New Projects Will Help Expand Inclusive Education and Social-Emotional Development in Serbia
Childhood Education International has been awarded two grants to implement programs that will build primary school capacity in inclusive education practices and social-emotional character development in Serbia.
The grants provide an opportunity to continue ongoing work on two projects that CE International launched in Serbia in late August 2022. The projects will continue to build educator capacity, strengthen school systems to provide universal design learning and social-emotional competency building, and support character development work among staff and students.
The first project builds on the success of an inclusive education training project that CE International organized in 2021 with support from the U.S. Department of State. Over the course of the next year, thanks to continued funding from the U.S. Department of State, CE International will organize a training of trainers that scales the training to build professional capacity for numerous educators across Serbian schools. The teachers will implement universal design learning practices in their classrooms, leading to more children being able to actively participate and learn effectively. They will also be guided on implementing project-based learning activities and lessons in their classrooms and participate in an exchange with U.S. educators.
The second project, thanks to funding from the John Templeton Foundation, will focus on teacher training skills in social-emotional learning and character development. The teachers will develop a community of practice, putting what they’ve learned from training into implementation for their students, and bringing about skills in students such as self-management, self-awareness, greater empathy, and positive relationships with peers and school staff.
Throughout the two projects, 10 different primary schools throughout Serbia and more than 300 school pedagogist associates and teachers will partake in one of the training streams. The content covered in the inclusive education practices and the social-emotional character development projects will equip the participants with new skills and knowledge, which they will be able to integrate into their school action plans to promote and enhance inclusive education and social-emotional learning efforts.
In Serbia, supporting children’s upbringing in education is of vital importance, but much in social-emotional learning and development has not yet been brought to the forefront in schools. The aim of these projects is to bring about greater capacity and implementation for children’s positive upbringing in schools.
Through uniting multiple stakeholders around the urgent topic of children’s inclusion and social-emotional development in schools, CE International demonstrates collective action and collaboration for the sake of all children’s education. CE International will partner with Serbian organization the Center for Interactive Pedagogy (CIP) to assess educator and school needs, develop trainings, and implement and measure the impact of such trainings on both educator and student growth and performance.
Assessments will begin this fall, with trainings toward the end of the year and implementation in schools planned for 2023. More information on these projects will be shared as the projects are underway, and we look forward to seeing the impact of building educator capacity and implementing more inclusive practices in the Serbian classrooms.