The Minister of Education receives a delegation of Education Ministers from the Southern African Development Community (SADC)
Dr. Reda Hegazy, Minister of Education and Technical Education, received a delegation of education ministers from the Southern African Development Community (SADC), which included representatives from the countries of (Angola, Botswana, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Lesotho, Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Madagascar, South Africa, Namibia, Mauritius, Swaziland, and Seychelles); To discuss ways to enhance cooperation and exchange experiences in the field of pre-university education, and best practices in developing digital education.
At the beginning of the meeting, the Minister welcomed the attendees, stressing the depth of historical relations with the countries of the African continent, and the Egyptian state’s keenness to build bridges to expand the scope of cooperation, achieve sustainable development on the continent, and build a more comprehensive, equitable, and sustainable future.
The minister pointed out that the Egyptian state and political leadership support the education sector, and the Ministry of Education and Technical Education attaches great importance to digital transformation, which is one of the important axes that the ministry focuses on, to keep pace with the requirements of the labor market.
The Minister reviewed the education reform program in Egypt, which began in 2018, noting that the strategic plan 2024/2029 is built in light of the government’s three work programs: building the Egyptian human being, education for employment, and protecting security, and there are three basic strategic axes, which are availability and quality. and governance, pointing out that digital transformation intersects with all of these axes.
The Minister explained that Egypt has a strong and clear experience in preparing question banks and electronic exams, noting that tests are drawn from question banks according to the technical specifications for exams based on simple understanding, deep understanding, and higher levels, noting that electronic exams are conducted for the first and second grades of secondary school through... 2,500 schools are equipped with a Viber network, and they are linked to a database, adding that the marking process in high school is done electronically.
Dr. Reda Hegazy continued that Egypt is one of the few countries that completed education during the Corona pandemic, due to the presence of a strong technological structure and human cadres capable of using technology. The Ministry was also interested in providing various digital resources to students on the Ministry’s website through the live broadcast platform, Egypt’s Classes, and the education platform. Al-Masry, and the e-learning portal, as these platforms provide books, digital teacher guides, satellite broadcast channels, and interactive curricula for academic subjects, through interactive software that allows the student to learn through these programs and evaluate the extent of his learning, in addition to the presence of smart boards. There is also interest in smart schools that Serving high density areas.
The Minister stressed the Ministry’s interest in teaching students starting from the fourth grade of primary school information and communications technology, as well as in the preparatory stage, adding that the Ministry has e-learning methods and mechanisms to support the teacher with technology and help him perform his role efficiently.
The Minister also indicated that the Ministry celebrated yesterday by honoring the winners of the national competition (Innovative Teacher for Tomorrow) to create digital content in cooperation with UNESCO, where teachers are trained to produce digital educational materials.
The minister added that most countries suffer from a high density of students and a shortage in the number of teachers, and that digital transformation is one of the most important solutions to these problems by following the approach of integrating technology into education.
For its part, the Southern Development Delegation expressed its happiness at this important meeting, praising the development achieved in the pre-university education system in Egypt, and the successes achieved in partnerships with the private sector.
During the meeting, the role of the National Center for Educational Examinations and Evaluation and its tasks in determining policies for student evaluation was reviewed, and the interest in the new educational system in changing the evaluation policy at the secondary stage, which is based on measuring higher cognitive levels instead of memorization and recall, preparing question banks, and training a number of teachers and experts. Learn how to write test vocabulary and draw questions according to the test map.
The meeting also touched on the most important features of curriculum development, which in the primary stage depends on life skills and human values, and the completion of development of the preparatory stage curricula, which focuses on improving the quality of students and their families, as well as attention to learning outcomes, research projects, languages, the fields of communications technology, programming, and entrepreneurship, and the integration of contemporary issues into the curricula. In order to build the student's personality.
The meeting also discussed the Ministry’s mechanisms to raise teachers’ performance levels and develop their professional skills and capabilities in line with the targeted development of the educational system, through developing a set of training programs and packages that are in line with the latest global trends. To keep pace with cognitive and technological development and achieve the quality of the educational process.
The meeting will also discuss the features of the Ministry’s strategy for developing technical education, which included improving the quality assurance of technical education programs by establishing an independent academy, rebuilding technical education curricula based on the competency methodology, training technical education teachers to teach the new curricula and evaluating their students, and involving the private sector in developing technical education.
The Minister welcomed cooperation with the Southern African Development Community (SADC), the exchange of experiences and visits in this field, and the establishment of joint educational platforms between the group’s countries to serve both students and teachers in a way that supports the development and implementation of the group’s countries’ strategies.