An Assessment of Educational Renewal and Reform in Bosnia and Herzegovina Seth Spaulding, Professor of Administrative and Policy Studies School of Education, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA 15260, USA United States Information Service Fra Andjela Zvizdovica 1/X, UNIS Building Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina March 15, 1998 Table of Contents EXECUTIVE SUMMARY THE CURRENT SITUATION HUMAN CAPACITY BUILDING AND INFRASTRUCTURE ISSUES IN EDUCATION CURRICULUM AND TEACHING METHODS THE SARAJEVO DECLARATION NEW EDUCATION LAWS RECONSTRUCTION OF THE SCHOOLS SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND MANAGEMENT SCHOOL STRUCTURE AND ORGANIZATION CIVITAS TEACHER EDUCATION AND HIGHER EDUCATION REFORM EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT BIH GOVERNMENT POLICY PLANNING, MANAGEMENT INFORMATION AND PROGRAM COORDINATION ACTION OF DONOR AGENCIES IN SUMMARY ANNEXES: 1 - PEOPLE INTERVIEWED 2 - SARAJEVO CANTON EDUCATION WORKING GROUP (SARAJEVO DECLARATION) Executive Summary At the invitation of the United States Information Service in Sarajevo, I spent two weeks in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, from March 2 to March 14, reviewing progress in the reform and renewal of the education sector. I had earlier participated in emergency assistance activities sponsored by UNICEF, the World Bank and other organizations in which the University of Pittsburgh took part. I therefore had some prior knowledge of the system of education in the country and the problems it faced during the war and its immediate aftermath. The terms of reference of the mission suggested that I review the internationally-funded projects in the education sector in order to assess the probable over-all impact of them on the education sector. In addition, I was asked to suggest possible strategies for encouraging appropriate long-term institutionalization of reforms compatible with the Dayton Agreement and the new Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, both of which decree that education shall be the responsibility of the two entities, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Republika. In a system that is to be highly decentralized, there are many questions concerning the ways in which educational policy and planning will be undertaken; schools financed and administered; curriculum planned and textbooks developed; teachers prepared and certified; and educational indicators developed relating to student achievement, curriculum relevance, educational efficiency and equity. Further, questions relating to the preparation and certification of teachers and of the recognition of school certificates were raised during the visit. Before the recent war, all such matters were centralized and there was one centralized educational system for all of the entities in the former Yugoslavia. Now in the region it appears that there will be two different systems of education in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, either Croat or Bosnian, and one in the Republika Srpska Entity. Attempts so far to coordinate educational plans and policies even in the ten Cantons of the Federation have had only very limited success. During the course of the visit, I had an extensive series of interviews with officials at the Federation, cantonal and school levels in Sarajevo, with a brief one-day visit to Mostar. In addition, I interviewed local representatives of the principal funding agencies for educational projects , ranging from private groups such as the Soros Foundation to inter-governmental groups such as UNICEF, UNESCO, the Office of the High Representative and the Council of Europe. A list of the formal interviews is appended as Annex 1. In addition to the formal interviews, I had informal discussions with several agency and government officials whom I had met on previous visits. It would appear that whatever educational policy, planning, program development and reform that is happening in BiH is the result of projects undertaken by organizations within the international community. Such projects are layered onto the present system (or lack of it) and few leave any local infrastructure behind once the training, seminars, research or other activities have been completed and the international project personnel leave the country. International programs that deal with education issues have their own suites of offices separate from government offices; personnel are not housed with local counterparts in local institutions and, although there are exceptions, there is little thought to the development of institutional frameworks to continue the work when international project personnel leave. The international community must move from the crisis mode of reacting to day-to-day political issues and to the immediate needs of school reconstruction to the longer-term mode of advising local authorities on the institutional development and processes necessary for medium and long-term reform and renovation of the education system. The first step in this direction might be the appointment of a full-time professional educational policy and planning expert in one of the international agencies to advise both international authorities and local authorities on alternate strategies for medium and long-term educational development in the country. Such a person might wish, as a first step, to undertake a detailed sector analysis of the status of education (policy, planning, finance, teacher education, pre-school, higher, technical training, manpower development projects, etc.) with recommendations as to alternative scenarios for reform and development. Government authorities, in turn, should be encouraged to set up educational policy, planning, and management information systems at all levels. These units might be advised in early stages by international experts, but in the long run they should develop the capacity to coordinate reform activities and to be pro-active in seeking support for such reform. So far, government and institutional authorities at all levels have been mainly reactive, accepting whatever aid is offered by the international community, without concern for possible duplication or other dysfunctions. Of course, in a situation that is early in recovery from a crisis, this may be necessary, but the transition to medium and long-term planning and coordination by government authorities must begin now that physical reconstruction is well advanced. Although there can be no claim that the many pressing political issues will be solved by such educational development efforts, one might assume that normalization of the functioning of the various educational systems in the country will contribute to rationale political decision-making and stability over time. