Commonwealth workshop agrees on gender-awareness plan in public sector

Civil servants across the Commonwealth could benefit from open distance learning (ODL) to create greater awareness of gender issues in their policies and practice.

A two-day Commonwealth workshop on how non-traditional learning techniques could be harnessed to ‘mainstream’ gender in the public sector ended 22 July with delegates recommending country-specific pilot projects for training.

It was agreed that pilot countries would be chosen on the basis of their willingness to participate and what mechanisms were in place for implementing ODLs, among other criteria.

Workshop organiser and Gender Adviser at the Commonwealth Secretariat, Dr Auxilia Ponga, said: “We realised that to actually implement some of our recommendations, we have to go back to member states and conduct a country needs assessment so that the issues we have discussed and conclusions we came to will be owned by member states.”

It is hoped that this will eventually lead to the development of training manuals for all participants within the Commonwealth.

The workshop was organised by the Secretariat in collaboration with the Commonwealth of Learning (COL) and took place at Marlborough House, London.

In his closing remarks, Deputy Secretary General Ransford Smith commended the participants for collaborating with the Secretariat to “develop innovative strategies for transferring knowledge and skills in regards to gender mainstreaming”.

He added: “While we recognise the importance of developing capacity for all stakeholders, we believe that priority has to be given to the public service in view of the pivotal role it plays in facilitating development.”

Participants from around the Commonwealth discussed the status of their various governments’ and organisations’ gender awareness and how ODL can contribute to public servants being gender trained so that gender can be factored into their work at policy level.

They discussed the findings of a study on gender mainstreaming and good governance that recommended that ODL can be used to effectively deliver gender training to public sector workers. Their goal included mapping out a draft action plan to identify activities and timelines by which gender can be mainstreamed in target countries.

“I think that we had a successful meeting because the objectives that we set were all met,” observed Dr Ponga.

In the short term, participants agreed to share existing gender training materials developed with the Commonwealth of Learning and for participants from open universities to add audio to their online programmes to make them easier to use and create interest.

Another goal was to approach various government ministries and management training institutions for assistance to implement the ODL programmes in their countries.

Dr Ponga said, “We realised that this is a venture that we cannot do alone either as an institution or part of government. So there is a need to create networks.”

Professor Asha Kanwar, Vice President of the Commonwealth of Learning, noted the meeting helped harmonise COL’s work with the Commonwealth Secretariat, their sister organisation, by allowing them to contribute their expertise in distance learning.

“This will help to bring this course to thousands of people, which would otherwise not be possible,” said Professor Kanwar.

Representatives from the University of Papua New Guinea, the Tanzania Global Development Learning Centre, ActionAid International, Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge, and the Zambian Open University attended the meeting.

Key Links:

• Gender
• Governance

Related News:

• University of Papua New Guinea
• Tanzania Global Development Learning Centre
• ActionAid International
• Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge
• Commonwealth of Learning (COL)