UNESCO IITE participated in the International Conference “ICT and Post-2015 Education” in Qingdao, China

UNESCO IITE participated in the International Conference “ICT and Post-2015 Education” in Qingdao, China Representatives of the UNESCO Institute for Information Technologies in Education and of the Ministry of Education and Science of the Russian Federation participated in the International Conference “ICT and Post-2015 Education” held on 23-25 May in Qingdao, China. The Conference was organized by UNESCO, the Ministry of Education of the People’s Republic of China and the Chinese National Commission for UNESCO with the support of the Qingdao Municipal Government. It gathered more than 300 international experts from 90 countries, including Ministers of Education and high-level ministry officials, leaders of ICT industries, senior representatives of UN agencies and international organizations, eminent researchers and practitioners.

The Conference examined how educational technology can support the global agenda for education adopted by the World Education Forum for the upcoming 15 years. Broad themes included how to foster an effective pedagogical use of ICT and the role that teacher development and support have to play; how to scale up successful innovations for lifelong learning; the contribution of technology to knowledge creation particularly through open education resources; and finally how to monitor and evaluate good practices. Exhibitions and associated seminars were convened to demonstrate ICT innovation designed for education and best practices of leveraging ICT for equitable and quality education and lifelong learning for all.

At the Conference, IITE was represented by IITE Governing Board Chairman Dr. Mansoor Al Awar, IITE GB Members Prof. Gard Titlestad, Prof. Dae-Joon Hwang, Prof. Jianzhong Cha and UNESCO IITE Officer-in-Charge Prof. Alexander Khoroshilov. They participated in panel sessions and selected breakout sections, delivered presentations and moderated a discussion of topical issues related to the recognition of tools and results of online learning in the framework of breakout section “Recognition of online learning”. The small exhibition of IITE publications was arranged at the information stand at the public space of the Conference. The official delegation of the Russian Ministry of Education and Science headed by Vice-Minister Mr. Veniamin Kaganov who delivered a speech at the Panel Session also participated in the Conference. During the Qingdao Conference, the Officer-In-Charge of UNESCO IITE Prof. Alexander Khoroshilov had a number of meetings and negotiations with the participants of the Conference including the ones with top education policy makers and colleagues from different UNESCO entities, and took part in the discussion as well as the development of recommendations included in the final Declaration of the Conference.

A Statement was released at the end of the Conference to provide Member States with policy recommendations about how to effectively use ICT to address current educational challenges and to ensure equitable quality education and lifelong opportunities for all. Follow up actions and opportunities to forge international partnerships were discussed with the aim to assist Member States to better unleash the potential of ICT in education when unfolding the post-2015 sustainable development agenda.

The Qingdao Declaration, the first global declaration on ICT in education, was approved unanimously by participants at the conclusion of the conference on ICT and Post-2015 Education. The Qingdao Declaration highlights different ways in which technology can support the global agenda for education which was suggested at the World Education Forum for the next 15 years. It states that “the remarkable advances in Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and the rapid expansion of internet connectivity have made today’s world increasingly interconnected and made the knowledge more accessible for every girl and boy, woman and man. To achieve the goal of Inclusive and Equitable Quality Education and Lifelong Learning by 2030, ICT must be harnessed to strengthen education systems, knowledge dissemination, information access, quality and effective learning, and more efficient service provision”.

Conference programme is available at UNESCO web-site or in PDF.

Qingdao Declaration