A real revolution is taking place in the pre-university education development file in the current period, as the government has adopted an ambitious strategy and took bold steps to reform and develop a new education system which can help in building a generation who is capable of innovation and creativity, and can really contribute to achieving sustainable development. During the recent period, we witnessed a radical change in this system & features of development, where the upgrading of the educational process began to appear. However, there are still some challenges that limit the kickoff of the train of educational development in Egypt.

In this convention CEBC & ECIC had the honor to host H.E Dr. Tarek Shawky; Minister of Education and Technical Education discussing the topic “Development of the Education System in Egypt … Opportunities and Challenges”.

In the opening remarks Eng. Motaz Raslan; on behalf of CEBC & ECIC; welcomed our dear distinguished members, guests, ambassadors and his dear friend H.E. Dr. Tarek Shawky. Then said that for decades the education file has suffered from neglect and many successive governments have not been able to get close to the roots of this thorny file to accumulate its problems and increase its challenges and Egypt is retreating in the indicators of the quality of education, this is because there is no long-term vision and strategy for the future of education and investment in human wealth and we have seen this in conflict resolutions such as the abolition of the sixth grade elementary and double secondary and other solutions that did not come close to the basis of the problem which is human construction.

Then he mentioned that because education is the passport for the future, Egypt realized that the development of education has become an imperative for achieving sustainable development, and the political leadership from day one has put building the Egyptian human being at the forefront of the priorities and has begun to reform and develop education.

Over the past six years, we have seen a radical transformation in the education system in Egypt, where the Ministry of Education has adopted a new approach based on understanding rather than preservation and indoctrination.

Then he continued; these praises did not come out of nowhere…

but it was behind it a vision and a sophisticated thought to put Egyptian education in the place it deserves and here Eng. Motaz mentioned when His Excellency the Minister took over and began to talk about the application of tablets and the introduction of electronic teaching methods, he met a strong attack at the beginning and everyone was betting on his failure in the light of sticking to the traditional education, which hit its roots in educational institutions for decades and we noticed what happened in the first year of application of the exam with tablet in the first grade high school where he faced many challenges and problems in the extent of acceptance of the idea and difficulties of accessing the Internet and others. But with the outbreak of coronavirus and the growing fears of millions of parents for their children to go to school and even to perform the exams was a real test of the feasibility of his new system, which succeeded ably in overcoming the crisis and assured everyone the extent of the dimension and validity of his vision for the future of education in Egypt.

H.E. Dr. Tarek Shawky, Minister of Education, thanked CEBC & ECIC for inviting him & welcomed all respectable attendees then said that his goal is to develop Egyptian education and revolutionize our students’ path to cognitive progress, not learning to get certificates.

Dr. Shawky added that the ministry is implementing a different plan through the curriculum that we have developed to push our students to think and not just pass the exams, pointing out that we invested more than two years ago in the implementation of question banks and knowledge banks and the introduction of technology in the educational process.

He pointed out that the ministry began investing in digital education beginning in 2016 and we succeeded in bringing content to the Knowledge Bank, and it started in 2018 starting from high school and kindergarten. “We are now studying English from primary school, and we have succeeded in applying different educational models, including Japanese schools, which are directly receiving attention from the political leadership.” H.E Dr. Tarek said.

He explained that more than 10.4 million electronic exams were conducted during the last two years of high school, pointing out that we had difficulty at the beginning of the application of development, but the students made up for it quickly and made great progress in understanding the development of the educational process.

And he added: “We have a problem with the cultural heritage in our society, which is relying on private lessons, but we were able to provide several digital platforms and we provided live broadcast platforms for educational lessons, all of these tools helped us in the stage of the spread of the Corona virus.”

He pointed out that the implementation of the new education system with the new curricula has reached the third grade of primary this year, and we will finish building the curricula for the rest of the primary school classes in the middle of next year.

Dr. Shawky said, “We own the curricula that were created for the new education system, in addition to our having the question banks for the first time, which helps us transfer our experience to dozens of countries along the lines of international” sat “certificates. He also confirmed that the ministry now has all the capabilities that qualify it to confront the private lessons mafia and the exam leak mafia, indicating that our goal is to preserve the future of our students.

He also stressed that the teacher is the basis for the success of the new education system, and there is a training plan for teachers on the new curricula prepared by a group of the best professors at the National Center for Curriculum Development, and we are working to provide all the tools that help the teacher deliver his message. On technical education, He stressed that the new system in technical education depends on the idea of ​​merits, which work to give students specialized skills in their field, noting that the ministry has developed the experience of schools of applied technology in cooperation with the industrial partner to provide a better opportunity for students of technical education.

Ultimately Dr. Shawky referred to the state’s interest in developing technical education in order to meet the needs of the labor market and raise the technical competence of labor, in a way that contributes to enhancing the capabilities of the national economy, additionally he called for the necessity of restoring the desire to learn and away from all the unfavorable societal phenomena that harm our students, such as the phenomenon of cheating and the phenomenon of private lessons.