Guarantee of the Right to Online Education in Exceptional Situations: Case Study of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Nejla Peka – Head of Department of the Public Law, “Luarasi” University, Tirana, Albania

Abstract

Covid-19 came as a challenge in human being life. After the an­nouncement of the state of the world pandemic on March 11, 2020, by the World Health Organization, the government reacted to this situation, under­taking a series of measures considering the general interruption of social and economic activities such as closing schools, the prohibition of mass gatherings in closed or open places, the restriction or prohibition of other movements in­side and outside the country, which brought the country into total quarantine for about three months. Among other things, the government also presented an action plan for the prevention and response to Covid-19 in May 2020, which provided three pillars of action: prevention, response, and recovery, to continue providing health services to the entire population. While the government’s re­sponse has necessarily been swift in terms of protecting health and guarantee­ing the right to life, the pandemic situation brought a new challenge, in terms of children’s well-being and the effective exercise of their rights, especially in the most vulnerable children. In the situation of the global pandemic, internation­al institutions have addressed a series of recommendations and statements for the protection and guarantee of the rights of children and their families.

In April 2020, ENOC 2 calls on governments, the European Commission and the Council of Europe to take all appropriate actions to ensure that the rights of all children are guaranteed in accordance with the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Children’s rights and, the comments of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child, should be respected during the Covid-19 health care crisis.

LIMEN Conference

8th International Scientific-Business Conference – LIMEN 2022 – Leadership, Innovation, Management and Economics: Integrated Politics of Research – CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS, Hybrid (EXE Budapest Center, Budapest, Hungary), December 1, 2022,

LIMEN Conference proceedings published by the Association of Economists and Managers of the Balkans, Belgrade, Serbia

LIMEN Conference 2022 Conference proceedings: ISBN 978-86-80194-66-0, ISSN 2683-6149, DOI:  https://doi.org/10.31410/LIMEN.2022

Creative Commons Non Commercial CC BY-NC: This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-Non-Commercial 4.0 License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) which permits non-commercial use, reproduction and distribution of the work without further permission. 

Suggested citation

Peka, N. (2022). Guarantee of the Right to Online Education in Exceptional Situations: Case Study of the COVID-19 Pandemic. In V. Bevanda (Ed.), International Scientific-Business Conference – LIMEN 2022: Vol 8. Conference proceedings (pp. 371-376). Association of Economists and Managers of the Balkans.  https://doi.org/10.31410/LIMEN.2022.371

References

Avokati i Popullit. (2022), The special report of the People Advocate Institution “On the viola­tion of the rights of the child during the Covid-19 situation”, drafted with support of the Save the Children in Albania, www.avokatipopullit.gov.al 

Convention on the Rights of the Child, United Nations (1989). https://www.coe.int/en/web/compass/convention-on-the-rights-of-the-child#:~:text=The%20Convention%20on%20 the%20Rights,children%20into%20one%20single%20document  

Decision of the Council of Ministers no. 540, dated 19.09.2018, “On the organization and func­tioning of the School of Directors of pre-university education institutions and the method of their training and certification” (2018).

Decision of the Council of Ministers no. 98, dated 27.02.2019, “On the establishment, organi­zation and functioning of the Agency for Quality Assurance in Pre-university Education (ASCAP)” (2019).

Decision of the Council of Ministers no. 99, dated 27.02.2019, “On the creation, organization and operation of the General Directorate of Pre-university Education” (2019).

Instruction no. 13, dated 22.05.2019 of the Minister of Education, Sport and Youth, “On the pro­cedures for accepting and appointing a teacher to a vacant position in public educational institutions of preliminary education and for the administration of the portal “Teachers for Albania”, amended. (2019).

Instruction no. 25, dated 25.07.2018. of the Minister of Education, Sports and Youth “On the es­tablishment and functioning of the board of the educational institution” (2018).

Instruction no. 543/1 dated 21.8.2020 of the Minister of Health and Social Protection: “On care and anti-covid-19 measures in pre-university educational structures” (2020).

Law no. 15/2017: ‘On Vocational Education and Training in the Republic of Albania’ (2017).

Law no. 18/2017: “On the Rights and protection of children” (2017).

Law no. 69/2012: “On the pre-university education system in the Republic of Albania”, amend­ed in 2015 and 2018 (2012).

Law no. 8454, dated 4.2.1999. “On the People’s Advocate Institution”, amended (1999).

Synthetic Report of the People Advocate Institution, for access to the right of education during the pandemic situation (2021, November).

Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 26, United Nations (1948). https://www.un.org/ en/about-us/universal-declaration-of-human-rights#:~:text=Article%2026,on%20the%20 basis%20of%20merit.

Additional reading

Law No. 121/2016: “On the social care service in the Republic of Albania” (2016).

Directive no. 10, dated 25.2.2015, “On the ways, forms of cooperation and intervention proce­dures to assist children at risk for the main institutions and structures responsible for child protection” co-nomination of four ministers, according to state responsibility areas (2015).

Decision no. 573, dated 24.6.2015, of Council of Ministers, “On adopting standards of the ser­vices of child protection units” (2015).

Decision no. 91, dated 14.2.2018, of Council of Ministers, “On the procedures of carrying out inspection and emplacing sanctions from the State Agency on the Child Rights and Pro­tection” (2018).

Decision no. 148, dated 13.3.2018, of Council of Ministers, “On establishing rules of coopera­tion among the institutional mechanisms, structures for the protection of children at the lo­cal level and non-profitable organizations to execute national and local policies as well as for the necessary services on child protection” (2018).

Decision no. 353, dated 12.6.2018, of Council of Ministers, “On rules of the functioning of the cross-sectional technical group for the protection of children in the municipality and ad­ministrative units” (2018).