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46 Digital Education Centers implemented by UNICEF and the Association for Innovative and Digital Education (AIDE) with the support of the Ministry of Education and Culture have opened their doors to students of Kherson, Mykolaiv and Odesa regions.
Many communities in the southern part of Ukraine have been liberated from occupation, but are currently close to the front line and constantly suffer from attacks. The situation in the Kherson region is even more tense, because the region is bombarded every day - in such conditions, about 10,000 students live in the Kherson region, who need to be provided with proper training and access to education. In the rest of the regions, this issue also becomes relevant due to possible blackouts.
"The state continues to actively work to ensure safe and accessible education for our children. We are making every effort to restore face-to-face education in regions where possible, while at the same time considering new formats of organizing the educational process for the safety of students. Digital educational centers are currently the best alternative for children, if there is no opportunity to study in schools", - says Deputy Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine Nadiya Kuzmychova. Since the beginning of 2024, 16 Digital Learning Centers (DLC - Digital Learning Centers) have been successfully operating in three southern regions (Kherson, Mykolaiv, and Odesa), and another 30 have been operational since the new academic year.
"Digital education centers are primarily located in those communities where there is no face-to-face education. These are either liberated communities or those that are close to the line of active hostilities. Also, certain areas of regional centers are covered by educational spaces, for example, Odesa and Mykolaiv, in which some schools also do not work offline completely or partially due to the absence or insufficient number of places in shelters. Our partner, the Association for Innovative and Digital Education, implements 46 Centers out of more than 100 funded by UNICEF across the country. According to the research of the State Education Quality Service, the educational results of children who visit these centers are higher than the results of children who have not yet been covered by them," says Anatoly Ignatovych, coordinator of UNICEF educational projects.
In Digital Education Centers, children can learn and relax with the help of the most modern innovative technologies: Artificial Intelligence, virtual reality, case lessons, Minecraft, etc.
“Our team has launched 46 centers in a very short time: from repairs, supplying modern equipment to organizing the process of catching up on educational losses using the “flipped classroom” model, which changes the paradigm of educational content, when the child is at the center of the learning process and processes information through gamified technologies, and the teacher acts as a reliable assistant, a mentor whom the student asks for at his or her own discretion. Thus, children and teenagers not only become interested in the learning process itself, which they manage themselves, but also develop important life skills of time management, independent decision-making, etc.”, explains Maria Boguslav, Executive Director of the Association for Innovative and Digital Education, coordinator of the Network of Ukrainian Education Hubs.
In November, a three-day training on space management was held for the coordinators of the new 30 Digital Education Centers.
“It is very important for the Kherson region to have such infrastructure for children as Digital Education Centers, as students in our region have been studying online for the third year in a row, the first of which many children, unfortunately, had to spend under occupation. Such centers are very popular not only among children but also among adults, because sometimes they are the only safe space with all the conditions for communication in communities,” said Oleksandr Prokudin, head of the Kherson Regional State Administration.
The results of the work of the Digital Education Centers also attracted the attention of government officials who have already visited the educational spaces: Prime Minister of Ukraine Denys Shmyhal, Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine Oksen Lisovyi, UNICEF representatives, heads of Kherson, Mykolaiv and Odesa regions and departments of education, mayors, and leaders of the communities where the educational spaces are located.
The above activities are part of the project “Establishment of Digital Learning Centers (DLCs) and provision of psychosocial support services for children and youth”, implemented by the Association for Innovative and Digital Education in cooperation with UNICEF with the financial support of the Government of Japan.
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