A Periodic Kaleidoscope on Education and Pedagogy in Hellas

VOLUME 1 NUMBER 2 2004

Hellenic

Pedagogical

Cosmos

A Periodic Kaleidoscope on Education and Pedagogy in Hellas

‘FOLOI’

HellenicPedagogical Cosmos

A Periodic Kaleidoscope on Education and Pedagogy in Hellas

Editor

Dr Leonidas C. Bombas

Contributors

Alexandropoulos, Dionyssios

Kritikou, Anna

Anna Kritikou

Yannoutsos, Katerina

Ziaga, Stavroula

Assistant to the Editor

Kleoniki Bombas

Hellenic Pedagogical Cosmos ( HPC ) is an informative, rather unusual, periodical on educational and pedagogical issues and developments in contemporary Hellas. It is not an academic review in the traditional sense, as such reviews have become known throughout the international academic community. The format is different, the contents as a whole are presented differently. Notwithstanding this HPC seeks, primarily, to serve the needs of all those Anglophones whose access to the esoteric educational atmosphere of Greece is limited due to the Greek language barrier. Throughout the contents of the periodical, the non-Greek speaking reader may find a number of highly synoptic presentations of a variety of educational and pedagogical themes from a wide spectrum of ‘originators’ (e.g. academics, researchers, teachers, parents, students, journalists, politicians, etc) that rarely cross Greek borders via the medium of a ‘foreign’ language. In that sense, the heterogeneous panorama of the synchronous Hellenic pedagogy analyzed in this ‘Cosmos’ may always be of both theoretical interest and practical use to all those involved in the field of education.

Editorial correspondence should be addressed to: Dr Leonidas C. Bombas , 24 Efthimiou Papa Street, 17342 Agios Dimitrios, Greece.

HPC will be published two times a year, in May and November. These two issues constitute one volume.

Athens, Greece: ‘Foloi’ Publications

HELLENIC PEDAGOGICAL COSMOS

Volume 1 Number 2, November 2004

-Editor’s lexis

and…

-The educationalist John Pirgiotakis (24)

-European dimension aspects in Greek schools as the ‘Alpha Hypothesis’ (29)

-Learning difficulties, Dyslexia and…the like: the ‘Central Theme’ (37)

-The governing political party on education (35)

-Article 16 of the Greek Constitution (43)

-A decade ago…the same old themes and problems: part one (33)

-Teaching English in secondary education (22)

-‘The teacher and the curriculum’ in a book review form (48)

-Conferences and Symposia ‘a la Grec’ (17)

-An icon of our Ministers of Education…and their ‘life span’ (13)

-The numbers always tell their story (26)

-About our ‘aliens’ and their educational life in contemporary Greece (45)

-The major reforms well up to 1981 (9)

-A decade ago...the same story: part two (54)

Editor’s Lexis

As expected, the entire educational ‘climate’ in Greece over the last six months has been characterized by mixed feelings of expectations and anxiety as to the exact course that the education system will follow after the March 2004 General Elections and the coming to power of the right wing/conservative party of ‘Nea Dimokratia’. The main proposals and the educational platform of ‘Nea Dimokratia’ have already been presented in brief in H.P.C. (Vol. 1, no.1) and in a rather more revised form are presented in this issue. Thus far, however, eight months after the elections and the ensuing change of government very little -if any- concrete action in the educational affairs may be recorded. Replacing officials at almost all educational levels of the education hierarchy centrally and locally has been seen by many sceptics as another round of appointing ‘our own children’ indiscriminately -a very old and well known tradition/practice each time there is a new government and a new Minister of Education in Greece. Of course it is quite early for major reforms to take place and one has to admit that there have been a series of public declarations for upcoming educational reforms across the education system. We will see in due time!

The fact of the matter is that, on the educational front over the last few months, the issue of illegal (or ‘atypical’) registration (transfer from universities in the Greek periphery) to central universities in Athens and Thessaloniki by the sons and daughters of several politicians prevailed for quite a long time -an unpleasant development that in itself led to the resignations of a minister of the government and of a press spokesman of the official opposition (PASOK).

Concerning the central theme of this issue that focuses on the so-called learning difficulties aspect of schooling world-wide, a number of points are stressed from the Greek perspective. More specifically, a primary school teacher provides a brief account of his personal experiences in the actual classroom with regard to learning difficulties, by sharing with the reader his own thought and school practices in action. Furthermore, a number of ‘explanatory directions’ governing different aspects of the day-to-day schooling of children with learning difficulties issued by the Greek Ministry of Education are also included here. An epigrammatic comment by the editor in a rather critical tone completes the picture -for the time being.

