Fernando M. Reimers et al.

The institute also sponsored the creation of international relations clubs
on college campuses. In addition, in the 19203 a few colleges in the United
States, including Harvard University, offered their students the opportu—
nityto participate in simulations of the League of Nations with the pur—
pose of educating them on global issues, interdependence, and the factors
that threatened peace and security.

Following World War II, the creation of the United Nations and the adoption
of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which included education
as one of the basic rights whose pursuit would help achieve peace, accentu—
ated the cosmopolitan aspiration for education—that is, that education would
help students discover their common humanity with others. The preamble to
the constitution of UNESCO, the specialized agency established to advance
the achievement of the right to education, makes explicit reference to the
need to educate students on the focus of the United Nations and on advanc—
ing human rights. This idea gave impetus to the view of global education
as a specific subject matter that would require direct study and interaction
with diverse peers, not indirect infusion into other disciplines. In collabora—
tion with governments around the world, UNESCO advanced a number of
programmatic initiatives to promote global education, peace education, and
human—rights education. These included a series of affiliated schools, starting
with thirty-three schools in fifteen countries in 1953, whose goal was to “en—
courage the development of education in the aims and activities of the United
Nations and the Specialized Agencies and in the principles of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights.” UNESCO also contributed to the develop—

ment of curricula for peace and human—rights education.

In the 19605 two important education programs emerged to promote
global understanding. One of them, the International Baccalaureate (1B)
Organization, was established in 1968 in Geneva to develop and support
a university preparatory curriculum—a diploma program—for students
who had to move between countries as a result of their parents’ occu—
pations. In developing this curriculum, the organization initially built

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