Education in Tagmatium
The education system in Tagmatium is overseen by the Ministry for Education of the Tagmatine government and the governments of the Provinces are responsible for carrying out the policy for public education and state-funded schools at a local level. Tagmatium also has a tradition of Church-funded and privately-funded schools, as well as home education. However, all of these must conform to the curriculum set out by the Ministry for Education. This is monitored by inpections and assessments by the Ministry for Education itself via annual inspections. Education in state-run schools is universal and free of charge; this was brought in in stages between the 1850s and 1950s. Before this, education was often provided for free by the Church and tended not to go beyond the age of 14, or was private and much more comprehensive. This was slowly reformed over the course of one hundred years and has resulted in Tagmatium being amongst one of the better educated nations on Eurth. For example, the literacy rate of the country is judged to be 99%. The government spends 6.8 percent of its GDP on education.
Education is compulsory between the ages of 3 and 18 and is divided into age groups. These are from ages 3-4, 5-10, 11-15 and 16-18. Education consists of a broad range of subjects, including but not limited to mathematics, science, theology, history, languages and others. Tagmatine children are taught to be bilingual, being taught both Laimiaic and Fragran from the age of 5. Other common wurld languages are also taught, such as Anglish or Dolchic, but these are usually optional. From the age of 16, people may elect to take vocational courses, training, apprenticeships or even volunteering rather than continue with schooling. Otherwise, children complete a further two years of schooling before going onto higher education, such as universities.
Higher education usually begins with a bachelor's degree that takes three years. Postgraduate degrees, whether taught or by research, commonly last one year and doctoral level research degrees usually last three years. Depending on both the degree taken and the institution attended, most bachelor's degrees are state-funded or allocated bursaries. Private universities and colleges do exist, which can often charge significant fees. Tagmatium has several wurld-renowned universities that are consistently ranked within the top 100 universities on Eurth and undertake international research and collaboration. Some of which are ancient, such as the Mouseion in Prousa, dating from 451, or the Hekademion in Thenion that was founded in 501. Others are much more recent but are still considered to be amongst the top establishments in the country or even on Eurth.
