**** ETNI on the web http://www.etni.org.il http://www.etni.org **** Greetings, all! Rodney, from Malaysia (.my = Malaysia), has offered ETNI members a very well constructed micro-mystery that very frequently occurs on the Internet. I will definitely use it in my Cambridge College courses about the Internet. Thanks, Rodney. Let?s assume that the LATIE Web site at http://latie.org/ is factual and that we accept the value of creating recognized standards for courses in EFL/ESL/ESOL etc. Nevertheless, who are ?leading international organizations and individuals? who established LATIE in 1999? The Web site doesn?t say. The Web site also refers to a Board of Governors, but does not list the members or the organizations that they may represent. The Web site states that LATIE ?was founded in 1999 as an evolution of the United Nations conference on Intercultural and Multicultural Education in Montreal, Canada?, but does not say that the United Nations founded LATIE. The Web site also states that ?the initial LATIE mandate was endorsed by LATIE attending participants at the 2000 World Education Forum in Dakar, Senegal, entitled The Dakar Framework for Action: Education for All.? Please note that the Forum did not endorse LATIE and its mandate, rather, a number of ?LATIE attending participants? (Who? How many?) endorsed their own ?initial mandate?. Possibly the most interesting thing about who LATIE is, or isn?t, is found via the UNESCO ?Right to Education? icon in the upper right corner of LATIE?s home page, visually implying that UNESCO is somehow connected to LATIE. When you click on this link, you get another nicely constructed LATIE page entitled ?UNESCO AND LATIE?, once again giving the impression that there is some kind of organizational tie between the two. All seven paragraphs on the page are about UNESCO, not mentioning LATIE even once, although the seventh paragraph does mention NGOs (non-governmental organizations), which we can assume includes LATIE. The page ends with a single sentence, shouted in all-caps, in a large red font: ?LATIE IS PROUD TO SUPPORT UNESCO IN THE PERSUIT OF RIGHT FOR EDUCATION FOR ALL.? Well, LATIE?s support for UNESCO is very commendable, but there is no hint of UNESCO?s reciprocal support for LATIE. As a final comment on the LATIE Web site, I would like to point out the brilliant use of the Passive Voice. Many admirable things are being said and done through-out the Web page, but the agents are poorly identified, if identified at all. Once again, everything in the Web site may be factual and the goals of LATIE may be good ones, but a careful reading leads to many unanswered questions. Jimmy ---------------------------------------------------- Date: Sat, 16 Apr 2005 09:05:13 +0800 From: Rodney Tan Chai Whatt <rodt@xxxxxxxxx> Subject: [etni] Website: Licensing Authority for the Teaching of International Dear All, Here's a news tidbit from another mailing list about a body that is in charge of International English. Does anyone know more about this body? It claims to have been the result of a United Nations Conference held in Canada. Best regards, Rodney Tan Chai Whatt ------------------------------------------------------------------- "An independent body to serve as a global English language directorate and Standards authority serving the needs of English Education worldwide." http://latie.org/whatis.php Good luck. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Plan great trips with Yahoo! Travel: Now over 17,000 guides! http://travel.yahoo.com/p-travelguide ##### To send a message to the ETNI list email: etni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx ##### ##### Send queries and questions to: ask@xxxxxxxx #####