Suriname

Suriname, situated on the Atlantic coast of northern South America, became a Dutch colony in 1667 and won independence in 1975. Its population of 431,000 consists of Creoles, East Indians, Javanese, Chinese, Africans, and Amerindians, most of whom live in the country's narrow coastal plain and capital, Paramaribo. Dutch is the official language, but English is spoken, as well as Hindustani, Javanese, and Sranang Tongo. In 1887 the first government school opened, patterned after the Dutch high school. In the 1940s the Dutch government divided the schools into primary and junior secondary schools, and a teacher-training college. A senior secondary school and law school were added by 1950. The country's Constitution of 1987 made education both free and compulsory from age 6 to age 12. More than 90 percent of the children in the coastal areas attend primary school. When the University of Suriname was established in 1968 (renamed Anton de Kom University in 1980), it absorbed the School of Law and School of Medicine, and added a School of Social Sciences. A need for trained technical workers led to the founding of the Natural Technical Institute in 1973 and later the Commercial Institute. Since the 1970s further changes in the educational system have focused on the curricula of primary and secondary schools.