On 20 October employees of Kaunas University of Applied Sciences participated in a meeting with the minister of Education, Science and Sport Jurgita Šiugždinienė. During the visit, the minister presented the planned and already implemented changes in the education sector, answered the questions of the community.

The minister first introduced changes implemented in the basic education institutions and gymnasiums and presented future plans related to reforms in the higher education sector. The community’s attention was drawn to such changes as professional guidance of pupils, their preparation for studies in higher education institutions, more opportunities to get help in learning from the school itself instead of hiring tutors, a more transparent system of knowledge verification, etc. J. Šiugždinienė noticed that these changes will affect higher education institutions as well, therefore, in order to better understand one or other actions of the ministry or other organisations, it is important for the Kaunas University of Applied Sciences community to be familiar with these changes and plans.

The minister also mentioned that tools of Research Council of Lithuania will be improved and addressed to strengthening the internationality of science, the involvement of young researchers and strengthening of priority areas of science.

During the meeting, a problem affecting all higher education institutions and the labour market was also discussed – the extremely small number of pupils choosing engineering and technological sciences. Employers have felt the lack of specialists in these fields for some time, so solving this problem includes not only higher education institutions, but also primary and basic education schools.

The minister also drew attention to the possibility of the universities of applied sciences implementing the concept of lifelong learning, as it is believed that in the future some people may need to retrain once or twice – universities of applied sciences, conducting short studies (5 ISCED), can successfully implement this idea. This year, Kaunas University of Applied Sciences was one of two universities of applied sciences in Lithuania that offered two short-cycle study programmes.

During the visit, J. Šiugždinienė was pleased with the excellent achievements of the Kaunas University of Applied Sciences, orientation towards high quality of studies, principled adherence to the minimum transition score during admission to higher education institutions – this year only five universities of applied sciences followed this recommendation.