The real-world stress test of the COVID-19 pandemic, with most countries finding themselves unprepared to ensure the continuity of education, has prompted a new thinking about the need for planning, specifically to build more resilient education systems that can adapt to the “new normal” and withstand future shocks.

This resilience agenda for educational planning must now be merged with the fundamental agenda of planning for universal quality education for all in the context of continuing stresses to the economy, to societies and the environment.

Together, these two agendas serve not only SDG 4, but also other SDGs pertaining to social, economic, and environmental issues.

Climate change is among IIEP’s top concerns. Its consequences will have significant adverse effects on education systems around the world. The growing frequency of disasters, including extreme weather events, already causes school closures and damage to educational infrastructure in many settings. Rising sea levels and the loss of viable habitats will bring challenges at the population level, including accelerated migration, with cascading effects on the geographic and demographic parameters of educational planning. In addition to planning for resilience, educational planning and management has a proactive role to play in reducing the environmental footprints and impacts of providing education, from cleaner schooling transportation schemes to greener school buildings.

Bringing educational planning to another level to address new challenges requires a continued effort on existing approaches, like comprehensive cross-sectoral and cross-territorial planning, multi-stakeholder governance structures, and the steering of non-governmental education providers.

But IIEP is also investing in the largely unchartered territory of planning for new models of learning systems, including the technology-enhanced. At country level, this decision to adapt new models may be motivated by an ambition to improve learning at scale. Or it may be forced on decision-makers who, wary of school disruptions, see no other way to ensure education continuity. IIEP has a responsibility to adapt planning approaches and techniques and to provide the tools for this transformation.

Beyond educational planning, IIEP is experiencing a growing demand from Member States for support on educational management. There is widespread awareness that a given policy, reform, or plan is only as good as its implementation. Implementation challenges require adaptive and distributed forms of decision-making and leadership.  Following the 10th MTS’s investment in research and development in this area, IIEP stands ready to increase its training and technical cooperation offer on issues of management.

At its core, the management of education is about finding ways to make human and financial resources available where and when they are needed for learning to happen.

Together, these two agendas serve not only SDG 4, but also other SDGs pertaining to social, economic, and environmental issues.

Climate change is among IIEP’s top concerns. Its consequences will have significant adverse effects on education systems around the world. The growing frequency of disasters, including extreme weather events, already causes school closures and damage to educational infrastructure in many settings. Rising sea levels and the loss of viable habitats will bring challenges at the population level, including accelerated migration, with cascading effects on the geographic and demographic parameters of educational planning. In addition to planning for resilience, educational planning and management has a proactive role to play in reducing the environmental footprints and impacts of providing education, from cleaner schooling transportation schemes to greener school buildings.

Bringing educational planning to another level to address new challenges requires a continued effort on existing approaches, like comprehensive cross-sectoral and cross-territorial planning, multi-stakeholder governance structures, and the steering of non-governmental education providers.

But IIEP is also investing in the largely unchartered territory of planning for new models of learning systems, including the technology-enhanced. At country level, this decision to adapt new models may be motivated by an ambition to improve learning at scale. Or it may be forced on decision-makers who, wary of school disruptions, see no other way to ensure education continuity. IIEP has a responsibility to adapt planning approaches and techniques and to provide the tools for this transformation.