Strategy Report of CEOS Ad-Hoc Working Group on Education and Training (WGEdu)
14^th CEOS Plenary

Executive Summary

• CEOS at the 13th Plenary meeting (during November 10-12, 1999 held at Stockholm) established an ad-hoc Working Group on EO Education and Training (WGEdu) to address the issue of EO Education and Training and to arrive at a Strategy for CEOS to consider.



• With ISRO chairing the WGEdu, the WG includes nominees from ASI, BNSC, CCRS, CNES, CRI, CSA, CSIRO, DLR, EUMETSAT, ISPRS, INPE, NASA, NASDA, NOAA, NRSCC, NSC, UN-ESCAP, UN-OOSA and WMO. Other CEOS Members/Associates have provided support and encouragement through their Contacts.



• The WGEdu adopted a multi-pronged strategy in conduct of its business and arriving at its report to Plenary:



• A detailed survey of EO educational institutions of the world - mainly from contacts and web-sites



• Conducted an international workshop to focus on EO Education and Training.



• Administered a questionnaire to CEOS space agencies for assessing their existing and future programmes of EO Education/Training/Professional Development



• Interaction with UN agencies (specifically the UN Regional Centres) to understand their role in capacity building



• A meeting of the WG to assess and take-stock of the strategy and its report. The WG Members were in regular e-mail interactions during the year to conduct the affairs.

• CEOS Strategy for EO Education and Training must not be ab-initio but must build or provide an over-arching framework on the already on-going efforts of CEOS agencies and other international agencies. CEOS could provide an effective coordination mechanism of the EO education and training efforts - where space agencies, institutions offering programmes, other experts could meet annually and exchange experiences and issues related to EO education and training. In particular, CEOS could address the following issues:



• CEOS could consider working closely with education institutions, especially the recently established UN regional Centres for Space Science and Technology Education, so as to enable the outreach of EO data/services/tools/experts to the developing countries in the world.



• CEOS agencies develop/promote a wide variety of materials and teaching aids and there is need to strengthen educational institutions with these resources.



• Educational institutions need access to the variety of EO data available from the EO satellites for building applications and enabling scholars to utilize and get familiar with them. CEOS could bring together E/T institutions and space agencies to ensure diffusion of this resource to the most needy E/T institutions.



• CEOS could contribute to a curricula "standardization" activity and participate in the UN efforts for the regional Centres for Space Science and Technology Education.



• CEOS could enable initiation of education/training programmes in newer areas - Disaster Management Support, Interferometry, Global Change, Photogrammetry, Tropical region applications, Natural Resources Management, Education/Training Technologies, High Resolution Image Analysis techniques, Hyper-spectral Imaging techniques and applications, GIS Ingest and Integrated Modelling, Web-enabled EO techniques and Information Extraction techniques. CEOS agencies and E/T institutions need to work together to address these areas for future programmes.



• CEOS agencies have professional experts in the field of EO and some of them could be forwarded to the educational institutions to serve as expert faculty. The best approach seems to be for E/T institutions to directly approach CEOS agencies and work out modalities - considering the positive response of the CEOS agencies.



• CEOS WGCALVAL, WGISS and WG-DMS also address issues related to education and training and there is a need to establish a formal mechanism of coordination - either as back-to-back meetings or special dialogue sessions. This is felt essential to be able to bring about a harmony amongst the WGs on this issue.



• EO E/T activities offer considerable scope for private sector participation and CEOS could consider promoting this as part of its Industry interface (through ISPRS).


• WGEdu urges the 14^th CEOS Plenary to endorse the WGEdu Strategy Report and extend the WGEdu term for one more year so as to be able to arrive at a concrete Action Plan.