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Current Situation The mission concentrated on the education situation in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and did not examine issues in the Republika Srpska in any detail. Within the Federation, politics dominate the education sector as in all other sectors, and perhaps even more so because of the strong feelings that parents and politicians have about education. Most education decisions are made on the political level and there is little education sector planning that is not reactive to political events. The principal reason for seeming paralysis in terms of medium and long-term planning in education in the Federation seems to be the element of the Dayton agreement that indicates that education is the prerogative of the cantons in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Since 19 November 1996 when the Cantonal ministries of education were established, there have been at least ten meetings of the ministers, under the chairmanship of the Federal Minister, and there has been little agreement on matters of substance among the predominantly Croat and the predominantly Bosniak cantons. Even among the predominantly Bosniak cantons, agreement is not always easy. Most international organizations operating in the country feel strongly that there must be integration of the schools and cooperation among the cantons in establishing curriculum, standards, and at least some core content in the schools. Some, however, point to systems such as that in Switzerland where distinctly different systems operate in the same country, teaching in different languages. Even in those systems, however, there is a highly developed infrastructure to assure collaboration and standard-setting among the various cantons. And, of course, such countries do not have the recent history and current political problems facing Bosnia and Herzegovina. Certainly, the way the Dayton agreement and the BiH Constitution read, the cantons are not required to cooperate with the others in educational matters if they do not so desire. There are about 2.3 million people currently living in the Federation entity of Bosnia Herzegovina. Although the educational statistics may not be entirely accurate because of the difficulty of collecting information from some cantons, the following tables show estimates of the scope of the education system going back over ten years. It should be remembered that the figures of 1990/91 and before are of the entire unified area of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Figures of 1993/94 were collected by the author in late 1994 during a sector study funded by UNICEF. They show schools in areas then controlled by the Bosnia army. Figures for 1995/96 and 1996-1997 (the latest available from the Statistical office of Bosnia-Herzegovina) are of the Federation entity only and its ten cantons; they do not include information on the Republika Srpska entity. Table 1 - Primary Education in BiH School Year Number of schools Number of students Number of classrooms Number of teachers 1965/66 2,696 597,256 17,874 15,856 1970/71 2,714 644,497 22,428 21,798 1980/81 2,462 625,619 20,210 23,053 1990/91 2,205 539,875 19,383 23,369 1993/94 285 199,689 7,308 7,238 1995/96 898 252,332 8,982 10,719 1996/97 955 260,407 9,454 11,331 Clearly, the number of primary schools, teachers and students dropped dramatically during the war. Since the war ended, the number of schools, teachers has classes has dramatically risen, but not to pre-war levels because the figures represent only the Federation entity and its ten cantons. The number of teachers would seem to be adequate if one considers student/teacher ratio. There are more teachers in relation to the number of students than there were ten years ago. There are no figures, however, on how many unqualified teachers may be in the system; some estimates suggest a relatively large number in some cantons. Some caution must be taken in interpreting these figures. During the height of the war, schools continued in basements of buildings; even now, schools are often are running two or three shifts a day to meet the demand. Secondary education has been affected as well as shown by Table 2 (1993/4 figures reflect only schools in territories controlled by the government of the then RBiH and later figures those schools in the Federation entity and its ten cantons): Table 2 - Secondary Education in BiH School year Number of Schools Number of Students Number of Classrooms Number of Teachers 1965/66 375 102,637 3,411 4,172 1970/71 289 107,202 3,503 4,562 1980/81 447 227,408 6,999 8,839 1990/91 239 172,556 5,605 9,610 1993/94 133 59,212 2,124 4,146 1996/97 183 88,554 3,126 5,745 1997/98 184 97,303 3,336 6,065 In the medium and long term, there are policy and planning issues that must be resolved. These involve decision-making on numbers of schools to open; which to consolidate; whether to charge fees and for what; how to find financing for continuing operation of a decentralized system; how to train new teachers and re-train existing teachers; how to develop curriculum options that suite local conditions; and many other issues. Some of these are dealt with further in later sections. Table 3 shows the situation as higher education has developed during the past several decades (figures from 1990/1991 cover the entire country before the war; figures from 1993/4 are those of territory controlled by the Bosnian army; those of 1997/8 are of the Federation Entity and its ten cantons). These figures include all post-secondary institutions. When the latest figures are compared to the 1990/91 figures, clearly the higher education sub-sector in the Federation Entity and its ten cantons has re-established itself to the extent that are more faculties and more students in the Federation than there were in the entire country prior to the war. Again, these figures do not reflect quality of higher education offerings; some informants have indicated that many of the best teaching faculty have left the country and that many faculties have poor equipment and facilities for teaching. In addition, the inflation in numbers of higher education faculties might suggest that there is need for serious thought about higher education reform. In ten cantons with a population of about 4.3 million with only 34,477 students in higher education, one wonders if there is need for 55 separate faculties, all of which seem to operate more or less independently of one another. Clearly, further study is needed of possible higher education reform in the Federation, and the Council of Europe has initiated dialogue on the subject during 1997 and 1998 (see later sections). Table 3 - Higher Education in BiH School Year Number of Higher Education Faculties Number of Students Number of Teaching Staff 1965/66 25 22,756 1,965 1970/71 27 31,414 1,703 1980/81 41 48,461 1,934 1990/91 48 37,763 2,340 1993/94 40 10,500 1,392 1997/98 55 34,477 2,833 There are at least 13 political levels that are involved in decisions concerning the future of the country: the over-all Bosnia and Herzegovina government, presided over by a tripartite presidency, and the two entities within the country: the Federation and the Republika Srpska. The Federation consists of ten cantons, ranging in population from over 400,000 (Tuzla) to around 50,000 (Gorajde), each with a Ministry of Education (usually combined with culture , communication, and/or sports and even religion). The Federation has a Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport, for instance, while the Canton of Sarajevo has a Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Information. The Federation Ministry is officially located in Mostar, but also maintains offices in Sarajevo. The Minister is of Bosniak background while the Deputy Minister (who resides in Mostar) is of Croatian background. None of the Ministries has a large staff; usually they have less than six professionals working in the education area. The Federation Ministry has five units: education, culture, science, sport and financial/administrative. There are 12 full-time staff on the education side, 6 in Sarajevo and 6 in other cantons, plus two inspectors. These inspectors are in the government's inspection group that combines inspectors of all services. The education inspectors will limit their work under the new decentralized system to formalities such as school attendance, availability of textbooks and materials, general working conditions in school and that, in general, schools are operating as they should. Classroom work and substantive supervision will be the responsibility of the cantons. The Sarajevo Canton Ministry has ten professionals total (including two Croats, two Serbs and six Bosniaks), only about half working in the education sector. There are, however, Pedagogical Institutes attached to several