What is #ASEFClassNet?
For over two decades, the ASEF Classroom Network (#ASEFClassNet) has been providing capacity-building opportunities for collaborative teaching and learning and a platform to explore the potential of cutting-edge EdTech tools and the integration of Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) in secondary, high, and vocational schools in the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) Partner countries. Its target group is broad, given its intergenerational & multi-stakeholder outreach. It ranges from students, teachers, school leaders, teacher trainers, researchers, policymakers, and to EdTech experts. Since its inception, about 2,000 teachers from all 51 ASEM Partner countries have participated in and become members of the ASEF Classroom Network. As a result, about 35,000 students have been engaged in over 430 Asia-Europe School Collaborations and local spin-off activities.
16th ASEF Classroom Network Project
The 16th edition of the ASEF Classroom Network project series is focusing on the topic “Leading Change: Digital Transformation of Education in the Era of AI”. The primary aim of the project is to conduct various capacity, dialogue, and partnership building activities that result in equipping K-12 stakeholders with basic awareness, competencies, and strategies on AIEd to build smart education systems. It also aims to enable participant teachers and scholars to engage and empower students to leverage on AI to improve their learning experiences through spin-off activities.
ASEFClassNet16 will be a hybrid project and is planned to take place both online and on-site throughout 2023. It aims to engage a diverse group of intergenerational participants on the topic of “Leading Change: Digital Transformation of Education in the Era of AI”.
In this edition there will be two parallel activities and platforms to engage with:
1 | School Collaboration
This activity is for teachers, trainee teachers, and school leaders at the secondary education level to develop their knowledge on the topic as well as advocacy and leadership skills for integrating ethical and effective AI innovation in classrooms across Asian and European schools.
2 | Faculty Collaboration (by invitation only)
This activity is for academic experts (professors, researchers, teacher trainers, etc.) in Higher Education Institutions to engage in critical and timely conversations on integrating ethical and effective AI innovation to identify crucial areas and work in partnerships to create collaborative resources on the topic based on the discussion findings.
Through these two platforms, the project aims to engage approximately 150 participants over a period of 6 months and to increase awareness and understanding of issues related to innovation and leadership in the AI era based on effectiveness and a strong ethical foundation.
ASEFClassNet16 Faculty Collaboration
ASEFClassNet16 Faculty Collaboration is a 7-month (May – December 2023) exchange and dialogue project for academics and teacher trainers working at higher education institutions (HEIs). It aims to create avenues for scholarly discussions and resource creation on the topic of “Leading Change: Digital Transformation of Education in the Era of AI” to support educators at the K-12 level as well as to foster collaboration among Faculties of Education.
This is a new element of the ASEFClassNet project that aims at strengthening collaboration across Faculties of Education and supporting innovation in teaching and learning at the K-12 level.
Participants (Faculty Collaboration)
Citizens of any of the Asia-Europe Meeting (ASEM) partner countries who are Academic experts (professors, researchers, etc.) or managers working at a Faculty of Education at a Higher Education Institution (HEI)
Programme Design (Faculty Collaboration)
The programme of the ASEFClassNet16 Faculty Collaboration consists of 3 key phases:
Phase 1 – Cross-Faculty Dialogues
In this phase, the academic experts will collaborate with each other and share ideas through a series of dialogues on the topic to identify crucial areas that need to be prioritised to support integration of AI tools in schools effectively and ethically. The dialogue series will take place in 2 stages:
Individual Presentations: In this stage, selected experts will deliver sessions to share their ongoing work, exchange information with each other, and look for synergies. The sessions will be interactive, allowing for knowledge exchange, and dialogues on the topic.
Group Discussions: In this stage, experts with similar interests will jointly develop ideas for collaboration among their institutions e.g., joint curriculum development, pedagogy enhancement, joint research, joint PhD programmes, etc. The key aim is to come up with ideas that could lead to sustainable peer networks with concrete outputs. Actionable ideas will be presented at the ASEFClassNet16 Conference.
Phase 2 – ASEFClassNet16 Conference
A 3-day long on-site conference will be organised to bring the participants of ASEFClassNet16 together. Academic experts, teachers, teacher trainees from various countries across Asia and Europe will ensure a great intergenerational and diverse dialogue on the topic. During the conference teams of academic experts involved in Faculty Collaboration will engage with School Collaboration participants teachers of the ASEFClassNet16 project.
Phase 3 – Collaboration in Action
In this phase, Faculty collaboration participants will start implementing their ideas e.g., joint curriculum development, pedagogy enhancement, joint research, joint PhD programmes, etc. ASEF will help with coordination.
Expected Contribution from Participants (Faculty Collaboration)
- Full participation in 7 online sessions between June – September 2023 (est. 16 hours)
- Come up with ideas for collaboration on three key areas: curriculum development, teaching & leadership guidelines, and student engagement for effective use of AI in schools
- Start collaborations on the identified areas.
Outcomes (Faculty Collaboration)
The Faculty Collaboration aims to achieve the following key outcomes:
- Raise awareness and promote meaningful discussions on the significance of ethical AI innovation for effective quality teaching and learning in HEIs’ Teacher Training Departments
- Create new resources to support the leadership of secondary school stakeholders on the significance of ethical AI innovation for effective quality teaching and learning
- Provide a global dialogue platform to reflect on existing academic resources, teaching resources, practices, and partnerships on the ethical AI innovation for effective quality teaching and learning
- Provide an intergenerational mentorship platform between academic experts and teachers as well as teachers-to-be to not only have meaningful conversations on the topic but also to build innovative education initiatives (ITPs) through joint collaboration
- Promote Asia-Europe cross-cultural cooperation among Faculty of Education in HEIs in ASEM countries
- Evaluate the impact of education initiatives built as part of spin-off activities after the project and generate new insights and resources on better integration and use of AI tools in schools
- Inform Education policymakers in Asia and Europe with relevant insights gathered from teachers and ITP evaluations to improve secondary-level education scenarios in the ASEM region.
For more information on ASEFClassNet16, please see the Concept Note.