The Challenges
The CEECIS region was long known for universal education with broad gender equality and relatively high learning achievements. Yet the economic, social and political upheaval of the period of transition placed enormous stress on education systems. The break-up of the Soviet Union and the Former Yugoslavia in the late eighties and early nineties led to the birth of 22 independent states across Central Asia, the Caucasus, Western CIS and South-eastern Europe. Independence brought with it a period of transition that wreaked havoc across the region, giving rise to war, ethnic hatred, intense political instability, economic collapse and the destruction of social services. Schools were and are caught in the cross-fire of ongoing conflict, shrinking social sector budgets, changing national identities and obsolete curricula, among other things. While overall enrolment rates remain quite high, 2.4 million children of primary school age and 12 million children of secondary school age were out of school in 2004. Disparities in access and completion of basic education vary by country but worrying gaps are found for children affected by conflict, children from disadvantaged families, children of marginalised ethnic groups (especially the Roma in Central and South-Eastern Europe), children with special educational needs, and, in some cases, girls - with Turkey and Tajikistan not on track to achieve Millennium Development Goal 3, which calls for gender equal access to primary school. A 2009 report published by the Regional Office entitled ‘Learning achievement in the CEECIS region: a comparative analysis of the PISA 2006 results’ confirms that education quality in the region has not kept pace with its economic development. Fifteen-year-old students in the CEECIS region scored significantly below their peers in Western Europe in reading, mathematics and science, on average. Furthermore, in UNICEF Education programme countries , students were over 30 per cent less likely to achieve the proficiency benchmark in all three subjects than in EU 8 countries. These results show an undesirable level of learning outcomes, which indicates that education is not meeting the needs of students with regard to basic skills and life skills needed for positive participation in society and the workforce.
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