The conference would discuss developments in and implementation of character education strategies in various countries, Suwarsih Madya, chairperson of the meeting`s organizing committee, said here Friday.
She said the six countries to take part in the conference were Australia, Malaysia, the United States, the Netherlands, Iran and Indonesia.
"The meeting is expected to serve as forum for the participating countries to learn from each other regarding the implementation of character education," Suwarsih, a professor at the Faculty of Languages ​​and Arts of the University of Yogyakarta, said.
She said as an institution engaged in teachers` training and education, the University of Yogyakarta was very interested in and cared much about development of character education.
"The conference is expected to stimulate character education and raise its quality to international level and also enable its participants to know what is happening in character education in other countries, besides serving as an opportunity to learn from each other," she said.
According to her, character education strategies in different countries needed to be studied because people`s characters were mainly formed in certain cultural contexts.
In every person there were good character values that were universal, in addition to values stemming from local wisdoms, she added.
Indonesians can not learn on their own so they must think globally to build their national character which should be multicultural while based on local knowledge.
"However, we should not forget that we are also members of a global community and should therefore also care for the outside world," she said.
Meanwhile, Darmiyati Zuchdi, a member of the event`s organizing committee, said character education meant the inculcation of universal values namely those accepted everywhere such as honesty, sense of justice and religiosity.
"Character education in other countries has developed profusely and we need to think globally while retaining our local identity," she said.
Speakers at the international conference to be attended by about 300 participants would include Bernice Lerner from Boston University, USA, Frank Dhont (Yale University, USA) and Vishalache Balakhrisnan (University of Malaya, Malaysia).
In addition, Siebrig H Schreuder (Akademische Ziekenhuis Utrecht, The Netherlands), Fasli Jalal (Ministry of Education), Azyumardi Azra (Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University Jakarta and I Gede Raka (Bandung Institute of Technology ).
(T.KR-LWA/HAJM/S012)
Editor: Priyambodo RH
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