Education Minister: Completion of Academic Year, Survival of University Is Important

Dejan Vuk Stankovic (BETAPHOTO/MILAN OBRADOVIC)

Serbian Education Minister Dejan Vuk Stankovic stated on June 5 that the ministry and the Serbian government considered it important for the academic year to be completed and for the “university to survive.”

“We have completed two steps and the third remains – the completed academic year and the enrollment of the next generation of students,” Stankovic said in an interview to TV K1, adding that on-line tuition was “a forced solution and a temporary one, a consequence of our current circumstances.”

“Institutions will dissolve on their own, the financing of the faculties is based on the number of newly enrolled students and these institutions are already in debt,” Stankovic said. He stated that the Serbian government would greenlight the enrollment of new students after it became clear when the academic year would be completed at each individual faculty.

Commenting on the demand of the students in blockade for early parliamentary elections, Stankovic said that “a non-contestable majority” existed in the parliament. “A pattern of political exclusivity of opinion and action has been imposed at the university – that the authorities must be toppled at any cost,” Stankovic stated.