.

Organization of a seminar on the importance of education in prison in the region of West Africa, which will take place in 2016

The UNESCO Chair is participating in the organization of a seminar on the state of education in prison in the Francophone countries of West Africa. This seminar will be held in Dakar in 2016 with the Canadian and Senegalese commissions for UNESCO as part of the UNESCO Participation Program.

The completion of this type of activity is possible thanks to the collaboration of partners. A first meeting between the holder of the UNESCO Chair in Applied Research for Education in Prison, Mr. Jean-Pierre Miron, and key individuals in adult education took place in 2014. During their meeting, they discussed the organization of a first preparatory seminar in 2015 to lay the foundations of the seminar on the importance of education in prison in the region of West Africa to be held in 2016.

A committee of influential members in the field of education and in the study prisons was created during that first preparatory meeting. The goal of the two-day seminar in 2015 is to report on the state of education in the countries of West Africa, in collaboration with UNESCO’s regional office in Dakar, Senegal, and to write recommendations.

The committee must determine the key themes of the seminar. Mr. Jean-Pierre Miron and Mr. Jean-Pierre Simoneau have contacted the Canadian Commission for UNESCO in order to evaluate the feasibility of submitting a project to the Participation Program (PP), whose beneficiaries would be countries in West Africa. Wealthy countries cannot submit PP projects for their own benefit. Only developing countries can be financed for this type of project.