of the Cantons. There was a State (Federal level) Pedagogical Institute until 1997, but this was abolished in light of Cantonal indications that under the Dayton Agreement they did not wish a State Institute nominally over the Cantons. Until September 1998, 17 of the former staff of 25 of the State Pedagogical Institute are being paid by the Ministry, with special assignments to work with several funded projects. These staff posts will be abolished at the end of the one-year notice period required for termination of government employees, unless new structures are established within the Federation ministry to employ them. The now defunct State Pedagogical Institute undertook an almost impossible job during the worst of the war in 1992-4 in producing a new curriculum for the schools; an encyclopedic compendium listing everything in hundreds of subjects that they thought should be taught in the schools after the war. The Soros Foundation published the several thick volumes of these curriculum outlines. Most of the schools in Bosniak dominated cantons use this curriculum but even those who developed it now suggest that it is much too dense and encyclopedic. However, under the Dayton accords and the new constitution, there is no authority for the development of a national curriculum nor is there any longer a pedagogical institute at the Federation level. The Cantonal Pedagogical Institutes (where they exist - all Cantons do not have them) usually have less than 20 staff (though the Sarajevo Institute has around 48), and these staff traditionally have concentrated on advising teachers on new approaches in subject-matter areas. The Ministries of Education in the canton where these exist may draw upon the skills in the Institutes when needed. In at least three cantons, there is a semblance of a Teacher's Resource Center, usually attached to the Pedagogical Institute, equipped with computers and meeting rooms for in-service training of for teachers to be able to interact with the community through various teacher-community programs. These were established during the past two years under projects funded by UNICEF and Soros Foundation, but they seem to not have a program of activities and are used mainly by international programs as meeting places for training programs and project committees. The Sarajevo Pedagogical Institute has two main program units. The first, with a staff of 28, has as its mission to advise pre-school, elementary, primary and secondary teachers on curriculum, methods and materials and to help teachers in evaluating the progress of students (test development and similar approaches). The second is the Teachers' Center established with Soros and UNICEF funding, designed to help teachers understand technology in education (seven staff). The latter unit seems not to have developed into an inter-active center attracting teachers, as yet, but is rather used as a meeting center. In the former educational system before the break-up of Yugoslavia, all curriculum, finance, structure, organization and related issues were decided centrally, and the role of the Institutes was to help teachers carry out directives more efficiently. It might be appropriate now to reconsider the role, function, structure and future of these Institutes. Perhaps they should become Educational Development Centers, offering each Canton expert help in analyzing policy, planning, financial, organizational, structural and legal issues, in addition to helping with curriculum and teaching methods issues. This would require a major restructuring of such centers, re-training of staff, and a medium-term continuing international assistance effort over a period of several years. Human Capacity Building and Infrastructure Issues in Education There have been a number of international and bilateral projects designed to train educational policy analysts, planners, and managers; to train pedagogical institute experts and teachers in new curricular and teaching methods; to introduce active learning methods and new approaches to civic education in the schools; and to plan new approaches to teacher education. Few of these efforts have led to significant institution-building in BiH. This is due in large part because there is little possibility of getting all of the cantons in the BiH entity to agree to new institutional structures, curriculum content, or educational standards. In the Republica Srpska entity, even dialogue with the BiH entity on such matters is often impossible. Although there are trained management information specialists, planners, and others that could staff policy planning and management information services in the cantons and the Ministry, such services have not been established. Decisions are basically made by the political structure in the governments. To some extent, the Office of the High Representative (OHR) acts as a catalyst for short-term planning on issues deemed important by the international community. Thus, when the Federal Minister of Education endorsed in 1997 the idea suggested by some cantons of segregating children of Croat, Bosniak and Serb into separate classes, even in the same school, the international community expressed grave concern and the endorsement was rescinded. This did not change the basic situation in areas where most of the children are of Croatian roots; the curriculum and textbooks used in those areas are those of the Republic of Croatia. There are reports from those schools that children consider the President of Croatia their president, and not the President of BiH. In the Republika Srpska entity, the situation is similar - the curriculum and books are those of the Republic of Serbia. Clearly, most of this is political and can not be solved through professional or technical work. At the same time, if attractive and effective new school curriculum, textbooks and teaching methods are introduced in the cantons of the Federation that want them, there will surely be interest shown in other cantons in these materials and some of them may be adopted there at some time in the future. Curriculum and Teaching Methods The Federal Ministry has been meeting with Cantonal Ministers in the Federation for some months in an attempt to deal with curriculum and teaching materials issues. There seems to be little possibility of early resolution of the outstanding issues. Nonetheless, the international community should continue with efforts to establish local institutional infrastructure designed to improve curriculum and methods and to seek ways of integrating such efforts into the ongoing programs of government. Outstanding issues are many: how to deal with religion in schools; how to introduce Civitas-type programs into the regular curriculum (integrate into other subjects or as a separate subject); how to simplify the highly complex current curriculum (about 16 subjects at upper levels of elementary and in secondary); how to set standards across cantons; should there be core subjects for all plus local curriculum beyond that?; how to make compatible with European systems; etc. Continuing expert help would appear to be needed in these and related areas. Several reviews of textbooks appear to be underway or planned, in cooperation with international agencies, some in connection with the Sarajevo Declaration (see below). UNESCO has a visiting Human Rights specialist from the Paris headquarters beginning a study of human rights issues in the texts. The Civitas project, sponsored by the United States Information Service (USIS) with the cooperation of European groups, is planning a study of the civics content of textbooks. The World Bank has a textbook study planned, but has postponed it until later in 1998. Again, these seem to be external projects looking into the system, rather than efforts to help the educators and officials