Tag: education

In 2022, the Armenian government introduced a voluntary teacher certification program. Teachers who pass with high scores receive higher salaries, however, problems persist in the process.

Mellisa, a six-year-old from the village of Harav in besieged Artsakh, should have started first grade this year. However, she will not be attending school, and neither will her four older siblings.

In the 19th century, Armenian women began dismantling stereotypes about them that were being published in the Armenian press of Tbilisi. Sofya Bayanduryants, founder of the first Armenian kindergartens, was among them.

Suzanna Shamakhyan, Vice President of Strategic Programming at the Foundation for Armenian Science and Technology (FAST), joins us to discuss the organization’s initiatives to improve education and science in Armenia. She breaks down how the current poor state of the country’s education system can be viewed as an opportunity to pilot innovative new solutions. We also discussed FAST’s new Generation AI program, which aims to bring artificial intelligence education to high schools in Armenia.

Davit Buniatyan is the co-founder and CEO of Activeloop, a data infrastructure company that specializes in building optimized data lakes for deep learning. Davit discusses the importance of optimized data infrastructures for deep learning and how the MLOps ecosystem is evolving with the rise of foundational models such as GPT. We also explore the exciting future of AI, including the role of multimodal models and how they will shape the landscape of deep learning.

Dr. Anu Noorma, the director general of the Estonian Research Council, joins us to discuss the development of Estonia’s scientific and innovation ecosystems over the last 30 years. We also spoke about the importance of communicating the need for public funding of science research to society. Lastly, Dr. Noorma shared her thoughts on how to make innovation more inclusive, so that its positive impacts are felt across all of society.

Yervant Zorian, chief architect and fellow at Synopsys, and president of the Synopsys Armenia research and development site, joins us to reflect on the past two decades of Synopsys’ presence in the country. Zorian also discussed the current trends in the semiconductor industry, its impact on the EDA market, and why more companies are increasingly opting to design their own chips in-house.

Last year, Teach for Armenia launched the Tech4Armenia initiative. The program allows tech professionals to move to underprivileged areas of Armenia and teach computer science while continuing to work remotely in their current roles. Gor Nazaryan, the managing director of talent initiatives at Teach for Armenia joins us to discuss the program’s objectives and the overall state of education in Armenia.

As Azerbaijan’s blockade of the Lachin Corridor is now in its second month, all schools in Artsakh, starting from January 19, were shut down indefinitely because of the rolling electricity blackouts and shortage of natural gas supply.

SpaceTech denMACH is a Danish space engineering company building solutions at the intersection of IoT (Internet of Things) and satellite communications. The CEO, Sheila Christiansen, and the CTO, Alexandru Csete, join us to discuss how their work is impacting the logistics, smart agriculture and education spaces. Sheila and Alexandru also shared with us their perspective on what approach smaller countries should take to develop their space industries.

In order for tech to truly benefit Armenia, it needs to benefit all of Armenia. For this to become a reality, accessibility to education in the regions as well as the creation of more local job opportunities are essential.

Dr. Lucy Abgaryan, the co-founder and CEO of GrittGene Therapeutics, a biotech company based in Los Angeles, California, joins us to discuss how her company is working to find treatments for Myotonic Dystrophy, a rare genetic disorder that causes progressive muscle loss and weakness. Lucy also shared with us her experience in trying to find opportunities to work with the local Armenian biotech industry.

The Armenian government has recently attempted to reconfigure the country’s educational system, with the stated goal of increasing efficiency and enhancing quality. While this is a noble effort, without quantified analysis, it leads to more questions than answers.

While innovation is increasingly being acknowledged as key to a country’s competitiveness in global markets, contributions of the humanities and social sciences to the body of knowledge are largely left out of debates.

«1991 ստորաբաժանման» պարբերական նախապատրաստական դասընթացներին անդրադարձող հոդվածի ՁայնաԳիրը։

A training course for young men and women launched in 2019 by the FAST Foundation—Unit 1991—is a new military unit focused on the creation of arms using the latest technologies.

This week on EVN Disrupt, Manana Hakobyan, the founder and CEO of DataPoint Armenia, joins us to discuss the importance of data-driven culture, and how her organization is working to accelerate the development of data science in Armenia.

Armenia’s Science Committee has launched ambitious grant programs to attract scientists and researchers from around the world to come to Armenia and strengthen scientific excellence in the country.

Estonia, Ukraine and Armenia inherited an appreciation for the hard sciences from the Soviet Union, helping to leave their mark on the global tech map. While Estonia is considered the rising star, Ukraine and Armenia still face challenges despite significant achievements in the field.

Back in 2020, the Paradigma Education Foundation published the “Guidebook on History Teaching: Why, How?” for teachers in Armenia the purpose of which is to develop active historical thinking. This year, they launched another innovative tool for teachers—a gender history pack—called History #5. Co-founder Narek Manukyan speaks to EVN Report about the idea, the journey and the purpose of this new tool.

In EVN Report’s news roundup for the week of December 24: Yerevan has a new mayor after City Council impeaches now former Mayor Hayk Marutyan; 10 POWs return to Armenia through EU mediation; Armenia appoints a special envoy to start dialogue with Turkey and more.

