Bulgaria
Summary
Bulgaria has established democratic traditions in modern secular education, which date back to the middle of the nineteenth century. During the 1990s, the education system was subject to a thorough transformation running parallel to the nation's post-communist transition. The success of the education reform will shape the future of the nation in profound ways. Schools are expected to be an agent of democratization, grooming generations with better skills for critical thinking and public discourse. Transformed and modernized education is regarded as a vehicle of Bulgaria's integration in the European context.
The educational reform is an on-going process and more changes are bound to occur in the foreseeable future, while some of those that have been introduced have not come to fruition. Private schools at all levels, which have a considerably lower enrollment than the public ones and often face unfavorable attitudes, are yet to prove themselves as a viable alternative in education. Higher education is disconnected from secondary education; there is no system of pre-university establishments. The education system does not correspond to the needs of the labor market. Because of the shrinking of the latter, the schools overproduce specialists. The worst problem is the general lack of facilities to meet the challenges of a technology-based society and foster the qualifications that the nation needs in a high-tech environment.
Despite all difficulties, in the 1990s Bulgaria sustained the integrity of its education system and introduced considerable improvements. This positive trend is bound to continue because Bulgarian national psyche relates education closely to the ideas of progress and personal betterment.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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—Petya Nitzova
Additional topics
Education - Free Encyclopedia Search EngineGlobal Education ReferenceBulgaria - History Background, Constitutional Legal Foundations, Educational System—overview, Preprimary Primary Education, Secondary Education