Delegates from 14 countries with active JET Alumni groups met with representatives of MOFA and CLAIR from the 1st – 3rd October for the 2010 JETAA International Meeting in Edinburgh.
The event marked the end of a 15-year tradition of annual face-to-face meetings between JETAA Country Representatives. Naoki Murata (Director-General, Public Diplomacy Department) from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA) confirmed that financial support would not be available for the event in 2011. Mr Murata spoke of the funding challenges for the coming year, but affirmed MOFA’s ongoing firm commitment to both the JET Programme and activities of JETAA.
Hiroshi Narita, Executive Director of CLAIR (Council of Local Authorities for International Relations) Tokyo confirmed that the JET Programme’s budget had come under scrutiny, but he expressed the view that JET was increasingly important in an age of growing internationalisation. He also spoke of the coming 25th anniversary for the programme and his aspiration for the continued improvement and development of both the JET Programme and JETAA.
Michelle Elliott, the outgoing JETAAI Chair welcomed our newest chapter JETAA Tokyo to the family and updated delegates on the success of recent initiatives to effectively communicate the value of the JET Programme in the international press.
Moving towards the future, delegates discussed ways to develop closer international ties between chapters, grassroots links with Japanese organisations and ways to support smaller or newly formed chapters. Reforms were also proposed to the current structure of JETAAI to enable the organisation to adapt to the immediate funding challenges. These reforms will be presented to CLAIR next week and carried forward over the coming year by the newly appointed Executive Committee comprising;
- Shree Kurlekar, JETAAI Chair (JETAA New York)
- Barbara Gill, JETAAI Vice Chair (JETAA Scotland)
- Kay Dunkley, JETAAI Secretary (JETAA Jamaica)
- David Boyd, JETAAI Public Relations (JETAA Sydney)
- Paul Donovan / Bob Schnyder, JETAAI Webmasters (JETAA British Columbia and JETAA Portland)
A wide range of issues were covered during the three-day meeting. Throughout, delegates expressed their strong mutual determination to collaborate at a regional and international level; Utilising videoconferencing and social networking tools as appropriate; To collectively support the proposed transition in the way the organisation operates in the coming year. An official statement will be issued by JETAAI shortly detailing the outcomes of the meeting -some of the main points were also updated via twitter throughout the meeting.
The National Committee of JETAA-UK would like to congratulate JETAA Scotland on their success in planning and delivering an outstanding International Meeting. Their hospitality, hard work and enthusiasm was greatly appreciated by all delegates.
Otsukaresama deshita!