of BiH to develop their own review and curriculum reform mechanisms that will undertake permanent, on-going curriculum review and revision. Soon such efforts must move from the crisis, reactive mode, with outside experts looking in, to the institution-building mode whereby BiH institutions and experts do the necessary research, assessment, policy analysis and development themselves. In the meantime, international efforts that look in from the outside should develop improved mechanisms for collaboration with one another. The Sarajevo Declaration In early 1998, the international community became concerned with problems related to the return of refugees to the localities where they lived before the war. Sarajevo, it was felt, should take the lead in encouraging return of refugees and should take concrete steps to create the conditions to attract them. The Office of the High Representative and other international officials convened a conference on such issues and the conference issued on 3 February 1998 the "Sarajevo Declaration." This calls for Sarajevo to "enable the return of at least 20,000 minority pre-war residents in 1998, as proof of its determination to act as a model for reconciliation." This would suggest expanding the educational infrastructure in Sarajevo by about 25%. Seven articles (articles 18 through 24) in the declaration deal with education issues: 1) Principles for an education program must be developed by 30 June 1998 that address the needs of children of different ethnic and religious groups in a non-discriminatory manner; the development of a program incorporating these principles should be initiated during the 1998/1999 school year; 2) Sarajevo education officials and the Federal Ministry are to appoint working groups on issues of curricular content and textbook evaluation and will cooperate with international projects on civic education, democracy and human rights, and by March 1 1998 will establish a Sarajevo Education Working Group to develop projects that foster democracy and ethnic tolerance; 3) under supervision of the Working Group, Sarajevo education authorities will review all currently used textbooks and withdraw any that contribute to ethnic hatred and intolerance no later than September 1, 1998; 4) the Working Group will review any charges of discrimination in the schools and in the hiring of teachers and will take action to remedy discrimination, including the drafting of new laws and the setting of administrative mechanisms to handle such issues. "The right of parents to choose the nature of education their children receive must be respected, and compelling children to attend particular classes or schools in contravention of that right shall not be allowed."; 5) Sarajevo will use their best efforts to assure that all schools are properly equipped by the beginning of the 1998/9 school year with teaching materials and equipment and will provide a transparent budget to the Working Group to show that resources are distributed equitably; 6) Sarajevo education authorities will provide information for returnees about educational opportunities, validation of educational credentials from elsewhere, and assistance for returnee children, in cooperation with international organizations; 7) Sarajevo authorities should cooperate with entity authorities in the sphere of higher education, encouraging enrollment of students from throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina and cooperating with entity authorities on the issue of financing and other issues; they should "ensure academic freedom and self-government of institutions, promote the adequate graduation of trained professionals, and encourage the role of the universities as a locus of peaceful inter-group dialogue." The Sarajevo Declaration educational articles as summarized are the closest to a statement of goals and a beginning education plan that I have encountered during the two-weeks of interviews. The problem will be, of course, that elements of the plan will require an infrastructure that is beyond that which exists currently in the Sarajevo Cantonal administration. The Cantonal Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Communication on March 7, 1998, appointed a Permanent Working Group of 20 members (thirteen from the Canton and seven from the international community) and they will commence their work immediately (see Annex 2). The administrative and substantive infrastructure of the Ministry, however, is very limited, and to do well all of the things mentioned in the articles will probably be beyond the capacity of the ten professional staff in the Ministry, only several of whom are in the education sector (the others are in science, culture and communication). Further, although there are seven representatives of the international community on the Committee, none would appear to be recognized international experts on educational policy, planning, reform and development, with the knowledge of how to advise the Sarajevo authorities on the professional and infrastructure issues that will arise as the plan progresses. Among the issues: many of the returning students will have missed schooling during the war or have had schooling in a different system. They will need remedial work. Who is to provide such help? Where are the trained teachers to come from? Even without the return of the refugees, there already may be a shortage of qualified teachers, though data on this are inadequate, in part because of inadequate management information systems in the cantons. The Sarajevo Declaration may be an indication that the international community wants to move toward medium and long-term renewal and reform plans and programs. If so, this is a good sign, and this should be matched with new kinds of medium and long-term assistance activities to be based within the educational infrastructure of the country and not simply layered on as projects from outside. New Education Laws Currently, there are a number of working committees at all levels to draft new education laws. At the level of the Sarajevo Canton, for instance, there are five new drafts in preparation on pre-school education, elementary education, secondary education, higher education, and communications media. These drafts will be discussed in public hearings. But to be effective, education laws must be linked to current international thinking in terms of educational development, finance, and programming. And there must be development goals and plans linked to the laws. Laws are only on paper unless there is effective educational infrastructure to implement effectively the provisions of the laws. Unfortunately, I have been told, most of the participants in the committees drafting these new laws are lawyers, not education specialists. The educational implications of various alternatives may not be known by the lawyers and politicians drafting this legislation. Elements of the new laws will attempt to deal with current controversies; for instance, in Central Bosnia (Cantonal Capital, Travnik), the Croats do not want to pay for Bosnian schools and perhaps vice versa. Any decisions on such matters will have long-term effect on educational financing and perhaps on educational equity. Are there educational finance experts providing the community with professional advice on such issues? Reconstruction of the Schools It became clear that emergency needs of the schools are fast being met. With assistance from the World Bank, Soros Foundation, various bilateral aid organizations and private donations, most of the elementary schools in Bosnia and Herzegovina have now been repaired and/or rebuilt. Most have a reasonable supply of basic textbooks under textbook programs of several donors. Many schools have some computer equipment, although some of this is obsolete and not useable for