To increase the quality of education, to make training at the University useful and attractive for the students, and the teaching process effective and modern – these are the aims of the project “Fostering Competencies Development in Belarusian Higher Education” (FOSTERC).

The project is implemented at Francisk Skorina Gomel State University within the frames of EU programme ERASMUS+. Since 2016 the lecturers of the university have been establishing close ties with the colleagues from Belarusian and European universities, since the project unites 15 partners from Spain, Lithuania, Poland, Finland and Belarus. They upgrade their qualification, exchange their best experiences, introduce the innovative technologies and successfully integrate theory and practice.

The Dean of the Faculty of psychology and pedagogy Vladislav Beizerov focused on the details of the project FOSTERC at GSU.

- At the initial stage of the project more than 9000 graduates of the universities, employers and lecturers participated in online questionnaire survey in order to estimate the current situation in the educational systems and define major areas for further work.

Training of lecturers and experience exchange take place during the seminars and trainings conducted on the basis of higher education institutions participating in the project. For example, in November a seminar was held at GSU, in April – in the universities of Poland and Finland, this year a number of seminars are planned in Lithuania, and in the autumn – again in our University.

- Project-based teaching technologies focused primarily on students are involved into the educational process. Consequently, it breaks the stereotypes of traditional education, since in order to solve problems or make a project or a presentation the children have not only to read the paragraph from the textbook, but also to borrow knowledge from various subjects, work with the problems in the real world, show their independence and be able to analyze.

- Due to the fundings provided by the European Union, the University was able to improve its material and technical base and acquire modern equipment for 18,500 euros. New multimedia projectors, printers, multifunction devices, tablets, laptops, interactive boards, cameras are widely used during our lectures, practical seminars, in conferences and in the work of the research laboratories at the Faculty of psychology and pedagogy.

Moreover, the lecturers improve their skills in accordance with the latest requirements of the Bologna process, and this is very important, since the quality of education depends on the professionalism of teachers.

Finally, GSU students get better training and new relevant competencies. All these factors give our graduates a chance to become demanded specialists in the labor markets of our country and abroad.