Internationalization of INEKO portals on schools, municipalities and consolidation computer game
Dátum: 01.12.2014
Project is supported by a grant from the Foundation Open Society Institute in cooperation with the Think Tank Fund of the Open Society Foundation.
The project aims to transfer three successful internet portals operated by INEKO to other countries primarily in Central and Eastern Europe. The portals focus on increasing public awareness about primary and secondary schools’ results, about financial health of particular city or village, and about various alternatives to secure long-term stability of public finance. Thus, through informing public, the project should increase pressure on improving the education system as well as the financial stability of the local and central governments.
The project goal is to transfer following three internet portals run by INEKO and the relevant know-how to other countries mainly in the Central and Eastern Europe:
- The portal evaluating results of primary and secondary schools
- The portal informing about financial health of local municipalities
- The computer game about long-term public debt consolidation.
The transfer of portals should help to increase public awareness about schools’ results (e.g. about chances of schools’ graduates to find a job), about financial health of particular city or village (e.g. about its indebtedness), and about various alternatives to secure long-term stability of public finance in a given country. Thus, through informing public, the project should increase pressure on improving the education system as well as the financial stability of the local and central governments.
Free offer: Create your own portal for assessing public administration
We have launched a website (http://portals.ineko.sk/) offering a free opportunity to create your own internet portal for assessing and comparing various entities and units mainly related to public administration. The entities can be for example schools, hospitals, courts, municipalities, but also teachers, doctors, judges or mayors. They can be assessed and compared using a set of measurable criteria, as well as user defined ratings. We strongly believe that measuring and comparing performance indicators can enrich public debates and lead to the improvement of quality and efficiency of public services. If interested, you can simply download a template, set it up, and enter text and data. Once you have the data ready, it takes only 2-3 days to create the portal and you do not need to have any knowledge of programming.
The website includes examples of two portals INEKO has already created by using this template. The portals allow for comparing and evaluating school results and financial health of municipalities in Slovakia. Both are widely used by the Slovak public.
If you decide to use this tool for creating your own portal or if you have any questions/problems regarding its implementation, please, let us know about it (contact: portals@ineko.sk). If you also know about anyone who might be interested, please, let him/her know about this opportunity. We would like to know about all portals created by this toolkit so that we could add them to the website and offer inspiration for others.
The creation of this toolkit was supported by a grant from the Foundation Open Society Institute in cooperation with the Think Tank Fund of the Open Society Foundations.
Free offer: Create your own computer game on taming the public debt
Have you already played our game on taming the public debt? Now we have the English version. Put yourself in the position of the Minister of Finance and choose relevant measures. Your task is to achieve the lowest possible debt by the year 2062. If you like it and find it useful, you can now create your own simple game for free and adapt it to parameters of your country. All you need to do is to read this manual and proceed step by step. You can think of your own measures and random events and make the game even more interesting and funny than the original.
The growing public debt in developed countries is a real threat for future prosperity. The tension grows with the ageing population and in many countries unpopular measures are necessary to balance the budgets. To implement such measures it is of crucial importance that the public understands what are the threats and alternative solutions. To get these messages to the public in a funny and popular way, we have created a simple educational computer game for managing the public debt. The game is based on real long-term forecasts for the public debt in Slovakia and around 200 measures for public finance consolidation. The player chooses the measures every quarter and sees how they help to tame the public debt. The goal of the game is to have the lowest public debt possible by 2062.