Facts are not enough

"The strongest feature of environmental education in Bulgaria is that young people receive a lot of facts, both in secondary school and university. They learn facts such as which species are protected, which ones are endangered; they learn a lot about protected areas," says Katinka Mihova, Assistant Professor in the Department of Economics and Environmental Management at Bulgaria's Higher Institute of Forestry. But this is not the whole story.

"It's not easy for our students, even our graduate students, to express their knowledge when they go to work," adds Mihova. She was the Regional Environmental Center's first Senior Fellow of 1995.

Bulgaria's universities operate on two layers: some students study for free, others must pay.

"After the information comes in from different employers, such as municipalities, state offices, and plants, the ministry of education announces a quota for the different specialty students. For example, the ministry says, 'We will give support from our budget to such-and-such university for first-year courses for 80 students in forestry, 25 in landscape architecture, and 25 in environment protection.'"

Universities then have the option of accepting more students, on the condition that they are prepared to pay for their education. Fees range from 8000 to 20,000 leva (USD 120 to 300) per semester depending on the faculty. This fee does not cover the real costs of studying - education is still subsidized because the extra students use the same laboratories and attend the same lectures. If tuition were calculated at real costs, the figure would be two or three times higher, according to Katinka.

In contrast to the American education system, for example, where students learn about problems in the environment and then learn about how the biosphere works, Bulgarians study nature conservation before they study environmental problems.

What she hopes for in Bulgaria is an integrated, interdisciplinary approach that combines the best of both worlds.

"We have to combine both: the biosphere - the rules of nature - and the environmental problems caused by human beings. We have to try to find the best way to integrate these two."

THE BULLETIN * SPRING 1995