Public Council of Ministry of Education of Ukraine Stresses Importance of Teaching Values and Morals in Schools

In August, the Ministry of Education approved a program of spiritual-moral education of children of preschool age and granted it a status which allows one to widely use the program in kindergartens.

At the session of the Public Council, it was decided to publish these programs in professional editions and on the websites of the Ministry of Education, regional institutes of further education, Ostroh Academy, and other leading higher education institutions to improve access to them for methodologists and teachers. The next important objective for the Public Council in this area is to organize the process of preparation of textbooks and attract and use donations for their printing and spread in schools.

"Society and especially parents do not yet realize fully the importance of the subjects of spiritual-moral character for the education of the young generation. It is absolutely necessary that children form values and high morals at an early age. Ukraine will not survive without that," stressed the Dean of the Ostroh Academy, Vasyl Zhukovskyi, in his address.

As Christian ethics and other subjects of spiritual-moral character are taught in schools on an optional basis, the Public Council called parents to be active and draw up applications in order for their children to be able to attend the optional lessons of spiritual-moral character instead of the secular ethics class.

The members of the Public Council discussed expediency and prospects of granting theology the status of a separate field, according to which bachelors in higher education institutions will be trained. As our readers may know, in May 2010, the Supreme Certifying Committee of Ukraine included theology in the list of specialities in which dissertations are defended to acquire academic degrees of Candidate and Doctor of Sciences.