What happens with the students of closed universities?

Ilir Paco, Top Channel: Before speaking about the activity in which you presented the results of this legal inspection, I would like to ask you about the concerns of the opposition, which accuses you of not doing anything about the higher education, and that you have even lowered the number of students with 12,000.

Lindita Nikolla, Minister of Education: The opposition keeps standing on the path of untrue declarations. We are determined to implement reforms in the entire education system. We closed 300 days that resulted successful for all our objectives. The public saw everything that we were committed to do, and we are on the way of standing to these commitments. Today we concluded a process that was held for the first times in the higher education institutions, with a complete transparency in the process of verifying their lawfulness.

Ilir Paco: Can you describe the violations noted by the inspections, and why you decided to close those universities?

Lindita Nikolla: A series of criteria have been violated, including some decisions of the Council of Ministers regarding the licensing conditions. There are other criteria about the staff, the program, the pedagogic conditions, the student evaluation standards, the admission standards, etc. Some of the findings are even bizarre. Most of these institutions do not fulfill the conditions for the staff. There are no data about their students for the past three years. Registers have disappeared. When documents were found, there are traces of falsification. The academic staff doesn’t have the credentials and the right professionalism to keep their duty. There are a set of criteria on which the foundations are laid. This inspection of their lawfulness will be followed by a quality control by an international agency.

Ilir Paço: There are about 26,000 students in the universities that are being closed. Where will these stu8dents go? The government has planned to transfer them, but who will carry this burden?

Lindita Nikolla: 26,000 is not the number of students who are at risk because of this intervention. We have communicated with higher education institutions and there are no problems in continuing the studies for the years to come. We have only blocked the registrations for the first year. In 18 private higher education institutions, the number of students who have finished the first year goes to 6000. We have prepared a working plan. The public and private universities will help these students based on their credits.

Ilir Paço: Do you think that by closing more than two thirds of the universities, there will be a monopoly situation in the higher education market?

Lindita Nikolla: We think about what has happened and about which the public opinion is informed. We have stopped illegality in the higher education for the first time. We had taken a path that didn’t lead anywhere, in which everyone was losing, from families  to students who were receiving a worthless diploma. The entire society was losing, because they were not valuing the human resources righteously.

Ilir Paço: What will happen with the universities that will be closed? Will they open again? Will they be transformed? Do they stand a chance to exist in the future with a new license?

Lindita Nikolla: During these 300 days we have established a new communication with these institutions. We are supporting them. I will meet representatives of the institutions that have been suspended to determine the terms and the conditions of their new tasks, and then they will undergo the quality control by the British agency.

Top Channel