CONGO Committee on Education
The CONGO Committee on Education is a substantive committee of CONGO - the Conference Of Non-Governmental Organizations in Consultative Relationship with the United Nations [1]. The Committee has made a commitment to supporting the United Nations Decade on Education for Sustainable Development (2005-2014) as well as related decades, and is developing a network of web sites to this end. The information architecture of the networks is based on properties and principles of a networked information economy, and on a prototype open source and Creative Commons framework for organizational domains, with the goal of gathering, compiling and sharing a vast collective wealth of knowledge - and building the foundations of a Common Wealth, co-created in a rapidly-evolving intelligent networked universe in which abundance is not constrained by the laws of conservation of mass and energy.
United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development
Launched in April 2005, the United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development [2] presents an extensive and vital challenge. The forty-one chapters of Agenda 21 [3] - the landmark agreement reached at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro - together with references to education in Agenda 21 [4] offer an indication of the scope that a comprehensive curriculum needs to cover.
- * Report of the UN Conference on the Human Environment - Stockholm, 1972
- * Our Common Future: Report of the World Commission on Environment & Development - 1987
- * Agenda 21 - Rio de Janeiro, 1992
- * Promoting Education, Public Awareness And Training Agenda 21, Chapter 36
- * References to education and awareness in Agenda 21
- * United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development - General Assembly resolution 57/254
- * United Nations Decade of Education for Sustainable Development UNESCO
- * Division of Sustainable Development UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs
International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Non-Violence for the Children of the World
Just over the halfway point of the International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Non-Violence for the Children of the World (2001-2010), many of the visions and signs of an immense outpouring of hope and expectations for a Millennium of Peace may appear to have been "blown away" by the destruction of the twin towers of the World Trade Center on Septemer 11, 2001 and the subsequent declaration and progressive escalation of a global war on terror.
War is clearly unsustainable - and most acutely so when conducted with overwhelming force and massive destruction; where massive areas of land, including critical wetlands are contaminated for many millennia with highly-radioactive depleted uranium, whose toxicity represents a threat to the life and health of people born and living in the contaminated areas.
In its attention to the Decade for a Culture of Peace, will pay particular attention to key elements of a culture of peace: Peace within our selves, peace between people, and peace with the earth, and to the an evolving set of values, traditions, principles and practices that are increasingly beng articulated and embraced by representatives of diverse faith - and non-faith - in which love and respect for all people is extended to embrace love and respect for the Earth and for the entrie community of species and sentient beings.
- * Essentials of Peace General Assembly resolution 290 (IV)
- * Uniting for Peace General Assembly resolution 377 (V)
- * Declaration on a Culture of Peace General Assembly resolution 53/243 A
- * Programme of Action on a Culture of Peace General Assembly resolution 53/243 B
- * International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Non-Violence for the Children of the World (2001-2010) General Assembly resolution 53/25
- * World Report on a Culture of Peace
International Day of Peace
In its resolution 55/282 [5] of September 7, 2001, the UN General Assembly established September 21 as the International Day of Peace. Since 982, it had been observed on observed, on the third Tuesday of September every year. The International Day of Peace has been very widely observed in local, national and global events, and for many in the NGO community - and particularly among NGOs affiliated with the UN Department of Public Information - is considered the high point of the year and a key time, following the Annual DPI/NGO Conference and at the beginning of a new General Assembly session, to uphold the preamble, purposes and principles of the United Nations [6].
- * United Nations Charter: Preamble, Purpose and Principles
- * International Day of Peace General Assembly resolution 55/282
- * International Day of Peace We, The Peoples Initiative, Pathways to Peace & International Day of Peace NGO Committee at the UN
Gandhi-King Season for Nonviolence
The Gandhi-King Season for Nonviolence - January 30 through April 4 - commemorates the deaths of Mohandas K. "Mahatma" Gandhi and Rev. Dr. Matin Luther King, Jr.. The Gandhi-King Seasons for Nonviolence web site [7] web site was initially developed for the New York Task Force for the Gandhi-King Season for Nonviolence and has continued to evolve under the auspices of Seasons of Peace Cooperation Circles [8]. The database-generated web site incorporates a ten week curriculum in Nonviolence and the teachings of Gandhi and King, and incorporates a set of form-based templates for participants to share information and comments.
Annual events commemorating the Gandhi-King Season for Nonviolence are held at United Nations headquarters in New York, and around the world.
- * Gandhi-King Season for Non-Violence
- * Seasons of Peace Cooperation Circles
Peace Cubes
The twin Virtual Light & Colour Cubes - dedicated as Peace Cubes at the United Nations Peace Bell [9] on March 20, 1997 at an Earthday on the Equinox on the Internet ceremony - are a remarkable and fascinating virtual, elementary mathematical entities in the form of cubes with dimensions of red, green and blue - the primary colours of light.
