Opinion piece – Ilona Bērziņa, BNN
Latvian PM Krišjānis Kariņš has discovered a treatment for the issues that plague Latvia’s training system. He means that if Latvia reduces the variety of colleges, the nation can have what Estonia has now. The nation will be capable to neglect about mediocrity amongst college students, lecturers will get wages worthy of officers, and new lecturers will storm the colleges to fill in vacant posts.
Sadly, the concept of optimising the college community was juggled a lot by earlier ministers of training, nobody believes it any extra.
Latvian Affiliation of Schooling and Science Employees (LIZDA) beforehand warned the federal government about potential strikes. However these strikes have turn out to be a standard sight as properly.
In virtually 30 years there have been roughly ten protest acts organised by lecturers over inadequate wages,
and virtually all this time talks about potential college community optimisation have remained lively. If the college community is optimised, colleges which have a small variety of college students will go away, and everybody can be completely happy for some cause. Academics working bigger courses of scholars can be paid extra, municipal administrations will get monetary savings, officers will connect a medal to their fits for profitable optimisation of the college community, and kids will turn out to be so good, they might get forward of Estonian college students in OECD scholar information score!
On the Saeima assembly of the seventeenth of February, Kariņš stated «the portion of the funds pie that goes to the training, is kind of the identical in Latvia and Estonia» and «mainly our training system receives proportionally giant funding». That is why Latvia ought to observe Estonia’s instance and cut back the variety of colleges, which might assist enhance wages of lecturers. Equally to Estonia, the place lecturers are paid almost twice as a lot…
Let’s examine. After the compromise reached in September 2022, the bottom price for lecturers in Latvia is EUR 1 080. In Estonia the minimal pay lecturers obtained was EUR 1 412 a month earlier than taxes till December 2022. Beginning with the first of January 2023 this quantity is EUR 1 749.
However even Estonian lecturers obtained pay rise on account of a strike, and on this nation, like Latvia, there have been talks that the scenario is essential and lots of lecturers think about leaving their jobs on account of low wages and an excessive amount of workload.
The Estonian Ministry of Schooling has composed a piece group that may deal with learning what this sector must reorganise the college community.
The federal government’s plan consists of, amongst different issues, the closure of one-tenth of Latvia’s colleges within the subsequent 4 years.
Nevertheless, if discount of the variety of colleges was sufficient to resolve the issues that exist within the training sector, then we have now to conclude that Latvia could attain Estonia’s stage pretty quickly.
In accordance with official statistical knowledge from the Ministry of Schooling and Science, in 2021/2022 college 12 months there have been 660 normal training day colleges in Latvia: 138 in Riga, 100 in Kurzeme area, 82 in Latgale area, 44 in Riga area, 127 in Vidzeme area, and 76 Zemgale area. There are 429 colleges in areas (together with juvenile correctional services), amongst which there are small countryside colleges.
In Giant cities, Riga not included, there are 93 normal training day colleges. Statistical knowledge from the ministry signifies the variety of colleges has beneath gradual discount for years (apart from the interval between 2012 and 2014, when there have been 807 colleges within the nation). Whereas in 1998/1999 college 12 months there have been 1 074 colleges within the nation, then it shouldn’t be troublesome to conclude that over the past 23 years a complete of 414 colleges have been shut down. These embrace 50 elementary colleges, 265 major colleges and 13 particular training establishments.
The hopes of the closure of small colleges serving to to fill vacant trainer posts in giant colleges by no means got here to move. Many lecturers of pension age merely determined to retire after the closure of their colleges. Information from the Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia signifies that in 2012 there have been 23 230 lecturers employed normally training establishments. In 2021 there have been 21 204 lecturers.
In Estonia there are 521 normal training services which have greater than 14 000 lecturers. [Let’s not forget that as of the 1st of January 2023 there were 1 357 739 residents in Estonia and Latvia had 1 875 575 in 2022]. Discount of the variety of colleges in Estonia was an necessary step, however not the one one. On the similar time, whereas attempting to enhance the standard of training, Estonia was additionally attempting to cut back social and financial inequality in accessibility of training.
