Romanian Pres Says Education Strategy Should Include Student Views

"My hope is that school year 2008 – 2009 will begin with this strategy completed. There is a bit of optimism in my statement, but I feel we need to hurry," Basescu said.

He added he hopes student organizations would get involved in the development of this strategy, so that their problems would be included in the document.

In his opinion, if the strategy is not completed by fall, this would generate delays in the development of the legislation for the reform of the education system, which would mean sacrificing new generations of students.

At the same time, Basescu said he is concerned because none of the Romanian universities are ranked among the top 500 in the world and top 100 in Europe.