The new school programs for high school, made publicly available, represent “a paradigm shift” for Romanian education, says the Minister of Education, Daniel David. The reform aims at the formation of the eight key European skills and promises a drastic reduction of functional illiteracy – a phenomenon that the minister considers “national security risk”. The new curriculum would take effect in high schools from the 2026–2027 school year.
Minister of Education, Daniel David. PHOTO: Mediafax
According to the minister, the new programs are built to develop communication, multilingual, STEM, digital, life, civic and legal, entrepreneurial skills, as well as skills of expression and cultural sensitivity.
“It is a paradigmatic change of programs that are almost 20 years old,” points out Daniel David.
A first step in the reform was the adoption of the framework plans, in two variants: standard, made after extensive consultations, and alternative, more flexible and oriented towards the personalization of education.
“Only through a balance between science and religion, on the one hand, and between disciplines associated with national culture and those associated with life preparation, on the other, will we be able to effectively train good specialists (at qualification levels 3 and 4 respectively), good citizens and people with a good quality of life”, explains the minister, according to Agerpres.
The current stage – the development of school programs – involved more than 1,500 specialists from pre-university, university and socioeconomic backgrounds. Among the principles pursued: more contents “airy”, coordination between disciplines, the gradual introduction of skills training and labor market reporting. Approximately 25% of each subject’s time will be devoted to remedial activities, skill building, or performance preparation.
“After the approval of the school programs, there is the development of manuals and the training of teachers to implement this curriculum with modern methods, along with the finalization of the national evaluation standards for each school program. Following this process, I am convinced that the generation that will have the chance to be prepared at the high school level through the new curriculum – starting with the ninth grade of the school year 2026-2027 – will reach the educational standards expected by the country, and functional illiteracy – which has become in recent years a national security risk – it will be drastically reduced”, Daniel David also stated.
Functional illiteracy, he says, manifests itself at the high school level through the difficulty of applying knowledge in real contexts, which increases exposure to manipulations, pseudoscience and makes it difficult to integrate into the labor market.
The programs are in public debate until December 12, and by the end of January 2026 all the programs for the study years and for the compulsory subjects of the new high school curriculum will be published.
