ACTIVITY REPORT
BY
S.Altantsetseg Sodnomtseren
IPF-2001
ID: 156-SOD-MN

Reporting period: February 2001-June 2001

During the period between February- July 2001, the following activities were undertaken:

1. Signing agreement with OSI, Hungary and obtaining first installment: Middle of January, 2001
2. Meeting with external mentor and discussion of the proposal: Beginning of February 2001
3. Participation in the IPF workshop: 18 February-4 March 2001]
4. Revision of the policy proposal: March 2001
5. Data collection and interpretation: April and May
6. Data analysis and writing a research paper: June and July (will continue in the following months)
 

Revision of the policy proposal: March 2001

The policy training conducted by OSI helped me understand that in order to make the proposal useful for policy analysts and match the priority of the funding institution, the paper had to be revised and re-written. The first paper was more focused on university needs and aimed to provide advice to universities to generate income.
The revised paper is to analyse role of state funding for higher education and its effects on university mission and role, students and their families and other stakeholders.

The paper has been submitted to Zorana Garic, OSI mentor, Prof. Balazs Varadi, external mentor from CEU and Dr.Ts.Gelegjamts, external mentor from Ministry of Science, Education and Culture, Mongolia. According to the mentors' opinions, revision was worthwhile doing.

Data collection and interpretation: April and May

Data collection was the most time consuming part of the research due to several facts:

Secondary data research

An extensive range of documents including national documents, law and policy documents related to education and budget, statistical documents, internal documents of Ministry of Science, Education and Culture, the NUM and the Ministry of Finance and Economics, materials of previous and current projects of international donor institutions, and books and articles by consultants, policy makers and researchers (see bibliography) was examined.

Primary data collection
Interviews were made with the following persons:

The named people are the key policy makers, administrators and researchers who facilitated me to track current development and policy trends on higher education financing and to deeper understand the present situation.
I had an opportunity to closely work with the World Bank international and local consultants on education, share views and participate in the consultative workshop of World Bank and donors held in June 2001 in Ulaanbaatar. The workshop gave me clear picture of the Government policy on education sector development. Data collection is still underway.

Data analysis and writing a research paper

This activity is ongoing (see research paper).
 

Second report
Reporting period:    July 2001-December 2001

During the period between July-December 2001, the following activities were undertaken:

1.    Participation in the IPF workshops: October 2001 and March 2002
2.    Meeting with mentors and discussion of the first draft: October 2001 
3.     Revision of the research paper and policy paper: throughtout the whole period: July 2001-January 2002
4.    Participation in the Asia Pacific University Presidents Conference: 7-12 October 2001 (presentation of paper "Financing of state higher education in Mongolia"
5. Organisation of the workshop at the National University of Mongolia (February 2002): draft Education Law and discussion)
5.    Final draft of the research paper and policy paper: February 2002
6.    Submission of research paper and policy paper to mentors: March 2002
7.    Advice and comments from mentors: Dr. Balazs Varadi, CEU, Zorana Gajic, OSI and Dr. Ts. Gelegjamts, MOSEC, Mongolia.
8.    Policy paper translated and submitted to MOSEC: February 2002
9.    Editing of research and policy paper (ongoing after advice by mentors)

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