Page "Education in Slovakia" Paragraph 7

Despite the current lack of money, primary and secondary education is at a quite high level compared to many countries of the world.

A major deficiency is insufficient promotion of independent thinking and student initiative, a complete absence of creative learning, unreformed and outdated teaching material, methods and syllabi inherited from the former communist educational system, and relatively low remuneration of teachers, leading to a decrease of the number of qualified ( and of well qualified ) teachers especially below the university level ( see the statistics section for some pay figures ).

University-level schools, unable to provide sufficient pay to get real experts and motivated teachers, are rather mediocre compared to other countries, usually promote pure swotting and use outdated texts and other material.

Some reforms of all educational levels, including the introduction of school fees for universities, are said to be in preparation and could be carried out after the next paliamentary elections ( to be held 2005 ).

Nonetheless, Slovakia has thus far managed to avoid the excessive brain-drain that has plagued most post-Soviet states.