jamaican Media Practitioners' workshop, held at the Courtleigh Hotel in St. Andrew.
The workshop was organised by the Creative Production and Training Centre (CPTC) in collaboration with UNESCO.
2015 Educational Goals
In order to achieve Education For All, UNESCO has identified six goals to be realised by 2015. They are:
Expand early childhood care and education.
Provide free and compulsory primary education.
Promote learning and life skills for young people and adult.
Increase adult literacy by 50 per cent.
Achieve gender equality by 2015.
An overall improvement of the education quality.
