Announcement

CIES International Travel Award for Distinguished Service in Educational Reform

We are pleased to announce that George Soros and the Open Society Institute have initiated an endowment that will allow us to attract distinguished researchers and practitioners from developing countries to present at CIES conferences. The newly established CIES International Travel Award for Distinguished Service in Educational Service attempts to increase the presence of educational experts who serve in countries where international projects are implemented. Other international organizations are invited to contribute to this inter-agency endowment fund, initiated by CIES and OSI.

The 53^rd Annual Conference of the Comparative and International Education Society marks the twentieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall and the beginning of a new era in education and development. Arguably, OSI was the largest and most influential NGO in the post-socialist region and has left a deep mark on educational development in these thirty and more countries. In 1992, OSI funded travel and accommodation for fifteen ministers of education from the newly established countries in the Commonwealth of Independent States as well as from Eastern Europe. Since this historic moment, OSI has provided numerous scholarships and travel grants for residents from the post-socialist region and, more recently, from other countries that dependent on external financial assistance.

The establishment of the endowment will be launched at the 2009 CIES conference. It is anticipated that other international organizations, agencies, and foundations will match this initial contribution to support the continuation of the travel award.

Conference participants with more than five years of professional experience in educational development are eligible to apply. A travel award in the amount of $1,000 will be given provided that their proposal has been accepted for presentation at the conference. The awardees will be notified by January 10 and announced on the conference website as well as in the CIES Newsletter.

The application form can be found on the CIES conference website http://www.tc.edu/cies2009. The deadline for submission is November 15, 2008.

Henry M. Levin, President CIES

Gita Steiner-Khamsi, President-Elect CIES