IV. Policy Options

Since 1989, governments have developed separate strategies for the development of Romany education. Although after each election new strategies were articulated the appropriated programs had recurrent, common elements. These are the following:

1. development and operation of catch-up and talent-care developmental programs,
2. development of the system of scholarships and tuition fee support,
3. promoting school integration of Romany students,
4. increasing the proportion of Romany students achieving basic education within compulsory schooling,
5. fostering participation of Romany students in secondary education,
6. supporting teacher training including basic romological attainments,
7. organising and supporting in-service training of teachers, social workers and educational advisors.

The elements of the above list have not been fully implemented. So far none of the Hungarian governments were able to develop a coherent strategy that is designed to address all of the underlying reasons for the school failure of Romany children (Radó, 2001, p. 60). Roma education policies were marginalized, the design of mainstream policies and the Roma educational policies were not always harmonized (Radó, 2001. p. 60). Although statistical data show positive changes compared to the data of the beginning of the 1990s there are huge problems with the educational success of Roma.

The aim of our paper is to contribute to the fostering of integrated education of Romany children in Hungary. In our approach, from the point of view of human rights and equity any form of (non-voluntary) segregation is not acceptable. However, we know that beside the prejudices existing in society some times the base of discriminatory actions is the lack of information and knowledge.

We are convinced that along with making changes in the legal framework and in the financing system and with developing new pedagogical view and practices the measure of segregation can be decreased.

IV.1 Legislation

According to our legislative analysis we feel the need to give voice to our criticism and express the necessity of legislative changes in connection to the following topics:

IV.1.1 The reform of the anti-discrimination legislation

After long years of professional debate the Government formed in May 2002 committed itself to reforming the Hungarian system of anti-discrimination. The government program explicitly contained the promise of the adopting a comprehensive anti-discrimination law. In accordance with the plans, the Ministry of Justice prepared a concept paper in late November 2002. Although the process suffered some delay, the Draft Bill of the Act on Equal Treatment and Equal Opportunities (Draft Bill) has to date been finalized. Its passing is scheduled for the fall of 2003.

A big breakthrough envisioned by the Draft Bill (besides the introduction of class action and the extension of the reversed burden of proof) is the setting up of a specialized body for combating discrimination. The Equal Treatment Committee would be authorized to investigate cases of discrimination in a number of fields including education and with regard to a wide range of grounds including racial and ethnic origin. The Draft Bill gives a definition of segregation and explicitly forbids such practices – generally and specifically in relation to education as well. A very important development is that the Equal Treatment Committee – besides other measures – would be entitled to impose a fine of HUF 50,000 – HUF 6,000,000 (USD 220 – 26,400) on discriminators. Such a general anti-discrimination fine would be a novelty in the field of education. Unlike the local notary, who is in charge of sanctioning educational discrimination at present, the Equal Treatment Committee would be independent from the school owners, so this sanction may prove to be adequately effective and dissuasive.

We support the adopting of a comprehensive anti-discrimination law and believe that it will prove more effective than the existing patchwork of anti-discrimination provisions.

IV.1.2 Special schools

The legal framework concerning special schools is relatively detailed and seems to contain safeguards that could in theory prevent the wide-ranging abuse of the institution. Violation emerges primarily in the course of implementation. The main reason for this is that if the parents are undereducated and unable to assert their rights, their involvement in the process means no real guarantee against abuses. They do not understand the procedure and – even if the information on available remedies formally takes place – they do not know whom to turn to. It often happens that they simply acknowledge the expert opinion on the question of disability and they do not know that by signing the statement concerning the fact that they have been informed, they in fact decide about the future fate of their children.

This kind of problem is of course very difficult to tackle through legislative measures. A closer control on the operation of the expert panels seems possible though. One field in which (legislative) improvement may be achieved is the determination of criteria for qualifying children as slightly mentally disabled. At present, the picture is not very clear in this regard.“According to the World Health Organization’s pertaining convention, only children with an IQ under 70 should be sent to special schools for the mentally disabled. […] If we draw the line between normality and disability at IQ 70 and we took only the psychometric aspect into consideration, then only 48.3% of the special school population would qualify as mentally disabled, 50.7% would be on the line and 12% would be regarded as normal” (Ombudsman 1999, p. 236.).

