У стен американского посольства в Латвии сегодня, 22 марта, прошел пикет родителей русскоязычных школьников, недовольных реформой образования и грядущим переводом обучения в школах национальных меньшинств на латышский язык.
Участники пикета передали послу США свое письмо, в котором выражают озабоченность ситуацией, которая сложилась в Латвии в сфере образования национальных меньшинств. Электронная копия письма была отослана ещё вчера, а сегодня его бумажную копию передали послу через сотрудника посольства. Сам посол к участникам пикета не выходил.
Организатор пикета Ирина Смориго рассказала BaltNews.lv по телефону, о том почему родители решили обратиться со своими проблемами именно в американское посольство.
«А куда ещё обращаться? Это влиятельная страна, которая позиционирует себя как борца за права человека. А в Сейме сидят люди латышской национальности, которые не принимают в расчет, что Латвия всегда была многонациональным государством, и что кроме латышей тут жили и живут евреи, русские, поляки, немцы. В первой Латвийской Республике вообще сразу шесть национальностей имели школы на своем языке, где их дети учились на родном языке», — сказала Ирина.
Пикет у посольства США сторонников сохранения образования на русском языке в Латвии
По её словам, в пикете приняли участие примерно 20-25 человек, чьи дети ходят в школу и сталкиваются там с определенными проблемами, связанными с языковой политикой государства.
«У меня ребенок ходит в 7 класс, а старший уже взрослый. Но и он попал под каток реформы образования ещё 2004 года. У него была эмоциональная травма. Тратя деньги из семейного бюджета мы были вынуждены нанимать репетитора, и в итоге из-за низких оценок, вызванных необходимостью учиться на неродном языке, он не смог получить высшее образование. И с такими проблемами сталкиваются многие родители. У них могут быть талантливые дети, которые показывают хорошие результаты на родном языке. Но при переходе на латышский язык успеваемость заметно снижается».
Ирина Смориго пояснила, что участвовавшие в пикете родители ожидают от США реакции на происходящее. Хотя бы в виде ответа на их письмо.
«Мы рассчитываем на авторитет влиятельной демократической державы, родоначальницы Декларации о правах человека. США бесспорно имеют большое влияние на правительство Латвии и может указать на нарушение демократических принципов», — сказала организатор пикета корреспонденту BaltNews.lv.
Текст письма, переданного послу США
To: Ambassador
Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the United States of America to the Republic of Latvia
March21, 2018 Riga, Latvia
Violations of minorities’ and children’s rights caused by education reform in Latvia
Your Excellency,
We, representatives of Russian-speaking residents of Latvia, are appealing to you as a representative of a democratic and very influential country. We would like to inform you about the alarming processes going on in Latvia at present and how they are perceived from our point of view.
A month ago, a legislative proposal on education reform was submitted to the parliament of the Republic of Latvia. In the course of the reform the language of instruction in all high schools of national minoritieswill be switched to Latvian. Most of those schools are Russian-langusage schools with more than 200 years history of teaching in mother tongue of pupils and teachers, and 14 last years of bilingual teaching.
In the course of the last 14 years, due to switching to bilingual model of education with60:40 language proportion in high schools (at least 60% of school subjects are taught in Latvian which is the official language, up to 40% are taught in mother tongue), the quality of such education sharply decreased.
The same is planned for private schools as well. It will affect approximately 80,000 students associated with national minorities which amount to 37% of the total number of school students in Latvia.
Children who have no command of Latvian language are given Latvian language textbooks and are told to perform various tasks the meaning of which they don’t understand. Obviously, for them it is very hard to do and, consequently, it results in negative emotions and negative attitude.
Children spend much more time on homework than it is allowed by physiological standards what causes physical harm to them. Also chidren cannot do such homeworks themselves and ask their parents to help them but, possibly, not all parents are competent enough to help their children in such cases. As a result children do not absorb knowledge properly and leave school uneducated or show lower results in comparison with results they would have shown if they were taught in mother tongue, as it was before.
Many parents have to hire private tutors what can be considered an economic damage for families. Consequently we have a lot of undereducated children and this can be viewed as marginalization of the rising generation.
We reckon that education reform that had been implemented in Latvia in 2004 has not proved its value as it inflicted emotional and economic harm upon children, their parents and the country itself.
The authorities do not give us back the opportunity of learning in mother tongue in the schools of national minorities, as it had been here over the course of decades. Instead, they,acting through Ministry of Education and Saeima, launched another reform which is even more severe towards our children.
The Saeimahas rejected a petition in favour of withdrawing the reform, signed by 14,000 parents. The Central Electoral Commission has not accepted, as a legislative initiative,the bill on autonomy for schools of national minorities drafted based on the analogous law of 1919, passed at the dawn of Latvian independence.
More and more often, hate speech aimed at national minorities can be heard in schools, in everyday life as well as in mass media. Children and their parents are subject to psychological pressure, they are told to either accept the policy of forced assimilation or to «come back to their ethnic motherland». However, their motherland, and motherland of several generations of their ancestors is Latvia.
The protests of Russian-speaking people of Latvia against switching Russian schools to Latvian language of instruction are becoming more and more wide-scale. They see it not as reforms but as punitive measures. With all the shortcomings of 2004 reform, it was a compromise which government agreed to make after mass protests against proposed elimination of secondary education in languages of national minorities. Russian-speaking community agreed to this compromise in the name of preservation of civil peace.
At present moment, antagonism in the society is escalating, the civil peace is under threat. Russian-speaking people of Latvia are disappointed by the silence of the West, connivance at obvious violation of principles of democracy and respect of minority rights. On the other hand, Russia views this elimination of Russian-language education as oppression of Russians,which creates huge political risks.
Therefore, Your Excellency, we are addressing to you this appeal to get this information to the officials of the State Department. We hope they will use their influence in their communication with Latvia to highlight impermissibility of mass violation of children’s and ethnic minorities’ rights in one of the NATO members.
Sincerely yours,
Parents’ representative
http://baltnews.lv/news/20180322/1021810936.html
