博主按：以下是中信所就中信所2004年间在广西举办的一次信息分析培训班的情况向联合国教科文组织全民信息计划（IFAP）秘书局的汇报。

Report of the Information Analysis Workshop

 for Western Regions of China （2004）

1.     The Information Analysis Workshop for Western Regions of China, hosted by the Chinese National Commission for UNESCO and ISTIC (China National Bureau for UNESCO IFAP), was held at Nanning from 13 to 16 September 2004.

2.     It was a well-attended training programme, with around 100 participants coming from 50 cities ofChina. More than 80% of the participants were information analysts. Distinguish guests of the workshop included:

Ø  Mr. Jiang Hesheng, Vice Diector of Science and Technology Bureau of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region

Ø  Mr. Guo Changming, Officer of Publicity Department of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region

Ø  Professor Wu Yishan, Chief Engineer of ISTIC

Ø  Professor Sun Chengjian, former Vice Curator of China National Library

Ø  Mr. Wei Baoping, Director of Institute of Science and Technology Information of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region

Ø  Ms. Zhao Zhiyun, Director of the Information Analysis  Center of ISTIC.

Ø  Mr. Deng Jiuhua, Officer ofChinaNational Commission for Education, Science and Culture

3.     The training workshop had three agendas.

AGENDA  ITEM  1.  OPENING  OF  THE  WORKSHOP

The workshop was opened on Tuesday, 14 September  2004 by Ms. Zhao Zhiyun, Director of the Information Analysis  Center of ISTIC. Mr. Jiang Hesheng, the Vice President of Guangxi Science and Technology Bureau, and Mr. Guo Changming, the officer of Guangxi Publicity Department, made opening statements at the opening session respectively. In their opening addresses, two officers both thanked Chinese National Commission for UNESCO and ISTIC for hosting the workshop. They also expressed their best wishes to the workshop and similar activities for western regions ofChina.

AGENDA  ITEM  2.  TRAINING　PROGRAMME

Training began after the opening session and lasted around two days from 14 to 16 September  2004. Six courses aiming at improving trainees’ primary analytical skills and capabilities were as follows:

Ø  Soft Science Research

Ø  Skills and Methods of Information Analysis

Ø  Theories and Practices of Competitive Intelligence  

Ø  Network-based Information Retrieval

Ø  Theories and Practices of Statistics

Ø  The Development and Future of Digital Library

Apart from the training courses, the workshop also arranged Mr. Deng Jiuhua, the officer of UNESCO, to give participants a brief introduction of the vision, mission, and activities of UNESCO’s Information For All Programme. Furthermore, the organizer of the workshop demonstrated Chinainfo, a non-profit website oriented to disseminate S&T information among public, and urged communities/institutes to join in the programme and share S&T information on the platform of Chinainfo. 

AGENDA  ITEM  3.  WORKSHOP  EVALUATION

In order to improve future work, the organizer conducted a survey of the evaluation of the workshop afterwards. The number of questionnaires dispatched is 79, among them, 61 were returned.

 Analysis of the questionnaires shows that the training programme is a productive one. Major results of the evaluation are as follows:

Ø                    Overall evaluation

Above table shows clearly that the majority of respondents were satisfied with the arrangement of the workshop. But at the mean time, some trainees thought that the time of training was too limited and some topics should be explored further. Some trainees suggested that online distance-learning might be a good solution in the future.

Ø   Recommendations for topics of similar activities in the future mainly focuses on following four aspects:

a. The foundation and for establishing cooperation in the area of S&T Information Resources Sharing;

b. The development and future of information service industry and the mechanism for cooperation within the industry;

c. Partial commercialization of information resources and services that could be delivered to industrial clients; and

d. Methods and skills of soft science research, information collection, and information analysis.

Ø   The respondents suggested that ISTIC should organize systemic training programmes to introduce successful cases and the latest research trends both at home and aboard in the area of information analysis, which would make training programme  more applicable and practical.