Moldovan colleges are ignored by new Education Code, study

After the new draft Education Code comes into force, the appearance of professional high schools will diminish the prestige of the colleges, Sergiu Lipcean, associated expert of the Institute for Development and Social Initiative “Viitorul”, says in the study “Vocational education at a crossroads: an analysis of the policy decisions in the professional secondary education system of Moldova,” Info-Prim Neo reports. The author of the study and the heads of a number of colleges do not agree that the studies in colleges should be extended by two years, as the new Education Law provides. According to them, the young people who decide to continue their studies at colleges after secondary school must finish a technical vocational lycee (four years) and post-secondary studies at college (two years). “After three years of high school and three years of university, the same person can obtain a licentiate diploma, which is evidently more prestigious. Thus, the attractiveness of the colleges and vocational schools will significantly decrease,” said Sergiu Lipcean. The expert also said that the universities have extra-budgetary resources, while the colleges have only public finances and run the risk of disappearing when the demand declines. The head of “Viitorul” Igor Munteanu said that until now the state financed the colleges without checking how the money is used and if the spent money had effects on the quality of the studies. Valeriu Pelivan., the head of the Chisinau Construction College, considers that four years of study at professional lycees and two years of study at colleges imply huge and unjustified costs. The head of the Financial-Banking College in Chisinau Gabriel Paladi said that though the students at colleges learn a profession quicker and obtain a baccalaureate diploma in four years, the university education is more popular. The expert of the Public Policy Institute Anatol Gremalski said he does not see any problem. “The problem of colleges seems artificial to me. They hinder no one. There are no European education standards as the education is a priority for every state,” he said. Attending the discussions, Deputy Minister of Education Loretta Handrabura said the Education Code will be adopted after it is debated at many levels. “This is not the Code of the Ministry of Education. Seventy persons worked on it. There were created a number of groups of experts. After debates, we will see how the beneficiaries perceive it,” Loretta Handrabura said. The study recommends optimizing the network of colleges and allocating financial resources according to a methodology based on the training costs per student at all the levels of vocational education. The Education Code presented recently by the Ministry of Education will replace the Education Law adopted in 1995.