City Council Clashes with the Ministry

The Tbilisi City Council and the Ministry of Education are clashing over the control of the secondary schools. But the partisan agenda seems to overshadow development of the policy in secondary education.

Tbilisi City Council ruled on January 29 to establish the municipal schools. However, the decree was suspended after the Ministry of Education appealed to the Tbilisi court on March 21.

The City Council says it promotes internal democracy in secondary education, gives the parents of the students and the school principals more freedom to design curricula and manage day-to-day business.

According to the draft the schools would be managed by specially created board of trustees, a council approved by a local governance body and the council of teachers. The board of trustees, consisting of 5 elected parents and 4 teachers elects a school principal.

Currently, the Ministry of Education fully manages the school and appoints the principals. The City Council draft says the ministry should only monitor the conformity of the managerial practices and school curricula to the national standards. Among other things, the Ministry will not have a right to dismiss a school principal according to the City Council draft.

Some principals disagree. “It is incorrect to exclude Ministry from the school management. If we want to do something good for schools, we must do it in cooperation with the Ministry,” Liana Shetsiruli, principal of the No 1 Gymnasium, told Civil Georgia.

Some teachers say that involvement of parents in the management is also controversial. “I am doubtful about the parents’ involvement. This might become a widespread tendency and parents, which would become members of the board of trustees, might start requesting privileges for their children,” teacher Tamar Khatishvili says.

However many parents of the students hail the initiative precisely because it would increase their involvement in the management.
 
“It will be good if the parents participate in the school processes. This could help eliminating the principals’ unilateral management and consequent problems, that we face today,” Tamar Machavariani told Civil Georgia.

Gia Murghulia, initiator of the project and chairman of the Education Committee of the City Council, explained that thus management of schools will become easier, but concedes the draft provides no mechanism for selecting parents and teachers to the board of trustees.

Many experts say that the confrontation between the City Council and the Education Ministry on the issue of school management exists because of political reasons and aggravates on the eve of the upcoming Parliamentary elections. The claims gain validity as the opposition political forces control the City Council, while the Ministry of Education has been known for declaring the schools a “politics-free area.”

Vasil Maghlaperidze, chairman of the Education Subcommittee of the Parliament says this policy of the Ministry was a smokescreen for forcing the school principals to manipulate their subordinates into supporting pro-governmental parties during the elections. Influence of the school principals on the local communities is also quite high, especially in the provinces and rural areas.

“Before the elections the directors are convened to the Ministry of Education and instruct them to secure the votes [for the pro-governmental parties]. That is why the Ministry does not want to give up such privilege by loosing influence on directors,” Maghlaperidze says.

The National Union of Education, an NGO, argues there also is an economic layer to the current debate, as the winning side will control a grant, issued by the World Bank in frames of Education System Realignment and Strengthening Program. They also say politics plays an important role.

“Executive government and the opposition-controlled Council want to achieve success in the elections with support of the school directors, because usually 80% of the district election commission chairmen are school directors. They also want to manage the USD 60 million program of the World Bank for the education system,” Giorgi Amashukeli, chairman of the Union, told Civil Georgia.

The Ministry of Education dismisses accusations. Its representative David Gochashvili explained that the Ministry has appealed to the court only because the draft of the City Council contradicts with existing legislation laws.

In response to the City Council’s initiative the Ministry of Education adopted a rivaling regulation. It establishes highly centralized structure, by which the Ministry establishes a school and appoints a principal based on open competition.

However, as the non-governmental organization the International Institute of Education Policy, Planning and Management states, this project of the Education Ministry is very general and does not consider implementation of real reforms in the system.

“We believe that the Education Ministry tries to assure the society that the education system is undergoing a process of decentralization by implementing only ‘cosmetic’ changes,” Giorgi Shervashidze, representative of the institute told Civil Georgia.

The institute has developed own project on “Decentralizing and Developing Management of the Education System”, which at certain extent concurs with the decision of the City Council. In particular, the project suggests clear distinction of functions along the management chain. Under this proposal, the Ministry of Education will form a functional link in a chain, which will be defining the education policy, general standards and conduct monitoring. Appointment of directors will be a function of the board of trustees.

Pre-election games are, however obscuring the discussion on policy issues, and the discussion of the rivaling regulations barely moves beyond accusations of the political forces that back them. Observers fear, such competition is heightening apathy on part of the parents and students.

By Tea Gularidze, Civil Georgia