A/67/293 16. Institutions mandated to address minority issues can increase minority rights awareness among minority communities and the wider society. They are valuable central sources of information on legislation, policies and programmes and acts that foster discrimination. They can provide advisory services on specific concerns, such as education, employment and housing, and facilitate consultations and debates in which minorities participate. A national institutional framework facilitates legislative and policy development and the design, implementation and monitoring of minority-related programmes. Affirmative action measures that address longstanding discrimination and inequality are often necessary and require institutional attention to specific minority issues or groups. Institutions can conduct studies and social surveys and gather and analyse disaggregated data so as to justify, implement and monitor such measures. 17. Minority rights institutions frequently have proactive mandates that include: reviewing and proposing domestic standards and providing expertise and information to legislation drafting and policymaking processes; monitoring laws and policies with respect to minority rights and recommending amendments or implementation measures; encouraging and coordinating programming on minority issues and strategies devised to address problems relating to minorities; promotion and education activities; developing good practice guides, information resources and reports; developing campaigns and outreach relating to minority rights; and forming a bridge between minority communities and public administration. Importantly, they should not act in isolation on minority issues but, should rather, actively promote mainstreaming of minority issues and cooperation across all relevant bodies. 18. Specialist bodies have a valuable educative role in developing and delivering teaching and training initiatives, which would include educating the general public through such activities as public debates, engagement with the media on minority issues and conducting campaigns and other awareness-raising initiatives. They may promote minority rights within the framework of human rights education initiatives through the development of curricula and provision of school teaching materials appropriate to diverse classrooms, reflecting ethnic and religious diversity, minority cultures and languages, and the histories and contributions of minorities. Dedicated bodies can provide training to staff of public bodies, including the police and judiciary, so as to enhance institutional awareness of minority rights and equality standards and promote the use of tools, resources and good practices relevant to minority rights. 19. Institutionalized expertise helps Governments to respond appropriately to challenges facing specific minority groups. In many countries, for example, linguistic minorities claim their rights, as established in the Declaration, to adequate opportunities for learning and receiving instruction in their mother tongue. Such rights require specialist knowledge of minority communities and their needs and pedagogic methodologies relevant to language education, including bilingual education models and their application. Institutional attention to the rights and needs of linguistic minorities must be a focus of both national policymaking bodies such as the ministry of education, and in municipal authorities responsible for implementing policy and programmes in practice. Specific minority needs may lead States to consider other policy and institutional options, including establishing and supporting minority schools. 8 12-45950