August, 2005. Welcome to the beginning of what I hope to be a year-long project where I investigate opportunities and challenges for Open and Distance Learning in Latin America. It is likely that this Web site will eventually become a component of my final portfolio project for the Masters degree program in Distance Education at The University of Maryland University College in the summer or fall of 2006.

Currently, the site contains only a proposal for teacher education in Mexico, an Annotated Bibliography, and a report on Carnoy's Globalization and educational reform: what planners need to know, perhaps the key reading for my entire Web project.

The Annotated Bibliography, however, is broader than the report on teacher education in Mexico and will almost certainly grow throughout the subsequent fall and spring semesters. Currently, it includes a number of resources that consider globalization, ICT, and development in Latin America, as well as teacher education, neoliberalist economic policies, and other issues regarding borderless education.

As a student, I am particularly interested in borderless education and the World Trade Organization's General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). I expect to write about this important issue in the coming year, as well as offer individual proposals/arguments/reports/research regarding ODL for Brazil, Chile, Argentina, and Peru.

--Steve Kerby