Discours de la Reine à la Yerevan State University

Exchange with students at Yerevan State University:

Introductory speech by Her Majesty the Queen

 

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Barèv dzèz.

Here we are in the oldest university in Armenia, the ideal place to re-affirm the importance of education and to remember that education is a fundamental right for every child, but unfortunately still not guaranteed in today’s world.

Education brings with it the delights of learning and contributes to the development of our personality but it is also the surest route to a bright professional future. It is one of the most effective tools to combat poverty and marginalization.

That is why the United Nations have made education one of their top sustainable development goals to be realized by twenty thirty. Unfortunately, it must be acknowledged that we are not on track to meet this target worldwide. In some sectors, we are even losing ground or finding the principles called into question.

But we cannot afford to be defeatist: it is all the more crucial at a critical time like this to take responsibility and to pool our efforts so as to realize the goals and endorse the values we signed up to in twenty fifteen.

In a national framework, having well educated youngsters is undoubtedly a huge asset. Education should be a priority in policy decisions as it lays the foundation of human capital that is needed to create a welfare state.

Education needs to be high-quality, suited to the times, and accessible to all. That implies that teacher training and the tools and methods employed to that end deserve the most careful consideration.

As a United Nations Sustainable Development Goals Advocate, I have made field visits to countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. In Bangladesh for instance, I was especially moved by my visit to Cox Bazar, a refugee camp home to more than one million Rohingyas.

Each visit has convinced me more that education is the key to giving billions of human beings a better future. For girls and women in particular, it is also an important means to empowerment and a weapon in the fight against gender discrimination. And this starts at the very first level. Tomorrow I am going to visit a pre-school in order to underline the importance of starting all children’s education at an early stage.

But educational systems have had immense and complex challenges to face:

For example, five years ago, Covid interfered with class attendance and generated a lot of mental health problems for students. My studies in speech therapy and psychology help me to understand the difficulties encountered by students.

In conflict zones, teaching is often broken off, classes cancelled, schools closed, all things which add to the harms already suffered by young people in these areas, making them all the more vulnerable to abuse and exploitation.

Then there are all the challenges posed by new technologies: Yes, they enhance progress in many ways, but they are also costly and can widen the gap between the haves and the have-nots. Moreover, artificial intelligence is leading us to question the importance of some types of learning: why acquire language skills if Chat GPT can translate for you; why learn how to solve an mathematic equation when a computer will do it much faster for you at the click of a mouse?

If artificial intelligence undoubtedly has great potential, it must never be allowed to reduce our creativity nor to weaken our critical faculties. As the UN Secretary General António Guterres put it at this year’s General Assembly: “Technology must be our servant – not our master”

I will use my time in your country to find out more about the challenges faced by the education system and about the aspirations of the youth in Armenia.

Thank you.

Shnurakalutsun