Dr Leonidas C. Bombas

Athens, November 2004

Anthology of educational-pedagogical issues as presented via the press

Do they dare?

New changes in the Greek education system are being prepared by the Ministry of Education. Whether these changes are going to succeed or not …is a matter of secondary importance! And this is so because it is almost certain that the upcoming changes are not going to live for long. The next government, whenever that government comes to power, will change the education system. Most probably, a change of government will not even be needed. The change of the education system could be carried out after a cabinet reshuffle and a new Minister of Education.

As we have argued in the past, this is the main characteristic of the Greek education system. Since 1964 (the specific year that a massive educational reform was implemented by the then liberal-centrist government of G. Papandreou) up to this very day, every government changes the basic features of the education system in Greece, especially so those features and structures concerning the higher education institutions –e.g. the entrance procedures into the higher education institutions.

Every Greek government wants to impose its own political platform. Thus, always, the newcomers tear apart whatever has been ‘built’ by the outgoing administration in the education sector….

The two big political parties (‘Nea Dimokratia’ & ‘PASOK’) which in turn govern the country should agree in the implementation of a mutually acceptable educational policy, so that this series of changes could stop. Do they dare?

(‘To Vima’, 10/10/2004)

A viewpoint on reforms

1. There are strong indications that the learning that our school promises does not finally reach its recipients (students). In international comparative studies measuring students’ knowledge and skills Greece is at the lowest level. This comparative finding along with several other ‘indigenous indices’ of students’ school performance should have made us think as to what is wrong for these gaps in learning and consequently what

we should do to improve the situation;

2. The entire system of initial and in-service training of our teachers at all educational levels is characterized by many problems…The Greek government should present specific demands and standards to the universities that educate and train future teachers;

3. Although there have been improvements over the last few years, the existing system of renewing the educational personnel present serious problems. Among others, special incentives for voluntary retirement of some teachers would allow the biological renewal of the teaching profession as a whole;

4. Curricula and school textbooks should always be adapted to the emerging needs and be renewed regularly, but all these changes should proceed step-by-step and the teachers themselves should be given the opportunity to follow these changes;

5. Approximately 8% of our student population consists of children of immigrants. Some of the non-Greek children were born in Greece. We have to look at this development very carefully using the basic principles and practices of the so-called intercultural approach in very concrete and effective ways – keeping out of futile ideological confrontations concerning cultural differences and the like.

Gotovos, Professor of Education, University of Ioannina)

(‘Kathimerini’, 10/10/2004)

Administrators of Education go to court

The decision of the Minister of Education Ms M Giannakou to fire in the middle of their term all school district superintendents and directors of education at municipal level has created series problems. Not only in that there is the possibility of a general strike of public and private school teachers but, more than that, these fired administrators are taking the Ministry of Education to the Greek courts and to the European courts as well. They accuse the Minister of Education of partisan politics and claim that the Minister is already appointing to these posts teachers who are members or sympathizers of the Nea Dimokratia ruling party….The

administrative pyramid of the education system as a whole consists of 600 individuals plus another 16,000 teachers who serve as administrators at

lower educational levels. It should be reminded that, among other ‘privileges’, these 16,600 individuals, one way or another, are going to be involved in the assessment and the evaluation of 120,000 primary and secondary school teachers across Greece. And that in itself is a very big and ‘hot’ issue. ‘Operation for inventing qualifications’ has been called by many the attempt of the Minister of Education to appoint the new administrators who allegedly lack the actual qualifications for the posts in question.

(‘To Vima’, 1/8/2004)

Greek universities: more students, less money

From this academic year fifteen new Departments are going to start operating within the Greek universities. Approximately 2,000 more students are expected to register in higher education institutions. In all, 82,000 tertiary education places are available this year for the 135,000 candidates of all categories…

The University of Athens has admitted 6,785 new students for the academic year 2004-2005. Once more, the authorities of the University of Athens are submitting their demands to the government to allocate the needed funds for the day-to-day operation of the university. The under-funding problem is a main concern for all Greek universities which strive to serve their increasing student population year after year

(‘To Kapodistriako’, 1/4/200415/6/2004)

Secondary school teachers for the elementary school

Over the last years our education system faces one very important issue/problem: there are no elementary school teachers to be hired for the daily needs of public education. Fortunately, at last, the education system employs all graduates of the Education Departments, all primary school teachers. However, the lack of primary school teachers is becoming more and more pronounced.

