Web: http://www.statpedu.sk/en/ [1]
The National Institute for Education (NIE) is a national budgetary organization directly managed by the Ministry of Education, Science, Research and Sport of the Slovak Republic. It is the oldest scientific research institution in the field of education in the Slovak Republic which provides applied pedagogical research. NIE is responsible for the provision of professional and advisory support in the area of general education in the Slovak Republic. It focuses on preparation, development and implementation of the national curriculum and provides guidelines for school policy and practice of schools and school facilities. Moreover, it provides assistance and counselling for schools and school facilities, and also for state administration bodies in the field of education. The main mission of NIE is to design the school environment to be a place respecting the human rights and principles of democracy, assist in the education process to form pupils, interpersonal and social skills for their future life and follow-up education.
The key tasks of NIE:
- proposals of curricular and didactic concepts of transformation and global school reform (pre-primary, primary, lower and upper secondary education);
- monitoring and analysing current trends in the school systems in the Slovak Republic and abroad;
- development of curricula;
- research and monitoring in the field of pedagogical innovations;
- defining recommendations and implementing the research results into school practice;
- providing in-service trainings for teachers – pilot/innovative educational projects;
- management, coordination and guidance of primary and secondary schools (especially secondary grammar schools) and educational bodies;
- editing and publishing activities;
- co-operation with universities, educational and cross-educational institutions;
- project management in co-operation with foreign countries;
- national and international measurements of outcomes, on VEGA, KEGA scientific research tasks, ESF projects and other international research tasks;
- implementation of innovative projects funded within grant schemes (Financial Mechanism of the European Economic Area, Norwegian Grants, Erasmus+);
- monitoring and analysing of educational outcomes.