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On August 23, the Minister of education M. Kuneva presented for public discussion draft standard for civil, health, environmental and intercultural education. Although presented primarily as regulating lesson of the class,the standard with the complex name has much wider application: in extracurricular activities, enhanced training and even as a separate subject. Although the topics of traffic safety, financial literacy and action to terrorist threats were explicitely underlined during its presentation, the standard provides a much wider range of subjects, divided into four components of the standard - civic, health, environmental and intercultural education.

Accidentally or not, intercultural competencies and formation of tolerance to which it should contribute, were not mentioned during the presentation of the standard, maybe because protection of these values is not very popular or because they are considered natural and understandable "with indisputable clarity" from all. In fact, the original idea of the standard, which was formulated back in 2010 was to be for civic and intercultural education and to regulate not only the purely technical requirements but also strategic policies for the development of student government and the creation of a multicultural school environment.

At first reading, the submitted for public discussion draft is considerably more narrow  technically from the original idea of it, as the key / strategic and innovative elements in it are omitted. The presented version surprised also the members of the working group, which developed it because it was not discussed beforehand with them.

The presented version is draft and can be changed and improved. Comments and suggestions on it send to "Educational programs and educational content", e-mail: kosta.kostov@mon.bg and a.zgurov@mon.bg to September 7, 2016.

The draft version, see here

Analysis of the proposed draft version coming soon to www.amalipe.com

Regulation on the status and professional development of teachers, principals and pedagogical experts was another document published by the Ministry for public discussion which purpose is to determine the state educational standard  for the status and professional development of teachers, principals and other pedagogical specialists in the system of preschool and school education.

Amalipe Center welcomes the efforts of the Ministry of Education and Science to regulate the status and professional development of teachers,principals and other pedagogical specialists. When the teacher has a clear perspective on how his/her career could help him/her to raise their status, receive recognition and satisfaction, it would give him/her the freedom to be creative in their efforts to help every child become the best performer, to achieve the best for himself/herself and be able to do it.

Comments of Amalipe aim to improve the standard so that it creates conditions for the development and qualification of each Bulgarian teacher, regardless of location, environment and type of school, where teaches and are based to the constant networking with over 170 schools, part of the program of Amalipe Center and Trust for social achievement "Every student will be a winner." They concern the continuing training and the need for it to include acquisition of knowledge and skills in practice (not just theoretically).

The Regulation states that ongoing training is aimed at continuing professional and personal development of pedagogical specialists. We believe, however, for now the Regulation focuses only on theoretical knowledge of pedagogical specialists, but does not include the acquisition and upgrading of knowledge and skills in practice and should therefore contain the following text 'participation in the practical application of pedagogical innovation and exchange of experience between different educational institutions. "

Over the past six years the basic approach that Amalipe Center applied while working with schools is the approach of the schools 'mentors': schools are divided into groups of three or four with similar specifics, pedagogical specialists exchange and share their experience through visits, joint activities, open classes between schools and thus, in practice, they develop and enrich their skills. The approach has proved that it is highly appreciated by educational experts, which was specifically emphasized in the assessment of the implementation of the project "Every student could be a winner", made by the "Proxima Consult" Ltd. and "Global Metrix" Ltd. agencies in February-March 2015 .

Amalipe Center welcomes the applied by the Regulation approach, the assessment of the development and qualification of educational specialists to be based not on gained work experience, but on other criteria. At the same time, we believe that in order each teacher to feel valuable and encouraged in his/her work, his/her results should be evaluated primarily in terms of the progress achieved by the students he/she works with, especially children with special educational needs, children in risk children - bilingual etc. The impression of the Regulation in its version offered for discussion creates (especially in some articles (Art. 58, Art. 67, Art. 84), which describe the professional portfolio, the process of attestation, etc.) that the results of the students are perceived only as "certificates and prizes from participating in competitions, olympiads and others." This again leads to underestimation and belittling the efforts of teachers who work in marginalized communities and in small settlements, and who managed to turn a child with poor command of Bulgarian language, for example, into active student who not only covers the basic educational requirements, but also takes active citizenship, actively participates in school life and beyond, includes in various volunteer activities, etc. I.e. the success of the teacher should be measured by the change that a child achieves compared to himself, not comparing with others (eg, contests, competitions, etc.) where there is significant subjective factor. In this sense, we propose a change to reflect this comment to be made in the above articles.

The entire statement can be read here.