advanced purposes such as internet connections, multimedia presentations and the like. It is also clear that much of the equipment for schools has been provided without careful study of what is needed to use the equipment appropriately. Computers in principals' offices, for instance, seem to be rarely used and software for appropriate computer assisted school management probably is not installed in most of the computers. Similarly, overhead projectors are available in some schools, but transparency-making equipment and materials are scarce. Essentially, the physical appearance of schools is fast improving, but the infrastructure needed to continually supply teaching materials and to backstop school administrators in their work is lacking. The principal agency involved in school reconstruction is the World Bank, and the self-financed Project Implementation Unit at the Federal Ministry is the managing unit for this program. The unit deals with all of the cantons and the PIU director must collect nine signatures in order to authorize disbursement of funds. There are nine full-time staff in the unit plus some part-time staff. The unit is considered a good source of information on educational statistics in the country. The various cantons and entities are willing to supply data as part of their obligation in participating in the program. The first school reconstruction project was for $10 million, of which $500,000 was used in Serb schools in order to encourage them to participate. The second loan was delayed a year but is now operational. To date, about $11 million have been allocated, about 70% to Bosnian school reconstruction and 30% to Croat school reconstruction. In the second loan, funds are available as follows: Civil Works Fed of Bosnia-Herzegovina $3.2 million Republika Srpska $2.3 million Goods (mainly textbooks) Fed of Bosnia-Herzegovina $1.0 million Republika Srpska $ 0.21 million Consultants Fed of Bosnia-Herzegovina $0.35 million Republika Srpska $0.14 million Incremental Operating Costs (Project Implementation Unit) Fed of Bosnia-Herzegovina $0.21 Republika Srpska $0.07 million Unallocated Fed of Bosnia-Herzegovina $0.09 Republica Srpska $0.09 Because of the investment in textbooks, the Bank will be conducting a study of the existing and needed textbooks in November, 1998. The terms of reference for this study are not yet available. School Administration and Management The new policy of decentralization has placed new responsibilities on school administrators at the cantonal, municipal and school levels. There has been, beginning in 1997, a project sponsored by UNDP and UNESCO to train specialists in educational policy, planning, management information and school management. That project, however, is not designed to help cantons set up new standards for school administration nor new school administration infrastructure that will demand new kinds of management and administration skills. Similarly, the Pedagogical Academies that train pre-school and elementary teachers have taught courses in school management, but of the style appropriate in the old centralized system. Clearly, major attention should be focused on medium and long-term projects to design new management structures in cantonal school systems and to prepare the school managers appropriate to the new system. Such managers must deal with new kinds of financial issues, community relations, teacher/parent relations, teacher professionalization, quality supervision and other matters that were handled very differently under pre-war systems. School Structure and Organization Many schools are operating two shifts with students often studying into the late afternoon and evening. The curriculum assumes that it must, as one teacher told me, make each student into a walking encyclopedia, with all the information necessary for the rest of his/her life. Emphasis seems to be on encyclopedic - facts and theory and little practical is taught . Another teacher told me that "everything mathematical and theoretical about a circle is taught, but nothing practical about round things such as auto tires." The curriculum needs to be simplified and made more concrete; kids need to be taught how to learn and think. This involves curriculum revision, of course, and the curriculum should be simplified into far fewer subjects; this will make possible the restructuring of the school day so that longer periods are possible and so that room can be made for creative activities leading to cooperative attitudes and thinking skills. Again, there is need for a comprehensive sector study in education that shows how all the elements of an educational system must fit together to accomplish appropriate goals for the future of the country. The many projects such as those of the University of Munich with the University of Sarajevo that are designed to deal with immediate, emergency issues such as HIV, mine awareness, and other behavioral issues must be integrated into the regular school program. Civitas The Civitas Program, begun with a exploratory study and pilot activity in 1996, is designed to introduce new active methods and interactive materials into the schools to encourage students to analyze local issues and problems and to design plans of action for doing something about them. The program was designed by the Civitas organization and the Center for Civic Education in the United States, in cooperation with the American Federation of Teachers. The program is coordinated in Bosnia and Herzegovina by a Program Coordinator who works with cantonal coordinators and municipal liaison officers. In the Republika Srpska, the work is coordinated through a Civitas coordinator at the Pedagogical Institute in Banja Luka with coordinators in the five pedagogical regions or units in the Entity. Teachers, principals, and Pedagogical Institutes are involved in training programs designed to introduce the basics of democracy in the school. This is done by encouraging students to study problems and issues related to responsibility, privacy, justice and authority, and to come up with action plans relating to these issues. Training materials are available in Bosnian, Croat and Serb languages. The students are taught how to think, not what to think and the parents are often involved. As the curriculum in schools is already overloaded, the program is not taught as a separate subject but rather as an activity in a kind of home room. Those trained are involved in training other teachers, thus providing a multiplier effect. It is estimated that over 1,500 teachers currently are participating in the program, with some 52,000 pupils involved. Future discussions will revolve around whether to introduce a new subject in place of a former subject or to integrate these kinds of materials into existing subjects. Total cost to date has been about $1.2 million, with about $615,000 for the USIA portion of the program for fiscal year 1997/8. One current question is how to institutionalize the project; there seems to be no suitable structure within the BiH educational structure to absorb the project; another option might be to create a non-governmental organization, though NGO's do not have strong support as yet in Bosnia. Perhaps future support could be channeled toward the establishment of an educational development center in Bosnia that would include curriculum work in Civitas areas (see related recommendations in other sections). A current activity is to have students in both Entities develop portfolios based on their work in class, and then to present their portfolios in school and cantonal events that select the best ones. Those selected in both Entities will be brought to Sarajevo for display and celebration at a forthcoming international conference on civic education to be hosted by Sarajevo. A team of the international