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Description
The founders of municipal schools are a forgotten target group of Czech education. Part of them do not have the internal motivation to take care about the education and the school more than is the usually established practice of "heat and light". Part of them do not have knowledge of the possibilities that modern pedagogy offers. EDUin comes up with a restarted form of its ''Founders'' Club'', which put together local government representatives who see school development as an important part of their agenda. The project is a great advocacy activity to persuade others and create legitimate pressure on local politicians and officials, to make specific decisions, for the benefit of their school and thus also of Czech education.
Summary of project results
There are 3,635 schools in the Czech Republic, the founder of which is a municipality or union of municipalities (via www.vzdelavacisluzby.cz). Of these, 28% are schools where the total number of pupils does not exceed 50. The Czech education system is organized very freely and decentralized, but completely uncoordinated and very little information permeable to the level of a specific school or village. The founders of schools, especially in smaller towns and villages (often using the kind metaphor of "mayor tractor driver") encounter a professional deficit, especially in the field of pedagogy. They do not have available data and, above all, their objective and consistent analysis as a basis for deciding on any measures. They are not oriented in the directions and trends of modern education in the 21st century. He primarily fulfills the role of administrator of school buildings with an emphasis on economic-operational and properly organizational aspects. They supervise the main function of the school, i.e. upbringing and education, much less or not at all. There is often a vacuum between the state (MŠMT) and the school (principal / founder) in this area.
We quote from the Strategy 2030+: "In addition to the lack of truly professional capacities, the Czech education system also faces the problem of their considerable fragmentation, which is particularly evident in the case of smaller founders of schools and school facilities, who often do not have sufficient professional knowledge and competence in the field of education and at the same time they lack systematic methodical help in this area. The excessive administrative burden, which is particularly noticeable in schools of smaller founders, is also connected with the obligations arising from the legal subjectivity of schools."
One of the main consequences of recent years is the continued growth of inequalities in access to quality education. According to the ČSI announcement, the level of knowledge of a ninth grade student in the Ústí Region corresponds to the level of a seventh grade student in Prague.
Increase the awareness of key representatives of municipalities about how they can modernize and support their schools in development and increase the number of members in the Club of Founders - By implementing project activities and achieving milestones in accordance with the schedule, we continuously fulfilled the general goal of the project. The aim of the activities aimed at school founders was exclusively to increase the awareness of key representatives of local governments about how they can modernize and support their schools in development and to increase the number of members in the Club of Founders.
Creation of a strategic document for the development of education at the level of a medium-sized city - the goal was achieved by creating a strategy for the development of education in the city of Tábor, in the creation of which he actively participated. It was approved by the city council during the fall of 2022.
By the end of 2023, it will start min. 10% of club members will approve and start implementing an activity aimed at creating a strategic document for the development of education or such a document.
During the monitored period, a thematic meeting was held for members of the EDUakademie Club of Founders entitled What is an education development strategy and why should you have one? The meeting was accompanied by the mayor of Tábor, Štěpán Pavlík, and the program director of EDUin, Miroslav Hřebecký. The aim was to explain to representatives of municipalities what advantages the conceptual document has for the development of education in their city. Thematic blocks at the Lepší škola autumn 2021 and 2023 conferences were devoted to the topic of strategy, entitled The process of creating a local strategy for the development of education and How the education strategy was created in Tábor. We consider the municipalities that participated in the autumn EDUakademie on 23 October 2023 to be relevant interested parties in the creation of a strategy - there were 12 people from 7 municipalities and thus started or confirmed an activity aimed at creating a strategy in their territory. These were Ústí nad Labem, Drahelčice, Mnichovo Hradiště, Jilemnice, Dolní Chabry, Česká Kamenice, Prague 11, which at the time had a membership base of 74 entities, which was 10% of the total number of members.
On an ongoing basis, EDUin will approach at least 500 cities or municipalities with an offer to join the club of founders.
As part of the promotional conference Lepší škola, which includes the offer of free membership in the Founders'' Club. In this way, we informed approximately 6,500 cities and towns, i.e. almost 100% of all founders in the Czech Republic. To increase our reach, we used established media partnerships with monthly magazines for the founders, which are the magazines Moderní obec, PRO města a obce and Řízení školy, the main readership is in the order of thousands of subscribers.
By April 2023, we will increase the number of Founders'' Club members to at least 50 entities. Cities (municipalities), private founders, representatives of regional authorities.
The goal was achieved. The membership base of the Founders'' Club had 57 members as of 4/30/2023. at the end of the project, the membership numbered 92 members.
On an ongoing basis, all members receive an information package and recommended literature (publications available on the book market) related to the role of the founder and present current knowledge and trends in education.
The goal was achieved. All members of the Founders'' Club received an information package containing a Guide for school founders and specialist literature.
The project managed to expand the membership base of the Founders'' Club - a freely available platform offering its members the opportunity to draw information from founding practice, share their experiences and inspire each other. The project responded to the fragmentation of the Czech education system and the information vacuum between the Ministry of Education and the municipalities. During the implementation period, the activities of the club attracted 548 people, who had the opportunity to directly participate in conferences and all-day seminars and draw on the info service in the form of a quarterly newsletter. We see the greatest contribution in the organization of national conferences, which connected the founding community across the country and represented the most significant advocacy activity of the founding theme. The output, the value of which also lasts even after the end of the project, is the Guide for school founders, which is available online to the general public and covers the most important areas of founding practice.