“Minister must have an Armenian education”
A number of members of the Public Council are getting ready to present a special proposal to Serzh Sargsyan to have Armenian education as a condition for appointing an education or culture minister.
They raised this issue today during the session of the Public Council's subcommittee on religion, preservation of historical, cultural and national values of the Diaspora and world integration committee.
There were mainly two topics being discussed, including the preservation of Armenian cultural monuments in Turkey and the opening of foreign language schools in Armenia.
All members of the subcommittee rejected the opening of foreign language schools and prepared a package of proposals. The proposals underline that instead of opening foreign language schools, it is necessary to raise the level of instruction of foreign languages in Armenian schools.
"But this must be under the condition that Armenian, or physics or geography should not be affected. If parents want their children to learn foreign languages more in-depth, then there should be extra hours. If we don't go with this system, the name of the school will change to a school with a bias, but in content it will be a foreign language school," said subcommittee member Rafik Tadevosyan.
All education professionals attending the discussion find that if foreign language schools open today, the demand of universities for foreign languages will be inevitable in ten years. There was also a proposal to take advantage of the Public Council's right to a veto during the subsequent hearings on the issue at the National Assembly.
The subcommittee also raised the issues related to improvement of Armenian language instruction, as well as the reinstatement of television programs teaching Armenian language and poetry.
The members also discussed the state of Armenian historical-cultural monuments in Turkey.
"We don't know exactly how many historical-cultural monuments there are since the figures range from 2,500 to 3,000. In that case, how can we tell Turkey or other countries' diplomats to help us preserve our heritage?" asked subcommittee member, YSU professor, doctor of historical sciences Ashot Manucharyan.
In that sense, the members proposed to address the corresponding bodies to provide financial and technical support to individual experts who will be ready to go and conduct studies in Turkey.