Experts draw attention to the fact that – obviously – it is the IQ 70-95 zone with regard to which the most abuses and misjudgements may occur. In the lack of strict legal criteria, it may solely depend on the discretion of the members of the expert panel which children falling into this category are relegated to special schools and which are sent to normal primary schools. And this is exactly where discriminatory patterns may emerge. We therefore suggest that the Minister of Education – based on the authorization contained in Article 94 Paragraph (1) point (d) of the Public Education Act – issue a decree on this question.

Another – not strictly legislative – measure (also proposed by the Minorities Ombudsman) that may be applied by the Ministry of Education is the elaboration of a procedure through which – in the framework of professional supervision – it can monitor and assess the work performed by expert panels on a regular basis (Ombudsman 1999, p. 242.).

IV.1.3 The role of minority self-governments

Minority self-governments can be interpreted from legal aspect as kinds of guarantee against segregating processes. The approval of the minority self-government is required for both types of institution with regard to – among others – the following: the establishment and closing down of the institution; the amendment of its scope of activities; the adoption and amendment of its budget; the assessment of the professional activity conducted in the institution; the approval of its rules of operation; the approval of the institution’s educational program or pedagogical program, and the assessment of the implementation thereof.

This right of approval could serve as an effective tool in the hands of minority self-governments in the struggle against school segregation supported by local governments. However, some deficiencies of the legislative framework hinder its effective use:

1. contains no provisions as to how the acquisition of the approval shall take place and what shall be done if the local government fails to acquire the approval of the minority self-government.
2. no provisions are in place to dissolve problems arising from the minority self-government’s refusal to give its approval.
3. neither the Minorities Act, nor Act LXV of 1990 on Local Governments (Local Governments Act) contain appropriate sanctions for the event that the local government fails to acquire the minority self-government’s approval .

A severe problem of the legislation in force is that it contains no provisions as to how the acquisition of the approval shall take place and what shall be done if the local government fails to acquire the approval of the minority self-government. The only procedural rule is set forth by Article 29 Paragraph (3) of the Minorities Act, which claims that “the entity vested with the right of approval shall make a statement within 30 days of the submission or the announcement of the request. Failure to comply with the deadline shall lead to the loss of this right.”

No provisions are in place to dissolve problems arising from the minority self-government’s refusal to give its approval. The Minorities Ombudsman suggested in this regard that a mediation procedure similar to the one set forth by the Public Education Act¹ be prescribed by law for such occasions. A further problem is that neither the Minorities Act, nor Act LXV of 1990 on Local Governments (Local Governments Act) contain appropriate sanctions for the event that the local government fails to acquire the minority self-government’s approval – such a sanction could be that decisions brought without the minority self-government’s approval shall be null and void.

IV.1.4 Question of integration

In order to make schools interested in integration instead of segregation, Decree 57/2002 introduced new educational form with a per capita support. Such a training may be organized for those students who participate in the skills development training and attend the same class (or group) as those students who do not participate in such training. This form of education may be launched at first and fifth grades (and at the ninth grade of vocational school), and the rules pertaining to it are identical with the provisions regulating the skills development training (e.g. with regard to the conditions of participation).

The legislative framework of the new approach separates the catch up element from the cultural element in the education of Roma, or to be more exact, makes the catch up element completely independent from the Roma origin of the students who may need it due to their social disadvantages.

Let us now examine what criticisms are voiced in connection with the new solutions and what further problems may arise. In November 2002, the Minorities Ombudsman organized a national forum on minority education. At this forum it was emphasized that the conditions set for participation in skills development training and integration training (i.e. that the student may participate if his/her parents’ highest level of education is elementary² and the parents are entitled to receive a supplementary family allowance after the child³) and thus also for requesting the related normative support may undesirably narrow down the scope of implementation, since – from the point of view of the way of living and employment opportunities – there is no big difference between parents with elementary education and parents who accomplished vocational school. Furthermore, there are several families, which would be entitled to receive a supplementary family allowance, but do not know about this possibility or fail to acquire the allowance due to their low ability to assert their rights (Ombudsman 2002, p. 108.). We have to see how the practice evolves to assess the validity of these concerns.

A further problem is that the institution of Roma minority education can still be misused to segregate Romany children in schools. Unless the system of professional supervision is strengthened, there are still no guarantees for the program’s quality, although the elimination of the remedial element makes it more difficult for schools to provide substandard education.

IV.2 Financing

In our view there are three possible financing models dealing with the education of disadvantaged students:

1. “integration grant” (a supplementary per student grant),
2. project based financing, and
3. the market-type financing models (voucher system and quasi-market financing).

