Ukraine
Capital: Kyjiw
Area: 603,700 km²
Population: 46.81 million
Official Language: Ukrainian
Webtipps:
Ukrainian Ministriy of Education and Science
Ukrainian government web portal
Department of Education and Science, Odesa regional administration
Odesa Regional In-Service Teacher Training Institute (LFI)
University of Educational Management in Kiev (UMO)
Odesa
The OeAD Cooperation Office Odesa supports educational cooperation with Ukraine in the pre-university sector on behalf of the Federal Ministry of Education, Science and Research (BMBWF). In close cooperation with the Ukrainian Ministry of Education and Science and institutions for continuous professional development of teachers and headmasters and headmistresses the OeAD Cooperation Office Odesa implements educational projects to support sustainable educational reforms.
Key focuses:
- Quality development and school management
- Inclusive education
- Digitisation in education
- Promoting the national and international education dialogue in cooperation with the Ukrainian Ministry of Education
Examples:
Psychological support in difficult times
Since immediately after the beginning of the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine a number of measures have been taken in the field of psychological support and crisis intervention. The aim is to support our Ukrainian partners in the education sector during the crisis and to sensitise them in dealing with traumatised children. Twelve webinars (crisis intervention, psychological first aid and burnout prevention for teachers, school psychologists and headmasters/headmistresses) have been offered so far, a reference book on psychological support for refugees (Dr. Barbara Preitler – “An ihrer Seite sein” (“Being at their side”) has been translated, 7,000 copies of it have been printed and made available free of charge throughout Ukraine, and training videos and psychoeducational booklets have been translated and offered. Moreover, seminars on this topic were organised for school psychologists in Uzhhorod in the autumn of 2022. In 2023 additional webinars on burn-out prevention will be offered for teachers and headmasters/headmistresses.
Safe Space – Emotional support for teachers and professional development
"Safe Space" was conceived as a response to the psychological consequences of the Russian war of aggression in the compulsory education sector. The project aims at helping teachers to learn how to deal with the new mental challenges in their professional context caused by the war. Moreover, they will acquire the skills to better support their pupils psychologically and emotionally. Finally, the programme ensures that teachers will be able to identify children with symptoms of particular psychological distress, integrate them into the classroom by means of group dynamics, plan suicide prevention and organise open dialogues with children, parents and teachers. "Safe Space" is implemented in close cooperation with two Ukrainian partner institutions: the National University Kyiv Mohyla Academy and the State Service for Quality in Education. At first 40 school psychologists will be trained as multipliers of the "Safe Space Method". Subsequently they will train 5,000 teachers from all over Ukraine in this method. Most of the training will take place online, accompanied by two face-to-face training sessions in Ukraine.
Digitisation
The aim of the project is to provide quick and uncomplicated support for teachers in online teaching. Ten teachers and five mentors from the subjects of physics, biology, mathematics, Ukrainian and English will create a total of 100 online sample lessons for implementing the curriculum under the guidance of an expert in digitisation of education, using the most popular digital applications in Ukraine. Subsequently, training on the implementation of the designed units will be offered in 50 webinars (ten per subject) and conducted for a target audience of approximately 600 subject teachers.
Leadership and management in times of crisis
Building on previous projects, we support our long-term project partners (teacher training institutes in Ukraine and their staff in the field of leadership and management) in their work with headmasters/headmistresses also during the challenging time of war. Managers currently need extremely flexible crisis management skills and at the same time have to support and motivate their staff emotionally.
Our objective is first and foremost to support the existing project team of 22 lecturers in leadership and management in dealing with the war at their institutions. In a further step elements and experiences from the interdisciplinary trainings are to be included in the professional development courses of the participating teacher training institutes. For this purpose two face-to-face meetings in Uzhhorod and three webinars will be offered.
School headmasters/headmistresses will thus benefit in the future from the measures taken, especially in the areas of crisis and personnel management, burnout prevention, decision-making, preparation for the transition phase after the war, development of healthy organisations, vision and strategy development, and change management in extreme situations.
Support of the institute for continuous professional development of teachers in Transcarpathia in the development of inclusive education
Another focus of the cooperation is to promote inclusive school education in the Transcarpathian oblast. Basically, the Ukraine-wide reform of the "New Ukrainian School", for example, has already been dealing with the introduction and development of inclusive education and individual educational careers since 2018.
Therefore the aim is to promote the development of inclusive education in the Transcarpathian oblast by means of several multi-day seminars with experts from the University College of Teacher Education Upper Austria on site in Uzhhorod. The events are aimed at staff of inclusive resource centres, teachers at inclusive schools and specialists for inclusion of the Transcarpathian institute for continuous professional development of teachers. The focus will be on developing individual support plans, vocational orientation, democracy education, forms of cooperation between kindergartens and schools, inclusive school development and TEACCH – SoKo for all pupils.
In the course of this project a resource room was also set up at the institute for postgraduate education studies in Transcarpathia. This room is primarily used for training and professional development of teachers, psychologists and educators. The latest equipment is used to show how to train and improve the sensory abilities of children with special needs in the classroom. Subsequently, the room will also be made accessible to parents and their children.