SIL International Media Release
Symposium on Multilingual Education in Bangladesh
DALLAS, TEXAS (August 25, 2005) Representatives from ethnolinguistic communities in Bangladesh, in partnership with non-government organizations and intergovernmental organizations, recently met for a Symposium on Multilingual Education. The symposium provided a forum in which local development and education practitioners and others could interact. A number of language communities around Asia are establishing multilingual education (MLE) programs to help develop and protect local languages and cultures. As a result, education, national integration and continued cultural vibrancy are improving for them.
Main topics of discussion
- Preliminary research of baseline data
- Mobilization of participating organizations
- Developing orthographies for primary languages
- Recruitment and training
- Evaluation and documentation
- Building cooperative relationships
- Building and maintaining relationships among organizations in attendance
- Organizations and their potential contribution to the MLE program
The symposium reports emphasized that the most successful MLE programs are those applied within a political climate that recognizes and supports the full and equal rights of ethnic minority communities, including the right to quality education. The program’s sustainability, it was said, rests on the ability of the stakeholder groups to work together to support the programs.
Sponsors/organizers
- UNESCO-Bangladesh (Mr. Wolfgang Vollmann, Country Representative)
- UNICEF-Bangladesh (Dr. James Jennings, Chief, Child Development and Education)
- SIL-Bangladesh (Mr. Paul Giacomini, Director and Susan Malone, Ph.D. Chief Consultant )