Штаб защиты русских школ, официальный сайт
Штаб защиты русских школ, официальный сайтInformational notePrepared by:Latvian Human Rights Committee (F.I.D.H.)LATVIAA MATTER OF HIGH CONCERN:ELIMINATION OF THE STATE-SUPPORTED EDUCATIONIN MINORITY LANGUAGESProblem overviewLatvia always was an ethnically heterogeneous country. Nowadays ethnic minorities in Latvia make up 42% of the whole population. The largest ethnic and linguistic minority in Latvia are Russophones – mostly, ethnic Russians. The system of state-supported education in minority languages had been established in Latvia since early 20th century, it’s well developed and efficient. However, despite evident and strong protests, in 1998 Latvian Parliament has accepted the Education Law, where was stipulated that starting from September 1, 2004 instructions in all state and municipal secondary schools must be provided in the state language only. In practice that meant demolition of existing education system in minorities’ schools with no clear evidence why this is necessary. There are several accompanying circumstances that make the situation in Latvia highly conflict-prone and actually constitute a case of emergency. 1. Inappropriate governmental policy of taking decisions related to one ethnic group based on inspired support of another, without taking in consideration opinion of a target audience and moreover, knowingly ignoring it, inevitably sets ethnic groups of Latvia in opposition to each other.2. Since the education issue is related to children, there is no hope for consent unless their parents are sure that no hurt will be done. 3. Despite many requests there was no scientific background demonstrated to the influenced group that could convince in necessity of such severe changes nor ensure that they’re at least safe. On the contrary, results of several researches (include those, that were done by co-authors of so called “education reform” ) explicitly show that chosen method may cause severe problems in intellectual growth and development of children’s maturity.4. Public disputes about “education reform” are accompanied with hash and highly nationalistic statements of political leaders: ministers, MPs and the President, explicitly expressing their will to get rid of national minorities on Latvian territory thus establishing “Latvia for ethnic Latvians”.5. All abovementioned, as well as practical experience in implementation of transition to the new education system made highly doubtful sincerity of publicly declared goal of the “reform” – an increase of competitiveness of non-native Latvian speakers in the labour market. In order, this caused mass discontent within Russian-speaking society.To avoid uncontrolled mass protests and coordinate protesting activities, minorities’ NGOs (that Latvian Human Rights Committee has joined to), parents, schoolchildren and some democratically thinking politicians, including MPs, have created an umbrella union – a Staff of Russian School Defenders. From that time on, the Staff coordinates the absolute most of activities of anti-reform movement in Latvia.Since then, a number of mass actions against the education reform took place in Riga, as well as in other cities and small towns of Latvia. There was also sign-up campaign launched, during which more than 106,000 residents of the country signed up an Appeal against the demolition of education in minorities’ language. The result of the sign-up campaign makes a perfect example of authorities’ attitude towards minorities. The Appeal has not been taken in consideration and all signatures dismissed on the plea of not being notarized, which would cost 530,000 lats (about $1,000,000) and is impossible to afford indeed.Nevertheless, as the grade of society’s indignation was going that high, after several huge meetings with tens of thousands people involved, the Parliament had to adopt amendments to the Education Law, stating that from September 1st, 2004 not less than 5 subjects in minorities’ secondary schools (excluding the Latvian language and literature) are to be taught in Latvian. Another condition is that not less than 60% of the curricula must be taught Latvian, leaving maximum of 40% for minorities’ languages. Besides that, since the year 2007 all the state examinations and tests will have to be passed in Latvian. The latter obstacle has totally dismissed that outwardly compromise character of the amendments, as the obligation to hold all state exams only in Latvian will inevitably enforce schools to transmit the instruction to Latvian language in order to ensure acceptable results on the exams. Therefore the existing viable and needful state-supported education system providing instruction in minority languages is in the process of elimination. This is the most painful and prominent minorities’ problem in Latvia. The chronicle of the “reform” To illustrate development of social confrontation caused by “education reform”, a list of major related facts is given below. 