Over 52,000 children waiting for a place at kindergarten

The authorities aim to include 77% of the children aged between 3 and 6 and 90% of the children aged 6 and 7 in the early education system by 2014. In the public debates on the prospects and problems in preschool education, Valentin Crudu, division head at the Ministry of Education, said that the waiting lists for a place at the kindergarten contain over 52,000 children, Info-Prim Neo reports. Almost 30,000 persons work in the kindergartens of the country and they have the lowest salary in the education system. “This is a problem and it must be solved. The discrepancy between the pays of school teachers and kindergarten educators and workers is too wide,” said the head of the General Primary, Preschool and Secondary Education Division. According to Valentin Crudu, the profession of trainer-mentor may be introduced in the future and the logopedists may be brought back to schools. A parental strategy is needed as only 29% of the parents read together with their children and only 5% of the families that include children with special needs take them to kindergarten. A major problem underlined by the specialists is the fact that 57% of the children younger than seven are beaten by parents. The authorities plan to improve the quality of the early education and development services, including by training the educators and outfitting the institutions with the necessary materials and equipment. Valentin Crudu said a goal is to extend the early education services into the 110 communities where there are no kindergartens. The public consultations involved members of the parliamentary commission on culture, education, research, youth, sport and mass media, representatives of the Ministry of Education, municipal and district education divisions and civil society as well as experts.