The Minister of Higher Education, Science and Technology, Franklin García Fermín, warned that any initiative that aims to unify these ministries is not in the interest of higher education in the country.
The official made the warning when asked about the possibility of a government restructuring plan that would unify and abolish several institutions, including the merger of the Ministries of Education and Higher Education.
In an interview on the program Infórmate, García Fermín clarified that he has not yet received any official information regarding this possibility and that so far there has been only presumption.
However, he argued, “but you are going to burden that ministry (Education) that is full of problems, you are going to bring the ADP, the unionism to the universities, because if you organize the pre-university teachers, you must organize the university ones too, then you are going to bring the ADP to carry out strikes and stoppages to the universities.”
He said that university education has advanced rapidly in the Dominican Republic, where there are currently 57 registered universities and higher education centers and that these are subject to evaluations every five years, which he described as something very complex.
“Never in the history of the country has pre-university education been combined with higher education, which is university education,” the official added, reiterating his rejection of this possible proposal.
Scholarship Program and English by Immersion
Regarding these programs, Franklin García Fermín denied that they have been reduced as has been reported, stating that, on the contrary, when he took office, fewer scholarships were awarded than those given now.
He indicated that due to the lack of application of the budget for international scholarships in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, the ministry had a cut of 700 million pesos from the national budget, but that this did not mean a cancellation of the program.
“What did we do? We renegotiated with the universities around the world with which MESCYT has agreements and we achieved savings of more than 400 million pesos, which we used to increase the number of scholarships that were awarded,” he said.
He added that each year the ministry provides around two thousand international scholarships and around eight thousand national scholarships, for a total of 10 thousand scholarships per year.
