In Pursuit of Educational Change: Transformation of Education in the Czech Republic

Abstract

This study, using a common theoretical framework, analyses the process of educational change in the Czech Republic since the political changes in 1989. It starts with a brief introduction to the country and its educational system. Its main concern is focused on the phases and particular dimensions of the transformation process in school education at the primary and secondary level. Social and political incoherence, non-linearity, imbalances, atomization and diffussion as a consequence of tensions between continuity and discontinuity are identified as characteristic features of the process. In spite of positive shifts concerning educational policy, legislation, management, financing regulation, the curriculum, teacher professionalisation and support structure development, there are still barriers, e.g. lack of political consensus and the lack of a steering and monitoring mechanism in the educational sector. Real systemic reform reaching the intermediate and microlevels of the educational system has not been implemented yet.