A Closer Look at the Greek Educational System

We are always hearing about the importance of education, the problems in education, new training methods and a bunch of other things related to it. Every country, in accordance with its needs and habits, has designed its own education system that aims to shape the new generation for the healthy development of the country. Education in the broadest sense includes all activities designed to influence the thought, the nature and physical education of the individual in a particular way. This training must be done in a specially designed programme, with specific learning objectives and is limited in time." Here we try to look at the Greek educational system, both at a theoretical and practical level, since this is what we are interested in after all. Firstly, when children are still young, their parents are able to send them to nursery school. As in other cases concerning the educational system, here the law seems to change from year to year. At first, attending nursery school was not compulsory, then it was and now once again it is not. Decisions of individual politicians who, in an attempt to show that they are making changes to improve the system, turn to easy solutions.

Afterwards, at the age of six, children are compulsorily sent to primary school. They will stay there for 6 years where they will receive a basic education. They will be taught Modern Greek, mathematics, physics, physical education, religious education and various other subjects. Each day children go to school at 8.15 and leave between 12.30 and 4.30. The exact timetable depends on the grade of the child and the individual school. After 6 years the students will automatically be enrolled at a secondary school. This can be either a musical or athletic school, or a classic secondary school. As the names of the musical and athletic schools suggest, at the former children learn a lot about the history, the theory and the practice of contemporary and traditional music and at the latter children choose a sport which they want to follow . For 3 years students will attend secondary school. There the system is a bit more austere and impersonal. The climate changes, there and the behaviour is not the same as at the primary school. Students will need to study more, deal with more things, and participate more actively in class according to their age and abilities. Every 3 months parents will be invited to take their childrens grades which have been given by their teachers according to the performance of each student. At the end of each year, in May and June, students have almost daily tests based on material taught throughout the year. If someones total from the 3 terms and the final written exam is under 38 out of a possible 80, they will have to go back to school in September to take exams which will determine whether they will pass that grade or if they will have to repeat it. In only rare cases does a student actually have to repeat the year, because grades theoretically ranging from 1 to 20 are quite flexible and actually usually range from between 8 to 20. There is, however, another case where a student has to repeat the class. It's when someone has reached the limit of absences, which is admittedly pretty high. Of course, due to personal affairs of the student's family it is quite

often the case that a child does not even complete the 12-year compulsory education. This is a consequence of the states and the schools ignorance. It also required that the school organizes an excursion each month. For this, students will go to a nearby place to rest and learn new things. During the year the school will organize trips to cities in Greece or abroad ranging from one to five days. In recent years several of these were of an environmental nature and were supported financially by various European programmes. Again in theory, compulsory education ends after secondary school but, according to the perceptions of our society and the need for a job most students choose to continue their studies even though they do not have any inclination to learning. This can be either a classic senior secondary school or a kind of college. The first is most often chosen by the better students who later want to study at a university. The latter is chosen by those who want to have technical training in some field. At the classic senior secondary school, at least the first of the three-year total is not significantly different from secondary school. The courses are more or less the same as well as the learning process, which mainly depends on the teacher. Students learn Modern Greek but only in the format of the composition, ancient Greek literature, history, English, mathematics, physics, chemistry and some other minor subjects which they choose. Here the relationship between students and teachers is even more impersonal. In the second and third year students are asked to choose the direction they want to follow according to their preferences. There are three directions theoretical, exact sciences and technological. Depending on the direction of the student, beyond the basic lessons of "general education" as told, they will be asked to focus more on the subjects of their direction. College is primarily a more substandard school. Although initially a wise idea it seems that later on the "recipe" did not succeed. There are several areas which students can choose such as electrical, plumbing, engineering, economics, hairdressing, nursery school teaching, nursing and others. However, these schools do not have the right organization to work properly and the knowledge of students who graduate is incomplete. And after the 3 years of study at senior high school students take pan-Hellenic examinations the results of which will mainly decide the ranking of students in universities and the TEI (Technological Education Institutes). The duration of study in higher education is 8-12 semesters. The entry requirement, namely the grade which one needs to join any of these institutions, is determined by the ministry of education and has slight differences each year. At times there has been the entry requirement of 10, which states that no one will enter a university or a technical school if he has not achieved a total grade of more than 10, but after pressure mainly for economic reasons, this requirement was removed. Generally the membership at the universities is also another issue that concerns the government and it is changed every so often. These changes, however, are not vital. "Obviously" the biggest problem of education is not the final stage, namely the inclusion to universities or colleges, but the path to get there. Greek education has several deficiencies at all its stages. It is the country with the highest percentage of after school education. As bad as it is, the

private schools for tutoring are primarily those that maintain the educational level of Greece and students are rely on them for their inclusion in higher education. Education, especially in senior secondary schools is very poor. Politicians and of course students and parents who either elect them or fail to ask for a more effective education are to blame. The money spent by families for the schooling of their children in foreign languages and secondary education tutoring is far too much. The Greek government spends 4% of the GDP on education and it is supposed to provide effective free education, but that does not seem to happen. Besides the large number of tutorial schools, Greece is heading towards first place for the number of private schools. What can we expect when the ministers of education themselves send their children to private schools? Apart from nursery schools, primary schools, secondary schools, colleges, universities and the TEIs which have been mentioned so far, there is also IEK (Vocational Training), which, depending on the individual field that being offered, accept graduates from either secondary school or senior secondary school. Compared to the TEI, the courses of vocational training institutes are geared towards the labor market and are designed with the cooperation of the state, employers and employees. There is also the Greek Open University (EAP) which is the basis of open and distance learning. The main goal is to offer more educational opportunities to a wide range of interested parties and age groups based on the assumption that education is a right for everyone throughout life. If one considers the Greek educational system at a theoretical level one will clearly identify weaknesses, but if you look at it at a practical level things are much worse. It does not meet the modern day requirements because it fails to provide modern knowledge, education and democratic education and also it rarely recognises the skills and abilities of young people. Common assumption is that the current educational system does not offer students the necessary skills for the future, only the knowledge for the pan-Hellenic examinations and admission to higher education. This is something which is unacceptable and basically wastes so many years that students should have an appetite for learning and creativity. Years in which all young people should be in a period of development and pleasure, far from the unbearable pressure to memorize school material and integrate into a university with much the same system. There is no doubt that education should help to foster the spirit and not just focus on the creation of labour. Subjects such as gymnastics, painting, music and others should play a primary role in every school and not be completely neglected as in the current Greek educational system. Particular attention should be paid to the material taught to students so as for it to be a real source of knowledge. Through schools children are supposed to be educated as the young people who will build the future society. The sterile memorization of facts should be replaced by dialogue and cooperation between students in class through group work, in collaboration with responsible teachers who are worthy of their position.

All this seems to have been observed by officials, and in a climate of change in all areas, they have set a target to change the educational system. As decided, from next year everything

which has been mentioned in this article shall no longer apply and a new educational system will be implemented, a so-called more modern one which is said to set "the students needs first", as has been repeatedly claimed by parrot-like politicians. It is certain that if the mentality of the Greeks does not change and especially the mentality of the Greek educators nothing will change radically as regards the education received by the new generation in Greece. Only time will tell ........