Diversity of Secondary Educational Curricula in Establishments of General Secondary Education in Latvia

Abstract

Within recent years significant changes have taken place in educational management as regards the development of democracy, decentralization of its management accentuating the importance of professional as well as effective management of schools. Aim of the Study. The aim of the research is to analyse several theories and the former practice of creation of educational curricula in general secondary education in Latvia. Materials and methods. The authors’ of the article analyse the legal and educational management aspects in developing a general education curriculum in accordance with the Normative Guidelines and Acts of the Ministry of Education and Science to accentuate educators’ as well as educational establishments’ autonomy to develop education curricula, licensing as well as their implementation in practice. The analysis of the structure of the curricula at general education establishments is based on the comparative approach; also, the interpretation of the obtained results is carried out. Results. Development of educational curricula requires a specific outlook of regularities which focuses on the development of pupils’ personality and community needs for a qualitative as well as appropriate knowledge. Scientists of educational management such as D.Pratt, J. Eglitis, G. Haydon in their research work deal with scientific grounds of the essence , development and innovation in the creative process of education curricula that are vitally important in the current circumstances in Latvia when schools balance each pupil, their parents’,municipalities and the State order for education promoting each youngsters’ career development in order to continue studies on a higher level of educating, foster their effective penetration into the labour market enhanced by availability of appropriate schools’ technical as well as financial resources. The authors explore school experience in developing general secondary education curricula as well as analyse their correlation with the sample education curricula. The research reveals that schools develop general secondary education curricula creatively, highly evaluating professionalism, the significance of further educational development, pupils’ requirements for a larger amount of lessons in certain subjects as well as the demands of the State Education Standard. Educational establishments carry out independently a vitally important job of planning; moreover, they add/supplement the offered samples of educational curricula by Ministry of Education and Science with new study subjects as well as suggest certain changes in the number of lessons in several study subjects. Key words: educational management, general education, educational curriculum, school autonomy.