Page 33 - Tvisobrivi kvleva__GEORGIA - English

Study on Adult Learning and Education in Georgia

Laws

Laws directly and indirectly referring to adult education in Georgia include:

• the Law of Georgia on General Education 1
• the Law of Georgia on Vocational Education 2
• the Law of Georgia on Education Quality Improvement
3
• the Law of Georgia on Higher Education , and
4
• the Law on Employment Support , which has indirect relevance for ALE in Georgia.
5

Lifelong learning and education for all are underlying principles of the Georgian Law on
General Education. Article 3.2.a) stresses that “openness of and equal access to lifelong
general education for all persons” is a prerequisite to meet the basic goals of state policy in
general education. Article 9 grants to everyone the right to obtain a complete general educa-
tion, and specifies that “general education may be obtained in alternative ways […], taking
into consideration students’ age peculiarities and labour and family conditions”. The law thus
reserves the right for adults to remedy gaps in basic education at an older age.

1 Legislative Herald of Georgia (2005), Law of Georgia on General Education
2 Legislative Herald of Georgia (2018), Law of Georgia on Vocational Education
3 Legislative Herald of Georgia (2010), Law of Georgia on Education Quality Improvement
4 Legislative Herald of Georgia (2004), Law of Georgia On Higher Education
5 Legislative Herald of Georgia (2020), Law on Employment Support

After numerous amendments had been intro- papers, but was never formally defined by law.
duced to the original VET Law of 2007, the new Moreover, the new VET Law aligns vocational ed-
Framework VET Law was adopted in 2018 which ucation programme criteria with the levels of the
addresses some of the major gaps in the system. NQF (Article 6). The Law thus acknowledges the
Notably, the new VET Law opens up opportuni- needs of the adult learners in VET, and most im-
ties for better implementation of lifelong learning portantly it eradicates the problem of dead-ends
principles in the training system (facilitation of life- in VET. The situation until 2018 was that second-
long learning and equal access to education for ary school graduates (9 grade) were able to en-
th
everyone). More precisely, in addition to formal ter the initial VET system. However, if students

education the law now introduces and legally de- wanted to continue to higher VET or tertiary stud-
fines the concept of “informal education”, which ies, they had to return to the general education
has always been a buzzword in VET policy (Ar- system in order to graduate from high school (12
th
ticle 3.b). It was included in the earlier strategy grade), after which they could continue their stud-

31