Suchergebnisse

This article aims to compare two aspects of the education systems in two East European countries. As the political history of the Czech Republic & Poland in the past fifty years is similar, the authors compare the countries' development in tackling educational inequalities & attempt to evaluate their policies & reforms from the beginning of socialism to date. Despite many similarities & identical outcomes in the past (no effect in lowering levels of educational inequalities), these countries undertook two different approaches to the transformation of higher education after 1989. The specific current developments in higher education in the Czech Republic & Poland have been caused by conservative & reserved legislation in the former & the creation of new, very liberal rules for establishing non-state higher education institutions in the latter. As there emerged a considerable difference in the number of higher education institutions in each country, the authors show the negative impact on educational inequalities & the social consequences of the enormous increase in the number of students & private universities. Despite different approaches, the countries face many similar problems, such as quality assurance, a shortage of staff, & information asymmetry. These problems seem to be sharper in Poland, but it is only a matter of time for the Czech Republic.

The paper addresses the development of higher education in the Czech Republic after 1989, with special emphasis on the relevant legislation, institutional settings, financing, & enrollment. Czech higher education has changed profoundly since 1989. Universities were granted almost full autonomy as early as in 1990. They have reformed their curricula, expanded programs in the humanities & social sciences, & eliminated political criteria from admissions policies, both for faculty & students. However, the structural changes were not as quick & profound as obtaining & mastering the freedom was. The most significant structural changes in the Czech tertiary educational system addressed in the paper are decentralization & diversification. With regard to financing, the authors argue that universities have remained dependent on the state to a high degree. Several attempts to expand multi-source financing by introducing cost-sharing features (tuition fees, loans, student allowances) failed. The reliance on the public budget led to a severe financial crisis in public universities. As far as enrollment is concerned, the authors demonstrate that, although the number of students rose by almost 60% between 1989 & 2001, the offer of educational opportunities was too low to meet the steeply rising demand for tertiary education. The chance of being admitted hovered around 50%. Owing to the combined effect of a drop in the size of the relevant age cohort & the growing proportion of students admitted to bachelor programs, the chance of enrollment started to increase in 2001. In spite of this recent change, the transition from secondary to tertiary education still remains the most critical moment in an educational career.

The aim of this study is to assess the most recent trend in inequality in access to tertiary education in the Czech Republic. The authors put forward the hypothesis claiming that the period of stable inequalities in the years 1948-1989 was followed by a period of growing inequalities during the postcommunist transformation (1989-1999). The study focuses primarily on the cultural & socioeconomic (class) dimensions of social origin & gender & their net effect on success in the transition between secondary & tertiary education. Theoretically, the paper draws primarily on the work of Raftery & Hout (1996) & Hanley & McKeever (1997), who claim that the chances of attaining higher education among individuals from families with a low social status can only increase on the condition that the demand for the given level of education has first of all been satiated among all the strata disposing of social & cultural capital. Another important theory they build on is the theory of rational action proposed by John Goldthorpe & Richard Breen (Goldthorpe 1996; Breen & Goldthorpe 1997). The principal hypothesis (inequality has grown) is tested using log-linear analysis applied on the data from various surveys carried out during 1998-2000, merged into one data set. The authors construct several models of the influence of social origin on the chances of making a successful transition between secondary & tertiary education in the years 1948-1999. The initial hypothesis of the growing effect of class origin on this transition in the period after 1989 has been confirmed. One of the strongest explanations for this trend is the insufficient expansion of the tertiary sector of education, which is incapable of satisfying the continually growing aspiration & corresponding demand for higher education in circumstances where socioeconomic inequalities are on the rise.