Education

December 1st comes around again. Grateful to witness it once more. So many memories - the most vivid from Campion Days of old...pushing for almost glory or just plain survival through fields of mud, up frosted hills, leading or trailing friends of yore.

Four decades ago I left Aubagne, without any photos - which I sometimes regret, but I was young and stubborn and romantic and weird - but with images imprinted on my mind, and maybe my heart, forever.

Indeed, over the intervening years, these images have grown much stronger in relative terms, and moved closer and closer to the front and centre of the painting of my life, even as other, once seemingly permanent formative experiences have gradually faded....probably the reminiscence bump in action.

See also:

• On Provence

I finished primary school half a century ago on 19th July 1974. My memories of that last day at St Helen's are still vivid (in part) and very positive. I started at Campion on 3rd September 1974.

If the world were a village of 100 people, what would it look like?  Various answers have circulated around the internet for years, but a set of 20 posters provides a visual perspective on this fascinating hypothetical question.

The Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) were eight time-bound goals providing concrete, numerical benchmarks for tackling extreme poverty in its many dimensions.

The MDGs included goals and targets on income poverty, hunger, maternal and child mortality, disease, inadequate shelter, gender inequality, environmental degradation and the Global Partnership for Development.

Adopted by world leaders in the year 2000 with the attention of being achieved by 2015, the MDGs were both global and local, tailored by each country to suit specific development needs. 

The eight MDGs below in turn broke down into 21 quantifiable targets that were measured by 60 indicators.