On 6-7 July 2023 the staff of the National Information Center for Academic Recognition and Mobility (ArmENIC) participated in a study visit to CIMEA NARIC, Italy in the framework of the Council of Europe funded project “Equipping education stakeholders with competences to detect and combat education fraud/DETECT/”.

The project aims to equip stakeholders in education with the competences necessary to prevent, detect and combat education fraud through developing and conducting a training module. The training module will enhance the capacity of the participants to detect education fraud through practical and real examples.

The aim of the study visit to CIMEA was to get acquainted with the best practices in detecting and combating education fraud by CIMEA and discuss further activities related to the project and the final conference. During the study visit the director of ArmENIC presented the latest survey results and the report on the needs assessment for the development of the training as well as the ArmENIC’s previous publications on education fraud.

The Italian colleagues from CIMEA shared their experience in the national and international context in combating education fraud including their researches and publications concerning fraud in education. Besides, the colleagues from CIMEA had a detailed presentation of the verification tools and verification methods to assess the authenticity of educational qualifications. Later, colleauges from both centers participated in an interactive workshop on fraud and forensic having an opportunity to use the verification tools on verifying the real credentials.