3rd APEC Education Ministerial Meeting - Sergio Bitar, Education Minister of Chile

Distinguished ministers and fellow delegates:

Welcome to Chile.

We have a great common task - to strengthen development and expand our mutual understanding.

To commence our work, I bring greetings and best wishes from the school children of Chile. They expect much of us.

Sometimes observers have described Chile as a kind of long balcony looking onto the Pacific; certainly the ocean, the waves, and the mountains have been an inspiration for writers.

Sometimes distances seem overwhelming -

"Here in the island - writes Pablo Neruda - the sea and so much sea, overflows, at every instant" .

I should add that Pablo Neruda and Gabriela Mistral, - our greatest poets and both Nobel prize winners - were products of our public school system, where they learned to read, appreciate literature and wrote their first verses.

And together with vast distances we, in Chile, have in the past felt isolated; the Andes to the East, the Pacific in the West, the desert in the North and Antarctica in the South, which seemed, at times, to separate us from the rest of the world. This is no longer possible. Chile does not regard the Pacific passively; it must learn from its vibrant economies and societies, communities and schools and actively

More - we must follow economic openness with a cultural openness.

Our President - Ricardo Lagos - said at the inauguration of Chile APEC 2004 "civilizations have developed around the big seas, from the Mediterranean to the North Atlantic, and now it is the Pacific. It is around this ocean that the history of the 21st century will unfold".

And our hope is that this meeting, with your distinguished presence, will show how education - in the broadest sense and meaning of the word - can contribute to this goal.

And that role is first, to prepare citizens for the challenges to come: and second to preserve and enhance what we value.

What brought our 21 economies together was and is free trade and investment - this will help our economies grow, create new employment, give people more opportunities and a hopefully a better life.

But increasingly we can see that economic incentives are not enough - we are missing an important opportunity if we do not try to learn from one another and build toward economies that are also willing to understand differences, to share views and values.

Education is pivotal - it is my hope that it will become a key influence of our future relations and so contribute to new ways of thinking.

Let me explain - as I see it, APEC could help us learn from co-operation, learn about the broader meaning of education particularly communication and ensure that students share our excitement.

A common challenge contained in our Agenda today is to find ways by which education help reduce inequality and the digital divide, increase our core knowledge, boost learning skills and help civic values for democracy.

Given the range of tasks that an educational system has to fulfill, building cooperative processes is crucial in an era of globalization and resources.

In the context of this meeting, strengthening collaboration by carefully chosen collective actions will foster learning from one another.

The four themes cover educational topics from macro policy (Governance and Systemic Reform in Education), to specialized learning, (Mathematics and Science instruction, English/Foreign language learning) and the innovative use of new communication technology (Using ICT for Teaching and Learning).

They seem to have two things in common; the importance of the learning quality and the importance of cooperation as well as competition.

I have no doubt that policy research and a proper understanding of promising practices -within the APEC context - will allow all members to improve their understanding of successful experiences how they might or might not be adapted to different educational systems.

Promising practices have to be communicated - effective communication depends on both languages and an understanding of culture.

One community, our future, is an exciting challenge. If we consider the cultures and the history represented at this APEC ministerial meeting, we may consider this goal overly ambitious perhaps utopian. But I do not think so. We in Chile, drawing on our recent history, think it is possible to morally and politically construct a community that includes diversity; morally and politically construct cooperation and shared goals where yesterday there was division and tragedy.

Education must ensure that values are understood and appreciated, help strengthen cultural identity while encouraging a variety of opinions and the community of the diverse; and that these strengths do not get lost in the competition for creating and finding jobs.

We face too an additional communication challenge - to interest students, at all levels, in Pacific opportunities.

We need to think carefully about what students from different APEC economies who attended the successful APEC YOUTH CAMP in Thailand in July, 2003. told us.

They said:

I cannot close this brief introduction to the Third APEC Education Ministerial Meeting without referring to the educational policies of your host country.

Since 1990, during the transition to democracy, which ended 17 years of military rule, Chile introduced policies intended to reform its educational system in an effort to substantially improve both its quality and equity. To achieve these goals, three governments have pursued a consistent educational policy, combining state and private resources in a way that has characterized the educational system of this country.

Between 1990 and today, expenditure on education (both public and private) increased from 3.8 to 7.4% of GNP, school enrolment rose by 20.4% and enrolment in higher education by 93%. Time spent in school increased dramatically, as a result of major investments in infrastructure which allowed to change school work from half a day, to an extended school day, thus replacing the two shifts that occupied the same school building. Additionally, the material basis for learning was upgraded through universal provision of textbooks and ICT, and a profound reform was undertaken of the curricula from pre-school through grade 12-. In 2003 a change to the Constitution ensured 12 years of free education as legally mandatory. Also teachers' conditions were improved: a salary increase over a 130% in real terms; and a systematic effort to expand in-service training. These changes have taken place in a gradual and in a consistent way. Both a long term political agreement regarding the direction of educational reform, as well as a harmonious relationship with teaching unions have helped to implement the new educational policies.

If there is one lesson to draw and share from our recent experience is that the key to educational quality is teaching and that its transformation is probably the most complex in tackling and gradual in achieving of all challenges confronting education at the beginning of the XXI century.Final remarks

These themes - mutual learning and co-operation, communication and cultural identity - are not the exclusive privilege of any one community or people. They are common challenges and opportunities for educational systems and economies.

In the introduction of the version of the TAO TE CHING written by Lao Zu

Ramana Maharshi says:

"There is no question of time and space.
Understanding depends on ripeness of mind
What does it matter if one lives in the East or West?"

Thank you.