As Armenian citizens prepare to head to the polls on June 20 in an early parliamentary election, here is how several political parties and alliances of parties envision education in their election programs.

How an AI-powered platform that analyzes thousands of online job postings from a wide variety of commercial websites to provide insights into the labor market can make data-driven decisions come to life.

On the path to becoming a serious player in the global tech sector, Armenia needs to foster an environment that allows technology companies to achieve their business goals, which includes legal institutions to resolve complex disputes.

This is not a cyberpunk essay about a dystopian future, but rather an attempt to take a pragmatic look at creative industries and the landscape of digital culture in Armenia.

Armen Orujyan, the founding CEO of the Foundation for Armenian Science and Technology (FAST) speaks about their initiative with Armenia’s Ministry of Defense called UNIT 1991. The program will provide people of conscription age with education and knowledge in data science and AI giving them the opportunity to be employed by the Defense Ministry in respective divisions or in leading high-tech enterprises.

Award-winning photojournalist Anush Babajanyan documents the heavy burden of transitioning to distance education during the COVID-19 pandemic for children, parents and teachers.

Teachers, students and parents are all trying to cope with the transition to online education. Gohar Abrahamyan reveals some of the successes and challenges.

Tatev Mkrtumyan looks at five startups from the Armenian tech scene that are making a splash in four main industries that are growing during the pandemic.

Different forms of distance learning have been introduced in Armenia for three weeks now. What do we know about the use of information and communication technologies in the general education system of Armenia?

Educational institutions around the world are moving to online learning as the COVID-19 pandemic wreaks havoc. Narek Manukyan examines the Armenian education system’s preparedness for distance learning following the government’s announcement of a one-month state of emergency in the country.

With no comprehensive environmental curriculum in Armenian schools, individual teachers and NGOs have taken it upon themselves to educate the youth about pressing environmental issues from climate change to recycling.

Maral Mikirditsian is the project manager of TUMO Studios, a free educational program for university-aged students and young professionals with a passion for craftsmanship and design. The innovative program holds educational workshops in fashion, jewelry, embroidery, pottery, printing, product design and the culinary arts.

Hayk Mkrtchyan of the Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sports speaks about a new initiative to bring residents of different regions together to preserve and promote tangible and intangible cultural heritage, positioning museums in Armenia as centers of learning and much more.

Armenians usually boast a 99 percent literacy rate. Different measures, however, reveal another story.

A close examination of Armenian public school textbooks reveals persistent gender bias and stereotyping at almost all grade levels.

Protests erupted after a draft education reform agenda was publicized that sought to make Armenian language, literature and history courses optional in universities. However, there are a number of other proposed reforms that could potentially undermine the independence of universities that have been left out of the public discourse.

A child’s right to family life is enshrined in Armenian and international legal documents and considered a priority in Armenia’s 2017-2021 Strategic Plan on the Protection of the Rights of the Child. Here is EVN Report's White Paper about specialized foster care for children with disabilities.

Dismantling decades of prejudice and perceptions about people with disabilities is not an easy task. The inclusion of children with disabilities and special needs in public schools is not an exception, however, attitudes are slowly changing.

While Armenia has participated in several international comparative educational assessments, and has designed national assessment tools, neither have been implemented properly. Today, more than ever, there is a great need to properly analyze existing data that can inform educational policy making and curriculum development.

Education is an inalienable right, regardless of circumstances. Juveniles deprived of liberty in Armenia face challenges that include issues with rehabilitation and reintegration, but also with the right to education.

The Araratian Baccalaureate, a public-private partnership between the Armenian Government and Ayb Education Foundation launched under the previous administration, came under the spotlight when Education Minister Arayik Harutyunyan questioned the need for “elite” schools and the financial efficacy of the program.

Education has the immense power to impact industries and the economy. Artashes Vardanyan writes about the need to transform the educational system to meet the needs of one particularly promising sector of Armenia's economy, the High-Tech industry.

The essay attempts to offer several historical and pedagogical responses to the genocide of the Armenian people by suggesting a program on the study of the Middle Ages of Turkey, one that would entail the study of the three mediaeval epic tales that were forged during the Middle Ages on Anatolian soil.

For decades, production of historical texts in Armenia was in the tight grip of Soviet state ideology. Post-independence, some topics previously repressed or omitted found their way back into Armenian history textbooks, however “memory gaps” remain.

Mariam Tumanyan was a member of Tbilisi’s Armenian elite at the end of the 19th and turn of the 20th centuries. Her patronage of Armenian intellectuals and then her care of orphans from the Armenian Genocide have largely been forgotten. Here are some excerpts from her memoirs.

There are protests on the streets of Yerevan again. This time it is a student protest against a controversial bill on mandatory military service. One of the most powerful student protest movements in Armenia was in 2004 and ironically, some participants of these earlier protests are today themselves pushing for the abolishment of draft deferment for university students from ARP ranks.

Last week, Gyumri was in the national spotlight because of strikes and student demonstrations. At the heart of the matter was the Shirak State University, the rector and the merging of politics and education.

This commentary by Narek Manukyan touches upon some of the key findings about education in a study commissioned by the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung called, "Independence Generation - Youth Study 2016." It takes an in-depth look at societal aspirations and how they impact youth within the context of education.