From 16 to 20 February in the village Pidgirtsi of Kyiv region Associate Professor Volodymyr Semenov and Senior Lecturer Korol Sergey participated in the first training on interactive teaching methods for new teachers of civic education "Democracy: from theory to practice" from IFES International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) . The purpose of the course is to master interactive teaching methods for the effective implementation of the course on civic education "Democracy: from theory to practice".

This is the first of two trainings on interactive teaching methods of civic education that precede the introduction of the course "Democracy: from Theory to Practice" to the curricula of Ukrainian higher education institutions, including at SSU.

       The latest international teaching practices have been shared by Dr. Greg Burrows, IFES Senior Expert in Civic Education, Professor at New Jersey College.

According to the results of the training, the teachers received certificates.

On the 25 of  February  2020, a training aimed at developing communication skills for students of the 4th year of specialty "International Economic Relations" was held. During the training, the participants had the opportunity to gain self-presentation and group interaction skills. A special feature of the event was the opportunity for students to speak two languages: English and Ukrainian, thanks to the participation of English-speaking students.

For the fourth year in a row, the Department is implementing an international scientific project on institutional support for the NATO Information and Science Center. Within the framework of the project implementation, dozens of public events, conferences and workshops on security, international relations, European and Euro-Atlantic integration of Ukraine were held.

On the 23 of February, 2020 the first-year students of the department of psychology, political science and socio-cultural technologies participated in the student conference "The first step in science". Students of the specialties "Psychology", "Management of socio-cultural activity" and "Social work" worked in the section "Philology. Society. Communications"

On February 19, a series of trainings for senior school children from Sumy, "Independent external evaluation without worries", started within the project "Children-Friendly City". The training is provided by students of the specialty "Psychology" under the guidance of practical psychologists of the Psychological councelling service of SSU and teachers of the department of Psychology, political science and socio-cultural technologies in the framework of the practice.

On February 20, 2020, students of the specialty management of socio-cultural activity, group KD-81  was conducted round table in the framework of the practice-oriented training. The Gallery of arts «Academic» was chosen as the basis of practice. Meeting was conducted by the leader of gallery S.I. Pobozhiy.

Assistant Professors Kostenko Andriana, Lebed Andrii, Korol Sergiy, Volodymyr Semenov, and Oleg Tulyakov participated in a network meeting of project participants organized by the International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES) with support from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).

According to the project, a course "Democracy: Values, Principles, Mechanisms" is conducted at Sumy State University.

Today our student from group KD-81 had training with exercise “When I'm in a Conflict My Indian name is ….. and I prefer …. colors": Each student got to complete the sentence, "When I get into a conflict, I usually doing accoding this Indian name... and my Indian headdresses have …..colors"

This exercise helps students to understand their own place and own emotion during conflict.

And it helps to create a vivid example which can then be discussed and explored further.

On February 15, 2020, Sumy hosted the international multi-genre competition "Constellation - Gold Europe", with the support of the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic, the Ukrainian National House, I&J Company s.r.o. "GOLD EUROPE (EU TALENT)" (Prague, Czech Republic) and the non-profit NGO "Star Trek". Senior lecturer at Psychology, Political Sciences and Sociocultural Technologies Department of Sumy State University Tatiana Povaliy was invited as a jury member to select the most talented and bright creative teams and individual performers of the country.

Gender Resource Center, Department of Psychology, Political Science and Socio-Cultural Technologies, Departments of Public Health and Department of Applied Ecology jointly are currently developing a multidisciplinary course that intersects such issues as gender, public health, ecology. The course is based on the European experience of training professionals capable of integrating cross-disciplinary, cross-cutting issues into social, economic, environmental development, adhering to the principle of "No one left behind". The course developed will be submitted to the Erasmus + program, that supports academic innovation and exchange of experience.