MOOC: Mainstreaming early childhood education into education sector planning

05 April 2019

Worldwide, at least 175 million children are not enrolled in pre-primary education. A new MOOC is launching to help support countries in giving all children the best start in life.

Starting this June, professionals from ministries of education and their partners can register for a new Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) on mainstreaming early childhood education (ECE) into education sector planning. The MOOC will begin on 30 September 2019 and last for five weeks.

Co-organized by UNICEF, UNESCO, and the Global Partnership for Education and hosted on the IIEP-UNESCO Virtual Campus, the MOOC is designed for professionals from countries that want to improve early learning and achieve better education outcomes. The course will demonstrate how to strengthen the ECE sub-sector by ensuring that it is a core component of education sector planning.

Pre-register for this MOOC here.

Top ECE experts will introduce participants to fundamental concepts and key planning tools and processes needed to integrate pre-primary policies in national education sector plans. Participants will also learn how to analyse the current state of ECE in their country, how to develop ECE policies and programmes, how to cost and finance them, as well as how to support their implementation in an education sector plan.

The benefits of early childhood development are widely acknowledged and are key to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Yet, an estimated 175 million children are not enrolled in pre-primary education. To ensure access to ECE for all children, governments will need to plan for and implement quality ECE programmes as part of their national education sector plans.

This MOOC – held in English – will foster a global community of practice where participants and instructors can interact with each other and share best practices on strengthening ECE.

Are you at CIES?

IIEP is participating in a related panel on 15 Monday 2019 at the 63rd annual CIES conference in San Francisco (14-18 April 2019). If you are attending this conference, please come to our panel and learn more about the upcoming MOOC.

Strengthening early childhood education planning: introducing a new MOOC for ECE stakeholders
1:30 – 3:00pm | Hyatt Regency, Street (Level 0), Regency B.

Chair: Suzanne Grant Lewis, Director, IIEP-UNESCO

Individual presentations by:

  • Review of ECE in Education Sector Plans and Analyses (Christin McConnell, Global Partnership for Education and Hsiao Chen Lin, UNICEF)
  • Designing an ECE planning MOOC: A collaborate process across partners (Hannah Maddrey, IIEP-UNESCO)

Discussant: Raphaelle Martinez, Global Partnership for Education

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