Compulsory school starting age gradually being lowered

Free pre-school education for children as young as four is inching towards becoming a reality, Education Minister Athena Michaelidou explained to lawmakers on Wednesday during a House education committee that is examining a bill to this effect.

The session was not without digs at the minister’s predecessor Prodromos Prodromou, with MPs remarking that he used to threaten them that if they did not pass the law as he submitted, then Cyprus was at risk of losing EU funding.

It is clear this threat was not actually the case but a tool, Diko MP and committee deputy chairman Chrysanthos Savvides said.

Stemming from a clause under Cyprus’ Recovery and Resilience Plan, Michaelidou explained the goal is that by 2030, free pre-school education should be available for children aged four.

This will be implemented in stages and would first begin with children starting off aged four and six months.

Multi-million idea

“We are making full use of the €12.5 million that the Recovery Fund gives us until 2026 and we are accepting children from four years and six months old from next September, if this is approved by parliament,” Michaelidou said.

Currently, free pre-school is offered to children aged four and eight months.

“We will go down in age, so that in 2030 we will be able to accept children from four years old in our schools, compulsory and free of charge, in public and community kindergartens.”

The €12.5m is expected to cover the first two years of the change, though the total sum for “everything this includes” is €127 million, Michaelidou said.

More than 30,000 children to benefit

The minister stressed that having two years of preschool as opposed to one had proven benefits for children, not only for their educational results but socially too.

This is demonstrated in improved attitudes for issues such as violence, but can also go a long way in early diagnoses such as dyslexia.

“We can diagnose the children early from the age of four, so that they are better prepared for primary and secondary education later on,” Michaelidou underlined.

She specified that the bill allows for the creation of new pre-schools and a broader improvement of the education sector, which will ultimately lead to 22,500 children benefitting in public pre-schools, and 13,000 in community pre-schools.

Should the bill be voted into law, this would mean that for the next eight years, 250 new nursery teachers would have to be hired.

Private schools

Michaelidou sought to clarify that anyone who wanted to sign up their child to a private school was still free to do so.

A deputy social welfare ministry scheme funding parents that send their children to private schools would continue in 2025, she said.

Currently, around 20 per cent of parents choose to send their children to private school, the minister said.

Michaelidou expressed the hope that all would go well with the bill so that soon “we will open the registration platform to accept the first children in September, from the age of four years and six months.”