2025
There have been no reforms.
2024
The Ministry of Science, Education and Youth adopted two new ordinances
Decision on the appointment of the Working Group for the drafting of the proposal for the National Curriculum for Early Childhood Education and Care
In December 2023, the Minister of Science and Education issued a Decision on the appointment of the Working Group for the drafting of the proposal for the National Curriculum for Early Childhood Education and Care. The task of the Working Group is to draft the proposal for the National Curriculum for Early Childhood Education and Care and its refinement according to the consultations carried out.
2023
The National Plan for the Development of Education and Training until 2027 and the accompanying Action Plan
The National Plan for the Development of Education and Training until 2027 and the accompanying Action Plan for the Implementation of the National Plan for the Development of Education and Training until 2024 within the specific objective No. 1. The objective of Providing accessibility to the ECEC system envisages measures aimed at ensuring the necessary infrastructure for the availability of quality ECEC, ensuring the appropriate number and quality of educators, expert associates and heads, increasing equality in the availability of ECEC to children from different local and regional self-government units, as well as disadvantaged children and raising the quality of ECEC. The following are also included: measures related to changing the financing model and strengthening the role of the central government in making some of the key decisions in ECEC, ensuring the prerequisites for the full participation of all children in the education programme as part of compulsory education, and finally the preparation of a feasibility plan ensuring free ECEC for all children of early and preschool age.
In 2023, the preparation of the new National Preschool Curriculum began. In April 2023, a working group was appointed to prepare the draft proposal for the National Preschool Curriculum. In July 2023, the Ministry of Science and Education published a Public call for the selection of candidates for members of the Working Group for the drafting of the National Curriculum proposal for early childhood and preschool education. The national curriculum for early childhood and preschool education is adopted in accordance with the National Curriculum Framework. The National Preschool Curriculum determines the principles, educational goals and educational expectations, as well as the duration of the programme with the plan and method of implementation, which will extend general compulsory education in the Republic of Croatia.
The new National Preschool Curriculum foresees extending the preschool programme from at least 250 hours, according to the current curriculum, to 700 hours during one pedagogical year. As before, the programme will be mandatory for all children the year before starting primary school. Furthermore, children between the ages of four and six will be included in a preschool programme adapted to new circumstances, in a different annual programme. With the introduction of the new National Preschool Curriculum, it is planned to extend general compulsory education.
In July 2023, the Regulation on Criteria and Benchmarks for Determining the Amount of Funds for the Fiscal Sustainability of Kindergartens was prepared and is currently at e-Consultation.
In order to provide an additional 10,000 enrolment places in ECEC institutions, to ensure that the coverage of children in ECEC is closer to the Barcelona objectives, and to harmonise regional differences within the Republic of Croatia, on June 9, 2023, a second Call for the provision of grants named "Construction, Expansion, Reconstruction and Equipment of Kindergartens, Second Call", was published, which provides grants for infrastructure investments in kindergartens. The total amount of grants available for allocation as part of this Call is EUR 51,022,570.00 provided in the State Budget of the Republic of Croatia from the Resilience and Recovery Facility as part of the National Recovery and Resilience Plan.