Skopje, 8 August 2024 (MIA) – Radical changes will take place, but they will be visible once implemented. The Ministry of Education and Science is starting with numerous open fronts, but on all of them with step-by-step procedures, which will lead to serious changes and which will ultimately give a positive effect, said the Education Minister Vesna Janevska. 

Janevska told Kanal 5 TV on Thursday that she expects the school year to start with minimal problems and that everything else will be fine, except that there will be no textbooks for foreign languages, as well as textbooks for ethnic communities in paper form, but uploaded on the website of the Bureau for Development of Education, regarding which, she noted, she and the current government are not to blame.

"Most of them are not approved, we are working intensively to get them approved. But it won't be a serious problem," said the Minister. 

The public debate on the submission of comments and remarks on the curricula and programs for the seventh, eighth and ninth grades will last longer because of the summer holidays, she noted, and once all suggestions have been collected, the creation of new curricula and programs for these grades will begin.

"After that, we will return to the curricula and programs and to the previous grades because we want to have new optional subjects, many other curricular and extracurricular activities, but this will take place without great turbulence and problems that would appear in the teaching. So, in the next few years, I believe we will wrap up on the entire primary education. Since we are also listening to the stakeholders who need to be heard, I hope that it will take time and give a good result," the Minister pointed out. 

Asked whether the Ministry would implement in the textbooks something that has been agreed upon by the Macedonian-Bulgarian history commission, whose work has been at a standstill for a long time, Janevska said recommendations should be seen first because, she noted, "we have not received anything official so far ".

"I believe that our part of the commission will know how to protect our national identity and language, our state interests, and if there are any recommendations in such a case - yes, it could be implemented. But I will say again, a textbook - which is a special category of book, includes scientific truth, not political truth, and if the commission adheres to science and has a common position, I think that in the future it could be implemented in textbooks as well," Janevska told Kanal 5 TV. 

As regards when sex education and gender topics such as gender identity should be introduced, the Minister said that children should "receive appropriate information at an appropriate age, when they can perceive it properly."

She believes that there should be no taboo topics, but they should be dealt with at an appropriate age, and also there are many other priorities in education.

"In such a relatively conservative society, we must also ask parents when they think it is appropriate for their children to learn about something other than reproductive health. Given that in the past authorities insisted on comprehensive sex education from an early age, we saw the sharp reaction of society and we as a Government advocate sex education in terms of reproductive health, protection against unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, protection against sexual aggression, and what they could perceive in the seventh or eighth grade, they will study in the appropriate subjects - Biology, Civic Education, etc., while at an older age, i.e. in high school, it is not a problem to learn about the existence of other sexual orientations. It shouldn't be a taboo topic, but it should neither be the main topic, because, as we saw the other day, our kids don't know what Ilinden is," said Janevska. 

As regards teachers' paychecks, and the Minister's statement earlier on Thursday that there will be no raises in September but in March 2025, when paychecks will be increased by some 12 percent, Janevska asked for understanding from the teachers stressing that they deserve better. 

"I ask them that we must be realistic, we don't have a hole, but we have a crater in the Budget. We must first produce money, i.e. a business that will fill the Budget so that we can raise the wages... They deserve better and should expect better, I will do my utmost as much as possible. According to the General Collective Agreement, they should get a pay rise in March, and they will get that pay rise," said Janevska. 

According to her, collective agreements from the previous government were signed for populist reasons and before elections "in order to get votes without taking into account the economy and whether the state can bear such burden".

Photo: MIA archive / print screen