Education Coordination Meeting

EDUCATION/COMMUNITY SERVICES MEETING

16 August 2001

Minutes

1. Introduction of participants and definition of the goals.

Focus on educational needs of IDPs.

2. Introducing the current situation and localizing the main problems/ number of IDPs/ condition of the school buildings/ providing school materials.

According to information given by the MRC the number of IDPs at the moment is 54,000, or around 20,000 children from 0 to 18 years old.

The condition of the schools in the war-affected areas is very hard to assess because the authorities have not been there since the crisis started. It is expected that reconstruction of the school buildings will be necessary.

The school year will start on 1st of September and all children have to be included. ID children will go to the local school in the place where they have been relocated. The schools will register them and inform the Ministry of education about their number. This will help the organizations that are interested in helping and providing school materials to this group of children.

The review of the previous school year in the war-affected areas says that 22,115 children from grade 1 to 4 and 21,091 children from grade 5 to 8 were included in school.
IDPs who are now settled in student dormitories should be moved to another location by the 15th of August.

Help in providing school materials will be necessary.

3. Exchange of info with regard to ongoing activities of the participants and their plans about these issues.

• IRC - at the moment do not have plans about this issue.
  
• EP - so far there are not any educational issues taken over from them, but they may help in reconstruction of the school buildings.
  
• Step by step - during the summer Id-children from the collective centres were visiting the Children`s Creative Center. This activity can continue from September and transportation can be provided by Step by Step. Also, it can be arranged for these children to visit kindergartens in the afternoons. More data wil be available after Tuesday.
  
• CARE - not implementing an educational project but are interested in reconstruction of the school buildings.
  
• Save the Children - are planning to provide school materials and are interested in participating in the renewal of the schools.
  
• EU - no educational projects.
  
• Embassy of Switzerland - do not have enough budget for that purpose, but are open for collaboration next year if they have budget.
  
• Embassy of Netherlands - have 2 projects related to education: rehabilitation of 50 schools all over Macedonia and contribution to the youth development project.
  
• UNHCR - are present on the field and are ready to share all their field information with UNICEF, and hope to support the educational project in UNICEF.

4. AOB

Thanks to all for participating.