The Ministry of Education is trying to put an end to the waste of resources by passing a bill on “Greek Language Education Abroad”, which was presented on Tuesday, 26, July, by the Deputy Education Minister Fofi Gennimata, to the Cabinet. Moreover, the aim of the Ministry is to streamline the system via the connection of Greek language schools with the educational systems of countries where they operate. This is in order to enable the graduates of these school units to access the local tertiary education.
81 Greek schools, 100 bilingual schools and 799 Departments of Greek language operate abroad off the formal system and do not provide any certification. These school buildings will gradually face closure, as they will stop accepting students for new registers in each level of education from the 2012-2013 school year. The alternative offered to a school to “survive” is to join the educational system of the host country. The bill stipulates that exemptions from the general rule should occur only if required to do so by local conditions.
As shows the data released by the Ministry of Education, 106 million euros was spent in 2009 for the Greek language education abroad, an amount that fell to 88 million last year and to 73 million this year. The bill seeks to further cut down on expenditure from the budget for education through regular monitoring of the system. This will be done by creating a database and making better use of teaching staff, which number more than 1,800 members. Thus, are introduced the concept of a periodic evaluation of teachers serving Greek-speaking units abroad, and the digital distance education.
Finally, according to bill, education centers under the name ”Logos” will be created to promote the Greek language abroad. To note that the first ”Logos” center is already operating at Flinders University, Australia with a grant of $ 600,000 from local government.
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