Moreover, «the reorganisation of Estonia’s college community from the very starting was mentioned in a a lot wider context. The objective to make sure high quality training and applicable atmosphere was all the time in sight, as was provision of fabric and technical assets, in addition to attraction of certified specialists and assistants,»Opinion piece – Ilona Bērziņa, BNN
Latvian PM Krišjānis Kariņš has discovered a treatment for the issues that plague Latvia’s training system. He means that if Latvia reduces the variety of colleges, the nation can have what Estonia has now. The nation will be capable to neglect about mediocrity amongst college students, lecturers will get wages worthy of officers, and new lecturers will storm the colleges to fill in vacant posts.
Sadly, the concept of optimising the college community was juggled a lot by earlier ministers of training, nobody believes it any extra.
Latvian Affiliation of Schooling and Science Employees (LIZDA) beforehand warned the federal government about potential strikes. However these strikes have turn out to be a standard sight as properly.
In virtually 30 years there have been roughly ten protest acts organised by lecturers over inadequate wages,
and virtually all this time talks about potential college community optimisation have remained lively. If the college community is optimised, colleges which have a small variety of college students will go away, and everybody can be completely happy for some cause. Academics working bigger courses of scholars can be paid extra, municipal administrations will get monetary savings, officers will connect a medal to their fits for profitable optimisation of the college community, and kids will turn out to be so good, they might get forward of Estonian college students in OECD scholar information score!
On the Saeima assembly of the seventeenth of February, Kariņš stated «the portion of the funds pie that goes to the training, is kind of the identical in Latvia and Estonia» and «mainly our training system receives proportionally giant funding». That is why Latvia ought to observe Estonia’s instance and cut back the variety of colleges, which might assist enhance wages of lecturers. Equally to Estonia, the place lecturers are paid almost twice as a lot…
Let’s examine. After the compromise reached in September 2022, the bottom price for lecturers in Latvia is EUR 1 080. In Estonia the minimal pay lecturers obtained was EUR 1 412 a month earlier than taxes till December 2022. Beginning with the first of January 2023 this quantity is EUR 1 749.
However even Estonian lecturers obtained pay rise on account of a strike, and on this nation, like Latvia, there have been talks that the scenario is essential and lots of lecturers think about leaving their jobs on account of low wages and an excessive amount of workload.
The Estonian Ministry of Schooling has composed a piece group that may deal with learning what this sector must reorganise the college community.
The federal government’s plan consists of, amongst different issues, the closure of one-tenth of Latvia’s colleges within the subsequent 4 years.
Nevertheless, if discount of the variety of colleges was sufficient to resolve the issues that exist within the training sector, then we have now to conclude that Latvia could attain Estonia’s stage pretty quickly.
In accordance with official statistical knowledge from the Ministry of Schooling and Science, in 2021/2022 college 12 months there have been 660 normal training day colleges in Latvia: 138 in Riga, 100 in Kurzeme area, 82 in Latgale area, 44 in Riga area, 127 in Vidzeme area, and 76 Zemgale area. There are 429 colleges in areas (together with juvenile correctional services), amongst which there are small countryside colleges.
In Giant cities, Riga not included, there are 93 normal training day colleges. Statistical knowledge from the ministry signifies the variety of colleges has beneath gradual discount for years (apart from the interval between 2012 and 2014, when there have been 807 colleges within the nation). Whereas in 1998/1999 college 12 months there have been 1 074 colleges within the nation, then it shouldn’t be troublesome to conclude that over the past 23 years a complete of 414 colleges have been shut down. These embrace 50 elementary colleges, 265 major colleges and 13 particular training establishments.
The hopes of the closure of small colleges serving to to fill vacant trainer posts in giant colleges by no means got here to move. Many lecturers of pension age merely determined to retire after the closure of their colleges. Information from the Central Statistical Bureau of Latvia signifies that in 2012 there have been 23 230 lecturers employed normally training establishments. In 2021 there have been 21 204 lecturers.
In Estonia there are 521 normal training services which have greater than 14 000 lecturers. [Let’s not forget that as of the 1st of January 2023 there were 1 357 739 residents in Estonia and Latvia had 1 875 575 in 2022]. Discount of the variety of colleges in Estonia was an necessary step, however not the one one. On the similar time, whereas attempting to enhance the standard of training, Estonia was additionally attempting to cut back social and financial inequality in accessibility of training.
Moreover, «the reorganisation of Estonia’s college community from the very starting was mentioned in a a lot wider context. The objective to make sure high quality training and applicable atmosphere was all the time in sight, as was provision of fabric and technical assets, in addition to attraction of certified specialists and assistants,»
