Dear first-year students and graduates of the Department of Education and Early Childhood Care; dear parents, dear educators, and dear colleagues. On behalf of all of us, I welcome you to our department’s website.
On our site you may be able to find all the information you need concerning the courses and the curricula for all our academic levels (undergraduate, postgraduate and Ph.D. studies), information about the academic and administrative staff, as well as data for research activities; finally, useful information and documents will be available.
DECEC was founded in the academic year 1985-86 and since then, almost 40 years later, it constitutes an academic and interdisciplinary community, which serves both Early Years educational framework and a wider range of educational studies.
At that point I would like to underline the importance of the preschool educator’s contribution to the all-round development of children. Worldwide research findings confirm the importance of six pillars which affect children’s development:
- Infants and young children are negatively affected when significant levels of stress influence the environments of their immediate family and of their provided care. Supporting children’s resilience is extremely important and should be a priority for all of us; such a condition can be best built through meaningful relationships with others, parents, guardians, and educators.
- Children’s development is a highly interactive process which is determined not only genetically but also by the meaningful interactions between educators and children and between the children themselves.
- A large part of children’s brain architecture is formed during the first three years after birth, but the developmental dynamics continue to grow for years after the age of three.
- The high level of education of future teachers affects the development and the learning outcomes; therefore, the higher it is, the better.
- The high quality of the learning environment that offers rich stimuli to the children is said to greatly support their all-round development and learning.
- Last but not least, excellent cooperation channels between educators and family are of utmost importance for the common benefit of the children.
The recognition of the above pillars offers important added value to our department, meanwhile it constitutes a huge responsibility for us. We aspire to prepare highly qualified educators who will guide young children and their families effectively through the sensitive and critical years from their birth to school age.
This is exactly our vision as professors at our department; we strongly believe that you are going to be offered all the learning opportunities which will enable you to respond effectively to the societal demands for high-quality teaching standards at this critical preschool age. We are pretty sure that by the end of your undergraduate studies, you will get all the knowledge and information needed to support the above six pillars while putting additional emphasis on the reduction of the inequalities among children due to social or financial reasons.
Therefore, to accomplish all the above goals, we took the following actions:
- we designed a new curriculum for the undergraduate studies,
- we created the research laboratory “Development and Learning of the Child”,
- we established and operated an Interdepartmental master’s program in “Digital and Soft Skills in Educational Sciences”, which is already in its 4th operating cycle with over 200 graduates,
- we established a doctoral curriculum, and
- we recruited competitive research programs. Currently, there are three ongoing European research programs which offer expertise based on current research and science data in our field.
The driving force behind all our efforts is our great concern for our students that we always place at the center of our decisions and our actions. The Department of Early Childhood Education and Care is proud for the support and the established relationship with its students.
For the next four years we will be together, we will be by your side. We will appreciate your presence as well as your active participation, while you are highly encouraged to contribute to our improvement with your observations, questions, and comments.
We aspire and really hope to maintain this relationship with you after your graduation as well, through the alumni club; your active participation there will establish a lifelong communication and collaboration with our department, and you will be informed about all our actions throughout your professional career.
From the very bottom of our heart, we hope that you enjoy your studies with us, and I will end this welcome speech with a quote of Samuel Beckett:
“Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better”.
Maria Tsitiridou Evangelou
Head of the Department of Early Childhood Education & Care
