ADEA WGECD provides its support to the start-up of ECD ICQN activities

Published on Monday, 7 July 2014

The ADEA Working Group on Early Childhood Development (WGECD) supports the setting up of an ADEA Inter-Country Quality Node on Early Childhood Development (ICQN-ECD) under the leadership of Mauritius. The ICQN, now equipped with a Secretariat and a Steering Committee, is drawing up a roadmap and a strategy for the coming months. Briefing notes have also been issued in order to raise public awareness of the existence of the Node and a website is currently under construction.

On 21 May 2014, Ann Therese Ndong-Jatta, leader of the WGECD and Director of the UNESCO Regional Bureau for Education in Africa based in Dakar (BREDA), met with Mr. Ramlugun, Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Education of Mauritius, for an update on the progress made to date on the Node.

Regarding the strategic partners, WGECD recommended that the following organisations and countries should be involved in defining the strategy and activities of the Node: UNICEF, the UNESCO International Institute for Capacity Building in Africa (IICBA), which has been working on endogenous curricula for early childhood, the Africa Network Campaign on Education For All (ANCEFA) and the Consultative Group on ECD, along with the “Big Push” initiative countries (Angola, Lesotho, Swaziland) for which ECD is a key issue and a post-2015 priority.

Mr. Ramlugun has also informed the WGECD that the Ministry of Education of Mauritius is intending to arrange an official launch of the Node in three months’ time.

For more information, please contact Rokhaya Diawara, WGECD Coordinator, at r.diawara@unesco.org or Mr. Rajendra Coomar Reedha, Acting Executive Secretary of the ICQN-ECD, Tel.: +230 932 69 29