‘I miss the sun . . . the heat in the morning’.
Six people of different nationalities featured in Census 2011 outline their experiences of living in Ireland…
‘I miss the sun . . . the heat in the morning’
October 20, 2012
Irish News Immigration, People & Society, peter singhateh, West Africa Leave a comment
IPS Spotlight Photos
October 17, 2012
IPS Spotlight Photos, a set by IPS Inter Press Service on Flickr.
IPS – China Wants Peace in Africa | Inter Press Service
October 17, 2012
World News Africa, China, Peace & Security, peter singhateh Leave a comment
IPS – China Wants Peace in Africa | Inter Press Service.
– China could soon expand its involvement in peace and security issues in Africa, according to government officials, researchers and academics from both the Asian giant and resource-rich continent who met at the second China-Africa Think Tanks Forum in Ethiopia from Oct. 12 to 13.
Mulugeta Gebrehiwot, the director of the Institute of Peace and Security Studies in Ethiopia that organised the forum, told IPS that it should not come as a surprise that China is interested in peace and security on the African continent.
“There is nothing that is not touched by peace and security. Whether you’re (looking) for investment collaboration, economic operation or anything else. Peace and security has to be in place. Because that’s the central instrument that keeps the environment for any other interaction and collaboration together,” Gebrehiwot said.
A readers’ guide to learning Chinese
October 17, 2012
Education China, People & Society, peter singhateh Leave a comment
A readers’ guide to learning Chinese.
Do you want to learn Chinese? You do if you know just how important the language is going to be in your future. Here’s how to get started
ARE WE ALL TRYING TO LEARN CHINESE?
We should hope so. China could soon overtake the US as the world’s largest superpower. Across Ireland, students are getting ready for a sea change in global politics. Chinese language and culture are set to form a core part of the overhauled Junior Cert syllabus (see panel). Minister for Education Ruairí Quinn has also announced plans to offer Chinese as a Leaving Cert subject. University College Dublin and University College Cork already offer undergraduate and postgraduate degrees with Chinese language and cultural components…
Ireland’s demograpics shaped by migration
October 8, 2012
Irish News People & Society, peter singhateh 1 Comment
Ireland’s demograpics shaped by migration.
ANALYSIS: IRELAND IS the only territory in the world in which the population today is smaller than it was two centuries ago. Migration is the reason for this unique decline. Coinciding with the beginning of the first era of globalisation, the Famine caused a tradition of emigration to arise that changed this island forever.
If outflows of people have made Ireland stand out from all other countries over two centuries, the pattern of arrivals over the past decade has made it exceptional among its European peers.
Almost one in eight people resident here last year was not Irish. That is more than double the proportion a decade ago and far above the proportion in pre-Celtic tiger times.
By the standards of the rest of Europe, Ireland was one of the most homogeneous societies in the early 1990s. By last year it had become one of the continent’s most heterogeneous countries…
Lessons in early education from New Zealand
October 2, 2012
Irish News Early Education, People & Society, peter singhateh Leave a comment
Lessons in early education from New Zealand.
When it comes to early childhood care and education, Ireland is, in ways, where New Zealand was in the 1980s, according to Prof Linda Mitchell of the University of Waikato in Hamilton. She was in Dublin recently to explain what a 10-year strategic plan, which was started in New Zealand in 2002, meant to children under the age of six and their families.
“We’ve moved on – at least it shows you can move,” she says, sitting in the basement offices on Merrion Street of Start Strong, an alliance of organisations and individuals advocating improved early care and education in Ireland.
With New Zealand and Ireland sharing certain similarities, such as population size, climate, landscape and importance of agriculture, its work in developing services for children aged zero to six is seen as offering valuable lessons.
During her visit, which was organised by Start Strong, Mitchell met the expert advisory group appointed to help draw up the National Early Years Strategy. She also briefed members of the Oireachtas, although, ironically, publication of the wording for the children’s rights referendum that same morning affected the numbers attending her presentation.
Back in 1986, New Zealand became only the second country in the world, after Iceland, to integrate early childhood education services into its ministry of education…
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