The Youth Urban Agenda Civic Literacy Project traveled to conferences in  Dubrovnik, Croatia and London, England last year.  The conferences dealt with the ethnic conflict education and globalization. In October 2000, there was a conference at Wayne State University in Detroit.

Divided Societies: Evaluation of the Last Decade 1989-1999

Dubrovnik, Croatia  17-22 April 2000

The Inter-University Centre in Dubrovnik was established by a group of scholars in 1970.  The IUC was created in hopes of having an independent academically autonomous international institution.  Initially, IUC had 20 universities as members—by 1991, 250 universities from more than 40 countries belonged.  Since our trip in April, Wayne State University is now a proud member.         

Between the lectures, we had the opportunity to meet all the different students and professors from the all over Europe especially the Balkan region.   These photos were taken at the IUC’s courtyard during our breaks and in the old city were many of us would have large group lunches together.

Each day walking to the IUC, one was reminded of the shelling.  Although, the town has economically recovered, there are still buildings and roads that serve as a constant reminder. 

Professors and students from WSU’s Political Science department will be returning again this year for IUC’s Divided Societies, Citizenship and Globalization course this April.  We will be presenting papers and continuing collaboration. 

Institute of Education University of London

3-5 July 2001  Education for Social Democracies, Changing Forms and Sites

Under the symposium, Globalization and Civic Literacy, Professor Otto Feinstein presented The Politics of Inclusion with Gino Pagotto, a WSU student put forward The Confintea V Study Olga Volkova from the Russian Academy of Sciences, Siberian Branch gave her presentation on The Novosibirsk-Detroit Project. WSU Student Christopher Smith presented the Impacts of Globalization - Health Care in Michigan and his professor, Eric Bockstael, presented One Globe, Many Worlds—The Politics of Inclusion.

July International Institute for Policy, Practice and Research in the Education of Adults

We then attended the International Institute’s conference.  We established networks with many professors from places like the University of Tallin (Estonia) to YMCA George Williams College (South Africa).  Many members of the International Institute attended the October 2000 conference at Wayne State University and presented papers on the theme of Globalization, Adult Education and the Politics of Inclusion.

   The Politics of Inclusion: Globalization and Civic Literacy Conference at Wayne State University

  23-28 October 2000 

The Urban Agenda has linked schools from the area with schools abroad.  These connections include formulating urban agendas together and travel.  This year we were able to host the following delegations with their partner schools: Academy of Americas (Detroit)/ Honduras, River Rouge/ South Africa, Northville/Afghanistan, and John Page (Sterling Heights)/Siberia.  

                      The delegation from Afghanistan

At the end of the conference on Saturday the 28^th, the final Urban Agenda Convention was held at General Lectures at WSU.  All the middle schools (15), high schools (20), and higher education schools (10) from Southeast Michigan including our international guests came together to formulate their final Urban Agenda.  After much deliberation, their agendas were presented to the following guest speakers, US Secretary of Commerce, Norman Mineta, the newly appointed Head of the Department of Transportation and to Detroit’s Mayor Dennis Archer. 

Archer, Mineta, Otto Feinstein (Director of the project)