On the other hand we are experiencing an apparent antithesis: thousands of secondary school teachers (teachers of Greek language/History, Mathematics, Physics, Religion, Foreign Languages,

etc) with good education suffer from unemployment. No places available

in secondary schools for all those thousands of qualified teachers…

What is the solution to this serious problem? Who may fill the vacant places in primary schools that need teachers for their pupils? Evidently, the teachers educated and trained as secondary school teachers after having undergone an intensive training in pedagogical and psychological issues/aspects of younger children…

To avoid any misunderstanding, this very proposal may be realized and implemented only in cases that no Primary Education Department graduates are available in the teaching profession market.

The GreekState via the Minister of Education has the moral obligation, for social but mostly for educational reasons, to hire secondary school teachers for elementary schools that need teaching personnel.

(G. Babiniotis, Prof. of Linguistics, Rector of the University of Athens)

(‘To Vima’, 10/10/2004)

What is changing again in the education system?

As of the next school year the Ministry of Education intends to change the way primary school pupils are assessed.

Thus, as proposed, the assessment of primary school pupils will be based on: written examinations, twice a year (halfway through the school year and in June), for grades five and six ( the same for all three grades of junior high); additional examinations in between the school terms which will examine a smaller amount of material/phenomena taught periodically.

Senior high school (Lykeio) students will be examined in only six subjects (instead of nine as has been the case so far) when taking part in the pan-Hellenic exams in order to enter to one of the higher education institutions.

The Ministry of Education is in the planning phase for a number of changes to be introduced in the technical-vocational sector of education, while several proposals are under consideration concerning tertiary education: e.g. undergraduate programs of two cycles (successful completion of the first two-year cycle as a prerequisite for continuation into the second cycle), re-examination of the way that university books are free of charge provided to the students, and so on. (‘To Vima’, 19/9/2004)

From the history of the neo-Hellenic education system: a didactic nostalgia

The major reforms of the Greek education system until the year 1981

Almost all analysts of the Greek education system seem to agree that, on the whole, five major reforms have characterized the system since the establishment of the new independent Greek state in the 1930’s. No doubt, throughout the history of the education system several other minor changes and movements did take place but, as A. Dimaras (1978) has noted, such changes cannot be considered as constituting major reforms, since they only “touched” upon one level-aspect of the entire educational pyramid in Greece.

Thus being the case, on examining the latest massive reform of 1976 and its impact on the Greek education system as a whole, Dimaras has summarized his remarks as follows:

There are, in the history of Greek education, four periods when major reform plans were formulated: 1913, 1929, 1959, and 1964. Three of these (1913, 1929 and 1964) have in common a number of characteristics. They were compiled by liberal governments, they proposed the extension of compulsory schooling, they supported Demotike, and they viewed the system in a global way. In fact, they are successive stages of the same attempt to organize and reform the system.

The fifth major reform is that of 1976 which was introduced by the then conservative government of the New Democracy Party under the leadership of the present President of the country, Constantine Karamanlis. The conservative government in 1975 had found itself in a very difficult position. The constant demands for major reforms in the education system were strong and continuous after the fall of the military dictatorship in July 1974. The governing party of New Democracy – willing or not- had no other alternative. The chaos created by the junta of 1967 – 74 in the entire educational system along with the Greek people’s “thirst” for some new (democratic and modern) ideas in education “pushed” the conservative government into reforming the education system at all levels. For the most part, the reform of 1976 was based on the reform of 1964 proposed by the centrist government of George Papandreou. A reform that had been opposed as too progressive by the conservatives, the same conservatives who adopted the reform in 1976 as

the panacea for the crippling system left behind by the colonels.

Without going into detail about each educational reform, it is of importance to note that the three reforms compiled by liberal governments had not had the chance to make their presence felt in the Greek education

system. Thus, the first reform (1913) was never implemented because of the strong opposition exerted by both influential party members (liberals) and the “conservative strongholds such as the University of Athens”. As for the other two liberal reforms, although they had the opportunity to be tried in practice – with the support of the majority of the Greek people – were not destined to last for long. Two oppressive – extreme rightist – dictatorships “attacked” these progressive approaches to education (1935 and 1967) and, unfortunately, the reforms were never realized. On the whole, the reforms of 1913, 1929, and 1964 and to an extent, that of 1976, were aimed at promoting vocational and technical education.

The well known themes that have been associated with almost every educational reform across social-national contexts were not missing from the “Greek case”. The notions of democratisation, modernisation, equal opportunity for all peoples, and more so, the creation of the “thinking citizen” were the declared goals of these liberal reformers. The reform of 1959 consisted basically of a piece of legislation which focused on the organisation of technical and vocational education. No settlement was reached during those years of conservative government (late 1950’s) regarding the perennial “language question”. The appointed committee (1957), which had the mandate to study the issues and prepare recommendations for educational reforms, paid no attention to the crucial issue of democratising the system.