Due to practical problems – such as identification of Romany children – it is easier and more logical to focus on the disadvantaged children, as long as the financing is concerned.

Note that all three systems would require a proper monitoring system that could reflect on the performance of the schools, and on the use of the taxpayers’ money. For the elimination of segregation, it is essential to compensate the non-disadvantaged students as well. In order to reach the preferred integration the government has to provide incentives for each child to stay at or to go to the given schools by supplying proper infrastructure, transportation, teaching methodology, surrounding.

IV.2.1 Integration grant

The introduction of the “integration grant” is not a major change in the financing structure of the Hungarian public education financing. The major difference between the recent “special learning group grant” and the forthcoming “integration grant” is that the former orders additional tasks for the schools, while the latter rewards the integrated education as such. Therefore the “integration grant” does not necessarily increase per-student costs.

It must be noted that none of the additional per-student grants provide incentives for the elimination of the spatial segregation. The wealthier families will still have the motivation to seek for more illustrious schools, thus separating their children for the less well-off students.

Another disadvantage is that the “integration grant” does not account for the different school specific costs. It supposes that the disadvantaged students are equally dispersed in the whole education system, so the cost of instruction is similar everywhere. It seems to be far from reality; different per-student costs mean that at some schools the additional amount received will not cover the costs, while at others it will be more than sufficient.

In the case of supplementary financing per student grant the addressee of the central financial assistance is the school owner local government, thus the local political accountability and the central regulation stimulates schools to improve results. However, it supposes clear, easily enforceable requirements from the central government. If these are not clearly stated the school owner very often can use the grant for other purposes and the “integration grant” will reach the schools only in a certain extent.

The advantages of that model consist of its transparency, simplicity, and the low administrative costs, therefore the bureaucratic channels need not be reformed. It is also an advantage that it requires no special efforts from the schools or the teachers, and still promises to eliminate the segregation within and between schools.

IV.2.2 Project based financing

The main feature of this system is that the target institute is the school itself, which is able to promote certain (anti-segregation) projects. This financing system can only work successfully in the long run. It definitely needs a solid central government commitment, to encourage the institutions to apply for the grants.

By “eliminating” a level (the local government) from the financing system, it could be guaranteed that the government money will be spent on the proposed goals, and the school specific cost differences would be taken into consideration.

It gives the opportunity for the central government to set its requirements, and a monitoring system, that could enforce the proposed projects. It is a definite advantage – if the government prefers a centralized policy – compared to the “integration grant”, where the basis for providing more resources is only the number of disadvantaged (It is helpful if the government prefers autonomic local government based policy). The project based financing would definitely higher the administrative costs. The process of judging the competing projects will always be a political issue, but this could also guarantee the clarity of the judgement system.

The project based financing of the disadvantaged children seems reasonable, while the majority of the disadvantaged study in a well-defined set of schools.

IV.2.3 Market type financing

The two possible market type financing models are the voucher system – where parents receive an additional voucher that they can spend on their children’s education – and the quasi-market system – where the institutions receive a per-student grant, and have an option to stay under the local government coordination, or “opt out” and choose the central government as maintaining body.
Both of these systems would lead to a fierce competition between schools for students, and – depending on the amount of the additional disadvantaged student grant – for the disadvantaged students as well.

The model supposes that well-informed parents are actively involved in their children’s school choice. Parents and students are consumers of the educational services and their best choice is based on the quality of that services. It has to be noted, that the disadvantaged families are usually less informed about the quality of the schools.

The role of the government is only to provide controllable information about the competing institutions, and to set the proper amount of the additional per-student grant or voucher. The overshooting of this amount would lead to separated schools for the disadvantaged, because it would be profitable for institutions to specialize themselves on disadvantaged students. While if this amount is lower, that the real additional costs of instructing, no institution would serve disadvantaged children.

The major drawback of this system is that it can only be successful, if the whole education financing structure is reformed this way. None of the market-type financing can be used only for the disadvantaged students.

The advantages are clear: the competition between schools would substitute the local or central monitoring; this would lead to lower administrative costs and more effective use of taxpayers’ money.

IV.2.4 Additional means of financing

Besides the basic financing structure the government has to place a special emphasis on the additional means of financing.

For the disadvantaged children need not only the possibility to study, but also help form the adults, the central government has to subsidize programs for developing pedagogical methods, and the training of the teachers of the disadvantaged.

