For the educational institutions from the defense and public order field, regardless the training level or the origin country, the actual context of COVI-19 pandemics is a challenge in adapting their educational act to the new requests of professional training, while respecting safety and social distancing conditions. The pressure is even higher since professional training in these fields has a powerfully practical-applicative character, this requiring an innovative approach, a particular digitalized one of the educational process and its online/long distance realization. In these circumstances, four educational institutions from the defense and public order field -”Septimiu Mureșan” Police School (RO);Police College and Secondary Police School of the Ministry of the Interior (CZ); ”Mircea cel Bătrân” Naval Academy (RO); ”Nikola Vaptsarov”Naval Academy (BG) - and a digital tehchnology private provider - Holisun (RO) - have joined their efforts with the aim to develop the capacity of the educational institutions in the field of defense, public order and national safety of implementing online, blended and long distance teaching and learning, by digitalizing the evaluation techniques and methods used in the professional training system. Three objectives were established:1.Increasing the quality and efficiency of the evaluation component of the educational process by automatizing and digitizing the evaluation process/the grading of tests/questionnaires applied during the professional training/teaching; 2.Developing and using innovative tools with high quality and versatility digital content, through the cooperation with digital technology providers; 3.Harmonizing the evaluation practices between partners, through the creation and implementation of evaluation strategies in the educational process. Three innovative intellectual outputs were created: Methodology for the creation and implementation of evaluation strategies during educational process, Digital admission and evaluation process by use of secured software platform for online and offline examinations and Guide for digital admission and evaluation process. For all partner educational institution, the innovative elements are: a cross-sectorial approach of the evaluation strategies; the introduction of facial recognition technology as a preliminary step in online evaluations; the duality of the automatic system of admittance and evaluation (online and written exams), with the possibility of using short open answers. The automatization of the offline evaluation process, by implementing new digital techniques and tools represents an innovative element not only for partner police schools in RO and BG, but also for the professional training system of Romanian National Police. The main target group of the project is the didactical staff and students of the four educational institutions from the partnership and the candidates in the admittance exams. A second target group is formed by the other police or military educational institutions from partner countries, which could use the outputs as model for creating and implementing their own evaluation strategies, and by their candidates, didactical staff and students. The project results can be also used as model and/or intellectual output by civilian High Educational institutions or secondary schools, by their didactical staff, trainees or candidates. Each partner has a project team composed by two types of members. The first category is formed by the members of the project’s management team and implementation. The second category is formed by experts who will create the intellectual outputs. A leading organization was appointed for each intellectual output. It will be responsible for realizing the named intellectual output respecting the deadline and the general plans of the steering group. During the 24 months of project implementation, we will organize four transnational meetings - one in each country of the participating partners, plus the Closing Conference in Romania - and three multiplier events, one in each country participating in the project. Each partner will be responsible for the dissemination, sustainability and durability of the intellectual outputs in his country. At the dissemination and visibility activities, and at the multiplier events, we will invite representatives of other educational institutions from the defense and public order field in the countries involved in the project and in other partner countries, national and local police managers and representatives of Ministry of Interior and Ministry of Defense from participating countries, local and national civilian education institutions, local and national mass media. In all three participating countries, the developed outputs will be placed on the partners’ websites and will be accessible for all national interested parties, but also to other European partners.
Through FAST Project, the four educational institutions from the defence and public order field, using the expertise of the digital technology private provider, have joined their efforts with the aim to develop the capacity of the educational institutions in the field of defence, public order and national safety of implementing online, hybrid and long distance teaching and learning, by digitalizing the evaluation techniques and methods used in the professional training system. In order to achieve this purpose, three objectives were established: 1. increasing the quality and efficiency of the evaluation component of the educational process by automatizing and digitizing the evaluation process/the grading of tests/questionnaires applied during the professional training/teaching; 2. developing and using innovative tools with digital content of high quality and versatility, through the cooperation with experienced providers in the field of automatized and digitized evaluation process of written tests; 3. harmonizing the evaluation practices between partners, through the creation and implementation of evaluation strategies in the educational process. For SAPSM, the project was intended from the start to create a platform for the online and offline assessment of its students and also for the future assessment of the candidates in the admission written exams (the procedure of the admission exams in all the educational institutions of the Ministry of Internal Affairs is established at ministry level, not at the level of each educational institution). SAPSM team was the coordinator of FAST partnership. For PCSPS Holesov, the project objective consisted in improving the digital assessment process of its students, by providing long distance learning assessment tool for mass evaluation process in condition of online or blended-learning process, especially when some unexpected incidents occur (e.g. pandemic). PCSPS experts were the coordinators of the third intellectual output, the User Guide for online/offline assessment platform. MBNA Constanta and NVNA Varna needed a digital instrument for the online/offline evaluation of tests with short open answers and for the evaluation of tests applied on paper. MBNA and NVNA also contributed with its expertise, knowledge and good practices to a qualitative enhancement of the educational processes within the partnership, as a major added value for the consortium. MBNA experts were the coordinators of the first intellectual output, The Methodology for the creation and implementation of evaluation strategies during educational process. Holisun experts were the coordinators of the second intellectual output, The Digital admission and evaluation process by use of secured software platform for online and offline examinations. Together with the four educational institutions involved in the project, they tried to create a digital tool that could meet their most important needs regarding the digital assessment process.
