Reviews of National Policies for Education Education in Latvia (eBook)

Oecd (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2016 | 1. Auflage
288 Seiten
OECD Publishing (Verlag)
978-92-64-25726-9 (ISBN)

Infos

How can Latvia improve the quality and equity of its education system and realise long-term efficiency gains? This report covers the whole education system from early childhood education and care to tertiary education and provides an assessment of Latvia’s policies and practices against the best approaches in education and skills across the OECD. This international comparison brings to the fore the many strengths of Latvia’s education system, but also highlights the challenges it faces and provides a number of recommendations in response. This report will be of value to Latvia but also policy makers in other countries looking to raise the quality, equity and efficiency of their education systems.

Textauszug

Chapter 2. Early childhood education and care in Latvia1

This chapter reviews early childhood education and care (ECEC) in Latvia. All children are entitled to an ECEC place from 1.5 years old, and participation is compulsory for children aged five and six. It is provided and funded largely by municipalities, but private provision has grown in recent years, particularly in larger cities. Latvia spends a relatively large share of its GDP on ECEC compared with OECD countries. Barriers exist however for developing a high-quality and motivated ECEC profession and municipalities vary in their capacity to fund, deliver and monitor provision.

Latvia should continue to expand ECEC, particularly for younger children and those in rural areas; take a more strategic approach to improving the quality and status of the profession; strengthen data collection, monitoring and the use of research in policy making; and review the governance and funding arrangements for ECEC to support the achievement of national policy goals.

Introduction

High-quality early childhood education and care is positively associated with the cognitive, social and emotional development of children, and achievement among all children (OECD, 2006; Heckmann and Masterov, 2007; Heckman, 2012). In Latvia early childhood education and care (ECEC) covers all institutional arrangements providing care and education for children under primary school age – 1 to 7 years of age. Some countries make a distinction between “child care” – looking after children while their parents are at work – and “early education” – enhancing child development and preparing children for formal schooling. In practice, the division is not clear, as there are opportunities to learn in settings labelled “care”, and “educational” settings provide care for children. The use of the term ECEC supports an integrated and coherent approach to policy and provision which is inclusive of all children and all parents, regardless of their employment or socio-economic status (OECD, 2001, 2006; Bennett, 2008a). Although ECEC in Latvia is often referred to as “pre-school education”, which would suggest a primary focus on early education, it recognises that ECEC arrangements fulfil a wide range of objectives, including care, learning and social support.

Most of today’s rising generation in Latvia will have spent part of their early childhood in some form of ECEC programme. After a period of contraction in the early 1990s, service provision began to recover later that decade and the recovery has continued ever since. Nowadays around 90% of 5- and 6-year-olds are enrolled in ECEC (OECD, 2014a). Still, the transition to universal enrolment is incomplete as participation in ECEC, especially for children under the age of three, remains relatively low and unequal throughout the country. There are calls for greater investment in the quality of the ECEC workforce and better monitoring of educational quality in general. Current governance and financing arrangements also hamper equal access to high-quality ECEC.

This chapter starts with an overview of the ECEC provision in Latvia, followed by a detailed analysis of the key policy issues it faces. It concludes by presenting concrete policy recommendations for strengthening ECEC provision throughout Latvia.

Context and main features

Governance and financing

In Latvia, ECEC is an autonomous function of local governments. The central government has at its disposal powerful steering mechanisms, such as legislation and discretionary funding, to motivate and enable local authorities to deliver agreed outcomes. The legal foundations for ECEC institutions, whether public or private, are laid down in the Education Law, the General Education Law, the Law on Local Governments and the regulations approved by the institution’s founder, as well as various other regulatory enactments regarding health and safety that are also used for external evaluation purposes (Eurypedia, 2015).

To ensure a certain length of participation in ECEC programmes, many countries provide legal entitlements to ensure access to affordable, high-quality ECEC. Since 2011, all children in Latvia have had a legal entitlement to ECEC from 1.5 years of age. Latvia thus belongs to a small group of EU countries in which children have a legal entitlement to ECEC from a very early age, although in countries like Denmark, Finland and Sweden, entitlement starts earlier: from their first year onwards. In addition, since 2002 the last two years of ECEC, i.e. for children aged 5 and 6, have been compulsory in Latvia.

