Non-formal education - Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum

NON-FORMAL EDUCATION IN UKRAINE
The education system in Ukraine is undergone a constant change. Education reform has traditionally
been a part of declared and ongoing innovations which take place under the banner of election to
parliament and presidential elections, which are to some extent determine the political strategy of the
development of the country (from the establishment of private schools to the formation of the educational
process with professional competency component).
The national education system started to be formed in the 1990s, when major changes in the
political, social and outlook and society took place. Education has become the leader of the democratic
and national values in the state.
These changes were occurred in the context of the common civilizational transformation in the field
of education, which have been particularly dynamic at the beginning of the twenty-first century and
caused wide spread of new educational technologies, significant expansion opportunities and needs in
individual and personal development of humans.
And this process has led to a very wide and diverse range of educational services, new approaches
to the role of education of society. There are many examples of such changes. Let us say about
higher and vocational secondary education. On the one hand there was a surge in demand for higher
education, which, due to a contractual form of training, it was more accessible to society, on the other -
reducing the demand for blue-collar occupations, and thus, for vocational and technical education. The
reasons for this situation can be seen in changes in the socio-psychological, cultural stereotypes, and
awareness of the role of higher education as a criterion or a basis for changing the quality of life, etc.
Over recent years, we have a tendency to return attention to vocational education. And this is due to the
needs of the labor market and in Ukraine and European problems of social and economic processes.
And just recently we can notice a fairly obvious trend of awareness in the Ukrainian society between
education, the quality of education and received competences and quality of life. What is of greater
importance, education serves as a marker of social status, in which the quality of life, material wellbeing
performed not a minor, but and additional role.
The specificity of the education reform in Ukraine (as, indeed, in the other countries) is its pretty
clear relationship with political reforms: each new government began a new phase of work with the
reform of the education system. A classic example in this context the 12-year education in high school
is. Thus, the transition to a 12 - year period of education was defined in Article 12 of the Law of Ukraine
On General Secondary Education 1 . In 2000 for its execution (Prime Minister Viktor Yushchenko, the
Minister of Education and Science Vasyl Kremen) the government issued a decree number 1717,
which, inter alia, foresaw a range of activities during 2000-2003, aimed at updating the content of
general secondary education in accordance with the new structure of the school; educational plans and
programs for secondary schools of different types were developed; an effective form of state attestation
of school graduates was implemented, etc.
But in 2010 (Prime Minister Mykola Azarov, Minister of Education, Science, Youth and Sports
Dmytro Tabachnik) a decision was made and it was decided to reform the system of secondary
education. Changes, which have transformed the 12-year education were added to the Law of Ukraine
“On General Secondary Education” 2 : there was a rule “compulsory pre-school education for children
of preschool age” (Article 16), but a full secondary education ended at grade 11. Analysis of such a
reform is not a subject of the current investigation. Rather it’s one of quite striking examples of the close
1
http://zakon3.rada.gov.ua/laws/show/651-14
2
Bulletin of Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, September,1999, № 28, p. 230
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