A nation can plan educational content, aims, methods, evaluation and change at national level. The lead document is usually termed a national curriculum.

What is a national curriculum? A national curriculum (NC) is meant as a flexible conceptual and operative framework, which sets out the essential ?entitlement to learning? for the young citizens of a nation. This is a quantum of common learning meant to be offered by all schools to everyone, enriched by guidelines for going beyond or well-beyond the minimum ?core?, as well as, for older or otherwise able students, several alternative but interconnected pathways.

The NC will, once adopted and as a matter of right, provide all pupils with skills and competencies in a number of areas of learning, suitably graded, coherent in totality, delivered using appropriate pedagogies, in suitable environments, with the desired outcomes in mind.

For each of the identified stage of development or key stages, there will be set a baseline profile of the learner, i.e. ?attainment targets?, in the form of knowledge, know-how, activities & experiences, understanding and behavioural norms that pupils are expected to acquire by the end of that stage.

Its implementation would involve revisiting the desired outcome.

It is expected that all existing curricula & material will undergo (on a case by case, subject by subject basis) minimal to extensive revision for use after a NC has been developed and adopted, so as to provide for the learners the integral development sought. The NC will ideally be built from all that is good in what already exists. In its implementation, the NC can be adopted formally or remain as the informal unifying guidelines for curriculum developers, text-books writers and schools, thereby ensuring coherence and continuity in what is taught and learnt

Stages in the development and implementation of a NC.

1.Conception: This means analysis of existing local curricula and programmes of studies, for the pre-primary, primary, lower secondary and 14-16 age group. This entails considering best international practices from the national curricula of selected countries and other sources such as UNESCO?S Education for All project, the Faure Report (Learning to Be), ADEA documents, etc. and the extraction of their useful features;

2.Drafting of an initial version of a national curriculum, made up of existing elements, retained with or without adaptation, as well as insertion of new and innovative elements, which together form the backbone or framework of the new national curriculum.

3.Consultation and discussion: to be valid and worthy of being made into law (i.e. under a National Curriculum Act), designers and developers of a NC need in-depth consultations with and inputs from all partners in education as well as all stakeholders of civil society. (These consultations must include all political tendencies, to avoid the disaster of reversal of educational policies due to change of party in power, independent of what is right pedagogically and for the children).

4.Preparation of a ?final? version of the NC, which would include details of all subjects, themes and topics to be studied and practised, as well as the learning objectives for each element.

5.Decision to adopt the NC by Government;

6.Legislation, public relations;

7.Training of all stakeholders in the process;

8.Implementation through a gradual transition period, respecting the specificities and learning needs of each institution

9.Evaluation (at agreed intervals, e.g. after 1, 2, 5, 10 years), with follow-up and adjustments at each stage.

Conclusion: the most unlikely nation in the world is doing it! Indeed, the Palestinian people are presently engaged (despite the occupation and war situation) in a serious and dedicated effort to restructure their educational system by ?replacing the Jordanian and Egyptian curricula currently used in the West Bank and Gaza respectively, by a new, unified national curricula that reflects their hopes and aspirations?.

What about us, in independent and peaceful Mauritius? A national curriculum initiative brings with it the notion that curricula (i.e. what is learnt at school) are open to continued change over the years as conditions here and globally change. A desirable side effect of such attitude is that in future acceptance of change becomes a way of life.

In other words, had Minister Gokhool launched in July 2005 a broad national debate on the design and content for a NC, the minister of Finance might have had much less resistance to the ?new ball game? which the present national budget is and equally come to accept change gracefully where proposed measures have been demonstrated to be flawed.

I find no evidence that this process of the participatory development of a national curriculum, crucial for modernising Mauritius, has even started. When will it start, if ever?

<B>Dr. Michael ATCHIA</B>