On September 23, 2020, the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan signed a new law on education. This is a new phase in advancing the education system in the country, since for the first time a new law encompasses the terms ‘Adult learning and education’ and ‘Lifelong learning’.
Now Lifelong learning takes its decent place among essential principles in the field of education, like “priority of education; the freedom of selecting a form of education; unacceptability of discrimination in education” in the article 4. The law guarantees equal rights to education despite sex, race, nationality, language, religion, social origin, beliefs, private and social status (the article 5).
For the first time the law on education of Uzbekistan includes the article 19. Adult education and learning (ALE) is recognized as the “central component of lifelong learning, it includes all forms of education and learning as well as encompasses all processes of formal, non-formal and informal education” – the latter are also defined in the article. For many years DVV International jointly with the UNESCO and local partners has increased awareness on the importance of legal recognition of ALE as a separate sector of education. Starting from 2003, the regional and national conferences, round tables and seminars have been devoted to this question, all events concluded with recommendations on developing ALE and LLL in Uzbekistan.
Already in 2018, when the working group on developing a new law on education was formulated at the state level, it was clear that a new law will include the section on ALE. DVV International provided consultative support to the working group on describing ALE and LLL in the project of the law.
We are pleased that many of our recommendations on recognizing ALE sector and LLL have found their place in the adopted law. Further activities of DVV International in Uzbekistan will be focused on supporting initiatives focused on implementation of the new law.