Bridge the Gap 2020
The conference was held on the 9th of November 2020, with six keynote addresses. Sessions such as “Defining the Problem”, “Inequality in Education”, “Bridging the Gap”, “Lessons Learned during the Covid-19 Crisis” were all part of a rich program that included valuable presentations.
Each session had a discussant, and time was made for audience questions and discussion.
The conference brought together more than 300 participants from all five Continents. Participants were mostly from the education industry, not-for-profit organizations supporting education equality, and policy makers.
Round Table Discussion
London, UK: Bridge the Gap 2020 Roundtable was organized by the School of the Future International Academy (SoFIA).
The Roundtable: Bridge the Gap 2020 brought together policy-relevant evidence on the interelation between access to K-12 education, poverty and inequality. The Panel aimed to become a knowledge hub for education demographics research and policy that examines these interactions; the conference was a way to bring together international experts from across the globe to share their views and experience on this topic, address the issue of “why” this inequality grew during the pandemic, provide answers to “how” we could and should take advantage of this unprecedented opportunity for Transformation in Education and bridge the gap through effective actions on the school level but also through new international collaborations.
Honourable Speakers:
Dr. Constantine Kiritsis, host, Academic Board Member, SoFIA – School of the Future International Academy
Harry Patrinos, Practice Manager Europe and Central Asia, World Bank
Nicholas Piachaud, Head of Advocacy and Analysis, Varkey Foundation
Alexa Joyce, EMEA Education Skills Director WW Public Sector, Microsoft
Stelios Christakos, Chief Education Officer, Sofia Education Experts
Konstantinos Doukas, Founder and President, SoFIA – School of the Future International Academy
The Roundtable covered a range of topics that informed the central theme of intersecting access to K-12 education, poverty and inequality, particularly within low- and middle-income countries. The keynote speakers harnessed a set of cross-cutting themes that were highlighted in all sessions: the importance of solid methodological practice using the example of the usefulness of the lessons learnt during the COVID-19 crisis, the progressive use of technology, and how to create solutions that are useful for policy makers and educational stakeholders who will take advantage of this opportunity and bridge the gap.
The conference was held on the 9th of November 2020, with six keynote addresses. Sessions such as “Defining the Problem”, “Inequality in Education”, “Bridging the Gap”, “Lessons Learned during the Covid-19 Crisis” were all part of a rich program that included valuable presentations. Each session had a discussant, and time was made for audience questions and discussion.
The conference brought together more than 300 participants from all five Continents. Participants were mostly from the education industry, not-for-profit organizations supporting education equality, and policy makers.
The host, Dr. Constantine Kiritsis, board member of SoFIA stated “The speakers were true experts in their area, and I feel that the audience really felt the value. Covid has accelerated the need to change in education and the timing is right despite the challenges. It was great to hear tangible solutions from the roundtable experts apart from problems”.
President and Founder of SCHOOL OF THE FUTURE INTERNATIONAL ACADEMY (SοFIA), Kostantinos Doukas, in an effort to contibute to the global effort of transformation in education offered free access to the School Self Assessment tool (SSA) that the NGO has developed. Aiming to assist schools around the world in their quest for continious development. The School Assessment Tool will provide them with a clear idea of where they are currently and suggest actions for their Educational Transformation.
The roundtable offered a friendly Q&A session for all the participants and experts alike to learn about each other’s work, receive feedback, and forge collaborations on topics of education, poverty and inequality. We look forward to next year’s roundtable.
Speakers
Dr. Constantine Kiritsis
Academic Board Member, SoFIA – School of the Future International Academy
Entrepreneur, Professional Trainer, Author, Award winning training concept developer Constantine (Dino) is one of the most versatile professionals in business operating as an entrepreneur & consultant in the Business, HR, training & development industry. He is considered a world-class inspirational trainer / presenter having trained and led diverse events for numerous corporations and associations. He has delivered over 18,000 hours of professional training, hosting & presentations in the last 20 years in more than 45 countries in Europe, Asia and the Middle East mainly to corporate clients. He is founder of StudySmart.gr®, a company offering consulting, professional qualifications training mainly for corporate clients. He is also a consultant and International Curriculum Development expert for PwC’s Academy in the CEE and the Middle East. Dino has also done work with PwC’s Global Steering Committee for Private Company Services and has developed curriculum, methodology and mapping procedure for PwC’s Mini MBA programme being offered in the CEE region & the Middle East in more than 10 countries. In 2019, he won the Silver medal from the prestigious Boussias Education Awards for his Mini MBA concept based on a Holistic Process Diagram (Flowchart methodology).
He is known for his innovative flowcharting training techniques which have been licensed by a number of organizations and responsible for many of his conference invitations. ACCA named him one of its “tutor gurus’ in 2018, training trainers globally towards their preparation to teach ACCA’s SBL (Strategic Business Leader) exam, while his SBL flowchart has been used by thousands of candidates globally.
He has published a number of educational guides (7) and books such as ”Are you serious?” (2019) sold on Amazon and ibooks. He is an active speaker on entrepreneurship, innovation, educational, professional training and business development issues in over 100 events in the past decade.
Nicholas Piachaud
Head of Advocacy and Analysis, Varkey Foundation
Nicholas is a policy and advocacy expert with extensive experience of leading major projects for international NGOs focused on human rights and education.