1. No consultations with those who directly affected by the reform took place while making the decision. No state-financed research of the reform’s effect had been ever performed either. Announcements made by Latvian officials claiming wide support of the reform in the target audience appears to be very much fake or overestimated since the data of the first professional opinion poll is published. 2. State officials pay little or no attention to the international standards and the Council’s of Europe recommendations in the field of education, demonstrating low level of awareness of the relevant documents. To illustrate the point, here is a quotation of a statement by Education Minister Karlis Shadurskis, commenting on non-compliance of the reform with the Hague recommendations: “This document is not mandatory. The European Union adopted it in order to protect small ethnic groups that are in danger of disappearance”. 3. On the other hand, Latvian authorities declare full compliance of the reform with international standards, based to their own perception of them. As an example, albeit the Council of Europe, as well as the European Commission “urge Latvia to ratify the Framework Convention for Protection of National Minority”, which requires to ensure that “persons belonging to minorities have adequate opportunities for being taught the minority language or for receiving instruction in this language”. Latvian state officials proclaim fulfillment of recommendations of abovementioned organizations. 4. The formally declared goal of the reform is “to guarantee competitiveness of non-native Latvian speakers in the labour market”. However, the majority of the Russian-speaking parents are concerned about the quality of education, and reasonability of those concerns are confirmed by sociological data. The results of recent survey clearly reveal that the reform has a negative impact on students. More than a half of the teachers (62%) have pointed out that due to bilingual education method (considered as a transitional stage to education in Latvian) the knowledge of the schoolchildren decreases dramatically. 50% of schools directors underline, that the reform “negatively affects the way schoolchildren feel themselves psychologically”. 5. Thus, in the course of implementation of the reform, the emphasis is made instead of improvement of teaching Latvian as a second language, on teaching other subjects in Latvian as a method of studying Latvian language itself. Considering that the absolute most of teachers in minority’s schools are not native Latvian speakers and therefore unlikely possess Latvian on the level necessary to provide education with the same quality as if using their native language, this can only be done at the expense of knowledge of a particular subject. This can hardly be considered improvement of the competitiveness of the minority youngsters. The data show that 15% of those who are about to switch to studies in Latvian in 2004 “definitely will not be able to do this”. Another 69% “will face serious difficulties”. Besides, many Russian-speaking parents complain that their children’s knowledge of mother tongue has substantially deteriorated since the number of subjects taught in Latvian increased and on the other hand, there is no improvement in ability to communicate in Latvian noticed.6. At the same time, there is a number of examples, clearly demonstrating that studying Latvian as a second language in schools with traditionally high level of language classes using well developed methodology results in perfect knowledge, often higher than average graduates of majority’s schools possess.7. There is data indicating that the “reform”, if implemented in given manner, will have serious and negative long-term social consequences. The number of early school drop-outs among non-Latvian youngsters is already growing now, and will indeed increase drastically after 2004. A remarkable number of Russian-speaking pupils will not be able to obtain even secondary school certificate. 8. Unemployment among non-Latvians yet is considerably higher than among ethnic Latvians. Their share is also higher among those who immigrate both legally or illegally into EU countries, participating in the “black labour market”. The reform will foster the tendency, resulting in forming a considerable social group of ill-educated people, who will not be able to find a job (as long as Latvia doesn’t have large-scale manufactures to employ low-skilled workers). 