The South African government has undertaken to expand universal access to Early Childhood Development (ECD) with a particular focus on children from socially disadvantaged communities and with disabilities. This requires training and support of ECD practitioners, such that they are equipped 399with the necessary knowledge and competencies to implement effective teaching and learning approaches at ECD level. This research explored an innovative, inclusive approach to ECD practitioner development in which both Deaf and hearing students were enrolled in an ECD practitioner training program facilitated jointly by New Beginnings (an ECD non-profit training organization) and the Deaf Federation of South Africa (DeafSA). The research scrutinized key aspects of the training program, including how it extended students content knowledge on ECD, their pedagogical knowledge; as well as epistemological access for Deaf students. The findings and conclusions have important implications not only for equipping ECD practitioners with knowledge and skills, but also demonstrates how practitioner training itself can be effectively structured to cater for diversity among trainees.

The technological development and growth of the telecommunications industry have had a great positive impact on the education, health, and economic sectors, among others. However, they have also increased rivalry between companies in the market to keep and acquire new customers. A lower level of market concentration is related to a higher level of competitiveness among companies in the sector that drives a country’s socioeconomic development. To guarantee and improve the level of competition, it is necessary to monitor the concentration level in the telecommunications market to plan and develop appropriate strategies by governments. With this in mind, the present work aims to analyze the concentration prediction in the telecommunications market through recurrent neural networks and the Herfindahl-Hirschman index. The results show a slight gradual increase in competition in terms of traffic and access, while a more stable concentration level is observed in revenues.

The study, taking China as an example, employs a mixed-method approach of questionnaire surveys and in-depth interviews to explore the differing perspectives of disabled and non-disabled individuals on how to improve the social integration and quality of life of disabled people in developing countries. The study finds that the vicious cycle created by severe accessibility issues in developing countries is the root cause of the disabled’s difficulty in integrating into society. The impersonal barrier-free facilities suppress the desire of the disabled to travel, resulting in fewer disabled people on the streets and less visibility and attention, which leads to poorer accessibility facilities. Secondly, the study also finds that non-disabled people unconsciously show excessive sympathy and compassion when helping the disabled, which affects their self-esteem due to being patronized and helped. This creates two separate “social circles” between the disabled and the healthy. To address these issues, we have designed an application called “AbleMind” where the disabled can share experiences, make friends, seek help, and better integrate into society.

The Republic of Moldova is a state with a small, but dynamic economy and which, with the help of competitiveness in the IT industry, is looking for a place on the economic market in the Eastern European region. The research approaches this topic from an economic, historical, but also geopolitical point of view. This analysis of economic data and figures from the last period, combined with government policies and that of the National Bank of Moldova, means that in the near future the software economic area of Moldova will become an important regional player in this part of Europe.

The article investigates trade flows between the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) member-states and Belarus before the upcoming Belarus’ joining the organization. The export flows of the countries are modeled using a power function based on the time data. The results of the qualitative and quantitative analysis of foreign trade between the organization and the Republic of Belarus are presented, as well as the quantitative forecast of the prospects open to Belarus in connection with its joining the organization based on three original scenarios using econometric models. The results of the study show that Belarus has certain promising sectors of foreign economic activity, which can contribute to an increase in income from trade. It was found that the integration of the country will have a positive effect on increasing the volume of trade turnover with the participating countries, while in order to maintain sustainable economic growth of the country, domestic development of production should remain a priority, as evidenced by the obtained parameter estimates for the factors. An assessment of potential economic effects can be used to make a decision on whether a country should join an international organization. In particular, based on the assessments in our study in trade with Russia the expected increase in Belarus exports upon joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organization will constitute an increase of nearly 5%, exports to Kazakhstan are expected to increase by almost 75%, and to India and China by almost 90%. In the context of reshaping of international associations and organizations, the problems and issues raised in the study become even more relevant.