The technology park hosted the third Educational Technology Conference organized by National Center for Teacher Professional Development. The conference was opened by Alexander Jejelava, Minister of Education and Science of Georgia and George Machabeli, Director of National Center for Teacher Professional Development.

The conference aims to inform interested parties about the modern trends in the technology field, introduce and share the best practices and experience of the technology use within the educational process between teachers, experts, representatives of universities and organizations working in the area of educational technologies.

The Educational Technology Conference will involve 200 teachers and specialists, and reports presented on five thematic areas:

· Teaching and learning in the digital age - the direction involves all aspects, innovations, current trends for integration of technologies in learning environments, best practices of the technology use in teaching and training process, IT standards integration and ICT implementation strategies in schools, etc.

· Professional development – includes the skills development for teachers, school administrators and other employees involved in the educational field in order to create the educational environment appropriate for the digital age.

· Leadership and Management with ICT – includes the establishment and development of the vision over the role of the technology integration in educational programs at various levels; planning, evaluation and promotion of learning with the support of ICT.

· Studies on ICT use in teaching- learning process - includes research on integrating technology into learning process.

· Technological infrastructure - includes the introduction of the technologies, resources and strategies that are essential for arrangement of the technological infrastructure and for managing and administrating the effective teaching and learning process;

Among the conference participants are experts and trainers of the field, as well as schools, representatives of  ICT companies, international organizations, academia, and the Ministry of Education and Science officials.

The Conference is sponsored and supported by Intel, Microsoft, Liberty Bank and Lenovo.

The two-day conference format is diverse and includes as follows:

Plenary reports by experts and specialists of the field- all the participants of the conference will be gathered in one space to listen to the invited international and local experts who will share to the audience the most important topics of educational technologies and practices.

Poster session – On November 20 poster session will be held in the specially designated exhibition hall. The poster authors will present information on a school or individual teachers or successful projects. The poster session aims to identify and share the best practices. The authors will have the opportunity to interact face to face or in small groups with the session participants.

Technology exhibition - the conference participants will be able to visit the laboratories of innovative technologies. The companies, on the one hand, will present opportunities which technology offers to the education sector and on the other hand, they will get feedback about the school needs. The exhibition will include practical activities for interested persons to get acquainted with the technologies.

The award ceremony will take place on November 20 after the closing of the Conference. The participants of the conference will be awarded prizes in different categories by the sponsors.

Taking into account the experience of the past years and the forecast of the conference organizers, the conference will greatly contribute to development of new strategies for the technology use in the learning process by teachers; and Heads of schools will receive more information on how to improve the results of students through the learning technologies, as well as how to introduce and promote digital culture in the school; ICT managers will receive information on school information and communication infrastructure development opportunities; Universities will have the opportunity to learn about the latest trends and initiatives about the key teaching and learning skills; Companies will receive information about the school needs and challenges, the latest trends of using ICT in the classroom, technical infrastructure development strategies and models.

The Educational Technology Conference is held annually. Those interested in the Conference can visit specially designed website web getc.ge for registration.