The Minister of Education and Science of Georgia, Mikheil Chkhenkeli, during his speech to the parliament in the minister's hour format, spoke about the promotion of school infrastructure development, summarized the results achieved in this direction and provided information to the MPs about the construction-rehabilitation project of 800 schools. 

As Mikheil Chkhenkeli pointed out, in order to create an equally accessible learning environment in schools, the main priority of the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia is the provision of educational infrastructure throughout the country. According to him, an unprecedented scale project is being implemented in this direction this year, which was started in September of this year by the initiative of the Prime Minister of Georgia, Mr. Irakli Gharibashvili.

Mikheil Chkhenkeli: "Owing to the initiative of the Prime Minister of Georgia, Mr. Irakli Gharibashvili, a project worth 1 billion GEL has been started, which involves the construction and renovation of 800 schools. At this stage, the tendering procedures for the construction of 80 new schools and the renovation of 320 schools are underway. The tender for the rehabilitation of the remaining 400 schools will be announced in 2024, and by the end of 2026, a total of 800 schools will be constructed and fully renovated. The project ensures equal access to educational resources and their improvement. More than 230,000 students will benefit from its implementation. As a result, by the end of 2026, all public general educational institutions will be infrastructurally sound.”

It should be noted that during the rehabilitation and construction of new schools, it is planned to equip them in accordance with modern standards.

The minister drew attention to already implemented infrastructural projects. As he said, in 2021-2022, 3 new public schools were built by the Educational and Scientific Infrastructure Development Agency of the State of Ukraine, and 237 public schools were fully or partially rehabilitated. In addition, about 200 public schools received funding for the implementation of various infrastructural or material projects.

In his speech, Mikheil Chkhenkeli emphasized the importance of cooperation with various agencies in terms of improving the school infrastructure. According to him, with the financing of the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports of the Autonomous Republic of Adjara, 4 new public schools were built in the Adjara region, and 28 schools were fully or partially rehabilitated. From 2019 until now, the construction/complete rehabilitation of 121 public schools in the regions has been completed by the Municipal Development Fund of Georgia, and at this stage the construction/complete rehabilitation of 31 schools is underway.