As an advocacy leader, he has delivered summits that have convened dozens of presidents, prime ministers and ministers. As a campaigns strategist, he has developed public facing campaigns that have generated tens of thousands of actions worldwide. As an expert communicator and lobbyist, he has frequently appeared in the global media and spoken at key international bodies including the EU, OECD, UN and UK parliament. Today, Nicholas leads advocacy at the Varkey Foundation, where he manages the foundation’s key partnerships and grows its portfolio of global research. He studied at the University of Oxford.
Konstantinos Doukas
Founder and President, SoFIA – School of the Future International Academy
Konstantinos Doukas is the President and CEO of Doukas School (www.doukas.gr), a private education institution with a tradition of more than 100 years. As a third-generation owner, previously or parallel with his work at the school, Konstantinos held several teaching, research and administrative positions mainly in the private sector, specifically as Systems Manager Assistant at the TC Computer Lab of Columbia University (NYC), Scientific Consultant to Project Athena at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Boston, MA), President & CEO, at the Information Society SA (www.ktpae.gr) and several boards of directors positions.
As an entrepreneur, he has founded several start-up companies in Greece and also Internationally, most of them still in operation, mainly in the area of technological innovations, use of ICT in education, supporting services in education and digital marketing services.
He is the founder and Chairman of SoFIA (School of the Future International Academy, www. sofianet.org), an International NGO focusing on supporting educational institutions and schools that wish to excel academically and operationally, by using global best practices and innovative methodologies.
He is also the co-author of more than 11 publications in Greek and International Conferences and Journals and co-editor of 5 Greek Conference Proceedings. Recently he was the co-editor of the IGI Global Edition 2018: “Handbook of Research on Educational Design and Cloud Computing in Modern Classroom Settings”.
He holds an Electrical Engineering and Computer Science BSc from the National Technical University of Athens and an MA in Communications, Computers and Technology in Education from Columbia University (NYC).
In the past 20 years, Konstantinos has been a regular speaker at conferences on education, technology and the future of education in the USA, Europe and the Middle East.
He was born in 1964 has a family with 3 kids and his hobby is sports.
Harry Patrinos
Practice Manager, Education, Europe and Central Asia Region, World Bank
Harry Anthony Patrinos is the Practice Manager for the Europe and Central Asia region of the World Bank’s education global practice. He specializes in all areas of education, especially school-based management, demand-side financing and public private partnerships. He managed education lending operations and analytical work programs in Argentina, Colombia and Mexico, as well as a regional research project on the socioeconomic status of Latin America’s Indigenous Peoples, published as Indigenous Peoples, Poverty and Human Development in Latin America (Palgrave Macmillan, 2006).
He is one of the main authors of the report, Lifelong Learning in the Global Knowledge Economy (World Bank, 2003). Mr. Patrinos has many publications in the academic and policy literature, with more than 40 journal articles.
He is co-author of the books: Policy Analysis of Child Labor: A Comparative Study (St. Martin’s, 1999), Decentralization of Education: Demand-Side Financing (World Bank, 1997), and Indigenous People and Poverty in Latin America: An Empirical Analysis with George Psacharopoulos (World Bank/Ashgate, 1994). He has also worked in Africa, Asia, Europe, the Middle East and North America. He previously worked as an economist at the Economic Council of Canada. Mr. Patrinos received a doctorate from the University of Sussex.
Alexa Joyce
EMEA Education & Skills – Director – WW Public Sector Microsoft
My focus is driving digital, cloud and AI skills development as part of digitally transforming education systems world-wide as they adopt new approaches to teaching, learning and administration. I’ve worked with more than 100 countries at all levels of the system, from teachers and faculty level through to Ministers of Education as they develop their vision, strategy, skills programs and roll out digital transformation. I love learning and inspiring others to learn more.
I’m a globally-experienced leader, forging multi-stakeholder partnerships in science, technology, education to address the rapid digital transformation taking place in our society and economy.
I’ve got a track record in winning multi-million dollar contracts in digital services, campaigns and tech deployments in public sector. Award winning Public Sector communicator and sales leader. I lead high impact teams in non profit, government and Fortune 500 organisations.
Stelios Christakos
Chief Education Officer, Sofia Education Experts
I was born in Athens and studied Law in the University of Athens (LLB, Law). At the same time (1986-1988) I studied and got a Diploma in Programming and Information Systems Analysis of Data Rank Corp. I continued my studies at postgraduate level, gaining a Degree in Economics (MSc Finance) in 2001 from the University of Strathclyde.
In 2008 I became certified in Investment Management from the FCA, UK (Certificate in Investment Management (CertIM)).
My professional career began as a computer expert and then as the founder and CEO of my own software development company (1989), which I sold in 1999 and managed until 2004.
The period from November 2004 to September 2010 I worked for the Greek government (Ministry of Economy and Finance, European Union co-funded projects).
From October 2010 to September 2012, I worked at KPMG as Senior Manager. Starting October 2012, I founded and manage my own management consulting company working with public and private sector organizations and implementing Digital Transformation, Business Plans, Financial Studies, Feasibility Studies and Cost-Benefit Analysis, Marketing and sales for various clients.
During my career, I have launched successful start-ups in the sectors of ICT, Construction, Finance and Energy and have helped many others create and grow their businesses.
Since January 2017 I jointed SoFIA Education Experts as a CEO. I am responsible for managing all projects and coordinating all resources. I help Education Leaders strategize, plan, implement, deploy and adopt digital technologies.
I am passionate about change and transformation on what and how people learn, so they can adapt to the new world of the 4th Industrial Revolution.