On November 12, 2008 a presentation “School Board in Armenia: Public Participation and Power Balance” was conducted by young researchers Satenik Mkrtchyan and Ruzanna Tsaturyan in the scope of the CRRC 2007 Fellowship Program.

Since 1996 the Government of Armenia started the educational system reforms under the guidance and by crediting of the World Bank, through realization of a credit program: “Education management and financial reforms”, one of the aims of which was the democratization of in-school management and transition to School Board governance. Thus, School Boards have been introduced to the secondary educational system of Armenia as a part of Secondary Education system management reform. By the introduction of principles of democratic government into schooling system, parents formally first time were considered as independent and responsive actors. The research investigated parents’ current participation patterns, challenges, weak and strong points, as well as came up with policy recommendations to improve the situation.

As always, the draft version of the paper is available on CRRC-Armenia website. Your comments are most welcome.