Empowered for the future
FEECA General Meeting vote board an plans further symposia
Vienna, 29.10.2014. The General Meeting of the European Federation for Catholic Adult Education (FEECA) finished today. The board-members was voted. Also for the next four years Dr. Alois Becker as president and Edit Balogh (Hungaria), Heinrich Block (France) and Andrea Hoffmeier (Germany) as Vice-Presidents will lead the fortune of the Organisation.
The established sympoisa will be planed also in 2015 (22. – 23.04.) in Cologne with the theme “Catholic adult education and the changed world of media” and in spring 2016 in Brussel.
Family Education in Europe
24 persons came to the FEECA conference in Strasburg from April the 7th to 8th. Is the change of the idea of family in every country the same? This was one question of the FEECA-conference. The other was what kind of family education is necessary today. Projects and courses concepts were presented in Workshops and gave many inspiration for the own work in the own country. The Conference was supported from Renovabis.
COMECE Statement on the European Elections 2014
The Catholic Bishops of Europe publish a Statement in view of the upcoming European elections. In this text, they reaffirm their support for the European project. They encourage all citizens of the European Union to go to the polling booths on the 22nd and 25th May, and to start engaging, during the run-up to the election, in constructive dialogue with their MEP´s and those wo are candidates for seats.
http://www.comece.eu/site/en/acitvities/events/article/6431.html
Family Enrichment in Europe in time of changing the view of family
Conference April the 7th till 8th 2014 in Strasbourg
The idea of a european year of the family in 2014 or rather of the compatibility between family and employability, wich failed and the demonstrations against the gay-marriage in France, motivate us to have a differentiate look on the (different or same) view of family in the European Countries and the tasks for Family Enrichment in a changing society. Conference language: German
You can find the detail program here.
Educating people, supporting the European idea – The “European Federation for Catholic Adult Education (FEECA)” celebrated its 50th anniversary
“The focus of adult education in Europe must not only be its usability for the economy.” The European Federation for Catholic Adult Education (FEECA) was foundet 50 years ago and its presidet Dr. Alois Becker highlighted at a reception in Brussels what matters in lifelong learning: giving everyone that ability to develop personally and to also be involved in society. The astablishment of the FEECA in Lucerne was the result of wanting to focus an increase the commitment to Europe. In many countries, such as Germnay and Austria, Catholic adult education plays an important role in this. The FEECA president emphasised that the offers are open to everyone. Religious topics are included, of course. Examples of other key areas are family education, personal education, citizenship education, obtaining school qualifications at a later stage, language courses or offers for the older generation. Dr. Becker said that Catholic adult education is to be regarded as an independent field within the church an not just as part of pastoral work.
The General Secretary of the Commission of the Bishops’ Conferences of the European Community Patrick Daly, who also celebrated the festival church service, emphasised the importance of educational work for the church in Europe in his welcoming speech. The former FEECA presidents Dr. Erika Schuster and Prof. Mag. Karl Kalcsics spoke about their work at the federation and their successes in a talk round.
Doris Pack, Chair of the Committee on Culture and Education in the European Parliament, supported the cause of FEECA at a “parliamentary breakfast” to celebrate the birthday of the federation and emphasised that she always had to use the power of persuasion in her political work in Brussels to even raise awareness of adult education in many countries, for example during discussions about the organisation of the EU educational programmes. With the draft of the new support programme starting in 2014 (Erasmus+), which will provide significantly more money for the Grundtvig subprogramme, adult education will be given new impetus. “Thanks to these educational programmes an internal European community has emerged in recent years which will spread the European idea into the individual countries”, says the German CDU politician. The host of the parliamentary breakfast was Heinz-K. Becker from Austria, deputy member of the Committee on Culture and Education. A Romanian European parliamentarian was also among the invitees.
Successful European conference of experts for Catholic adult education in Romania
48 employees from the Catholic adult education from Hungary, Czechia, Romania, Germany and Netherlands, discussed from April 22 -24 the situation of ethnic minorities in Europe and the Countries of origin of the participants. The conference was conducted by Pro Educatione in cooperation with FEECA and took place in Miercureaciuc, Romania.
Alongside accounts and discussion forums, the visit of a Roma school allowed participants to inform themselves of the situation of the Roma minority.
The conference showed: Alongside the general adult education, which has the function to empower people to act on their own decisions, the adult education has also the assignment of political education.