National Assembly’s Education Committee Chairman Zoran Sami and representatives of the Mathematical Society of Serbia declared the announced alterations to the curricula in vocational high-schools decreasing the weekly math class load, a process that could damage Serbian education.

The Education Committee Chairman and representatives of the Mathematical Society of Serbia talked today at the National Assembly House about the announced reform of the curricula for vocational high-schools. The President of the Mathematical Society of Serbia Zoran Kadelburg and Society representatives Aleksandar Lipkovski and Zevdzo Huric handed in to Chairman Sami the unanimously adopted conclusions of the Society’s regular annual assembly of 14 January this year, requesting the Committee’s support for their demands. The Mathematical Society of Serbia believes that the current drafting of the new high-school curricula has been done without the participation of the professional and concerned public and that the decrease in mathematics class load is a phenomenon unheard of in Europe and the world. The Society requests that the compulsory minimum of mathematics classes in all technical schools be 4 classes a week in all four grades, while in other profiles the number of classes may not be decreased below the current level.

Education Committee Chairman Zoran Sami stressed that this is a serious problem concerning not only the mathematics class load, but the class load of Serbian language, history and geography too, aimed at transforming vocational schools into craft schools. He added that he would convene a Committee sitting to deal with the topic as soon as the next plenary session of the National Assembly is scheduled, to which he would invite the Minister of Education and representatives of the Education Council and Institute for Advancement of Education and Upbringing.