The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine of the seventh convocation will continue working on refinement of the legal basis of Ukrainian education, since the issue of development of national education has always been in the center of attention of the parliaments of all convocations. The Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Volodymyr Rybak stressed this addressing heads of educational institutions and pedagogical personnel of Kyiv Oblast during the August conference on Wednesday.
Volodymyr Rybak stressed that “core educational laws have been adopted already during the first years of independence of our state and they still continue being refined”. The Chairman of the Parliament believes that such law-making activity helped protect and preserve integrity of the national educational system during the years of economic crises and problems; it has dynamically adapted Ukrainian education to time requirements; and helped consider international innovations in the sphere of studying as well as globalization processes. “This and other activities on refinement of the legal basis of Ukrainian education will continue in the Parliament of the seventh convocation,” said Volodymyr Rybak. Thereat, he expressed confidence that consolidated position of the Parliament in regard to reform in the sphere of education is based on the principal ideas outlined in the Annual Message of the President of Ukraine to the Verkhovna Rada.
Volodymyr Rybak drew attention to positive dynamics observed during the past three years when settling the problem of accessibility of pre-school education. The number of kindergartens has increased by 768 institutions since 2010. He noted that the existing law on pre-school education standardizes legal, organizational and financial basis of this educational link. The Chairman of the Parliament stressed the necessity to regulate the problem of inequality of access to out-of-school education by city and village pupils.
Speaking about the current state of secondary education, Volodymyr Rybak noted that maintaining its quality is the strategic trend of its development. He informed that in overall, there were 20 thousands of functioning general education institutions in Ukraine in 2012/2013, involving 4,5 million of pupils and 510 thousands of teachers. Nearly 82% of children aged 3-6 gain education in the pre-school institutions. Almost two thirds of schools are located in the rural area with almost 1,5 million of pupils.
Among the well-known problems, the one causing concern in the society and still remaining unsettled in the secondary school, the Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada named deterioration of health of school-aged children in general and that of junior pupils in particular. He believes that the following problems also are to be resolved: “the problem of reforming training of pedagogical staff, decent salary, establishment of a modern system of teacher’s advanced training, and modernization of educational environment, etc.”