In Latvia, ECEC is defined comprehensively, encompassing the cognitive, socio-emotional and health development of the child. The Education Law of Latvia, for example, states that ECEC, or “pre-school education” as it is often referred to in Latvia, is “an educational level in which multi-dimensional development of the child as an individual, in the strengthening of health and preparation for the acquisition of primary education takes place” (Eurypedia, 2015). The central government has defined the main objectives and tasks of ECEC in the State Pre-school Education Guidelines (Box 2.1).

Box 2.1. Objectives and primary tasks of ECEC (“pre-school education”) in Latvia

The State Pre-school Education Guidelines define the objective of ECEC as follows:

The objective of ECEC is the promotion of the comprehensive and harmonious development of a child, observing his or her development patterns and needs, knowledge, skills and attitudes required for an individual and social life, thereby purposefully ensuring the child has the chance to prepare for the acquisition of basic education.

The guidelines stipulate that the primary tasks of ECEC shall be:

• to promote the development of physical skills and movements of a child

• to promote the development of self-esteem, awareness of abilities and interests, development of feelings and will of a child

• to promote the development of cognition and curiosity of a child, ensuring the acquisition of knowledge and skills

• to promote the development of communication and co-operation skills of a child

• to promote the forming of a child’s positive attitude towards himself or herself, other persons, the environment and the State of Latvia

• to promote the development of safe and healthy lifestyle skills of a child.

In addition the guidelines include a description of the pedagogical process, the content and learning outcomes, and how the evaluation process is organised.

Source: Cabinet of Ministers (2010), Regulations Regarding the Guidelines for the State Pre-school Education, Regulation No. 709, adopted 3 August 2010, Cabinet of Ministers, Republic of Latvia, Riga.

In Latvia, municipalities are obliged to ensure that children who have declared residence in the administrative territory of the municipality are able to access ECEC in the institution closest to their home. ECEC is largely the responsibility of municipalities.

The founders of public ECEC institutions are municipalities, while private institutions can be founded by people or legal entities such as foundations and non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Municipalities may establish an ECEC institution upon the request of parents of at least ten children living in their administrative territory. In case of children with special needs this number is eight. Children are enrolled when parents have submitted all necessary documents, and if there is a place available. Entrance tests are prohibited and parents and guardians are in principle free to choose among different types of ECEC institutions, i.e. those offering general programmes, programmes in minority languages (e.g. Russian or Polish), programmes for children with special education needs, and programmes for children with both special education needs and in minority languages.

In reality, however, the low population density in some parts of the country may limit choices, despite municipalities providing free bus transportation to children in remote areas. In the larger cities, shortage of places similarly limits parents’ and guardians’ choices.

Each municipality has a Board of Education to perform all education-related functions from ECEC to upper secondary education, including the founding and supervising of ECEC institutions. These municipal boards need to co-ordinate with the Ministry of Education and Science (MoES) on any issues relating to the establishment, reorganisation and closure of these institutions, however. Each board can develop its own binding regulations, which in turn means that decision-making processes regarding ECEC can differ between municipalities.

As in many OECD countries, both parents and community members play an important role in the governance of ECEC institutions in Latvia, including through participating in school boards. For example, the school boards have a decision-making role in the rules governing the daily life in the ECEC institution, and have a consultative role on issues related to the choosing of educational content, methods and materials (MoES, 2015).

Financing ECEC

A growing body of research evidence suggests the need for significant public financial investment supporting a sustainable and equitable ECEC system (OECD, 2006; Bennett, 2008b; Cleveland and Krashinsky, 2004; UNICEF, 2008). Latvia’s public commitment to ECEC is demonstrated by its...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 23.5.2016
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Sozialwissenschaften ► Pädagogik
• Themenwelt: Wirtschaft ► Betriebswirtschaft / Management ► Allgemeines / Lexika
• ISBN-10: 92-64-25726-8 / 9264257268
• ISBN-13: 978-92-64-25726-9 / 9789264257269