Teachers and civil activists in Nagorno-Karabakh suggest improvement of schoolchildren 's vocational guidance

On November, 13, a circular table meeting "Problems of education in the context of national security" was held during which a reform on Nagorno-Karabakh educational system was discussed. High-level personnel of Nagorno-Karabakh educational sphere, representatives of institutes of higher education, colleges, senior schools and civil activists had been invited to the meeting. 

Georgy Saakyan, member of the Council and teacher of Artsakh State University, remarked that the institutes of higher education were not turning out a sufficient number of specialists needed for Nagorno-Karabakh's economy, few school-leavers were coming to study at the faculties of basic sciences, there were no modern laboratories, the facilities and equipment were poor, the level of part of professional and teaching staff was low. 

Speaking of school reforms Georgy Saakyan emphasized that pupils of senior schools were not always making the right choice of their major subjects, vocational guidance work was not being done well enough, there was a lack of didactic materials. He paid special attention the problem of small villages and the danger of outflow of people from them to the towns where there were senior schools.

Irina Grigoryan, leader of a non-governmental organization "Institute of People's Diplomacy", said: "Today it is necessary to carry out voluntary work with the parents which will help the school-leavers chose the right direction to become effective for the state".

Valera Balayan, leader of NGO "Public Cultural Center of Artsakh "Tradition" suggested to organize excursions for pupils to various offices and enterprises for the children to have more ideas concerning their future and not yield to their parents' pressure in choice of their professions.

Vladik Khachatryan, Minister of Education of Nagorno-Karabakh, said in his turn that education in Nagorno-Karabakh was considered as a first-priority sphere and the authorities were doing their best to solve the problems existing in this system. According to him, the state is seeking to implement advanced international experience in the educational sphere.

"Caucasian Knot" has formerly reported that in 2007 Nagorno-Karabakh unilaterally joined the Bolognese Declaration and established a 12-year's secondary education.