Background

While there are many legitimate ways to define education, we at P3E define education as ‘the systemic transfer of knowledge to enable people to master their environments and or to otherwise improve their lives. We take a global view of how information transfer during well-organized education programs benefits both the information recipients and the offerors alike. Learners take away information that they can creatively use to solve important issues in health, economics, communications, agriculture, technology, the environment, and more. Meanwhile, education providers can generate revenues from their education programs to justify continued research in their areas of expertise for application to new markets expanding their knowledge base even further. There are often important third-party beneficiaries that benefit (or could benefit) from effective education programs that diminish climate change, stem the spread of pandemics, or improve the global economy.

The P3E education team continually seeks international opportunities where knowledge transfer through an effective education program can solve important local and global problems with inuring benefits to the knowledge providers, the learners, and third-party beneficiaries. P3E seeks to identify the economic engine in each opportunity that will make the education programs sustainable. The economic benefit to all parties ensures cooperation to make international education programs successful.

THE NEED FOR GLOBAL EDUCATION

All societies have the need for the education of their citizens. Whether formal or informal, individuals must learn the language, culture, hygiene, nutrition, trade skills, and more. Education needs vary widely with location, local circumstances, tradition, religion, natural resources, and culture. Despite the need for varying types of education and levels, there are various metrics that can be applied to provide an objective measure of where countries or societies might be deficient. High mortality rates, poor-performing economies, high unemployment, high crime, and other societal metrics are often tied to education in some way. Other issues like pandemic spread, global warming, ocean pollution, and other global issues are also tied to the lack of education in the areas of prevention and cure.

As different societies have different needs for their education systems, there is no “cookie cutter” education solution equally beneficial to all. Societies develop education systems around their perceived needs with local needs governing what is considered important. Dessert societies for example need education systems to contend with their environment which would be decidedly different than what would be needed in an ocean-side community in the Arctic. Agriculture, commerce, architecture, housing, and medical education needs may all be quite different based on these extreme differences in local. As is consistent with evolution theory, groups must change to meet the changing requirements of their environment or they must move or possibly perish. Short of perishing, societies that do not adapt their education to their current environment experience great stress leading to many bad outcomes. As an example, agricultural systems designed for thousands of people for instance must be retooled through education to support perhaps millions of people that now depend on the same farm area for food. The expertise to solve this problem likely exists—the challenge is finding it and exporting that knowledge base to those that need it

FIND THE RIGHT EDUCATION PARTNERS

Many countries around the world have developed highly specialized expertise based on their situations which they may have had to contend with for many years. That knowledge base can be of extreme value to those that just now have to contend with the same issues. Transferal that knowledge can be critical to solving important problems immediately including epidemiology and vaccination research, natural disaster response, infrastructure design, and more.

After Hurricane Katrina, the Netherlands provided the US with dam and levee expertise as the Dutch are the world’s foremost experts in protecting lowland areas surrounded by ocean waters. The US provided expertise to the Middle East to shut down hundreds of raging oil fires after the Iraqi due to America’s expansive and long-term expertise in oil production. Epidemiology teams around the world collaborated to help fend off Covid 19. Many countries share college exchange programs and other types of shared education programs for mutual benefit. The idea is that somewhere in the world the expertise necessary to solve any problem likely exists as someone else has already encountered the situation. The key is locating that expertise and then offering some incentives to entice that education provider to provide their knowledge base.

Bridging educators with willing students in an international setting is not always easy. There are many factors to consider including subject matter, selecting appropriate education levels, instructor availability, language/cultural barriers, classroom availability, time zones, ancillary technology, labs, project duration, education succession (training local instructors), and other issues including project funding. Oftentimes it takes a third-party like PE3 to secure the relationships that are necessary to make the education projects work. It can require a specialized consultant to manage such projects as few countries have developed specialized infrastructure for this—certainly not in all areas where it might be needed. PE3 Education has the consulting tools and network to support countries in identifying the education programs that might be useful—and then providing training and education support as needed.

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