engleski

Chapter 11: CONCLUSIONS

Croatia tertiary education sector was subjected to substantial changes in the last decade. The Act on Higher Education Institutions that was adopted in 1993 introduced several measures aimed at modernizing universities, created the basis for the establishment of the quality assurance system and initiated development of a binary system. Since then, a number of non-university tertiary education institutions have been established, leading to a diversification of programmes being offered and increased student enrolment. The increase has been substantial, especially in the category of fee paying students. Such higher enrolment was not accompanied by a corresponding increase in the hiring of academic staff, which in some fields led to dramatically high teaching loads. The deficit was partially compensated by substantial engagement of early stage researchers in teaching, even though Croatian universities have not adequately linked teaching and research activities. During the last decade there was a substantial regional development of tertiary education. Universities in Rijeka, Osijek and Split expanded their activities, three new universities were established in Dubrovnik, Zadar and Pula and a number of polytechnics and schools of professional higher education were established outside of Zagreb. Still, more than half of tertiary education activities take place in Zagreb. The tertiary education system was governed by the Ministry of Science until 2003 when it was merged with the Ministry for Education into the Ministry for Science, Education and Sports. This merger created some obstacles to the progression of tertiary education reforms but it also made possible the development of a comprehensive policy for the entire educational sector. In 2001, at the Ministerial conference in Prague, Croatia co-signed the Bologna Declaration and decided to implement all action lines of the Bologna Process. Since then, specialized expert bodies for the promotion and implementation of the Bologna Process have been created at the universities’ level, within the Rectors’ Conference and the Ministry, and numerous seminars and workshops have been organized, partially with financial support by Tempus and CARDS projects. Several foreign evaluator committees have evaluated Croatian universities and suggested directions for future changes.

biti će upisane naknadno

nije evidentirano