Civil Society in Myanmar’s Future: Education Sector
Australia Myanmar Institute invites you to a scheduled Zoom meeting
Date: July 26, 2021 (Monday)
Duration: 1 hour
Time: 06:00-7:00 PM Australia/Melbourne Time (02:30-03:30 PM Myanmar/Yangon Time)
Join Zoom Meeting: please click here
Meeting ID: 2852417834
Passcode: 12345
Prof Joseph Lo Bianco, AM, FAHA, is a Professor Emeritus in Language and Literacy Education at the Graduate School of Education, University of Melbourne. He is an inaugural member and Secretary of the Australia Myanmar Institute and a Past President of the Australian Academy of the Humanities. He recently received the 30th Ramon Llull International Prize for his effort in Australia and SE Asia on language rights and language policy. For many years he has worked with UNESCO and UNICEF in South and Southeast Asia on multilingual education, indigenous rights and access to education, literacy, girls education and multiculturalism. He designed and managed the UNICEF Language, Education and Social Cohesion Initiative in Malaysia, Myanmar/Burma and Thailand which resulted in several advances for ethnic rights in the countries and extended to preparation of a Peace Building National Language Policy in Myanmar. A climax of this was the first Myanmar conference on multilingual policy, held at the University of Mandalay in 2016 with 350 delegates and a national summit at NayPyiTaw hosted by Daw Su Su Lwin (the First Lady), Minister for Education and Minister for Ethnic Affairs. Under UNESCO he has conducted Asia wide policy workshops for senior policy officers and ministers of education across the Asia Pacific. He was author of the National Policy on Languages in Australia in 1987, widely regarded as the first multilingual comprehensive rights based language policy.
He has more than 140 publications on language, policy and planning, language education, literacy, culture and identity.
Ja Htoi Pan is the Deputy Minister of Education in the National Unity Government. She is a trained social anthropologist and educator who has studied at Northern Illinois University and the London School of Economics. She previously served as Director of Institute of Liberal Arts and Sciences (ILAS) in Mai Ja Yang, Kachin State, and Strategic Advisor and Associate Director of Kachinland Research Centre in Kachin State. Her work focuses on youth, education, social change, conflict and development in Myanmar. She is a member of Kachin National Education Committee and involved in numerous Kachin education projects including education policy and curriculum works. She is an alumnus of Chevening Scholar 2017-2018. Her work is published in international peer-reviewed journals such as “Development and Change” and “International Journal of Drugs Policy”.
A question and answer session will be conducted after the presentation. For more information about AMI, please visit: aummi.edu.au/.
***NOTE: Zoom can work very well, but it poses difficulties for people with a poor internet connection. So, people from Myanmar (or elsewhere) who might have a poor internet connection or low bandwidth should turn off the video mode and listen to the seminar. You may be able to switch on the video from time to time just to see who is speaking, but definitely don’t use the video mode if you wish to speak yourself. You can also pose questions using the chat function. AMI will upload the whole seminar later on the AMI website and Facebook page.