The National Ministry of Education and Religions carries responsibility for the implementation of educational laws, decrees and directives. Despite recent restructuring, Greek education is still governed by national laws voted by parliament affecting the organisation of educational institutions and curriculum. Private institutions are of limited importance in Greek education today as many institutions which were formerly run by private bodies have been taken over by the State.

1997 documentation gives the population of Greece as 10,259,900.

The GDP per capita is 9,214 and the workforce is broken down thus: agriculture 21%, industry 28% and servuces 51%
 

Population	10,259,900
GDP per head	9,214

The first continuing vocational training activities in Greece were developed in the mid-1950s by public services and State organisations as well as by large private industrial firms.

However, there was a large shortage of trained employees to meet the requirements of the labour market, as a result of the rapid and uneven economic growth that took place in Greece then.

This fact and in addition the non-existence of an effectively organised national formal system of initial vocational education and training before the early 1960s led to the development of continuing vocational training activities which were mainly restricted to forms of substitution or compensation for initial vocational training.

Consequently, the distinction between initial and continuing vocational training has been rather unclear in Greece. The existence of strictly defined continuing vocational training activities was marginal until the late 1980s.

A remarkable development in continuing vocational training has taken place since then characterised by the subsidiary role of the State, the multiplicity and diversity of suppliers and supply as well as an orientation towards the labour market's changing needs.

One of the major themes of the Voctade study has been the underlining of the importance on a global level distance education scene of the model of the open university or the distance teaching university which is regarded by the Voctade study as one of the most important contributions of the governments of the European Union to the development of vocational education and training world-wide.

The foundation of the Hellenic Open University of Greece is the seventh of the foundations of this nature in the European Union. It follows:

• the foundation of the Open University of the United Kingdom by the government of the United Kingdom
• the foundation of UNED in Spain by the government of Spain
• the foundation of the FernUniversität Gesamthochschule in Hagen by the government of the of North-Rhine Westphalia
• the foundation of the Open Universiteit in the Netherlands by the government of the Netherlands
• the foundation of the Universidade Aberta in Lisbon by the government of Portugal
• the Universitat Oberta of Catalunya was founded a few years ago in Catalonia to teach at a distance in Catalán as a virtual university

Government distance training provision

Proprietary distance training provision

Distance teaching university

University level distance education

• Nil

The announcement by the minister of education at a press conference in January 1998, attended by the board of governors of the new Open University, created great interest in the Greek media and an immediate flood of over three hundred applications for the first distance programme of the new Open University. The first degrees will be a post graduate diploma in Open and Distance Learning which will be commenced on the 3 March 1998, and a degree in Teaching English as a Foreign Language developed jointly with the University of Manchester of the United Kingdom which will commence later in 1998.

Further details are contained in the case study of the Elliniko Anikto Penepistemio in part 1 of the Voctade report above.

1994

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1997