The new law stipulates that a minimum of four hours of Lithuanian language
per week should study the children in kindergartens, and in 2013 a nationwide
equal exam on the state language was introduced for the graduates of both the
Lithuanian schools and schools of national minorities. At the beginning of
2011-2012 academic year Russian schools faced the lack of a mechanism of
implementation of new programs, and the acute shortage of methodological
literature and textbooks for minority schools.
In accordance with the approved plans of the local authorities to optimize
educational institutions further reduction of the number of Russian schools is
expected.
The inflow of young Russian-speaking professionals among the teaching staff
continues to decrease (as universities of Lithuania do not train subject-teachers for
Russian schools, except Russianists). On top of this, the Ministry of Science and
Education of the Republic of Lithuania tightened the knowledge of the state
language requirements for subject teachers.
It should be noted that through the efforts of the Russian-speaking and Polish
communities an acquiescence in the terms of implementation of the Act has been
achieved. So, for the schools of national minorities a transition period with softer
evaluation criteria was introduced. In addition, the Ministry of Education and
Science of the Republic of Lithuania set up a working group on minority schools in
which to discuss critical issues. However, these measures are still insufficient.
It's time to call the ongoing process by its true name: it is a deliberate
assimilation and linguocide! First, Russian and Polish population is forbidden to
write their names in accordance with their national traditions and grammatical
rules. We have been deprived of real opportunities to teach children their native
history and culture in schools, funded among other through our taxes. Now our
right to teach our offspring in their native language at all will be limited . What's
next? Will we be forbidden to write our names on the gravestones? Lithuanian state