In most EU member states, children go to school for the first time when they are less than 7 years of age. 6-year-olds are covered by compulsory schooling in Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, France, Greece, Spain, Ireland, Germany, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Italy and Lithuania. At the same time in England, Netherlands, Sweden, Wales, Hungary and Latvia children start their school education at the age of 5.
NIK has checked if the Polish schools are ready to admit 6-year-olds. All auditees complied with the requirement of hiring teachers with proper qualifications to teach early school children and conduct early care and education classes. The audited primary schools also had enough didactic rooms to teach a bigger number of pupils.
NIK inspectors enumerate plenty of irregularities that should be eliminated before going to school becomes an obligation for 6-year-olds. They refer both to the functioning of individual schools and of the whole educational system.
NIK has given the following recommendations to the Minister of National Education, as the entity responsible for the state’s educational policy:
- it should define basic standards of schools’ preparation to admit 6-year-olds;
- it should make sure that leading authorities provide schools with more support in that scope, apart from the ”Joyful School” programme [Radosna szkoła].
NIK had the following objections to the municipalities as the authorities leading primary schools:
In all schools, classrooms at the 1st educational stage should be equipped in line with the core curriculum of 2012. The NIK audit revealed that:
- in 27 schools (84.4%) first-class pupils did not have a separate computer in the computer room;
- in 14 schools (43.8%) 6- and 7-year-olds did not have computer sets with the Internet access or software adjusted to their age;
- in 6 schools (18.8%) first-class pupils had no audio-visual equipment in their classrooms;
- in 6 schools (18.8%) first-class pupils did not have their physical education classes in the gym or in the school sports field;
- in 4 schools (12.5%) classrooms for 6- and 7-year-olds did not have the recreation part.
Besides, it is also essential that all primary schools guarantee day care rooms and hot meals.
The NIK auditors made the following findings:
- four schools conducting early care and education classes did not have a day care room outside the school timetable (such classes were organised in classrooms);
- in 2 schools the pupils did not get hot meals since there were no conditions to arrange a kitchen and a canteen.
NIK has given the following remarks to school principals:
In line with effective legal provisions, proper care should be guaranteed to children in the school area before and after their classes. The number of 25 pupils attending day care classes may not be exceeded. The audit showed that in 12 schools, there were more than 25 pupils in the groups attending the early care and education classes. According to other NIK’s findings:
- in 18 schools (56.3%) the furniture in the classroom, computer room or day care room used by some first-class pupils was not adjusted to the ergonomic requirements;
- in 6 schools (18.8%) the school cloakroom used by first-class pupils was not adjusted to the ergonomic requirements;
- in 3 schools (9.4%) the school WC used by first-class pupils was not adjusted to the ergonomic requirements.
All in all, NIK has given 119 recommendations to the audited municipalities and school principals. Some irregularities were eliminated yet during the audit. Others - according to the auditees’ - are being removed on an on-going basis. NIK believes it is possible that all irregularities will be eliminated by the end of this school year.
The NIK audit covered the Ministry of National Education, 16 municipal offices and 32 schools. The NIK audit report includes also results of the inspection made by the State Sanitary Inspectorate comprising 11 958 schools.
