Macedonian Education System

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   Hello, I was wondering if someone can explain to me how the education system works in Macedonia concerning ethnic minorities. 

For example, is it true that an ethnic minority can receive their entire education in their own native language? If so, how do they learn the Macedonian language? Are Macedonians and ethnic minorities separated in the schools? 

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macedonia Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Senior Member Joined: 01-Feb-2008 Location: Lerinsko Online Status: Offline Posts: 754	Quote Reply #1 Topic: Macedonian Education System Posted: 21-Oct-2011 at 01:56
	Hello, I was wondering if someone can explain to me how the education system works in Macedonia concerning ethnic minorities. For example, is it true that an ethnic minority can receive their entire education in their own native language? If so, how do they learn the Macedonian language? Are Macedonians and ethnic minorities separated in the schools?

N23 Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Senior Member Joined: 03-Feb-2011 Location: Skopje Online Status: Offline Posts: 2159	Quote Reply #2 Posted: 21-Oct-2011 at 02:17
	I will try to explain to you in short way. Yes it's true that they learn on their own native language, but it must be mentioned that only Albanian, Roma and Turk minority are part of this. Part of other minorities, like Serbian and Vlachs, are going to ethnic Macedonian schools, because they have almost same culture, majority of them use Macedonian as native language and etc. They learn Macedonian language from IV th grade in the elementary school till the end of the high school education. Last year, the government tried to include the Macedonian language as a subject from the first grade, but the Albanian minority have protested because they thought it wont be good for their children to study Macedonian language from early ages. So till know, minorities learn Macedonian as separate language from IV th grade. Situation is same at the high school system. Although, at the universities where main language is Macedonian, there are hundreds of students from every minority who don't have problem to study on Macedonian. There are guaranteed places at every university for students who are part of ethnic minorities. About separated schools, we don't have it in majority ethnic suburbs. But in the cities where there isn't any big majority, there's one school and for example Macedonian goes in the morning at school and the students from other ethnic group go after them. I hope you will now get a clear picture of Macedonian education.

macedonia Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Senior Member Joined: 01-Feb-2008 Location: Lerinsko Online Status: Offline Posts: 754	Quote Reply #3 Posted: 21-Oct-2011 at 03:21
	Thank you for making it clear. I did not know that ethnic minorities can learn in their own language, I thought that they learn in Macedonian, and learn their native language as separate language. I have a couple more questions: Is Macedonian history/culture taught to ethnic minorities? Is English taught in the schools?

Marteen Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Newbiе Joined: 24-Aug-2011 Location: Skopje Online Status: Offline Posts: 0	Quote Reply #4 Posted: 21-Oct-2011 at 08:47
	Kids start studying English in 5th (I think) grade as mandatory subject, but there are earlier "preparational" classes even before that. Kids in kinder gardens and 1st-4th grade in elementary school learn a few English words, the alphabet and some songs. We learn English through all levels of our educational system. It's offered in Collages and Universities as English as Second Language (basic) and English as Second Language (advanced). These were optional for me.

mev Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Newbiе Joined: 16-Feb-2012 Online Status: Offline Posts: 0	Quote Reply #5 Posted: 16-Feb-2012 at 21:27
	I would like some clarification about ethnic minorities learning in their own languages. I just spoke to a elementary teacher who said that Roma students learn either Macedonian or Turkish. They are not taught in Romani. Does anyone know if there are textbooks available for learning Romani or for learning Macedonian if the child is a native speaker of Romani?

OCB Members Profile Send Private Message Find Members Posts Add to Buddy List Senior Member Joined: 03-Feb-2011 Location: 54 Online Status: Offline Posts: 921	Quote Reply #6 Posted: 16-Feb-2012 at 21:52
	You can find the answers to your questions (and much more) by reading the following article: http://db.tt/lg3Ynnkh written by Prof. Dr. Wolf Oschlies and published in this book: http://www.springer.com/social+sciences/book/978-1-4020-4868-5