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The Global Project training program began in 2008 and met with great success and enthusiasm. Throughout 2009 we have continued to run training courses around the globe, with courses having taken place in Italy, Jordan, the Slovak Republic, Japan and Canada. We have received excellent feedback from participants to date.
“ …these 4 days in Siena showed to me, that statistics can work effectively both as an explanatory tool for understanding difficult social processes and as a means for raising new topical questions”
- Kostantin Fursov, Institute for Statistical Studies, Russia.
“I really enjoyed the course and find I am a more strategic thinker as a result of what I learned”
– Rick Victor, Ministry of Education, Canada.
The goal
The Global Project’s Mission Statement says that “the project is open to all sectors of society” and the Istanbul Declaration urges “statistical offices, public and private organisations, and academic experts to work alongside representatives of their communities to produce high-quality, facts-based information that can be used by all of society to form a shared view of societal well-being and its evolution over time”. Training will play an important role in fulfilling this mission.
During the courses we endeavour to cover 4 key dimensions that we believe are crucial for those who want to measure and understand the progress of their societies.
1. The raising awareness dimension: why is measuring progress important?
2. Technical statistical dimension: how to measure overall societal progress and/or its multiple dimension (theories, statistical approaches, etc.)
3. Communication dimension: how to use innovative Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) to present progress measures to a wide audience and to facilitate the transformation of statistic into knowledge
4. Institutional dimension: how to build an initiative on progress and make it influential, how to establish relationships with stakeholders, etc.
The method
Our courses are a mix of formal teaching, interactive sessions and group work. The emphasis is on interactive and peer to peer learning, involving participants in debates, discussions and group exercises. For instance, during the course we usually simulate a scenario and have students prepare a presentation about a given topic. You can see an example of the kind of exercises we do by viewing the Measuring Poverty Exercise from the Ottawa, Canada course 2009, and an extract of one group’s presentation in response to another exercise, entitled ‘My name is Muma’.
The audience
Our training courses provide assistance to those wanting to measure progress, raise awareness and teach new methods, concepts and tools. Training is aimed at all those who have an interest in increasing the use of evidence in public debate and policy making, either in the developed or developing world. The target audience includes:
- Researchers (economists and statisticians) who want to learn advanced scientific methods to deal with measurement and statistical issues;
- Practitioners (from national and local governments, NSOs, civil society etc.) who want to know how to implement progress initiatives;
- Policy makers with an interest in developing, or using, sets of progress measures to improve decision making;
- Media and others who want to communicate information to citizens.
If you would like to find out more information or discuss the training courses with us, please don’t hesitate to send an email to progress@oecd.org
Visit the Training Courses Homepage using the following link: www.oecd.org/progress/training
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