News
"HighLingVoTech" Center of Excellence with a CIF Grant
22.03.2022
On March 21, within the framework of the monitoring visits, the representatives of the "Center for Education Projects" PIU carried out a final monitoring of V. Brusov State University (BSU). The working group was welcomed by BSU rector Karine Harutyunyan. The BSU rector stated, "Program graduates will develop competencies that can be used in the development of translation, voice recognition, text machine analysis, search systems, and artificial intelligence programs". The working group, accompanied by Christina Tsaturyan, the Head of the BSU Grants Program, toured the premises of the Language Technologies and Resources Research Laboratory and the Scientific-Educational Events Hall, renovated within the framework of the grant project, as well as in the area provided for the students' techno-audience and renovated by the university. Let us remind that the implementation of the program started in July of 2019. Today, within the framework of the grant project of BSU, "HighLingVoTech" Center for Excellence in Language and Educational Technologies, and the service technopark were established, equipped with the necessary equipment, property, and software packages. The "Computational Linguistics" bachelor's and "Simultaneous Translation" master's degree programs have been developed, as well as the toolset for online assessment of Armenian as a foreign language knowledge level. It has been created and developed the UD-Armenian_BSUT syntax treebank, published in the database of Universal Dependancies. During the meeting, the members of the working group with the grant project management staff discussed the goals and results set by the program, their manifestation at the level of indicators set out in the monitoring plan. During the visit, A. Margarov, an individual consultant providing professional assistance to the CEP PIU in the course of implementation BSU grant project, reviewed the compliance of the software acquired and installed within the framework of the program with the specifications and characteristics defined by the contracts, discussed a number of issues related to their use. The head of the grant project spoke about the extensive work done, as well as detailed the expected results of the program and some steps towards the continuation of the program. According to Ch. Tsaturyan, according to the grant agreement, the university has developed and submitted to the MESCS the licensing package for "Simultaneous Translation" master's degree and "Computational Linguistics" bachelor's degree, which has already been approved by the MESCS of RA. She added that the work on the establishment of a digital web resource assessment and testing toolset aimed at ensuring the full functioning of the Armenian language in digital infrastructure has been summed up. It should be noted that the charter and development concept of "HighLingVoTech" center have already been developed at the expense of the university's resources. The works of refining the descriptors of the levels of the knowledge of Armenian as a foreign language (LAK) (A1 to C2) and the development of tests for assessing the LAK from A1 to C2 levels have been summarized. An individual consultant providing professional assistance to the CEP PIU A. Margarov spoke about the technical compliance of the Armenian language proficiency assessment tests developed within the framework of the grant project and posted on the Moodle electronic platform, which was previously reviewed and observed by the consultant. It should be noted that in order to make the best use of the opportunities of the newly established center in the educational process, the necessary professional electronic literature has been acquired at this stage of the grant project. The steps towards the continuation of the program are obvious: the opportunities for conducting joint educational programs with the «National Polytechnic University of Armenia» Foundation and the Center for Digital Technologies as well as the organization of joint educational internships are under discussion. Agreements have been reached on the implementation of joint research projects, co-management of postgraduate theses, training of BSU lecturers, and establishment of joint workshops. Within the frameworks of the program, in order to expand partners and create cooperation networks, the university is also considering the possibility of conducting joint programs with the private sector. One of the great advantages of this program is the combination of cross-sectorial connections and educational programs, as by combining linguistic and IT education we get a new, competitive profession and a direction of scientific development. This new profession may be in great demand in business, which is a new impetus for the creation of additional value for the state. It should be added that the Brusov State University as a result of a grant project has a modern center, which can become a platform for excellence in the development of innovative research in the field of linguistics.
