The government approved the merger of Alytus college with Kaunas college

According to the Ministry of Education, Science and Sports, the reorganization is being carried out “in order to create more favorable conditions for the quality of college studies and scientific applied activities and to improve their compliance with the needs of society and the labor market of the city and region of Alytus”.

Alytus College itself has previously declared its desire to join Klaipėda University. In September, it was announced that the decision to connect it to the Kaunas College was appealed to the court.

During the coordination of the Government’s draft resolution, the Alytus collegium submitted a letter stating that the decision was made “ignoring the reorganization plan presented by the collegium itself” and reiterated its disapproval. The institution stated that the circumstances when the proposals of the reorganized institution itself are ignored “make us question the transparency and objectivity of the restructuring process, the goals of the planned measures and possible consequences.”

Alytus College has announced that both it and Klaipėda University train specialists in the same fields – health, informatics, engineering, technology and social sciences. Its director, Sigitas Naruševičius, was indignant that the decisions regarding the connection to the Kaunas college were made without discussions with the community, without hearing the arguments why a different option was proposed.

According to the drafters of the resolution, the proposal of the college was considered at the meetings of the commission established for the strengthening of the college network and, after evaluating all the arguments, it took into account not the institution, but the recommendation of experts regarding the connection to the Kaunas college.

“The commission, having evaluated the submitted proposal, found that the synergy between Alytus College and Klaipėda University is small due to the distance between the institutions and the fields of study, it will be difficult for the synergy of Alytus College and Klaipėda University to achieve the long-term goals set in the State Colleges Network Strengthening Plan regarding academic staff, scientific activities and graduate employment,” the ministry says.

She notices that the Alytus college did not argue why it would not be able to achieve the set long-term goals in the case of a merger with another state college and considered the merger with Klaipėda University as the only alternative.

“In the commission’s opinion, strengthening the potential of Alytus College by joining Kaunas College would allow strengthening all professional bachelor’s studies in health sciences, engineering, business and public management currently being conducted at Alytus College, while ensuring the preservation of collegiate studies in the Alytus region,” the submission states.

It also notes that in Alytus college, 46% of students out of the total number of students are studying in the nursing and midwifery program, the study infrastructure for this program is well developed, therefore it is necessary to ensure the implementation and strengthening of these collegiate studies.

In the case of the merger of Alytus College with Klaipėda University, these studies would not be carried out at the college, because the university can conduct collegiate studies only in exceptional cases, so this would significantly reduce the availability of higher education studies, and students from the region, who intend to choose collegiate studies, would have to go to study in Vilnius, Kaunas or other colleges and this would possibly affect the development of the Alytus region.

In July, the government planned to renew and strengthen the network of colleges, reorganizing and merging some of them.

The 2023-2024 state college network strengthening plan aims for at least 1.2 thousand students to study in any state college in 2029. students. It was also agreed that at least 76 percent of state college graduates would be employed within 12 months after graduation according to the acquired qualifications.

It is expected that in 2029, there will be at least 50 percent in public colleges. of full-time teachers and at least 10% teachers with a science or art degree working at least 0.5 part-time.