WRITTEN STATEMENT: U.S. NATIONAL COMMISSION FOR UNESCO Many thanks to our hosts, chairpersons, and rappatours—as a result of their hard work and close collaboration we can certainly look forward to thoroughly productive discussions, in several interesting settings. The new “café” approach will hopefully encourage greater participation and stronger creative thinking. I am especially impressed by the training that our Chairpersons and Rappatours have received in order to promote the best output from our discussions. The efficient and intelligent work that has been put into the planning of this meeting reflects the streamlining theme that we hope will come out of our discussions here. Overall, we hope that after our 5 days together, that we will have encouraged two overarching areas on which UNESCO should focus. Just last week our U.S. National Commission for UNESCO held its Annual Meeting— it was attended by over 40 commissioners and around 60 members of the general public, during which there was a great deal of discussions and input into this Questionnaire. Our primary overarching goal is that all Program Priorities should continue to be stated as specifically as possible. They should target progress in programs, and they should include specific goals and metrics. Second, there should be clear concise links between the C4 and the C5—in lock step with each other, promoting and maintaining a clear vision for the organization and its activities. Major Lines of Action (MLAs) within the Education Sector should support capacity development, specifically for assisting both public and private sector efforts to achieve the Dakar goals. Education MLAs should promote not only policy dialogue and research, but also recommend best practices. In addition, we would like to see civic education added to efforts in fostering literacy and quality education. The Natural Sciences Sector portion should specifically mention the technical capacity building priority of technology transfer, therefore targeting sound management of safe and adequate sources of drinking water and sustainable economic development. The review of priorities for the Social and Human Sciences Sector may promote principles, practices, and norms but, only those that are currently existing and universally agreed upon. We hope the Culture Sector actions will emphasize the appropriate interchange of cultural property among peoples and states; and the development of museums, particularly increasing museum-related capacity building. Freedom of the press and the safety of journalists should be referenced in the Communications and Information sector portion of the document. Finally, the section on Intersectoral Platforms--which we were pleased to see--should mention not only science education, but science and technology education. .