Secondary education in Poland 18 years of changes Fourth ECA Education Conference Tirana, October 24-26, 2007 Jerzy Wiśniewski CASE – Center for Social and Economic Research

The school education system 1989

Centralised system  curricula and teaching programmes  textbooks and other teaching aids  rules for recruitment of pupils to schools,  the school network,  classification of occupations  rules for awarding titles and diplomas

Vocational schools Industry – part of state-owned enterprises Agriculture – run by the Ministry of Agriculture Crafts – Associations, organizations of craftsmen

Distribution of students in secondary schools %

Changes in VET after 1989 Enterprises refused to finance works-based schools taken over by the educational authorities no longer guarantee life-long employment in one state-owned enterprise employers not involved slow introduction of counselling and guidance

Modernisation of VET after 1989 Efforts of the Ministry of National Education:  changes in curricula - promoting entrepreneurship;  introducing foreign languages (difficult due to the shortage of teachers);  introducing the subject „Elements of Informatics”;  76 independently developed curricula  work on curricular documentation for the new classification of occupations.

Students in secondary schools %

The reform of  new structure of the school system;  a curricular reform - the introduction of core curricula;  the assessment and examination system;  governance and supervision  the financing of schools;  teachers promotion paths and the new system of remuneration.

The school education system proposed by the reform of %20%

Students in secondary schools %

External examinations Common compulsory tests at the end of the primary school at the end of the gymnasium. the maturity examination upon completion of education in the lyceum. central examination board and regional examination boards

‘Correction’ of the reform (2001) The first decisions of the Government delay for 3 years of the introduction ‘new matura’ structure of the upper secondary education - (technika) would survive

The structure of the school education introduced in 2001

PISA 2000, average less than %15% more than %13.7% variance within schools63%83.3%

Students in (upper) secondary schools %

New ‘Matura’ the backbone of the reform External examinations objective tool for the evaluation of student's and school achievements quality assurance

What next? General secondary –quality and relevance of tertiary education Profiled general secondary schools –qualifications needed on the labour market basic vocational schools –short-, long-term perspective technical secondary schools