Minister for Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Pavlo Klimkin met with UzhNU scientists
The Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Pavlo Klimkin paid a visit to Uzhhorod National University on the first day of his working trip to Transcarpathia. This has been the second consecutive ministerial visit to UzhNU in the last two weeks. On November 17th, the Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine Lilia Hrynevych visited the university.
Such attention of the ministers to the leading university of the region is understandable since the leaders of the governmental structures are interested in the opinion of the intellectual elite of Transcarpathia on how to implement the law "On Education" recently adopted by the Parliament, so that the young representatives of ethnic minorities in the region had the opportunity to master the Ukrainian language perfectly, to be able to obtain higher education in domestic universities, become fully integrated into Ukrainian society and retain the opportunity to study in their native language at school.
When opening the meeting, the acting Rector of UzhNU Oleksandr Rohach said that the scientists of UzhNU had worked out their recommendations concerning the peculiarities of implementation of the new law on education. "This is a basic law and its provisions should be detailed in the law "On Comprehensive Secondary Education" which,should be publicly discussed before adoption, and which will hopefully remove tension in these issues", said Mr.Rohach.
The head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Pavlo.Klimkin emphasized that he considered Transcarpathia an extremely special and specific region, since its location, history, ethnic composition and the environment were unique. "Being residents of this region, you are experiencing an emotional burden from the processes taking place today, especially in your professional activity, and it refers not only the law on education, our relations with Hungary and other neighboring countries. Therefore, I will be grateful to you for your ideas and advice expressed during our informal communication," said Pavlo Klimkin.
In her speech, the Vice-Rector of UzhNU Myroslava Lendel touched upon the recommendations developed by UzhNU specialists regarding the implementation of the law on education. "Realizing the need to increase the training of specialists who will work in the communities of national minorities, we have already started the program of licensing the specialization "Ukrainian language and literature for schools of national minorities". It is very important to financially encourage the teachers working in schools for national minorities. This is a European experience and we should accept it. We also suggest that our scholars from different departments be involved in the elaboration of those draft laws that are under consideration in the parliament. Moreover, it is very important not to repeat the sad experience of 2010-2013, when many essential experts’ proposals on topical issues remained "in the pigeonholes" of high-level officials,” stressed Myroslava Lendel.
Volodymyr Prykhodko, the head of the department of international economic relations of UzhNU, expressed a number of relevant and important ideas for further development of cross-border cooperation, opening new international check points on the borders of Ukraine with the states of the European Union, development of mechanisms for investment attractiveness of the country as a whole and its regions in particular. He reasonably criticized the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine for complete inaction in the situation when domestic mass media purposefully formed a distorted image of Transcarpathia in the minds of Ukrainian citizens as the land of smugglers, barbarians-lumberjacks and potential separatists.
_thumb_wide.jpg)
