Epress.am News from Armenia
Why do graduates and students in Armenia show poor results; what is the level of general education in the country; do the high scores of Armenian schoolchildren in various international olympiads reflect the overall true picture of the Armenian education system; what problems and issues does the Araratian Baccalaureate entail? In an interview with Epress.am, sociologist Zhanna Andreasyan speaks about these and a number of other concerns in Armenia’s education system.
Armenia’s Education Level Is Constantly Regressing
– This year’s low number of applicants to Armenian universities is a topic which has recently been widely discussed. Students’ poor final exam grades are another relevant issue facing the country’s education system. What factors do you think cause these issues? What are the main concerns?
– There are several interrelated problems in the field. First of all, of course, the demographic problem, which is not solely caused by migration; it is also associated, for example, with the low birth rate. That is, not only are people leaving the country, but there simply aren’t enough children being born to ensure high numbers of school or university attendees. The problem therefore is multi-layered. We shouldn’t, however, ignore the money issue either.
In a society like ours – one that is based on money – the decision whether one should seek higher education is directly related to money: will you have enough money to afford graduating into a higher educational institution; will the time and money spent on a university education be justified in the long run?
There are less costly and significantly faster ways to end up on the labor market: short-term courses, lower-level college course, and a number of other common ways of non-formal education. Therefore, a large group of people decide to realize their work-related expectations by obtaining education outside of the traditional university system. And those who consider university education to be the only definite and clear guarantee of future occupation are willing to spend more money and time to master the same profession, say, not in the Yerevan State University, but in the American University of Armenia.
One of the main reasons for the low grades is the 12-year education system that has recently become mandatory in Armenia. In the past, you could finish 8 classes and decide that you were leaving school – it was considered an accepted level of complete general education. Now the law provides that you have to complete 12 grades to obtain a school certificate. Consequently, the group of students who for some reason are not interested in getting more than 8 years’ education are now forced to stay in school, and naturally they show significantly lower levels of school performance, which, in turn, affects the entire educational process and the results of final examinations. The poor results in some areas also indicate students’ tendency not to attach great importance to subjects that they believe are not going to be much use to their future profession. These, to them, are a mandatory but meaningless series of subjects.
Besides, low grades are not a new phenomenon. To be honest, I’m a bit surprised that is has only now become a topic of wide discussion. Our schools participate in various international studies. For example, the well-known Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) is periodically conducted among 4 and 8 graders in randomly-selected schools; the tests for all participating countries are the same, they are translated into relevant languages.
Armenian students tend to show very poor result in this studies; Armenia almost always ends up being one of the worst-scoring among 180 countries. This is indicative of the extremely low level of general education in these fields.
If we juxtapose this fact with the great results that specifically-selected Armenian students show at international olympiads, we will see that there are serious problems in the system. On the one hand, we have the average 8-grader who can’t even read a map, and on the other hand we have these students from specific schools who return from international olympiads with silver or gold medals. In other words, the education system has been elitarized, and the majority of Armenian students do not have access to quality education.
Elitarization of Education
– Is the Araratian Baccalaureate an example of an elitarized education? The program says that it is designed for students who aspire to excellence.
– This program is an attempt to create an Armenian-language high-school education program, with high-quality, internationally-comparable standards. On the one hand, one might think that this should promote the quality of education. But it is noteworthy that they only want high achievers and good performers to study here. This continues the trend of “good schools” in Armenia, where they have highly selective admission standards. They only accept students who, in their opinion, are good and are worthy of investment. The Araratian Baccalaureate is a continuation of this. It is becoming a state policy – you choose those who you want to work with, and what happens to the rest doesn’t really bother you. Because by choosing the “best” and working with them we are not actually encouraging others to follow their example and become better: we are only making the difference more tangible.
It is dangerous that this state program is only taking the inequality deeper.
Of course they will say the vision is that everyone is there- among those who study well. We do, however, understand that this is an uncertain prospect and is practically unrealizable. The reality is that you are creating a situation in which there are unequal education levels.
The Gap Between the Regions and Yerevan Is Growing
– Another concerning issue is the increase in the difference in education levels in Armenia’s regions and its capital Yerevan – in rural and urban communities. In small villages in particular there is always a shortage of teachers.
– The issue does exist, but currently there is no general systemized policy designed to improve the level of education in rural communities. This is a serious problem. There are some individual initiatives; for instance, it’s been announced that several good schools will periodically hold video-courses and classes for rural schools. It sounds good, yes, but we have to take into account all the technical issues that could arise with this plan: they are going need a good Internet connection, proper technical experts, a teacher with sufficient knowledge of information and communication technologies, who will also have a pedagogical approach and methodology, so that the class ends up a success and not merely another number in the list of “implemented plans.” It is much easier said than done. We need systemic solutions; the general level of education needs to be raised.
This should be correlated to the concept of the overall development of rural communities, because education is not a separate or independent unit there.
The Future of Armenia’s General Education
– What is the main problem of Armenian schools today? Can we expect any development in the near future?
– Our schools mainly provide humanitarian education. The 12-year school program, for instance, allows students not to study certain subjects at all, therefore, there is no consequent knowledge in certain fields. If you look at the current school curriculum, you’ll see that children have the opportunity to choose to study a particular subject, which means that they are free to completely leave out subjects like chemistry or biology for the entirety of the final year.
The Araratian Baccalaureate itself focuses mainly on humanities. The program consists of two parts: standard and in-depth. The in-depth itself includes various modules, which can be both mandatory and optional. The mandatory in-depth modules are the English language and Armenian studies. The other in-depth modules the students are free to choose themselves.
However, if we are talking about providing a better education, then we should not place the emphasis on humanities, because an education based solely on humanities cannot be fundamental.
The current content of general education reduces the hope for systemic reforms in the field, especially given the initiatives of recent years. These initiatives have only further confused the school system content-wise. Schools have been introducing more classes of chess, national songs and dances, church history, and the tendency is only expected to grow. The only possible way to improve the situation, I think, is the organization of education outside the school.