E/CN.4/2005/88 page 21 88. Indigenous education, adapted to indigenous peoples’ cultures and values, is the best way of ensuring the right to education; it does not mean shutting out the outside world or ignoring the challenges posed by national societies or the global economy, but is in fact viewed by indigenous communities themselves as a necessary tool for the full personal, social and cultural development of aboriginal peoples. III. RECOMMENDATIONS 89. The Special Rapporteur recommends to Governments that they attach high priority to the objectives and principles of indigenous education and provide public and private agencies and institutions involved in promoting indigenous education with sufficient material, institutional and intellectual resources. 90. The Special Rapporteur invites Governments to prepare, in close collaboration with indigenous communities, programmes for the training of an adequate number of bilingual and intercultural education teachers during the Second International Decade of the World’s Indigenous People. This will entail promoting the recruitment of indigenous candidates and providing them with the necessary services, incentive programmes and fellowships, and increasing the number of necessary educational and research facilities. The Special Rapporteur invites UNESCO and international cooperation partners to join in this effort. 91. The Special Rapporteur recommends to universities and research centres that they increase their involvement in the preparation of special multidisciplinary curricula for indigenous education. He further recommends that indigenous universities be expanded and strengthened. 92. The Special Rapporteur recommends that courses on indigenous peoples (including their history, philosophy, culture, art and lifestyles) be broadened at all levels of national education, with an anti-racist, multicultural focus that reflects respect for cultural and ethnic diversity and, in particular, gender equality. He further recommends that special attention be paid to the relationship between indigenous peoples and the environment and that participatory scientific research be promoted in this area (with special attention paid to vulnerable environments such as the Arctic, the forests of the far North, tropical forests and high mountain areas). 93. The Special Rapporteur also recommends that the mass media regularly include content related to indigenous peoples and cultures in their programming, in a context of respect for the principles of tolerance, fairness and non-discrimination established in international human rights instruments, and that indigenous peoples and communities be given the right to have access to the mass media, including radio, television and the Internet for their own use. 94. The Special Rapporteur recommends that, as part of the effort to consolidate the various kinds of indigenous education, emphasis be placed on strengthening physical education, special training in the criminal justice system for indigenous people, education in all areas for indigenous girls and women, distance learning, adult education and continuing education. -----