László Palkovics, state secretary for higher education, will also be in charge of public education. Judit Bertalan Czunyi, hitherto responsible for public education, will serve as government commissioner for digital content, human resources minister Zoltán Balog announced over the weekend.
Opposition parties called the move a sign of the government's failed policies in public education and called for a complete overhaul of the system, including the elimination of the controversial Klebersberg Insitute.
The prime minister has not criticised Czunyi’s work, he insisted. Viktor Orbán said she should still have a major role in public education, he added. The central body overseeing public education (Klik) will not be scrapped but changes will be made to its operation, Balog said.
Schools will continue to be under central control but he and Palkovics, state secretary for the whole of the education system from now on, will have full powers “to determine what should be corrected”. He added that a contested system of evaluating teachers would be retained, but admitted that the administrative burden on teachers was too great. Teachers, students, parents and civil groups held a demonstration in Miskolc, north-eastern Hungary, on Wednesday afternoon against the state of Hungary’s centralised public education system.
