The Ministry of Education will approve methodological recommendations for local authorities that will help assess the state of the network of vocational education institutions and direct resources to promising institutions.
Deputy Minister of Education Ihor Harbaruk announced this.
According to him, more than 700 institutions of vocational and technical education are currently operating in Ukraine, and considerable funds are spent on maintaining some of them.
"Currently, there are 732 vocational and technical education institutions operating in Ukraine, and among them, unfortunately, there are understaffed ones. This is primarily due to the unfavorable demographic situation observed in recent years. As a result, significant funds are spent on the maintenance of such institutions. The recommendations of the Ministry of Education and Culture will help local authorities to concentrate resources on priority areas, to increase investments in the material and technical base of vocational schools that need it," said the Deputy Minister of Education.
Among the criteria that the local government should take into account when working with the network are the demography of the region, economic and social development, the existing educational network, etc.
The Ministry of Education notes that after evaluating the indicated indicators, local managers will be able to make decisions about the reorganization of vocational schools, their creation or unification.
"The success of the network of professional education institutions depends on the interest and active actions of managers. Currently, they do not have specific tools that would help them to carry out this process correctly, so they often rely on their own intuition. It shouldn't be like that. Therefore, we will work out optimal criteria that will become an objective guide for them in making decisions," added Ihor Harbaruk.
Representatives of local education management bodies, employers' organizations, as well as Estonian educational experts are involved in the work on the document.
