Home - ACU (The Australian Catholic University)

Site Navigation

Education at ICFP, Baucau

East Timor Capacity Building: Sustained International Collaboration

ACU, through IACE, is collaborating with Instituto Católico para Formação de Professores (ICFP), Baucau, East Timor, on the project, "East Timor Capacity Building: Sustained International Collaboration"

The aim of the project is effective international collaboration which promotes the development of quality educational and institutional capacities in East Timor. Existing capacities were destroyed in 2001 with the Indonesian withdrawal. Effectively this is a start-up educational capacity building project.

The project is focused on developing East Timorese staff and students, institutional infrastructure and sustainability, and ensuring international recognition of ICFP and its academic awards.

This agenda is addressed through ICFP achieving quality capacity building in:

  • being a provider of quality professional development courses to the education and other sectors within East Timor and the region;
  • sustaining a supply of internationally qualified teachers who are capable of assuming leadership roles in schools and communities;
  • meeting quality assurance requirements for ICFP educational, financial and management accountabilities;
  • being a sign of hope for the people of East Timor during the period of nation building;
  • being a lighthouse in the areas of teacher education and financial management leading to government public policy consultation on education and management and;
  • implementing evidence-based reporting which informs the project’s research and publication agenda.

Partners

ICFP is a Marist Brothers College. The major partners working with ACU, Marist Brothers and ICFP are:

  • Deloitte Growth Solutions (DGS)
  • Independent Education Union of Australia (IEUA)

Educational and institutional capacity building at ICFP has been a priority for this innovative international collaboration since the foundation of ICFP in 2000. The project is ongoing. ACU has been involved since 2001.

Major Outcomes

ICFP’s capacity building achievements are demonstrated through excellent student results. To date ninety seven Primary School Teachers have graduated across November 2006 and October 2007. There are a further one hundred and fifty students enroled in the Bachelor of Teaching course as at October 2007. Additional achievements at ICFP highlighting the success of the long-term international commitment of ACU and its partners, to East Timor, sustained even through recent periods of civil unrest include:

  • the establishment, in partnership with ACU, of the first internationally recognised degree course for primary teacher education in East Timor since independence;
  • ICFP offering quality professional development education and business courses nationally;
  • extremely high student satisfaction and retention rate (more than 96%); 
  • ICFP academic staff trained in current student-centred methods of teaching providing a strong and positive model for classroom instruction. The lecture/tutorial approach is regarded as a significant innovation by other higher education institutions in the country. These institutions have benefited from employment of ICFP staff who provide leadership in quality teaching and learning;
  • East Timor Ministry of Education involving ICFP in developing higher education policies;
  • ICFP meeting all financial accountabilities, nationally and internationally, through advice, support and training offered by DGS. This partnership contributed to the development of the management capacity of ICFP East Timorese staff, with some now having significant executive roles.

Benefits

The ICFP project is acting as a lighthouse for educational services and capacity building across East Timor.

ACU, through IACE, is in partnership with Caritas Australia in further collaborative educational and capacity building work in the Pacific, Oceania and East Timor.

Leveraged Capacity Building

ICFP staff and students were unable to source local medical services. This affected ICFP as a service provider.

Marist Brothers invited St Joseph’s College, Hunters Hill in Sydney, Australia, to assist in this area. Medical services have been under review since 2004. Recently a medical clinic began operating to service the needs of ICFP students and staff, as well as the local community. Further capacity building in this area is continuing. ACU is providing ongoing training and reciprocal nursing student immersion programs.

The major partners collaborating in the Health Clinic Capacity Building at ICFP, in addition to ACU and Marist Brothers are:

  • St Joseph’s College, Hunters Hill,
  • ACU’s Faculty of Health Sciences Schools of Nursing

Future

Learning Together is a communications and learning exchange program, including reciprocal immersion, between students at ACU and ICFP.

ACU’s Faculty of Health Sciences, School of Exercise Science in Victoria is in the development stage of a Youth Engagement Program aimed to reduce the dis-engagement of youth, with the subsequent reduction of street violence, in East Timor.

East Timor is in a phase of rebuilding its country’s infrastructure. The work is ongoing. ACU will continue to work in collaboration with partners in East Timor.

Related Links