> SAMOA DEVELOPS SMALL BUSINESS STUDIES: Samoa Polytechnic is developing a distance education pilot programme to form the basis for small business studies in the Pacific. The aim is to prepare a small business instructional package to teach would-be entrepreneurs how to
> set up their business and improve their earnings.
>
> The programme is designed for students who are illiterate or barely literate
> including those who have had little time or opportunity to study, school
> leavers and small business owners. It will target individual communities and
> reflect their specific needs.
>
> The project will make use of the practical experience of small business
> owners in various villages throughout Samoa. "We are working with small
> business owners involved in retail, handicraft, fishing and agriculture. The
> course material will be tested in the villages and we will adapt the content
> of the course further to suit the needs expressed by potential business
> people," said Samoa Polytechnic's senior business lecturer Tertia
> Stunzner-Ryan.
>
> Mrs Stunzner-Ryan presented a paper detailing the pilot programme, entitled
> 'Adapting an Open Learning Package on Small Business for the Needs of
> Samoa', at a Distance Education Association of New Zealand conference in
> Wellington, New Zealand, in April 2002. "If we're successful, then other
> Pacific Islands will use our model," she said.
>
> The pilot programme is a joint initiative of the Commonwealth of Learning
> (COL) and United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation
> (UNESCO) to produce a set of learning materials which are designed to be
> adapted.
>
> The project has its origins in a COL workshop in September 2000 where
> delegates from Australia, Canada, the Caribbean, New Zealand, the Pacific
> and the UK set COL the task of producing the learning materials. COL
> commissioned the Open Polytechnic of New Zealand to undertake this challenge
> and the topic was 'Small Business'. The product was a three-part package
> consisting of a participants' workbook, a tutor's pack and an adaptation
> guide for the delivering institution.
>
> The course was presented to delegates from the South Pacific Islands at a
> UNESCO conference in Adelaide, Australia, in March 2001. The course material
> was reviewed and the final product was published as 'Learning About Small
> Business'.
>
> Mrs Stunzner-Ryan said that the initial stage of the pilot project in Samoa
> involved working with local trainers and getting their feedback on the
> 'Learning About Small Business' curriculum package that needed to be changed
> to suit Samoa's purposes.
>
> COL education specialist John Bartram said: "The work of the staff from the
> Samoa Polytechnic and the project's implementation through the various NGOs
> in Samoa will provide valuable interventions for other small or developing
> countries as they try to meet the challenge of encouraging the development
> of entrepreneurial skills and self employment in their communities. The
> project will also provide significant insight as we evaluate the
> effectiveness of the 'designed to be adapted' model of open and distance
> learning."
>
> COL, based in Vancouver, Canada, is an intergovernmental organisation
> created by Commonwealth Heads of Government to encourage the development and
> sharing of open learning and distance education knowledge, resources and
> technologies.
> www.thecommonwealth.org
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