Civitas organization, a consortium of civic education organizations from several countries, will be visiting Sarajevo in the near future to help assess the content of current textbooks related to civic education and to recommend revisions . A visit to one school where the program is in operation demonstrated that the students, indeed, are becoming very involved in the program, and they often have revolutionary ideas on how the school and the educational system should operate. Certainly, the program is exciting and should be continued, with attempts to place it permanently into the BiH setting, either as an NGO or as part of the governmental infrastructure. Somewhat parallel activities under the Civitas umbrella are being conducted by the Council of Europe. An inter-country team of trainers from a number of European countries has been conducting workshops for BiH educators in tolerance education and an extensive plan for exchange and training of teachers and teacher educators is planned for the future. Teacher Education and Higher Education Reform Teachers for primary school are prepared in secondary vocational teacher training schools and in two-year post-secondary Pedagogical Academies. Those who teach in grades 5-8 must have college or university training, and those who teach in grades 9-12 must have full university preparation (at least 14 years of study plus subject qualifications, usually in two subjects). A new law is being considered - it will probably be very general in order to get the cantons to accept it. In Sarajevo, secondary teacher education is in the faculty of philosophy, one of 23 faculties at University of Sarajevo. Tuzla and Zenica have more limited programs that concentrate on mining and technology , and Banja Luka also has a more limited range of offerings. Those who get degrees in mathematics, for instance, need not have pedagogical training to get a teaching certificate. There is some concern in the Canton of Sarajevo because large numbers of students from other cantons come to the university for training but under the decentralized system, each canton must support the university (if there is one) in that canton. The Ministry in the Canton of Sarajevo is negotiating with other cantons with the idea that they share some of the costs of their students that come to Sarajevo. A major project to introduce active learning methods in education and to plan for teacher education reform and renewal was funded jointly by several donors during 1995-1997. These activities were conducted by the Institute for International Studies at the University of Pittsburgh, in cooperation with local authorities, and culminated in a national conference on the renewal and reform of teacher education in Sarajevo in June, 1997. A BiH working committee under the chairmanship of Srebren Dizdar continued to refine the recommendations of this conference, and the final report of the group will be issued by Professor Dizdar within the coming weeks. This report of over 200 pages will be available in English, Bosnian and Croat languages. Further follow-up by the local BiH group interested in teacher education reform will include the forthcoming April 13-15, 1998, meeting on Special Needs Education, sponsored by the Norwegian Teachers, UNICEF, Society of Educational Workers, and the Canton of Sarajevo. Although major emphasis at the meeting is teacher education for children with special needs, the symposium will follow up on the 1997 meeting under the University of Pittsburgh project. Resource centers, community participation, etc. Resource centers at Zenica, Sarajevo (Unicef), Mostar (Soros). Pedagogical academies - longer program? Sarajevo wants 4 years, Zenica wants to stay at 2 years. Currently at issue is the question of duration of teacher education. Currently, primary teachers can receive certification after two years of training at Pedagogical Academies. The Sarajevo Academy wants to lengthen the program to four years; the Zenica Academy appears to prefer the two-year program. If the program does extend to four years, does it make sense for it to continue to be under a Pedagogical Academy while the secondary teacher education program is within the Philosophy faculty of the University? Perhaps there should be some kind of merger of the two. This raises the question of over-all university reform. As in many formerly socialist countries, the university has tended to prepare a myriad of highly specialized people for jobs that were guaranteed in state-run industries. Most such universities have undergone major reforms over the past seven or eight years, with much simplified curriculum preparing more general specializations that can be used in a variety of contexts in a market economy. Apparently, little such reform is underway at BiH universities as yet. Fortunately, the Legislative Reform Program of the Council of Europe has sponsored joint meetings with BiH university representatives on university finance, restructuring and reform. The latest joint meeting with Council of Europe and BiH university representatives was on November 19-20, 1997, in Strasbourg. A report dated 23 January, 1998 summarizes the results of that meeting under the title "Higher Education Financing in Bosnia and Herzegovina, legal and institutional aspects." Recommendations suggest structural and organizational reforms "which can subsequently alleviate financial problems...Moving towards a more balanced allocation of costs and responsibilities will enhance the system's capacity to deliver the services required." It is likely that further follow-up activities on higher education reform will be undertaken by the Council of Europe. Certainly, university structures need further study, and the many specializations offered by the many faculties need further examination, as has been done in many of the formerly socialist countries. In addition to the usual faculty exchanges, whereby university teachers exchange experiences and learn from one another, there is need for major university reform projects involving introduction of new management and finance structures, new university governance structures, and more flexible curriculum and accreditation systems. Finally, private universities will surely wish to develop (as they have in other formerly socialist countries) and procedures for accreditation of such ventures must be established. Educational research and development Educational research in the western European and American sense does not exist in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Pedagogical Institutes are very limited in their functions and although the personnel there talk of "scientific research," very little policy, management, curriculum, materials and methods research is undertaken. One possibility might be to develop a project, in consultation with the cantonal ministers of education and Pedagogical Institute directors, to create a new institution on the base of the Pedagogical Institutes, but with broader functions. The new Educational Develop Institutes might include planning , management information, donor coordination functions; they might develop indicators of quality, relevance and efficiency; they might have a standardized testing and examination develop wing; they might develop recommendations as to standard-setting and certification . In addition, of course, they might modernize their curriculum research and development activities and their in-service teacher training. Finally, they might be encouraged to develop the teacher resource centers attached to some of them so that these centers provide a variety of programs to attract teachers and to encourage community participation in dialogue on educational matters. There have been several projects designed to train teachers and educators in new methods and new curriculum approaches