From August 13-16 in Yangon, Myanmar, over forty representatives from various educational ministries convened for a national consultative workshop on the development of Education Management Information System (EMIS).
The participants discussed the current situation of data collection as well as usage processes as the first step towards constructing a foundation for Myanmar’s future EMIS.
Each department in the Ministry of Education as well as other Ministries presented their current data collection processes. The presentations opened up venues for information-sharing and networking among departments and ministries.
“Before this workshop, I didn’t know about all the data collection procedures in the various Ministries,” said Dr. Myat Lwin, Rector of the Myanmar Maritime University. He added, “There has been a lot of knowledge sharing and the chance to build relationships between different staff for better cooperation in the near future.”
The workshop was organized and facilitated by UNESCO, in collaboration with the Ministry of Education. UNESCO Education Specialists U Nyi Nyi Thaung and Roshan Bajracharya, under the guidance of the Ministry of Education’s Comprehensive Education Sector Review (CESR), which is supported by UNESCO as part of the CapEFA program, led the discussion in the workshop.
The CESR aims to develop an education plan and to establish an effective EMIS system. Different approaches to the development of EMIS were suggested by Thaung and Bajaracharya during the workshop, in which the importance of long-term thinking and cooperation for accuracy were emphasized.
Thaung noted, “Myanmar is changing and data for decision-making is becoming increasingly important. For this, good systems need to be in place. Now is the time to begin by laying a foundation for that system—with a strong foundation, you can build anything!”
Creative Commons Love: Sem Paradeiro on Flickr.com
Written by Carolina Shin