Beginning with the kindergartens the infrastructural capabilities need to be improved, so no children would be refused, and every student would be presented the best environment to study in. This includes repairing and building of new kindergartens, the development of proper infrastructure. In case of pre-school-education it is not the problem of segregation, but rather the problem of non-participation that has to be solved. So it seems to be reasonable to use the already in use additional per-student grant to finance the owners of the pre-primary education.

At the secondary level of the public education it is not the segregation that has to be reduced, but the low percentage of the disadvantaged, who continue their studies in the upper tracks of secondary education. This appears to be an individual, rather than an institutional problem; therefore it seems to be reasonable to finance it at the student level. The governments need to establish individual long terms scholarships and/or loans for the disadvantaged, and possibilities to use these (such as the Arany János program). That includes dormitory places at secondary level, proper transportation between home and school and other vital additional materials for education (computers, books, etc.)

Finally it is essential that the government recognises that although the majority of the Romany are disadvantaged and vica versa, the two groups are not equal. It is vital that besides the elimination of the segregation and the help of the disadvantaged the government runs programs for restoring the ethnic cultures.

IV.3 Pedagogy

Formulation of our pedagogical strategy is based on the conviction that “it is the educational system that must change to meet the needs of Romany children, rather than blaming the children for their lack of success” (Lorand, 2001). In order to increase the proportion of those Romany children who successfully finish their primary education and not only continue but finish their higher education we should think over the tasks of the school.

In the course of a recent research on the Roma in primary school (Havas, Kemény, Liskó, 2002. p. 151) teachers of Romany students were asked that according to them what it is that makes Romany children so much different from the others. The most common answers were focusing on: linguistic disadvantage caused by insufficient vocabulary, cultural differenceness, low level of culture due to poverty, material conditions of studying at home and lack of school equipment, insufficient hygiene, lower than average motivation to learn, due to low expectations of parents and minor chances at the labour market, not obeying school rules and rejecting the demanded behaviour, early sexual maturity, agressivity, strong group solidarity.

By analyising the above discription it can be realised that there is not a single attribute among the ones listed that could be typical of Roma as an ethnic group. These are much more attributes of children growing up in poverty, of teenagers in general and of defensive behaviour of any minority, so in our opinion the failure of Romany students in nowadays education system should not be changed by introducing teaching methods especially for Romany children but the whole educational practice, the traditional role of the school should be transformed.

During our focus-group discussions teachers of primary schools stated that according to their experience the traditional pedagogical methods does not function at teaching Romany children. Havas, Kemény and Liskó (2002,p.157) also observed that the majority of teachers who teach Romany children use traditional methods, give “frontal” classes and are very few who would try to activate the children in any way or who would try to exploit their natural curiosity. During the interviews conducted with the same teachers, however, it turned out that a great number of teachers were aware of the burdens and the imperfection of their pedagogical methods but did not have the necessary knowledge and abilities to change them.

In the light of the above comments it should be emphasised that if the schools would like to address successfully not only a narrow stratum of children but the most of them the basic principles of nowadays education should be changed. Our suggestion for solution is transformation of the traditional school into a kind of “open school”. While forming the main principles of this kind of school not only the above listed facts have been taken into consideration but also research findings saying that those educational initiatives that strive to integrate and (/or) raise achievements of Romany students are strikingly similar in some respects. The most important common points are the following:

• the use of project method or other, similar close-to-life approaches as opposed to traditional methods, frontal teaching,
• children-centred, flexible schools,
• organising free-time activities,
• relationship with the family and/or the community is considered to be of great importance,
• in-service training for teachers.

IV.3.1 The characteristics of an “open school”

1. School without strict time-limits. In order to decrease the high drop-out rate of Romany pupils the primary school should undertake a kind of pre-school training and follow-up tasks. Pre-school training means that for two or three months children would make two-hour-long weekly visits to their future school. This would enable them to become familiar with the athmosphere of the school, and get an insight into school-work. This kind of practice differs from kindergarten-work in two aspects:

1. it does not imitate school-work, the school-setting gives children a more realistic picture of what is waiting for them,
2. the teachers who will work with these children can become familiar with the family background of their pupils-to-be.

The follow-up method would be a kind of “mentor program", an institutionalised support of children participating in secondary level of education but having difficulties in meeting certain requirements. This kind of help would be more successful than a correpetition at the secondary school because the primary school teachers could use their “long-period knowledge” of each student.

