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Over the past six decades, IIEP has trained nearly 24,000 educational professionals from across the globe, developing their capacities and competencies in educational planning and management. Today, Beatriz Pont, the Global Training Practice Lead, shares how IIEP is reimagining the future of its training offer to embrace new innovations, adapt to changing times, and respond to the evolving needs of education systems.
Profound environmental shifts and climate change, technological advancements, evolving employment opportunities, migration, and conflicts are all affecting education systems, and educational planning is essential for effective teaching and learning in schools all over the world.
A strong track record
IIEP’s training started in 1966 with its historic Advanced Training Programme, an intensive year-long programme in educational planning and management that led to a professional certificate. The programme lasted for more than five decades.
As demand grew for IIEP’s support, its training offer also expanded to cover new topics and regions. Courses have been offered as part of technical support in countries and tailor-made courses were designed for specific needs. The Buenos Aires office developed its Regional Training Programme and Dakar launched the Training in Sectoral Policies and Management of Education Systems with the University of Dakar.
Many graduates of IIEP’s training programmes now work in ministries of education worldwide in developing and implementing education plans, in statistics and education departments, and in donor agencies, and many have advanced in their careers in education and contributed to shaping their education systems.
“I met planners from around the world who brought different perspectives to what we learned at IIEP. Today, they are all changemakers in their respective countries and contexts.”
- Rauf Abdulhaq, IIEP alum from Afghanistan
Take a leap with us
Over the years, IIEP has constantly adapted and innovated its training offer, for example, with hybrid and online options and face-to-face learning. However, as IIEP marks 60 years, we are taking a leap into new training territory with a new global learning campus.
Why are we doing this? Evidence shows that a key requirement for effective transformation is the capacity of educational planners and policy-makers to address evolving challenges and to ensure policies and plans are efficiently implemented to accomplish real change in and through education.
To respond, we are reviewing the content of our training to match demand across our offices in Paris, Buenos Aires, and Dakar. We will offer the possibility for education planners and relevant stakeholders worldwide to enrol in individual courses or to compile them to obtain a Diploma in Educational Planning in English, French, Spanish, or Portuguese.
This will ultimately become a system of IIEP micro-credentials. The essence of our training approach will continue to embrace practice-based learning. Taught by expert professionals, each course will continue to bring together people from across the world to learn together and work on practical exercises, case studies, and real-life scenarios to practice the effective application of new skills.
“I’ll never forget the exercise we did during the training at IIEP where we had to defend our policy priorities in a mock Minister’s presentation.”
- Neva Pemberton, IIEP alum from St. Kitts and Nevis
A commitment to each learner
At IIEP, we are committed to equitable quality education and lifelong learning for all. For us, this starts the professional development of the educational planners who turn this vision into reality.
We will continue to follow each participant to make sure they are learning, progressing, and can finish the course once they are enrolled. The focus will remain on developing knowledge, skills, and competencies in educational planning and management for people to use in their profession. Our evaluations also show that participants find the course content relevant.
More than 95% of IIEP trainees reported in surveys that training was good or very good and nearly 100% of all trainees said they intended to apply what they have learned.
Our challenge today is to deliver training – whether it be online, hybrid or in person – in a way that suits the needs of education policy-makers and planners, with limited time.
In the future, our offer will include short courses such as Foundations of Crisis Sensitive Planning or Using Learning Data to Monitor SDG 4 Progress. It will also include new topics such as TVET Planning, Digital Education Policies and Educational Funding and Budgeting. More generally, it will also include our Fundamentals of Education Sector Planning core training programmes, as well as tailor-made courses for specific educational planning topics at the demand of relevant institutions. A centralized course catalogue will also make it easier for interested applicants to browse what is on offer.
We are looking forward to shaping the future of education with high-quality training for education policy-makers and planners, working at every level of an education system.
Train with us. Plan with us.
