The Workers' Educational Association (England & Scotland) has been awarded a 100,000 Pounds (160,000 US Dollars) grant from the UK National Lottery Charities Board to develop regional initiatives with IFWEA partners in Asia-Pacific, Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean and central & eastern Europe. The project will run for 12 months from January 1999, and will be managed by the WEA - working closely with Euro-WEA and IFWEA - alongside PLADES (Peru), LEARN (Philippines), Barbados Workers’ Union, TULEC (South Africa), and MSZOSZ (Hungary).

The project proposal was constructed following the January 1998 Executive Meeting of IFWEA where there was a major discussion on the need to develop IFWEA’s regional activities. Robert Lochrie, WEA General Secretary, offered to explore a WEA proposal to the Lottery Board to assist the process.

The project has three broad aims: to strengthen workers’ understanding of the processes of globalisation; to strengthen national and local workers’ education organisations; and to strengthen regional and inter-regional collaboration.

The project will provide the resources to organise 4-day seminars in each of the five regions, attended by IFWEA affiliates and other organisations. Each seminar would be primarily concerned with exploring key issues on globalisation that might offer practical possibilities for collaborative education activity, and possible methods to be used such as the International Study Circles.

The seminars will be preceded by the production of education material. An international evaluation seminar is planned for November 1999, followed by the publication of a handbook of education materials, examples of education methods, and discussion documents on globalisation.