People on the Move guides educational policies
Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Education, Arts and Culture, Mrs. Sanet Steenkamp was welcomed back in Namibia at a special reception last week by the Chargé d’Affaires a.i. of the German Embassy, Mr Ullrich Kinne.
She was invited by a German Federal Government agency to attend a forum on cultural relations and education policies in Berlin. Themed “People on the Move”, the forum brought together high-ranking representatives from the education ministries of more than 30 countries, including several deputy ministers and permanent secretaries, Mrs. Steenkamp was greeted by the State Secretary of the Federal Foreign Office Stephan Steinlein as well as the State Minister of the Federal Foreign Office Maria Böhmer. During the forum, Federal Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier addressed the group. In addition, Mrs Steenkamp met with representatives of German federal and state educational institutions from Berlin and Hamburg and exchanged views on educational matters during expert forums and panel discussions.
Ms. Steenkamp was accompanied by representatives of the Delta Secondary School in Windhoek. Delta is part of the 1800 PASCH Schools network established in more than 120 countries and where approximately 600,000 young people are learning the German language.
The first two days of the three-day forum under the motto “World Class. School. Education. Future” focused on cooperation in the area of education, in particular on the “Schools: Partners for the Future” (PASCH) initiative which promotes the German language and was initiated by German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier in 2008.
