FOCUSING ON HIGHER EDUCATION

Developing a strong education system is the top strategic priority of the Competitiveness Foundation of Armenia. As part of this strategy, higher education acts as the nexus between the education system, industry and knowledge-driven economic activity. Universities set the upstream demand for the school system, and the downstream supply of human capital for scientific research and development, technology and innovation.

INNOVATION TRIANGLE

The Competitiveness Foundation's education program revolves around the 'innovation triangle' of education, science and technology. These are areas where Armenia has great potential based on its legacy of academic, scientific and engineering achievements. They are prime targets for investment, backed by government support and structured as public-private partnerships. The revitalization of the Yerevan Physics Institute, a leading center of particle and nuclear physics, is the science node of the innovation triangle. The modernization of the Mergelyan Institute, a major Soviet era high tech center, represents its technology node. And the Convergence Center, a new investment project developed by the Competitiveness Foundation, is the education node.

FRONTRUNNER: CONVERGENCE CENTER

The Convergence Center is a sustainable investment project designed to catalyze development across Armenia's entire higher education system. It will take the form of a mixed-use campus combining the kinds of mutually reinforcing activities that typically converge around leading research universities. It will function as the hub of a network of leading Armenian institutions of higher education. In addition to science and technology labs, teaching facilities and other academic resources, the Center will include office buildings, hospitality services and retail commerce. It will create opportunities for private investments and generate revenues, doubling a significant portion of the state budget for education and science. The Center will link pockets of excellence with each other and with counterparts abroad.

HIGH SCHOOLS AS TRIBUTARIES

The Competitiveness Foundation's second focus of activity is the upper-secondary level of the education system, on which universities depend for qualified applicants. Armenia has recently begun to consolidate high schools as stand-alone components of the school system, creating opportunities for new and progressive approaches to education. In combination with these reforms, the Competitiveness Foundation will assist in the development of new approaches to the pre-service training of teachers, complementing existing in-service training programs.

NETWORKING AND KNOWLEDGE TRANSFER

One of the most important roles the Competitiveness Foundation will play in the education sector is the brokering of connections for the transfer of knowledge to Armenia. Those transfers will be secured by integrating Armenian institutions into international networks and recruiting leading international academics, researchers and technologists to work with their Armenian counterparts. Another very effective mechanism is the creation of opportunities for international investments into the education sector, which the Foundation is actively mobilizing in partnership with the Government of Armenia.