RENSSELAERVILLE — After its launch in 2016, the Center for Learning in Practice, known as CLiP, at the Carey Institute for Global Good is working to alleviate the global crisis in education.

The center has released its first publication, a peer-reviewed journal article written by Director Dr. Diana D. Woolis that focuses on the initiative to better prepare teachers of refugees.

The article, Communities that produce value and foster sustainable learning: the case of action for refugee educators, explores the great and urgent need to create sustainable professional development for teachers of refugees around the world and the steps the Center for Learning in Practice is taking to secure more qualified teachers. The sustainable learning model addresses a large unmet but well documented need; by 2030, there will be a global shortage of almost 69 million teachers with 1 in 200 children in the world a refugee.

The design process of the sustainable learning model included the voices of over 200 educators in the field. The process began in late 2016 when Woolis interviewed over two dozen thought leaders around the world about the challenges of teaching teachers of refugees.

In March 2017, the Center for Learning in Practice hosted an online event aimed at developing a high-level concept of a refugee educator training community as well as identifying potential digital learning platforms used by practitioners in the field. Over 200 educators from 25 countries registered for the event, allowing the center to establish a next set of objectives, including further defining pedagogies for the teachers of teachers of refugees and developing micro-credentialing and pathways for learning certification.

Two months later, another 30 participants representing learning providers in the United States, Europe, the Middle East, and Africa convened at the Carey Institute for a two-and-a-half-day workshop to test the selected learning platform and develop prototype courses for a refugee educator community.

he online platform made the work transparent and allowed any community member to access it digitally. Highly contextualized knowledge is now available and adaptable in a dynamic digital environment. The participants of this project are prepared to develop funding and begin implementing the Refugee Educator Academy.

The Refugee Educator Academy will host an inaugural webinar with Dr. Sarah Dryden-Peterson, a renowned refugee education scholar at the Harvard School of Education. The webinar, “Integrated or Specialized? Making Choices about the Design and Delivery of Refugee Education” will be held on Jan. 4, from 10 to 11 a.m.