compatible with a democratic and multi-cultural society. There have been other projects designed to prepare educators for new participatory approaches to educational planning and management and for new approaches to teacher preparation. Other efforts have established a nationwide capacity for internet connection and for exchange of information via computer networks. At least three Teacher Resource Centers have been established and equipped, providing substantial potential for future in-service teachers education and school-related community activity if these centers are, in the future, professionally staffed and financed to provide services other than simply meeting space as seems to be the current situation. All of these activities (and most other externally-funded education-related efforts) have been in response to short-term needs and have been layered onto whatever infrastructure exists in the education sector. None have been efforts to help specific institutions or agencies in the education sector to become more self-sufficient or effective in their work. No projects have assisted the federal government or the cantons to develop effective policy and planning offices, with management information services and analytical capability to prepare information to help decision makers understand the probably financial and educational impact of policy decisions. There are no efforts to help cantons develop new accounting offices consistent with their new roles in handling school resources that come from a variety of sources, rather than from one centralized fund as in the past. Pedagogical Institutes exist in several of the cantons, but their roles must be reassessed in the current radically altered system under the decentralization rules. In addition, their role vis a vis Pedagogical Academies and faculties of universities should be assessed, in the light of reforms of these institutions. Perhaps the system should be simplified with the Pedagogical Institutes brought into a reformed system of higher education. These are but some of the alternatives that might be examined. Political issues in the country still dominate the attention of both local and international communities. Decisions on educational matters in each canton seem to be decided by politicians based on geopolitical issues rather than on substantive discussions on how to develop a high quality, relevant, efficient world class education system that prepares students for a world economic and social system. Funding agencies must increasingly devote attention to helping the country develop medium and long-term strategies for developing such a system. Most emergency projects to date have not helped in any major way to develop infrastructure necessary to do this. For instance, several groups have subsidized the printing of textbooks. But there is no institution in the county of the moment that has the resources and know-how to reform curriculum and develop new teaching materials and textbooks based on a reformed curriculum. All cantons have a Ministry of Education, but most have staff (including the cantonal Minister) that can be counted on one hand. Much more infrastructure than that will be needed if each canton is to develop full educational services in a fully decentralized system. There are simply no international projects that follow the usual technical assistance mode of helping the local educators create the institutions and services necessary for quality education in the new economic and social setting of a democratic and decentralized educational system. Since most (if not all) of the institutions in the educational infrastructure of Bosnia were created to serve a very different system under the previous (until the late 80's) socialist regime, it may be that some new institutions should be developed. For example, a non-profit educational assessment center might be appropriate to assist all cantons in developing indicators of achievement and quality. A non-profit policy analysis center might be established to help the cantons develop management information systems and indicators of quality and efficiency, and to help them establish certification standards for school and teacher certificates. Some of the staff of current pedagogical institutes might be absorbed into these centers and the remaining staff might move into pedagogical academies, thus eliminating the pedagogical institutes as they now exist. Assistance under such a strategy would be for a period of years in order to work with local officials in firmly establishing such institutions and services. Assistance would not be the short-term variety that up to now has trained some educators but that has not helped build effective institutions where they can use their new skills in improving and renewing the education system over time. Educational reform and renewal is a continuous process. Now that the emergency programs are well under way, attention should shift to the medium and long term and the infrastructure and processes that will be necessary to create the future that parents want for their children. BiH Government Policy Planning, Management Information and Program Coordination The governmental unit closest to a Educational Management Information unit is the Project Implementation Unit (PIU) of the World Bank educational reconstruction project in the Federation Ministry of Education (see section above). The cantons, including those in the Republika Srpska, respond to requests from information from the unit because they receive funds for school reconstruction from the work of the unit. The PIU, however, was established solely to operate the World Bank project, though it has made some efforts to coordinate related activity of other donors in order to try to avoid duplication of efforts (it has not been completely successful in this effort). The Unit is not a permanent part of the Federal Ministry. One possibility might be to transform this unit into a permanent Educational Policy, Planning and Management Information Unit for the Federation, working with the cantons on a regular basis to collect the kind of information necessary to encourage donors in the education area. If it offered the appropriate kind of policy analyses, information and sector analyses that would help the cantons in decision making and help them in preparing projects for international funding, it might gain acceptance by the Cantons. It would have to develop its activities clearly as services rather than as supervisory, much as is done by such offices in decentralized education systems in many other countries. As suggested elsewhere, a comprehensive education sector study might be the first step in establishing this policy and planning service unit. Such a sector study might be done by the World Bank as an extension of its emergency reconstruction project; an alternative might be to ask the International Institute for Educational Planning to do the study, under UNESCO auspices, as an extension of its current project to train educational planners, management information specialists and school administrators. USAID might be another appropriate unit under its relatively new Education and Training global strategic objective. In fact, contrary to the general impression that USAID in BiH does no education work, it has a significant program of short-term training of specialists in democracy and governance, in economic reconstruction and privatization, and in physical reconstruction. In any over-all sector study of education and human resource development activities, this training effort must be included. This short-term training must be complemented by long-term plans to prepare such people through reformed education and training institutions within the country that will still be here when the current USAID project closes its doors. Action