The fifth international conference was held in the seaside village of Egmond aan Zee in the
Netherlands from 30th June to 2nd of July, 2003. The Hotel Zuiderduin provided the venue for the
conference, based around the theme of Global Challenges: Local Responses.
The 2003 Programme.
Throughout the world, nation-states face a multitude of common issues and problems that could
potentially have a significant impact upon the structure, principles and practice of education and
the experiences of teachers and children.
The principle aim of the 2003 conference was to explore the ways in which educators can respond
to the issues raised by globalisation. More specifically, the programme looked at the relationships
that exist between global issues which provide contexts for the work of teachers and pupils in
local settings. The 2003 conference programme explored the manner in which educators and pupils
can develop broader and more grounded understandings of the teaching and learning experience
within the context of globalisation, and the common issues and themes which unite educators from
different nation states and cultural backgrounds in their common goal of educating young people.
This programme provided opportunities for participants to:
- share national and international developments in, for example, citizenship education,
developmental education, economic education, enterprise education, community education, and
environmental education;
- consider the implications for curriculum provision in social and economics education;
- publish their work amongst a wider international audience.
Keynote Speakers.
The fourth
Dorothy J. Skeel Memorial Lecture was delivered in Egmond aan Zee by Professor John J.
Cogan, professor of international and social studies education at the University of
Minnesota, USA. His research interests focus on citizenship education, policy development and how
young people of elementary and secondary school age acquire their civic values. He combines these
interests with studies in the field of comparative and international education, examining issues
in the context of educational reforms taking place in the US, Europe and Pacific Rim countries.
Prof. Cogan is the co-author, with Ray Derricott of Liverpool University, UK, of Citizenship
Education in the 21st Century (Kogan-Page, London, 1998) which explores the the importance of
citizenship education in the school curriculum, arguing the need for school and community to be
equal partners.
The
2003 Conference's second keynote speaker was Professor Micha de Winter, professor
of child and adolescent studies at the University of Utrecht in the Netherlands. His research
interests in youth policy, education and professional youth care focus on the participation of
children and young people, empowering them in the decision-making process, preparing them to take
up more active roles in society and building their personalities. In Children as Fellow
Citizens: Participation and Commitment (Radcliffe Medical Press, Oxford, 1996), he argues
that, from a social perspective, children do not really count until maturity, when society
suddenly expects responsibility, independence and commitment from them. This viewpoint, shared
by so many children and young people, is the basis of so much disaffection among youth
Egmond aan Zee Information.
The village of Egmond aan Zee with its fine restaurants and pleasant shops, lies on the North Sea coast some eight kilometres from the historic market town of Alkmaar, which is just thirty-five minutes by train from Amsterdam. The Hotel Zuiderduin is perfectly situated amid broad sand dunes 100m from the beach and the village centre. The map to the right shows the village's position in north Holland, with Amsterdam to the south.