2. School without strict boundaries. In order to be effective in pedagogical work and insure quality in teaching cooperation with variuos local and non-local authorities and institutions is of utmost importance. School should work together with local self-governments, local minority governments, Romany organisations and governmental and non-governmental organisations working as educational service institutions. Schools should rely on others’ experience.

3. Partnership with parents. School should establish a kind of partnership with the agents of education. Pupils, their parents and teachers should work together according to a principle of equality. A kind of “learning together” model should be introduced. It means that according to pre-arrangement the teacher visits the child at home, and together with the pupils’s parents they direct the child’s preparation for the next day’s lessons. In this context directing means a kind of help referring to effective learning. The teacher introduces various techniques of methodology of learning to the child and his/her parents. This kind of support is not only for one occassion but it is a year-long continuous help. Adapting this kind of model has several advantages:

1. influences the school-achievement of a pupil in a positive way,
2. makes it possible to create an informal relationship with the parents,
3. enables the teacher to have an insight into the learning conditions of the pupil.

4. Partnership with students. School as a service institution should treat its subjects as partners of equal rights. Teachers should support and strenghten the self-image and identity of the pupils and establish a kind of relationship based on confidence. The experience of teachers at summer camps for failed students should be implemented into everyday practice. According to them their pupils can be successfully prepared for their re-take exams if only they start their subject correpetition with self-image building exercises. The self-image of the majority of the participants is destroyed in such an extent that it impedes the pupils participation in an effective learning process. Children do not believe in themselves, in their abilities.

5. Child-centeredness. Pedagogical work should be child-centered, achievement of children should be assessed in the light of individual development. The class-curriculum should be completed by individual curricula, curriculum shaped by the personal needs of each child.

6. School insuring quality education. The role of a teacher should be transformed, he/she should be removed from a position of instructor and knowledge-owner, he/she should become a kind of supporter.The methodology tools of teachers should be also renewed. The “frontal” teaching should be exchanged by other forms, e.g. by project-method, which proved to be very successful because pupils can see the problem in context, realise the real “meaning” of the task. Instead of conveying lexical knowledge the emphasis should be put on skill-development, problem-solving and comprihension.

7. School giving equal chances to all of its participants. Teachers and the leaders of the school should take part in antidiscrimination training, they should become consciuos about their attitudes toward children of different ethnicities.

8. Renewal of teacher training. In order to be permanently successful all these above described principals should be implemented into the current practice of teacher training. During their training the future teachers should become familiar with skill-developing techniques, various pedagogical tools, their curriculum should have multicultural content and they should take part in antidiscriminatory trainings. They should understand the new position of the teacher, the role of supporter one of whose main role is to work successfully together with the several agents of the learning process.

IV.3.2 Principles of vocational training for disadvantaged youth

1. Rehabilitation, catching-up, training of margin groups is very expensive, therefore prevention should be aimed at (principle of prevention).

2. As it is not allowed to create a new institutional system for one quarter, one fifth of the students of a given year as in spite of the high costs it may become the scene of segregation and thus cannot provide real opportunities, we have to strive for integrating them into the “normal” system of training. Therefore second-chance schools are “bridge-programs” that focus on short, intensive development.

3. Experience shows that disadvantaged students fail in the knowledge-transfer type school. Activity-centred education is effective, which always links theoretical information to practice (the principle of practice-centred education).

4. According to the principle of adaptivity, the content, methods and requirements have to be defined in a way taking into consideration previous education and to what extent these students can be loaded.

5. In grades of vocational training there should be opportunities provided for obtaining the missing general qualification parallel with preparing for the vocational exam.

6. In teaching disadvantaged youth the well-tried European educational instruments should be used, such as projects, producing school, social pedagogy, working in small groups, individual development plans, agreements, leisure-time pedagogy, family pedagogy.

7. In the phase of modernization ahead of us the share of jobs requiring low qualification is diminishing, and youth having this narrow qualification find it difficult to get employed. Therefore competitive training should be provided for disadvantaged youth as well, which extends to the especially important key qualifications of future jobs – communication, creativity, informatics, foreign languages, teamwork, etc.

8. Young people of 16 or over 16 years of age are considered employees as well, and in compliance with their life situation in most countries the labour government provides for catch-up, career counselling programs and programs facilitating employability; and appropriate training support and normative social allowances are provided for the youth. It is obvious that “second chance” programs organized by schools and assuming a student status provide real opportunities for only those who are supported by their families. For youth and young adults who get employed, have their own families it is the labour government that has to create the conditions of institutional provision.