Center for International Cooperation in Education Development (CICED)

On December 4, 2023, the head of the Center for International Cooperation for the Development of Education held a working meeting with the Center’s partners in the Republic of Armenia. The meeting was held in a warm atmosphere; the Center for Testing and Quality Assessment is the longest-standing and reliable partner of CICED. Over the years of cooperation, together with CTQA, dozens of projects have been implemented to localize tools for assessing the quality of education, conferences, seminars and trainings have been organized, joint cross-country research has been conducted and applications for international grants have been submitted.

The meeting was attended by Deputy Director of the Assessment and Testing Center Arsen Bagdasaryan and Head of the Testing Department, Yesayan Alexan. From the side of CICED, the meeting was attended by the head, Neverov A.A. During the meeting, issues of localization of tools developed on the basis of the three-level methodology for assessing the educational achievements of schoolchildren SAM were discussed. New tools assess 21st century skills and information and communications competence.

The need to measure these competencies has increased every year, but 2020 has clearly demonstrated the increased need to measure them. Thus, the coronavirus pandemic has forced most educational institutions in the world to think about or switch to distance learning using technology. However, the success and the very possibility of such learning depends not only on access to a computer or smartphone, but also on the ability of teachers and students, for example, to correctly search for, create and present information in digital environments, analyze and evaluate information, convey information to the target audience and etc. The question is whether they have these skills, i.e. information and communication competence, and to what extent, is already extremely urgent and will become increasingly urgent as the world turns into an increasingly global one. That is why the development of tools that test such skills is the most relevant and agreements on the localization and testing of tools in 2024 were reached quickly.

The parties also discussed the possibility of holding a joint international conference in 2024, dedicated to the most pressing issues of assessing the quality of education in the Eurasian space. The Center’s conference will be one of the largest in-person events of this level after the end of the COVID-19 pandemic and will serve as a platform for renewing cooperation between partners of the READ Program.