Center for International Cooperation in Education Development (CICED)

The main topic of international work in 2021 for the Center for International Cooperation in Education Development was the overcoming of the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic for educational systems related to the closure of schools and the transition to other formats of education. For developing countries, the effects of the pandemic have been particularly significant. To help countries get out of the education crisis caused by sudden interruptions in regular learning and resulting in knowledge gap as quickly as possible, international expert groups are working to assess the losses and make recommendations for the period after learners return to school. The CICED Center took an active part in these works, by proposing and discussing modern methodologies developed by Russian experts and promoting the results of the READ Program. At the meeting of the international working group of the largest donors of education Building Evidence for Education, a tool for assessing the pedagogical practices of primary school teachers was presented. Within the framework of the Global Alliance to Monitor Learning UNESCO, approaches to assessing the quality of education in a distance format and assessing the global scale of knowledge loss as a result of the pandemic were discussed. At the UNESCO Forum in November participants discussed the impact of the education crisis on developing countries. For the first time, READ experts, with the assistance of the Center, took part in the work of the United Nations NGO Major Group, including translation and preparation of materials for the High Level Political Forum. This work laid the foundation for new collaboration on topics related to overcoming the consequences of the pandemic, strengthened the Center’s status as an international expert network organization and contributed to the promotion of the results of the READ Program in the international arena.