DUSHANBE, July 14, 2009, Asia-Plus — According to the results of a survey conducted by Journalists’ Association, Media Group & Mercy (MGM), in April-July this year, some two-thirds of Tajik youth do not want to continue education on finishing secondary school.
The MGM head Farrukh Ahrorov said the poll had been conducted among 3,000 senior students of high schools and school leavers across the country in order to find out to what an extent Tajik youth want to obtain higher education at universities of the country.
“Two-thirds of the polled youth said they do not want to continue education on finishing high school; they seek migrant work outside the country in order to provide financial support to their families, considering further education to be senseless,” said Ahrorov, “80 percent of the surveyed girls, mainly in rural areas, also do not want to continue their education.” Many girls in rural areas have dropped out of schools.
The overwhelming majority of those polled named poor financial conditions of their families as the main factor that hampers them from getting higher education.
“Only 0.5 percent of those surveyed expressed wish to enter universities and expect to get good knowledge while others consider entrance to a university as an opportunity to get diploma, be granted deferment of military service, or just to keep with the Joneses,” said the MGM head, “Selection of a university depends on, first of all, specialties it gives. Nine of ten youth said they would like to get a diploma that would allow them to have not only good salary but also have additional earnings in a form of presents, brines, etc.”
Some 7 percent of those surveyed, primarily city residents, said that they would like to study abroad. They explained that by the wish to learn more efficiently foreign languages, obtain good knowledge, and distrust in qualification of local teachers.
The survey results have also shown that there are very many pious youth in the country, mostly Muslims, who do not want to attend official educational facilities in Tajikistan. They consider that corruption has affected all the education system in the country, starting at schools. Moreover, many of them feel uneasy because of increase in allegedly morbid attention of the people around them to their clothes and behavior. Therefore, the majority of such youth would like to study at religious schools in the Middle East.
“Taking into account a greater religiousness among Tajik citizens, one may suppose that such moods of this category of youth regarding society can become a breeding ground for quite a serious conflict potential that may become to develop in the near future” the survey organizers said.
