The Record
We have completely overhauled Basic Cartography: new material (Remote Sensing, Documentation Marketing) was added, the existing material was updated or extensively rewritten by Roger Anson, in order to homogenize the contents, tone and level.

We have succeeded in bringing new areas within the CET orbit: South America (1996) and the former Soviet Union (1997, 1998).

We have continued co-operation with other ICA commissions:

History: Vienna (1995), Lisbon (1997), Athens (1999)
Map Production: Bandung (1997), Durban (1999)
Atlases: Prague (1996), The Hague (1996), Bandung (1997)
Children: Gifu (1996)
Concepts: Gifu (1997)
Map use: (Gifu (1996), Urbana (1999).

We have co-operated with sister societies’ educational commissions: Bandung (1997, ISPRS); a similar set-up organised for Kuala Lumpur with FIG was canceled due to financial problems in the host country.

We made a start on continuing education with a distance education programme.

We started producing a list of teaching establishments providing cartography programmes.

We have been stimulating regional cooperation programmes:

-Europaforum in conjunction with German and British Cartographic Societies
-Balkan cartographic education and research programmes in conjunction with the Hellenic Cartographic Society.

We have produced what can be considered to be a school atlas production manual

Publications:
Basic Cartography, vol. 2
Proceedings, Bandung seminar: ‘Digital Cartography for the Information Highway’
Proceedings, Intercarto 3, seminar, Novosibirsk: ‘Teaching Cartography for GIS’.
Proceedings, Intercarto 4, seminar, Barnaul: ‘Teaching Cartography for Sustainable Development.
Proceedings, Vienna seminar, ‘Teaching the History of Cartography’.

Production and upkeep of a website of the commission CET, October 1998
Highlights of CET, 1995-1999
The input of over 40 geography teachers and Education Ministry officials during a school atlas seminar in Bandung, Indonesia (March 1997), stands out most prominently in our present term. We discussed school atlas requirements with them, the influence of the national curriculum, and current trends and plans for electronic versions. Geography curricula from European and Asian countries were compared and current atlas projects with input from experts were discussed. We just managed to get the proceedings out before Ottawa, and hope to have a follow-up meeting in the region after their distribution. The fact that the chair of the ISPRS Commission on Education co-organized this meeting gave it an extra dimension.

The three volumes of the Basic Cartography Manual series have been updated, again reflecting the state of the art of our profession and co-operation with sister societies. It contains new chapters on remote sensing (from an ISPRS-affiliated author), desktop cartography, marketing, documentation (from an IFLA-affiliated author) and visualisation; all the other chapters have been overhauled.

Together with Santiago (Chile), Bandung was the venue of a larger meeting aimed at knowledge transfer to developing countries, a strategy also directed at Africa. A meeting there (Durban) was envisaged for February 1999. Though regarded highly succesful, the effects of such meetings can only be regarded as minimal in relation to the needs of the whole developing world. Therefore it is significant that we started the discussion on Internet courses, that can be accessed everywhere where an Internet link is available.

The educational seminars held in conjunction with Intercarto conferences in Russia stand out just as well. Held in Novosibirsk (1997) and Barnaul (1998) they were attended by colleagues working on the improvement of their educational programmes geared to training for environmental GIS specialists, in order to get the upper hand on the environmental hazards affecting work relating to sustainable development.

A completely different audience was met during the Teaching the History of Cartography conferences held in Vienna (1995), Lisbon (1997) and Athens (1999). Here, amongst other themes, the continuing education aspect of cartography was stressed, showing that/how people after or at the end of their professional careers could contribute to research, given the right tools and training. It is groups of retired enthusiasts, in Britain and the Netherlands, that are pushing forward the research frontier in the History of Cartography onwards.

Ferjan Ormeling