The idea of the network among chemical educator in the Asian-Pacific region may be traced back to the proposal by Professor David Clift of Deakin University, Australia in 1994 [1], who was a past chief of Chemical Education Division of the Royal Australia Chemistry Institute (RACI). This propsal was examined at the FACS General Assembly in May 1995 in Manila during the 6th Asian Chemical Congress (ACC) and accepted to start with the name Asian-Pacific Chemical Education Network (ACEN), with Professor Yoshito Takeuchi (Japan) and Professor Ma. Cristina de Padlina (Philippines) as directors.
At the 29th EXCO meeting in Dhaka in January 1996, Professor Takeuchi showed the outline of the initial planning of the Network [2], which was baed on the Internet, e-mail and worhld-wide web (www), and in connection with the Japanese project for publication of "Chemical Education in Asia Pacific." In 1996, the inaugural meeting of ACEN was held during the 14th International Conference on Chemical Education (ICCE) in Brisbane, Australia [3], with the attendance of Professors Clift and Takeuchi, Dr. Barry Noller, the Coordinator of Projects, and Professor F. Sevilla III, the President of FACS. There the first version of the www home page for ACEN was presented.
The www version of the "Chemical Education in Asia Pacific" [4] was disseminated as part of the ACEN materials by the 7ACC in May, 1997, covering 17 of the 24 FACS countries and regions at that time. After the fundamental structure of the network had been constructed by that time, at the General Assebly during the Congress, Professor Takeuchi resigned the Project Director and Dr. Masato M. Ito (Japan), who had been assisting Prof. Takeuchi in managing the home page, was nominated to codirect ACEN with Professor Padolina.
[1] D. Clift, "Asia-Pacific Network of Chemical Educators", FACS Newsletter 1995, No. 2, 14-15.
[2] Y. Takeuchi and, M. C. D. Padolina,
"Report from FACS Project
'Asia-Pacific Chemical Education Network'", FACS
Newsletter, 1996, No. 1, 5-10.
[3] "Asian Chemical Education Network inaugural meeting", FACS Newsletter 1997, No. 1, 16.
[4] "Chemical Education in Asia Pacific" web version: http://www.t.soka.ac.jp/chem/CEAP/.
(Presented at July 4, 2000, by Dr. Masato M. Ito)