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Forum organization Briefs Because of the technical nature of the focus of this forum we will issue short quantitative briefs on investment for education, training and employment. Every brief will cover technical, economic and financial aspects and review considerations which determine affordabilty and sustainability. This forum will be strongly "moderated" by a panel, including Roma from rural communities. The panel has the responsibility of maximising the transparency of contributions. People posting items may well be asked to improve expression or unpack complex arguments. The approach is quantiative so participants who are not used to quantitative approaches might undergo a steep learning curve but this process is essential to end up with useful and feasible proposals. Background and main lines of analysis In order to manage the forum nine "threads" or "lines" have been pre-defined. Contributors are asked to follow the argumenta and developments within those that interest them. Raising counter arguments is no problem as long as the logic is clear, and therefore useful. Basis for quantification In many circumstances there is a lack of readily available statistics. However, there are well established methods to quantity things which have not been quantified, basically by applying common sense. So some of the discussions will explain how this is achieved. Starting out The section on Leading Issues presents a resume of a view of the state of affairs of the Roma. The objective is to place the main "lines" into context. The briefs will be found in the Resources section and where relevant we wil include links to other resources on the Internet. The See the forum section allows participants to review what has been stated under each line and participants can conbtribute by simply clicking on the Contribute section.