Global Peace Foundation’s Transforming Education Webinar Series across multiple countries is providing guidance and support for educators to transform education by integrating ethics and workplace skills into secondary education to raise up the character, creativity, and leadership skills of their students. This focused educational environment prepares students to become successful employees, entrepreneurs, and involved citizens.
On September 24, teachers, principals, supervisors, students, parents, officials involved in the education framework of Paraguay—and the general public from different countries such as the USA, Uruguay, Colombia, and Brazil—convened for an online Zoom conference. Some 165 people participated through Zoom and 850 viewers joined through Facebook streaming to better understand ways to reform education together.
These are some excerpts from the speakers and participants from the online event:
“Although the school system and teachers are trying to generate participation in online classes for students, they face various situations: stress, due to uncertainty, anxiety, longing for their peers, overwhelming challenge, and little access to technology or absences of skills. This pandemic gave us valuable time to rethink what we were doing, think about how we are doing it now, and how to face the future of education.” – Eva Ruiz Diaz (Speaker), Director of the General Diaz School of the city of Asuncion-Paraguay
“Undoubtedly, we are facing a methodological transition scenario, in which the support or source of the content has changed substantially, diversifies, and actors who were fundamental in the classroom are relativized in a digital environment. Although it was difficult at first, little by little and working as a team we made progress. Communication between areas and mutual aid has been the key. The teaching team, scared at first, was able to learn, organize, and ask for help. Regarding the families, reluctant at the beginning, they finally appreciated the effort, especially when they saw the fruit of the work.” – Zunilda Neumann (Speaker), Director of the Plurinational College of Bolivia in the city of Asunción- Paraguay
“The Pandemic has its positive and also negative side. It depends on how we take it. I think that it helped us all to become familiar with technology, and I think it is very important because, in a certain way it woke us up, it encouraged us to venture into connectivity research, and experiencing a relationship at a distance brought us closer together at the same time. I think we are evolving; we are getting closer to many people that live in first-world countries. We always resist change and this pandemic forced us to change our routine.” – Higinia Gonzalez (Participant
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Illustration by Natasha Remarchuk from Icons8; Illustration by Dmitry Nikulnikov from Icons8; School vector created by pch.vector – www.freepik.com
