Public outrage forced Education Minister Niki Keramos to revise her plans and take back the anti-pedagogical provision according to which distribution of pupils in school classes would be according to their performances.
In a press release on Monday, the Minister made an U-turn and said announced that distribution of students in school classes will be according to alphabetical order as before.
The original provision would separate public school students according to their “learning needs” and their performances.
the draft bill triggered an outrage not only among the education community but also among parents with the majority of them being against the new system that would create “two-tier” classes and promote inequality.
Opponents described the provision as “completely anti-pedagogic.”
In the press release on Monday, the Ministry of Education said among others that “following the adoption of ideas and the inclusion of proposals of the educational community and institutions, amendment to the draft bill are already underway.”
PS what was Krameos thinking? Something like a 2. grade class with 14 smart kids and one with 5 less smart?
We have that model in some states in Germany for some tens of years now (with up to 5 tiers of classes). in other states we have the classic 3 tier school system with complete different schools for different intellectual levels.
In my biased opinion the combined system does not work very well. In theory pupils are able to climb up a tier if their performance improves – or fall down a tier if they cannot keep up with the stuff on their current tier.
Practically pupil stay in their tier until completion of their education (or failure of it in the lower tiers).
It is like with the money. Rich get richer and poor get poorer. In this case intellectual advanced pupil get smarter and not to bright pupils get – well even less bright.
So it is probably a good idea that the Greek back-pedaled.