On March 13, the Armenian final round of the Diamond Challenge youth entrepreneurship competition took place in Dilijan Community Center. During this round, the teams of Goris, Meghri, Yerevan, Dilijan, and Ijevan presented their ideas to the selection committee.

According to Armine Hovhannisyan, the president of the “Dilijan Community Center” NGO, Dilijan Community Center has been hosting the final round of the competition in Armenia for five years now. “Year by year, we try to expand our scope to include more high school students as we are very interested in transferring our entrepreneurial skills and knowledge to them. The students have come to compete today. However, it is more important to me that they learned and understood what the business idea is, and they were able to define a business idea, understood their customers and buyers, got budget, problem-solving, public speaking, and several other soft skills. This is the real victory for me.”

The small Business team representing Yerevan won the competition with their idea of edible flowers menu for a café receiving 250 $ from the Dilijan community Center and an invitation to participate in the final round of the competition at the University of Delaware  in the USA.

The competition was created by Horn Enterprise, the cornerstone of business established at the University Delaware in the USA.

The Head of UWC College Dilijan, Gabriel Abad Fernández, says he is happy to participate in this event: “This is a wonderful opportunity to see the entrepreneurial spirit of the Armenian youth, who try to find new ways to impact and realize their ideas.”

The purpose of the competition is to develop the entrepreneurial skills of high school students enabling them to start their businesses. “Even if we do not win, this will be a great experience, and what we couldn’t do now we will be able to use in our successful business plans,” says Ruslanna Dilbaryan, one of the competitors.

In previous years, the winning teams represented the cities of Dilijan, Yerevan, and Yeghegnadzor in the final. The “Papuk” team from Dilijan, which was recognized as the winner in 2021, represented the idea of recycling furniture within the framework of which soft furniture was made of used and unfit wheels. “Papuk” team has already sold its product, which can also be seen in Dilijan city park.

According to Varda Avetisyan, a member of the competition jury and the founder of “Kchuch” and “Tava” restaurants; such events are very important and inspiring for the youth, “I remember, when I was at this age, I had a business idea, but it was the 90s, and unfortunately, nothing was organized like this. I think that it is very important for the community to encourage young people to think constructively and organize big and small games in which they’ll participate and show their talent.”

 

In Tavush TV we talked about the accessibility, opportunities, and the issues of the field of education with the Executive Director of Dilijan Central School Naira Daluzyan, teacher-leader of “Teach for Armenia” educational program and the mentor of “Seroond” program Yelena Ghukasyan, and the president of Student Council of Aygehovit Secondary School Zina Poghosyan.

The main substantive change in the field of comprehensive education in 2021 was the approval and testing of a new standard of comprehensive education in the schools of Tavush region.

On February 2, Zhanna Andreasyan, the Deputy Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sports of RA, paid a working visit to Tavush region: “Today we are here to see how the process of introducing new subject standards takes place in schools, what problems, issues, points there are, that need to be amended, because it’s important for us that the tests are effective, and as a result, we can really get the best standard.”

The first stop of the Deputy Minister was at Khashtarak. Secondary School. Accompanied by the school principal, the Deputy Minister, Arsen Baghdasaryan, the Head of the Department of Comprehensive Education of the Ministry of ESCS, and Artashes Torosyan, Executive Director of the “National Center for Education Development and Innovation” Foundation, got acquainted with the process of application of the state standard of comprehensive education and answered the teachers’ and students’ questions. The Deputy Minister also visited Lusadzor Basic School, toured the classrooms, got acquainted with the educational process.

The visit ended at Ijevan Basic School N1, where a session of the pedagogical council took place. The Deputy Minister summed up the visit to the region in Tavush regional administration, with a meeting with the regional governor Hayk Ghalumyan.

According to Ms. Andreasyan especially the meetings with the teachers “were very important and they were meaningful discussions, where the good was talked about well, but the issues were also pointed out, very specific observations were made.”

It should be reminded that the new subject standards and programs have been introduced for experimental purposes in the 2nd, 5th, 7th and 10th grades of the state secondary schools of Tavush region. Subject standards have passed the stage of public and professional discussions with teaching communities and professionals of the field.

“TUMO gave me new knowledge, very interesting and new experience and areas, I did not know about”, “Due to TUMO, I have decided to build my future in IT.”

“While attending creativity course, I felt that I could work with a text and decided to become a screenwriter or journalist.”

TUMO Box has been operating in the border village of Berd for a year now, giving about 300 children from the city and nearby villages the chance to specialize and master in modern and demanded areas.

Here teens explore 14 areas ranging from design to technologies. “TUMO Box” is the first in Tavush but won’t be the last. Six more such educational centers will be established and will operate in different communities of the region, making modern technologies accessible to all the children.