More than 130 decision-makers from 30 countries from the five continents and representing 32 ministries of education and education agencies meet to establish high-level networking, foster peer-learning and cooperation, debate on the characteristics of 21st century learning, and analyse the relationship between international education networks and decision makers in the field.   

The Symposium is the first initiative at this scale meant for international networks operating in a diversity of education environments and cultures to build and exchange on the theme of innovation in education. It includes: six plenary sessions focusing in particular on ICT initiatives scaling up, priority cooperation strategies, key challenges and vision for the future; six break-out sessions dealing with creating compelling learning environments, enabling communities of learners, and evidence-based decision-making; as well as a number of private sessions. For a detailed version of the programme, please see here: http://blog.eun.org/is/upload/ISprogramme.pdf.

Partners, sponsors and supporter organisations

Together with European Schoolnet (EUN), which is unique not-for-profit consortium of 31 ministries of education in Europe created in 1997 (www.eun.org), three other major education actors are involved in the organisation of the ICT in Education Networks International Symposium:

- the Consortium of School Networking (CoSN, www.cosn.org), founded in 19992, is the premier US professional association for school district technology leaders. V Its mission is to empower K-12 school district technology leaders to use technology strategically to improve teaching and learning.

- Education.au (www.educationau.edu.au) is Australia’s leading ICT agency for educators and delivers a range of web services to clients in all sectors of education and training.

- The Agenzia Nazionale per lo Sviluppo dell’Autonomia Scolastica (ANSAS, www.indire.it) is the agency of the Italian Ministry of Education supporting schools autonomy in innovation, research and European projects and partnerships.

A number of key industry partners are also sponsoring the event, including eInstruction (www.einstruction.com), Intel Education (www.intel.com), Microsoft (www.microsoft.com), Oracle (www.oracle.com), PASCO Scientific (www.pasco.com), Promethean (www.prometheanworld.com) and SMART Technologies (www.smarttech.com).

Several other organisations support the Symposium, such as Futurelab in the UK (www.futurelab.org.uk), Apple Computers (www.apple.com), KERIS (the ICT agency of the Ministry of Education Science and Technology in South Korea – http://english.keris.or.kr), South East Asia Ministry (www.seameo.org), and World Links Arab Region (www.wlar.org).

Other networks expected to attend include African (Schoolnet Africa), middle-eastern (iEARN Lebanon, World Links Arab Region), European (Global eSchools and Communities Initiative, Digital Europe) and South American networks (Interdidatica, Fundação Vanzolini).

ICT in Education Networks International Symposium website (programme, speakers’ biographies, and any other valuable information):
http://is.eun.org