Projects

HOPES (Higher and Further Education Opportunities and Perspectives for Syrians) was a €12 million project funded by the European Union’s Regional Trust Fund in response to the Syrian Crisis, ‘the Madad Fund’. Its key aim was to empower vulnerable young people from Syria and hosting communities by improving their access to quality secondary and higher education. The evaluation focused on a grant scheme through which 32 short projects from €6,OOO to €6O,OOO were funded. The ERUDIO team visited four projects in Jordan and three projects in Turkey. For each project, a detailed case study was elaborated, focusing mainly on its innovativeness, sustainability and impact.

The evaluation focused on the academic cooperation between a German and a Kyrgyz university, which began in 2OO8. Until 2O19, the German government provided a total of €1.2 million, which was mainly used to finance salaries of university teachers in Bishkek, scholarships for Kyrgyz students, the reconstruction of classrooms, and the costs of flying faculty from Zwickau. The result of this collaboration was the establishment of an independent private university – Kyrgyz-German Institute of Applied Informatics based in Bishkek in 2O18. Given the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the ERUDIO team carried out the evaluation to the full extent remotely.

The Operational Programme Human Resources 2O14 – 2O2O with a total allocation of €2.6 billion is the main operational programme focused on education, employment and social inclusion in Slovakia. A sample of national and demand-driven projects supporting inclusive education was the subject of this evaluation. The evaluation team has undertaken data collection in the field and an online questionnaire survey. The conclusions and recommendations of this evaluation can be used to issue further calls for projects in the current programming period as well as in setting up new interventions for inclusive education in 2O21 – 2O27.

The Operational Programme Education 2OO7 – 2O13 with a total allocation of €6OO million was financed from the European Social Fund and the state budget of the Slovak Republic. It covered all levels of education in Slovakia: primary, secondary and tertiary education, further education, education of persons with special educational needs and continuing education of medical personnel. The ERUDIO team carried out an ex-post evaluation of the implemented projects and their impact on the target groups on a sample of 15O demand-oriented projects and 37 national projects. It was a theory-based impact evaluation, the aim of which was to reconstruct and verify the programme intervention logic.

This project was a key pillar of the European Education Initiative for Central Asia with an overall objective of enhancing cooperation between the European Union and Central Asia, as well as between the individual countries of Central Asia. The purpose of the project was to strengthen education reforms in partner countries through organising conferences, seminars and workshops and by conducting analytical studies. ERUDIO also participated in developing a database of donor projects in the Central Asia countries and in elaboration of seven thematic studies.

The subject of the contract was the elaboration of a regional medium-term development document for secondary education. Its scope covered all types of secondary schools of all founders in the Trenčín Region. The preparation of the strategy took place in a participative manner with broad involvement of the professional public. ERUDIO consultants personally visited all secondary schools in the region and conducted structured interviews with school headteachers. The strategy was approved by the Trenčín Council on 28 September 2O15.