The Minister of Education, Daniel David, revealed one of the changes made to the new framework plan for high school, which will be put into public debate on Friday, January 31.
Minister Daniel David announces a reform in education. Archive
“The curriculum which is available to the student from the school offer has a greater weight. This means that the school offers certain disciplines from which, afterwards, the student chooses. And it does not offer them in shape ”, the minister for Edupedu said.
Daniel David explained that this curriculum made available to the student from the school offer will not be completely left at the decision of the educational units. “The school does not have to have the freedom of choice as much as the student. For example, some disciplines will be structured that must be placed there. Maybe the student chooses them, may not choose them. However, he must be aware that those disciplines exist and represent very important contents. He can say, OK, I saw them, I’m not interested, but I’m there ”
“Healthy Lifestyle”, optional high school matter
The offer will be supplemented with the proposals of the Ministry of Education. “The ministry also makes certain proposals. We will also have a better control over the proposals that will come from the schools. Because in the past I had a series of approaches that were, in fact, pseudo. Or things were promoted extremely outdated by times. ”
Minister David offered a concrete example of optional matter talking about the introduction of the discipline “healthy lifestyle”. “Most likely in that content that has to appear, whether then the child will choose it or not, it will be a discipline that is related to the healthy lifestyle. Because I am bombarded with various questions of these, on segments. Within this matter, you will talk about the use of drugs, alcohol, cigarettes, about unprotected intimate relationships”.
Minister David’s statements about digital textbooks
High school students will only have textbooks in digital format for certain subjects. The Minister of Education did not say concretely what budget will be allocated for the new high school students, but stressed that they will be rethought, and the emphasis will be on increase in quality: “I will put how much money I have to put on to get things out, look like a manual we know from a school, I know, American, or from a western school, where you look with pleasure, not a manual on who you want to close it quickly ”, he said.
National Assessment, rethought on Western models
Daniel David believes that the current form of national evaluation in the eighth grade does not have a correspondent in other educational systems as a form of admission to high school. The official explained that the evaluation based only on mathematics and Romanian does not reflect the entire profile of the student. Therefore, alternatives such as educational portfolios or assessments over several years should be taken into account.
The autonomy of schools on employment, a two -edged sword
“My first reflex is to go on the idea of decentralization. But let’s remember how many schools we have in disadvantaged areas, in the small urban. Let us remember our collectivist structure and concentration of power. I have no question mark that the great schools we know from the big cities would be worth it and we should give them this power. “
On the other hand, the minister warns, such freedom could fall on the wrong hands. “Let us not complain afterwards about the construction that may appear in certain areas. We must also invent a mechanism to control or at least reduce these possibilities. Not to mention then that the mayor of the commune does not know who hired his daughter, hired his relatives and so on. My intention is to look for this decentralization mechanism, but I must also look for a mechanism in parallel to ensure that such situations are kept under control. ”
The degree exam must be rethought like outside
The degree exam is quite specific to us. You do not find it as a spread at European level. And this, from the beginning, asks me a question mark: we have to rethink things. How should we rethink them? Again, at this moment, I do not know. I just know it’s a problem. For now, I understood that the title exam, as we do, is not a set of good practices at European level. Must be rethought. How? I’ll come with the proposal in June.
The minister said that it is important for him to reorganized the Ministry of Education and Research for him. “Let’s reorganize the operation of the ministry, so that I should be sure that the money we receive do not go to certain areas, in black holes. For me a black hole is when the financial investment does not bring enough earnings on education and research ”.
Daniel David explains what a decent salary means for teachers
“When we discuss the law of pay, we will have discussions from the law of unitary pay”, the minister said. “I want to see that the commitment is for a start salary to the decent debutant teacher. What does decent mean? I believe that the proposal that was pushed in front of the unions is a good point of discussion, namely for the beginner to start somewhere from the average salary on the economy, which will then grow according to seniority, teaching degrees and so on further ”.
In addition to being decent, teachers’ salary must reflect the status we give to education and teacher in society. “Because we, at this moment, are in a situation where the best graduates in the area of higher studies are no longer choosing the university field. The good ones begin to leave the system because they find work in other areas ”, the official explained.
