Deputy Chair of the Education, Science and Culture Committee, Guguli Maghradze held the online meeting with the Coalition “Youth for Education Reform” of the “Progress Center”.

Issues such as state policy, priorities and reforms on the higher education system were discussed at the meeting. G. Maghradze spoke about the important laws adopted by the legislature and focused on the specifics of the Committee's oversight activities.

The Deputy Chair informed the youth about the important laws adopted by the Parliament, the implementation of which serves the main goal announced by the Government of the country - to ensure access to quality education for each young person. She paid special attention to the Law on Vocational Education, which fundamentally changed the place and role of vocational education in the country, thus taking an important step towards strengthening the economy, overcoming poverty and reducing unemployment.

G. Maghradze also introduced a number of laws adopted by the Parliament in 2016-2020, which are aimed at improving the quality of general education.

In order to improve the oversight, Guguli Maghradze introduced the youth to the Thematic Inquiry procedure provided for in the new Rules of Procedure of the Parliament, which allows the relevant Parliamentary Committees to conduct a more comprehensive study of this or that issue in the field and prepare recommendations for executive bodies. The Education Committee conducted five such thematic inquiries in 2019-2020 alone.

Students were interested in the content of the laws adopted to bring the higher education quality closer to international standards and presented their views on the challenges penetrating in the education system.

The questions they asked concerned a wide range of issues: whether it is planned to change the format of national exams, how to increase the role of higher education institutions in the student selection process, how to amend the funding system of higher education institutions, how to resolve the issue of suspended student status, how to replace compulsory military service with other forms available, further prospects of student dormitories, terms of master's studies, as well as the shortcomings in the field of general education, etc.

G. Magradze answered the questions of the young people in detail and expressed confidence that the involvement of young people in solving problems in education will be very useful as they are directly involved in these processes and taking into account their vision will be very worthwhile to make positive changes in this area.

The meeting was part of the Student Rights Support Program, implemented by the Progress Center with the support of NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR DEMOCRACY.

The project brings together hundreds of young people interested in education system reform. The organization has formed coalitions of education experts and young people selected through a competition, the main purpose of whom is to advocate for education policy and promote the successful implementation of reforms.