On 17 November 2021, a new online tool for monitoring school safety and comfort, developed by the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in Ukraine in cooperation with the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine, was launched. This tool will be part of the national information system for managing preschool, school, out-of-school and vocational education – software and hardware complex “Automated Information Complex of Educational Management” (SHC “AICOM”), administered by the SSI “Institute of Educational Analytics”.

The main speakers of the event were: Artur Seletskyi – Deputy Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine for Digital Development, Digital Transformations and Digitization; Michaela Bayer – UNICEF Ukraine Deputy Representative; Olga Dolinina – Education Officer at UNICEF in Ukraine; Viktor Salkov – Acting Director General of the Directorate of Preschool, Out-of-School and Inclusive Education of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine; Sergiy Londar – Director of the SSI “Institute of Educational Analytics” and Andrii Lytvynchuk – Deputy Director for Scientific-Project Work and IT; Yaroslav Bogomol and Roman Ivko representatives of the company-developer NZ “Soft”. The presentation was moderated by Victor Salkov.

At the beginning of the event, Artur Seletskyi addressed the audience with a welcoming speech. He began by thanking colleagues from UNICEF for their cooperation and support for educational initiatives in all areas, particularly in creating a safe educational environment in the face of contemporary challenges. Artur Seletskyі noted that the online tool for monitoring the safety and comfort of schools would improve the sanitary conditions and a friendly environment in educational institutions, help to ensure quality education and equal opportunities for all students, improve communication between all participants in the educational process. “The data contained in the database of the Automated Information Complex of Educational Management” (SHC “AICOM”) can be supplemented with new dimensions, which is an added value for educational analytics of the Ministry of Education and Science,” said Artur Seletsky.

In her turn, Michaela Bayer expressed hope that the use of the online tool “Express Assessment” will not only allow evaluating the level of safety and comfort of the schools but will also “help schools to improve the environment, to keep schools transparent and to make them a place where every child can unlock their potential.”

Olga Dolinina presented more detail about the development and piloting of the Concept of Safe and Child-Friendly School (SCFS), as well as the features of the school’s express assessment procedure.

During his speech, Sergiy Londar emphasized the importance of implementing a new online tool for monitoring the level of safety and comfort of schools, as the criteria for self-assessment of educational institutions correlate with the goals of the President’s Healthy Nation program and the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine. The SSI “Institute of Educational Analytics” provides information and analytical support to the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine and has in its arsenal a powerful information system SHC “AICOM”, which allows for the information exchange between all-day general secondary education institutions (currently 14,075 schools). As a result, the implementation of the software product “Safe and child-friendly school” under the SHC “AICOM” environment will allow educational institutions to perform self-assessment, as well as to analyze the data set generated by such self-assessment quickly and on a centralized basis.

Andrii Lytvynchuk described the features of the implementation, development and maintenance of the software product “Safe and child-friendly school”. During his speech, he outlined a number of advantages of implementing this tool under the SHC “AICOM” environment, including the availability of individual user accounts. The SHC “AICOM” also has a functioning and certified comprehensive information protection system (CIPS), which allows you to process and store personal information using this public information resource. Therefore, such an implementation is an effective solution given that further regulatory implementation of the instrument now becomes more natural and much easier.

The next speaker, Yaroslav Bogomol presented the technical features of the user experience in this system, in particular, he demonstrated the algorithm to register on the platform of the SHC “AICOM” and the procedure for organizing and performing self-assessment. Roman Ivko added that for now this functionality is fully integrated into the SHC “AICOM” and it is available for use at all levels of education.

In conclusion, the moderator of the online meeting Viktor Salkov thanked the audience for participating in the presentation and their significant contribution to the creation of a new online tool for monitoring the level of safety and comfort of schools.

The video of the Conference is available on the UNICEF YouTube-channel and the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine’s Facebook page.

Photo by Press Service of the Ministry of Education and Science of Ukraine