Each cube contains all colours, and the colour at any point in the cube is equal to the sum of the coordinates of the point within a three-dimensional mathematics of colour. The sum of the coordinates is expressed as #rrggbb - i.e. it is based on the HTML languuge of colour, a concatenation of three two-digit hexadecimal numbers between 00 and ff (0 and 63 in decimal terms), that represent, respectively, the intensity of red, green and blue light.
The visual effect of mathematically-defined cubes are striking - even in the two-dimensional images that have been generated to date - and the six faces of the virtual light and colour cube can be understood as the six faces of a three-dimensional colour space.
- http://habitat.igc.org/reconcile/open-600-012.jpg
- * Dedication of the Peace Cube
- * Journey of the Peace Cubes
- * Light Cubes
- * Digital Bridges in Peace exhibit
- * Templates to print and assemble Peace Cubes / Light Cubes - free download
International Decade of Action: Water for Life
Water is crucial for sustainable development, including the preservation of our natural environment and the alleviation of poverty and hunger. Water is indispensable for human health and well-being.
The United Nations General Assembly, in December 2003, proclaimed the years 2005 to 2015 as the International Decade for Action 'Water for Life'.
A decade of action! The primary goal of the 'Water for Life' Decade is to promote efforts to fulfill international commitments made on water and water-related issues by 2015.
- * Agenda 21, Chapter 18: Protection of the Quality and Supply of Freshwater Resources Rio de Janeiro, Brazil 1992
- * Report of the Expert Group Meeting on Strategic Approaches to Freshwater Management Harare, Zimbabwe, 1998
- * International Decade for Action, Water for Life, 2005-2015 General Assembly resolution 58/217
- * International Decade for Action, Water for Life UN site
- * Water portal UNESCO
United Nations Literacy Decade
The United Nations Literacy Decade (2003-2012) is a centerpiece of Education for All, the flagship campaign of UNESCO - the United Nations Educational, Cultural & Scientific Organizations - and literacy also must serve as a cornerstone for education for sustainable development.
- * World Declaration on Education For All: Meeting Basic Learning Needs. Jomtein, Thailand, 1990
- * Framework For Action: Meeting Basic Learning Needs
- * Dakar Framework for Action. Education For All: Meeting Our Collective Commitments, Dakar, Senegal, 2000
- * United Nations Literacy Decade, General Assembly sesolution 56/116, 2001
- * UNESCO - Education For All
- * UNESCO - United Nations Literacy Decade
Second International Decade of the World's Indigenous People
The Second International Decade of the World's Indigenous People (2005-2014) represents the second major formal phase of relationships between indigenous communities and the United Nations, in which the 1992 Earth Summit was a major catalyst, and that has included the Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous People and the establishment, in July 2000, of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues as an advisory body to the UN Economic and Social Council.
The NGO Committee on Education recognizes the immense significance of indigenous knowledge and experience in living in balance with, and respect for, the earth and all my relations and their ways of seeing, listening to and learning from the earth and from their spiritual traditions can offer invaluable lessons for all.
United Nations documents
An initial element of the web site for the NGO Committee on Education consists of the compilation of key United Nations documents relating to sustainable development, peace, education, human rights, etc. To date over 500 documents - global conference agreements, General Assembly resolutions, conventions, declarations, conventions and treaties - have been gathered in a full text database format from which HTML versions of the documents have been generated www.un-documents.net - in many cases requiring OCR conversion of scanned pdf files downloaded from the UN Official Document System [10], UNBISNET [11] and elsewhere - and with the addition of hyperlinks to references cited in the documents.
Free Summer School
A Free Summer School - or more accurately, an open network of Free Summer Schools - with a focus on learning, teaching and gathering a body of knowledge on sustainable development, peace and the larger freedoms of a knowledge-based universe will be in session from June 20, 2006 - the 2006 Summer Solstice - through September 22, 2005 - the Fall Equinox.
Participation in the Free Summer School will be free, and participants are invited to define their own curriculum and modalities of learning and participation, to make use of and discover more about free, participatory, open source and Creative Commons platforms - wikis, blogs, email lists, databases, web sites, and more - and to join or convene one or more cooperation circles focusing an their areas of special interests and concerns.
The culmination of the Free Summer School will take place on the International Day of Peace - September 21, 2006. All participants are invited to share what they have learned - and what they still need to learn - about knowledge-based response to the challenges of sustainable and regenerative development and of establishing a culture of peace.
Prospective Collaboration with other NGO Committees
Given the far-reaching scope of education for sustainable development, the CONGO Committee on Education is actively exploring opportunities for collaboration with other of the substantive committees of CONGO - there are twenty-one Committees in New York, ten in Geneva and seven in Vienna - with the goal of tapping into the wealth of knowledge within the UN NGO community on a broad range of issues relating to education for sustainable development.
NGO Committee on Sustainable Development
Commission on Sustainable Development
NGO Committee on the International Decade of the World's Indigenous People
Second International Decade of the World's Indigenous People
Indigenous Issues on Sustainable Development
United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues
NGO Committee on the Status of Women
Education of the Girl Child
The Wealth of Networks WikiNotes - A Free and Open Course
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