The first meeting of the IOE Visiting Committee, which includes six international experts in education from five countries alongside three Russian experts, was held on October 19–20. The Committee gave independent assessments with respect to multiple areas of the Institute's academic profile, which will serve as important groundwork for refining and reinforcing IOE’s Development Strategy through 2024.

A Cooperation Agreement has recently been signed between HSE and Politecnico di Milano (Department of Management, Economics and Industrial Engineering) to jointly embark on a large-scale study titled, Efficiency, Performance and Impact of Higher Education Institutions (EPI). In accordance with the agreement, the IOE Laboratory for University Development will act as the principal R&D venue for this initiative, while Dr. Tommaso Agasisti, Associate Professor at Politecnico di Milano and one of Europe's most renowned experts in education economics, will take up overall project supervision.

HSE Institute of Education and the Center for Strategic Research have come up with an all-round action plan for upgrading Russian education to bolster the country’s technological development and socio-economic growth.

IOE is soon to sign a Memorandum of Cooperation with Educational Testing Service, the world’s largest private organization in educational measurement and testing. During their recent visit to ETS Headquarters in Princeton (New Jersey, USA), IOE experts Elena Kardanova and Tatjana Kanonire met with their ETS colleagues to map out the overall scope of the upcoming cooperation and to negotiate preliminary plans in a number of specific areas.

On October 5–7, Hakone, Japan hosted the 2018 Conference of Asia Pacific Sociological Association (APSA), the largest forum for multifaceted social scholarship in the Pacific Rim region. Senior researcher Pavel Sorokin, Academic Supervisor in IOE’s Evidence-based Educational Policy MA, presented at the event about a recent study he carried out together with IOE Head Isak Froumin, which aims to largely rethink the conceptual framework of human capital.

This September, IOE research fellow Alexandra Bochaver traveled to the city of Ghent, Belgium to present at the 2018 Conference by the European Association for Research in Adolescence. In her talk, Alexandra gave a recap for a comprehensive cross-generational study of street activities among Russian adolescents.

Among an entire host of reinvigorating discussions that were featured at this year’s EdCrunch international conference, one topic that received special attention was how the ubiquitous digital move and Big Data can help advance education. Yaroslav Kuzminov, HSE Rector and Academic Supervisor for Education, talked about online courses as a means to update the university curriculum and bring training in sync with the modern-day pace of life, student expectations and economic needs.

Anastasia Andreeva, a student in HSE’s Comparative Social Research MA and research assistant at IOE’s Center for Educational Innovation, has recently set off for Paris, France to take up an academic internship with the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). During her stay, Anastasia will focus on exploring various frameworks in measuring educational innovations.