A Moroccan delegation representing the Moroccan High Council for Education visited the Netherlands between the 10th and 13th of May to learn more about the Dutch experience with innovations related to education. The delegation was especially keen to take stock of the Dutch experience on open online learning, distant learning, hybrid learning and virtual reality learning since they are considered as front runners in this domain.
The Moroccan national strategy plan for education -Vision reform education 2030 – views ICT innovations in education as a possible means to enhance the quality of education. More specifically they see it as an opportunity to reduce the quality gap between public and private schools, and to improve accessibility of education for rural populations and females.
The delegation thus visited the University of Leiden for an interactive workshop on the design of online curricula, change management and the new roll of future teachers. They also received the opportunity to experience courses through virtual reality glasses, and to explore ways for cooperation.
The University of Leiden will actively participate in two Moroccan conferences on innovations and education that are expected to take place in February and April 2018. The University of Leiden shared a lot of relevant “university grown” materials with their Moroccan guest: Manuals, toolkits and templates ,however, more structural ways of cooperation are being examined.
The second part of the visit consisted of a two days workshop at The European Association of Distance Teaching Universities (EADTU) in Maastricht. The EADTU is Europe’s leading institutional association in online, open and flexible higher education. It is at the heart of the modernization agenda of European universities.
The Moroccan delegation received training on how to design extensive open online courses and to ensure quality assurance. They discussed Moroccan strategies that are needed to pave the way forward for online open learning in a Moroccan context. The EADTU together with the Moroccan high council will use the coming time to explore European and Moroccan funding for possible cooperation.
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