9. Another consequence of the reform would be firing of Russian-speaking teachers that do not possess Latvian language enough to run classes. This may have two negative impacts: first, remarkable increase of unemployment, especially among elderly teachers, practically with no chances to find another job; second, many experienced teachers are to be replaced with novices (likely ethnic Latvians) having lesser knowledge in subject areas, which will lead to decrease of education quality.10. The statement above is proven to be a reasonable anxiety with existing governmental practices. While avoiding open dialogue on the issue, the Ministry of Education and Science exercises pressure on schools’ administrations, enforcing them to declare readiness of their schools to switch to Latvian. Those schools’ directors who oppose the reform are threatened with dismissal. Moreover, replacements of school directors with ethnic Latvians fully supporting the course of the government are reported. In the meantime, those teachers who agree to teach their subjects in Latvian are entitled to extra salary bonuses – regardless of a quality of education.11. According to independent researches , support of the “reform” in minorities’ society is extremely low, although government reports the opposite. Only 4% of teachers, 7% of schoolchildren and 14% of the Russian-speaking parents would welcome the studies overwhelmingly in the Latvian language. A number of opinion polls carried out by minority organizations gave similar results: up to 90% of the persons belonging to minorities do not see any necessity in eliminating the existing state-supported education in minority languages. 12. Alternatives proposed to the government are suppressed. As an example, several minority NGOs did not confine themselves to advocacy and campaigning but also elaborated their own minority education programmes, including those based on the bilingual education approach , which is considered by the government a “Holy Grail”. Although formally the Ministry welcomed some of these programmes, no cooperation or methodological support was offered to implement them at schools. Moreover, the Ministry’s officials off the record discouraged schools from using those alternative programmes.13. The minorities’ attitude towards the problem has been clearly expressed at the parliamentary elections of 5 October 2002. The “For Human Rights in the United Latvia” (FHRUL) was the only political block to stand for protection of education in minority languages. In fact, this was the key point of the FHRUL election platform. The FHRUL received 25 mandates out of 100, i.e. one forth. In electoral districts with the high share of minority voters, the support for FHRUL appeared overwhelming (e.g. in Latgale, the most multicultural region of Latvia, FHRUL received 9 mandates out of 17, i.e. more than a half). Given that at the time being 27% of Latvian residents (almost exclusively those who belongs to ethnic minorities) are banned to vote, this means that almost all non-Latvians voted for a single political block. That way, the citizens of Latvia belonging to minorities explicitly manifested their support for maintaining education in minority languages. Yet, the minorities’ claims are kept ignored by the new government. 14. The more unwillingness of the government for dialog on the issue becomes evident, the greater mass protests take place and it is easy to foresee them growing. The biggest so far meeting on May 1st has appealed about 65,000 people, which is amazingly huge number for small Latvia; however public attitude to the “reform” is so negative that even bigger manifestations are supposed in September 2004. 15. It appears that many pupils and their parents, directly or indirectly affected by the “reform”, are prepared to reject it in an extreme form like a schools strike. One is supposed to start on September 2nd, 2004 and last till the “reform” cancellation or at least till the beginning of negotiation on the issue. It fair to point out that the attitude to the schools strike in the society varies, however number of people supporting it permanently grows.16. The Russian-speaking society would not accept negotiation of the government with anyone but Negotiations Team authorized by a Congress of Russian School Defenders, which took place on March 6, 2004 in Riga. At the time being this is the only group that may be considered a legitimate representative of Latvian minorities on education-related issues, as the Team was elected by 968 participants of the Congress, that in order (according to sign-up lists) were nominated as deputies by an average of approximately 250 people each. However the government put much of effort to simulate negotiations with fake structures representing sometimes just one person and totally refuses to run such negotiation with the Team.17. There are also strong individual protests expected, in particular, a group of adults is preparing for a hunger strike at the end of August 2004. The ConclusionGiven all above, it is evident that a probability of mass riots in Latvia is high and growing. Considering huge number of people affected, as well as obstinate and short-sighted policy of Latvian government, extraordinary measures are necessary to prevent irreversible consequences of splitting society and setting major ethnic groups in opposition to each other. Unfortunately there is little or no hope that the issue would be solved internally, so the responsibility of EU institutions is high as never before. Issues of conformance of Latvian policy with international standards for protection of human (and in particular, minorities) rights must be raised at all levels in order to find a compromise as soon as possible.June 16, 2004Based on Informational note prepared on September 12, 2003