State provides free quality education
Everyone in Pridnestrovie has the right to free quality education. The highest law in the country, its Constitution, makes education compulsatory. The country's policy has been an unequivocal success: Today, Pridnestrovie has the highest literacy ratings in the entire Black Sea region.
Children in Pridnestrovie receive free quality education which meets Western European standards.
Out of 183 schools, 33 primary schools and 16 secondary schools teach exclusively in Moldavian. A total of 11,200 pupils out of 79,000 are taught in Moldavian, with Russian and Ukrainian taught as second languages (foreign language electives). Children in schools have their tuition in one of the three languages and have to learn one more out of the three. In addition, they can learn other European languages, with English and German usually topping the list.
30% of the budget goes to education
In the fiscal year 2005, almost 30% of the total state budget went to scientific, educational and cultural activities laid out by the Constitution of Pridnestrovskaia Moldavskaia Respublica. 60% of educational funds and 52% of computers were renewed. To motivate and keep quality educational staff, the salaries of teachers were increased in 2005.
Pridnestrovie sees itself as preserving the Moldavian language in its pure historic form and Cyrillic script, and considers that the language is Romanian when it uses the Latin script. Even so, Moldavian language schools are allowed to teach in latin script if they prefer to do so. Some of them do. The Ministry of Education does not interfere with what goes on in minority-run schools. It merely ensures that all of the educational institutions in Pridnestrovie have been accredited and to ensure that children do not receive sub-standard education the Ministry oversees that all schools perform their work according to a set of quality standards equivalent to those in other countries. [ More ]
