Report on Smart Education in the Republic of North Macedonia

Abstract

In the last decade, North Macedonia is going through numerous changes related to the introduction of ICT in all spheres of life, and it is especially emphasized in education. It is safe to say that North Macedonia is a country in digital transformation—the application of technology enables the creation of new, unique ways and applications in various fields, and not just facilitating or improving traditional methods by applying technology. The schools themselves, the teachers, or the smallest cells of the school—the class communities—can create their own learning materials by accepting what is relevant to them and rejecting the unnecessary. Cloud computing, for example, is a service that is relatively easy to use. One of the crucial phases in the development of a new policy, or adjusting an existing one, is the process of adaptation and/or alteration of the legal framework on which the policy is implemented. One of the goals of the Education Strategy 2018–2025 is intensifying the application of ICT in education through the establishment of an e-learning portal and a Learning Management System (LMS), as well as continuous training of staff to use new technologies and ICT tools in education. Teacher professional development, for example, is at the core of innovation in education—teachers need to be helped to learn how to apply technology to improve their productivity and student learning outcomes. The Government of the Republic of North Macedonia considers education, training, research, and innovation as key factors for strengthening the national economy and the well-being of the citizens. However, there are not enough didactic materials and didactic resources for teaching in all languages of instruction (including assistive technologies for students with special educational needs), whereas specialized cabinets for certain subjects are not fully equipped with teaching aids. In this chapter, we present a handful of diverse best practices covering at least three features of smart education: innovative teaching methods and strategies, solutions and policies on open educational resources, and educational governance, i.e., Content Management Systems (CMS), Open Educational Resources (OER)—skoool.mk, Structured Databases of Educational Materials (SDEM), Educational Management Information System (EMIS), and Electronic Grade Book (e-Dnevnik). In addition, starting from the available indicators in the World Economic Forum’s Global Information Technology Report, we propose a measure of the education informatization level in the Republic of North Macedonia in the past decade. Political instability delays educational development by producing uncertainties. The empirical evidence that supports the connection between political stability and educational quality is relatively rare. Therefore, the policy planning process needs to integrate rules that ensure stability and continuity of implementation. Smart education is a model of learning adapted to new generations of digital natives. This chapter discusses the definition of smart education and presents the education system, its dependence on advanced technologies, and their application, in order to build a smart education system. The introduction of technology can enrich experiential learning, encourage project-based and problem-based learning, and provide simulations of specific practical activities, collaborative learning, real-time assessment. All this can be done through various new tools such as interactive courses, virtual laboratories, discussion forums, simulations and experiments, and even various games. It is vital that teachers become agents of change, not only through the application of technological innovation, but also through their creation and design.