of Donor Agencies During the course of the mission I met with most of the major donor agencies who deal with education (see Annex 1 for a list of visits). Most international agencies involved in BiH, as already mentioned, are still in the crisis mode, responding to immediate needs for school reconstruction and emergency supplies. The work is coordinated by the Human Rights group of the Office of the High Commissioner. There is no attempt, as yet, of the international community to encourage close coordination within the framework of an over-all educational development policy for the country, except in crisis-context situations such as the return of refugees to Sarajevo (see section on Sarajevo Declaration, above). As the situation both internally and externally progresses to a concern for medium and long-term educational development, there must be increased efforts of the international community to encourage the local authorities to develop medium and long-term educational development and reform efforts. This will involve large projects extending over several years for such reform to be effective. A first step, as noted elsewhere, would be the appointment within one of the major donor agencies of a full-time educational policy expert to work with both the donor community and the local governments on policies, plans and donor project development. And, as noted above, a major education sector study should be sponsored by one or more international agencies to go into further detail on the issues outlined above plus the many other issues that a brief mission such as this one can not cover. In Summary Unfortunately, in two weeks one can only scratch the surface in an assessment of the current education situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina. I am confident that I have missed numerous important elements of the equation and I have neglected adequately to describe the efforts of many local and international agencies and organizations. I am equally confident, however, that the over-all conclusions are valid. Attention must shift from the crisis mode to the institution-building mode in both the international and the BiH communities. Processes and infrastructure must be built even while many political issues remain contentious and unresolved in a satisfactory fashion. With increasing development and reform of the education as well as other sectors and with various degrees of dialogue, even these contentious political issues may be resolved over time. Annexes: 1 - People Interviewed 2 - Sarajevo Canton Education Working Group (Sarajevo Declaration) Annex 1 - People Interviewed Ms. Heike Alefsen Representative of the Council of Europe Secretariat Strossmayerova 6 71000 Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Susan Barnes British Council Obala Kulina Bana 4/II Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina Mr. Wolfgang Amadeus Brülhart Embassy of Switzerland in Sarajevo Ms. Lynn Cohen UNESCO/UNDP Projecrt in Educational Planning and Management Sarajevo Bosnia-Herzegovina Mr. Bertrand Desmoulins Director of Sarajevo Office of UNICEF Bosnia-Herzegovina Mr. Dizdar Safet, Director Osnova Skola-Pofalici Sarajevo Bosnia-Herzegovina Ms. Elizabeta Delic Cultural and Civic Affairs Specialist United States Information Service Fra Andjela Zvizdovica 1/X, UNIS building Bosnia and Herzegovina Dr. Srebren Dizdar Professor, Faculty of Philosophy University of Sarajevo Bosnia-Herzegovina Mr. Jakob Finci, Executive Director Open Society Fund, Bosnia-Herzegovina Dzenetica Cikma 2, Sarajevo Bosnia-Herzegovina Ms. Janet Garvey Public Affairs Officer United States Information Service Fra Andjela Zvizdovica 1/X, UNIS building Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Bonnie Gutman Assistant Public Affairs Officer United States Information Service Fra Andjela Zvizdovica 1/X, UNIS building Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Esma Hadzagic Deputy Minister of Education, Science and Information Sarajevo Canton Bosnia and Herzegovina Prof dr Zehra Hubijar Prof. dr. Zehra Hubijar Dean, Pedagoska Akademija Skenderija 68, Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina Mr. Abdulah Jabucar Assistant Minister for Education Federal Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport Obala Maka Dizdara 2, Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina Mr. Nedim Jaganjac UNESCO/UNDP Project in Educational Planning and Management Sarajevo Bosnia-Herzegovina Ms. Tanya Jerlagic Assistant Program Coordinator Civitas Project, USIS Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Patricia Johnson Country Director, USAID Technical Training Program World Learning (Experiment in International Living) Dubrovacka 6, 2nd flr 7100 Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Tina S. Kaidanow US Embassy Alipasina 43, Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina Mr. Colin Kaiser UNESCO Representative Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina Mr. Richard Kauzlarich Ambassador, US Embassy Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Miranda Kazantis Human Rights Coordinator and Chair of the Education Committee Office of the High Representative Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina Mr. Hazim Kazic Soros Foundation Science and Education Program Director Dzenetica Cikma 2 Sarajevo Bosnia-Herzegovina Mr. Malik Kulenovic Minister of Education, Science and Information Sarajevo Canton Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Mira Merlo Advisor, Ministry of Education, Culture, Science and Sport Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina Ms. Hasniya Muratovic UNDP/UNESCO project on Educational Planning and Management Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Jasminka Nalo Advisor, Ministry of Education, Culture, Science and Sport Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina Prof. Azra Jaganjac, PhD Director, Project Implementation Unit World Bank/Federal Ministry of Education, Science, Culture and Sport Obala Maka Dizdara 2, Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Dervisa Pleho Teacher, upper elementary grades Elementary School Pofalici Sarajevo, Bosnia Herzegovina Ms. Ariane Quentier PI Officer, UNHCR Office of the Special Envoy UNIS Bldg, Towar A Fra Andela Zvizdovica 1 Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Erna Ribar Information Officer UNICEF, Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina Mr. Zlatan Sabic, Deputy Director M.I.T. Center (Management Information Technology) Economics Faculty University of Sarajevo Bosnia-Herzegovina Mr. Dizdar Safet Principal, Elementary School Pofalici Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina Mr. Michael J. Senko Deputy Chief of Mission US Embassy Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina Mr. Safet Smajkic, Professor Pedagoska Akademija 71000 Sarajevo Skenderija 72 Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Amila Terzimenic Council of Europe/UNESCO-ASP Civitas Project Prof. Milos Trifkovic University of Sarajevo Bosnia and Herzegovina Mr. Nusret Voloder, Director Pedagogical Institute of Sarajevo Canton Bosnia and Herzegovina Ms. Esperanza Vives Education Officer UNICEF Sarajevo Bosnia-Herzegovina Mr. Bill Warnock Country Director World Vision International Muvekita 2, 3rd flr. 71000 Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina Mr. Mate Zivkovic Federation Ministry of Education, Office of the Deputy Minister MinisterialLiaison to Civitas@Bosnia Herzegovina Mostar Bosnia-Herzegovina Mr. Nusret Voloder, Director Pedagogical Institute of Sarajevo Canton Bosnia and Herzegovina An Assessment of Educational Renewal and Reform in Bosnia-Herzegovina Seth Spaulding, University of Pittsburgh, USA USIS, Sarajevo, 3/14/1998 Page21 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------