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LATVIA / EDUCATION
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STORY: LATVIA / EDUCATION
TRT: 2:10
SOURCE: WORLD BANK
RESTRICTIONS: NONE
LANGUAGE: LATVIAN / NATS
DATELINE: APRIL 2010, RIGA, LATVIA
1. Wide shot, children and parents exiting school
2. Med shot, kids playing in sandbox
3. Close up, kids on jungle gym
4. Wide shot, Principal Astrida walking
5. SOUNDBITE (Latvian) Astrida Lukina, Preschool 200 Principal:
“If this didn’t exist, many of our 5 and 6 year olds could not go to preschool, and would have to enter schools later, with no early basis.”
6. Close up, kids reading
7. Close up, kid walking
8. Wide shot, kids playing and a parent
9. Wide shot, kids playing
10. Various shots, Inguna Irbe and daughter walking
11. SOUNDBITE (Latvian) Inguna Irbe, Parent:
“I send my daughter to preschool because I have to work and cannot educate her at home, and in preschools there is an appropriate environment for the small children where teachers can development the children’s skills.”
12. Wide shot, kids in classroom
13. Various shots, kids at work and play in classroom
14. Close up, kids in traditional costume, singing, playing music
15. Pan left, Ilze, the music teacher, as she plays piano
16. Close up singing kid’s face
17. SOUNDBITE (Latvian) Ilze Feldmane, Preschool Teacher:
“It is very important that preschoolers be educated in music and dance, because if the ear is not developed by three or four, it is too late.”
18. Various shots, kids singing and dancing in traditional costume
Latvia is working to ensure that mounting economic difficulties do not interfere with the education of the country’s children.
Effects of the economic crisis in Latvia are being felt even here, at Preschool 200 in Riga, where materials are harder to buy and salaries harder to pay. If it weren’t for a new boost in government assistance, says Principal Astrida Lukina, many preschools might have to close.
SOUNDBITE (Latvian) Astrida Lukina, Preschool 200 Principal:
“If this didn’t exist, many of our 5 and 6 year olds could not go to preschool, and would have to enter schools later, with no early basis.”
The financial aid comes under the Latvian government’s pre-primary education program which helps to pay the country’s preschool teachers. The program aims at ensuring early education for the country’s children, something teachers and parents say is essential.
Parent Inguna Irbe says that in these economically challenging times she needs to work and must depend on preschool to prepare her daughter for real school ahead.
SOUNDBITE (Latvian) Inguna Irbe, Parent:
“I send my daughter to preschool because I have to work and cannot educate her at home, and in preschools there is an appropriate environment for the small children where teachers can development the children’s skills.”
The financial aid to preschools comes as part of the Latvian government’s larger Emergency Social Safety Net Strategy, backed by the World Bank, which aims at mitigating the effects of the Global Economic crisis which has hit Latvia especially hard.
Ilze Feldmane has taught music to preschoolers for 12 years.
SOUNDBITE (Latvian) Ilze Feldmane, Preschool Teacher:
“It is very important that preschoolers be educated in music and dance, because if the ear is not developed by three or four, it is too late.”
She argues that the government boost to pay her salary is a boost to Latvia’s cultural future.