When we go back to the moment of FAST Project submission (the autumn of 2020), we must keep in mind the context of COVID-19 pandemics, with its challenges for the entire educational system, but especially for the educational institutions from the defence and public order field. Regardless the training level or the origin country (high education institutions from Romania and Bulgaria or secondary ones from Romania and Czech Republic), the pandemics was a challenge for all, in adapting their educational act to the new requests of professional training, while respecting safety and social distancing conditions. The pressure was even higher since professional training in these fields has a powerfully practical-applicative character, this requiring an innovative approach, a particular digitalized one of the educational process and its online/long distance realization. In these circumstances, four educational institutions from the defence and public order field - ”Septimiu Mureșan” Police School in Cluj-Napoca, Romania (SAPSM); Police College and Secondary Police School of the Ministry of the Interior in Holesov, Czech Republic (PCSPS); ”Mircea cel Bătrân” Naval Academy in Constanța, Romania (MBNA); ”Nikola Vaptsarov” Naval Academy in Varna, Bulgaria (NVNA) - and a digital technology private provider - Holisun Baia Mare, Romania - have joined their efforts with the aim to develop the capacity of the educational institutions in the field of defence, public order and national safety of implementing online, hybrid and long distance teaching and learning, by digitalizing the evaluation techniques and methods used in the professional training system. For SAPSM Cluj, the main need referred to the evaluation process used for the students, in their graduation exam, and for the candidates in the admittance exam. Prior to this project, the written exam was evaluated using multiple choice written tests corrected and processed manually with low efficiency regarding qualified human resources used and in reducing/eliminating the risks caused by the human factor intervention. At the Czech partner level, the institution need was related to the process of evaluation and correction of the tests applied during the training process carried out in the school. For that reason, they prior to use especially the online part of the software, including face recognition, for the purpose of distant learning and assessment. Before FAST Project, MBNA Constanta and NVNA Varna had technical endowment and digital instruments more advanced than the police educational institutions. They were already using online educational platforms and had digital instruments for the online evaluation of multiple choice written tests with closed answers. But they did not have a digital instrument for the online/offline evaluation of tests with short open answers and for the evaluation of tests applied on paper. Prior to FAST Project, none of the educational institutions used facial recognition technology as a way of securing in the assessment process. Education-related software solutions are a significant business line of the private partner. In order to develop competitive products and to maintain and consolidate its position in the national and international market, the private partner must always know, in real time, the software requests of the educational institutions from various fields, in Romania and abroad, and this is why they accepted to be part of FAST partnership. During the project implementation, the four educational institutions, together with the digital solutions provider, created three innovative intellectual outputs, according to their common and specific needs: The Methodology for the creation and implementation of evaluation strategies during educational process, The Digital admission and evaluation process by use of secured software platform for online and offline examinations and The User Guide for online/offline assessment platform. For all partner educational institution, the innovative elements within FAST Project were: a cross-sectorial approach of the evaluation strategies; the introduction of facial recognition technology as a preliminary step in online evaluations; the duality of the automatic system evaluation (online and written exams), with the possibility of using short open answers. The automatization of the offline evaluation process, by implementing new digital techniques and tools represents an innovative element not only for partner police schools in RO and BG, but also for the professional training system of Romanian National Police. So, prior to this project, all partners had basic digital materials for students, and also educational platforms used in the training process, but not all of them had a digital tool for offline / online assessment. Also, none of them was using the face recognition technique in the evaluation process. These needs were addressed through FAST Project.