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Demographic plunge puts 1000 Polish schools at risk

PR dla Zagranicy
Nick Hodge 05.03.2013 11:58
Data gathered from local education boards indicates that as many as 1000 schools across Poland are at risk of closure in 2013 owing to a drop in the number of school kids.
Immer mehr Polen im Ausland fordern polnische Sprachkurse und Polnischunterricht.Immer mehr Polen im Ausland fordern polnische Sprachkurse und Polnischunterricht.Glowimages

Photo:
Photo: Glowimages

The majority of the institutions at risk are primary schools. This academic year, 140,000 fewer pupils are studying in Poland than in the previous year.

“The figures do not lie – children of an age to go to school are simply not coming,” said Antoni Jezowski from Poland's Institute of Educational Research (IBO) in an interview with the Rzeczpospolita daily.

According to the paper, the Lublin region of south east Poland is among the worst afflicted, and it may lose as many as 101 schools by this September, prior to the start of the next academic year.

Some 41 schools in the region were already shut down last September, according to the Ministry of Education.

However, the situation varies widely across Poland. The Kujawsko-Pomorskie region of north-east Poland saw only one closure last year.

Data compiled by Eurostat indicates that Poland's population will have dropped from 38.2 million to 29 million by 2050.

Last year, Prime Minister Donald Tusk's centre-right government pushed through a controversial reform that raised the national retirement age to 67 for both sexes (from 65 for men and 60 for women), owing to anxieties over the demographic shift and the prospective imbalance between pensioners and working Poles.

Jaroslaw Kaczynski, leader of conservative opposition party Law and Justice, addressed the demographic issue at a party debate last month under the slogan of “Family Now.” Kaczynski declared that there should be a drive towards making child-bearing “fashionable” in Poland. (nh)

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