Armenia is One of the Few Countries Where In-Person Education Has Mostly Resumed

In a week, the International Day of Education will be celebrated for the third time. This year's theme for the International Day of Education is to restore and revitalize education for the COVID-19 generation. This was announced by the Deputy Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sport Zhanna Andreasyan on her Facebook page.

“The global event of the day will focus on three key areas: funding, innovation, and educational heroes. A crucial point in the draft declaration agreed upon by countries is the protection of education budgets with the aim of not reducing funding for education, despite the challenges,” she stated.

The pandemic endangered the education of approximately 1.6 billion learners. The remote learning formats adopted by countries further highlighted the so-called digital divide, resulting in about one-third of learners being unable to participate in online education. Currently, around 318 million learners are deprived of the opportunity to attend school, while the educational systems for another 643 million learners have partially resumed operations.

According to the World Bank, the loss for this generation in terms of income levels will amount to approximately 10 trillion USD, with the harm caused to children's development in skills, socio-psychological aspects, and other areas being much more profound and multilayered. This is why, despite new waves of the pandemic, some countries prefer not to close educational institutions, even if some types of other activities are restricted.

Armenia is one of the few countries where in-person education has predominantly resumed. In this context, the functioning of the educational system becomes vital,” the post reads.