As Mirela Lilek/Novac writes on the 27th of April, 2019, Croatia's situation still isn't good: the country is continuing to ''produce'' graduates with the third lowest employment rate in the whole of the European Union, and as a result, taxpayers pay more and more money for them. According to new data from Brussels, based on a comparative survey of youth employment among Croats with diplomas earned in the last three years, a third of highly educated people aged between 20 to 34 in Croatia have no jobs. Only Italy and Greece are worse.

Of the 28 countries EU member states, Croatia ranked 26th with a 66 percent employability rate. Four positions above Croatia lies Romania, Bulgaria is six places above, and Slovakia is nine places above. Croatia's neighbour to the north, Slovenia, is eleven places above Croatia, Poland is thirteen places above (impressively right behind Ireland and Denmark), and the Czech Republic, with an 89.9 percent employability rate which has impressed the European Commission's experts - has risen to an enviable fourth place.

Malta is in first place in Europe as an employer of its graduates with diplomas, the employment rate of Maltese students stands at a very impressive 94.5 percent, even better than Germany, which boasts a rate of 90.9 percent, followed then by the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, and then Austria. The EU average is on the rise, back in 2014 it stood at 76 percent and in 2018 it stood at 80.2 percent. Unfortunately, the Croats have been close to the bottom for years, more specifically for fifteen years, as it has a below-average rate of employability in relation to the EU. Of course, rather than attempt to fix the problem directly, the Croats are doing what the Croats always do - continuing to debate and argue over who is (more) to blame for such embarrassing conditions.

Economists see the issue as being that the Croats aren't adapting easily to the market, and that Croatia also has an old education system. At Croatia's universities, they argue that the key issue isn't Croatia's higher education institutions, but an underdeveloped labour market, low personal income, and demotivating working conditions. Experts from the European Commission have given a relatively simple answer: Investing in education will benefit everyone in Europe.

Let's see how they explain their theories in some of the country's universities, starting with the largest "producers" of graduates in the entire country, the Faculty of Philosophy and Economics in Zagreb.

''We're aware of the importance of linking study programs and labour market needs. In this regard, the Faculty of Economics makes an effort to make it easier for students to access the labour market by establishing multilateral cooperation with companies and respectable institutions that enable students to perform high-quality professional practices,'' stated Sanja Sever Mališ, who deals with strategic partnerships and projects at the Faculty of Economics in Zagreb. The basic message from this particular Zagreb university is that "they connect students and employers so their best students can find work even during their studies." Therefore, there is no concern for them.

On the other hand, Vesna Vlahović-Štetić, Dean of the Faculty of Philosophy, admits that Croatia's humiliating placement at the bottom of the employability scale of graduates is still something to be very concerned about and therefore the causes of that need to be looked at.

''I assume that part of the problem lies in insufficient development and the ability of the economy and the public sector to absorb newly graduated students. On the other hand, the question is how many colleges and higher education institutions meet the needs of society with their respective programs. At the state level, in some professions there's hyper-production, and in others there is a lack of experts. Additionally, study programs should be regularly updated and developed to meet not only society's needs but also predict what competences professionals will need in the future,'' the dean says.

Data obtained through the HKO project of the Faculty of Philosophy shows that the employability of their students in the year after graduation is 75 percent. They believe this is the result of "the excellent professional and generic competences of their graduates".

"We're convinced at the Faculty of Philosophy that the study programs need to be further improved, so we have just started the study reform process and I'm sure the future employability of our students will be even better," says the university's dean.

The rector of the University of Rijeka, Snježana Prijić Samaržija, doesn't want to run away from the fact that Croatia's universities do hold a share of the responsibility for this issue but, again, she's convinced that Croatia's higher education institutions are't the key cause of the problem, but the underdeveloped labour market definitely is.

Rijeka University has eleven faculties and four departments. On their official page, they point out that they are a modern European university and a centre of excellence within the region and beyond, and that they are responsible for the social and economic development of the community. Samardžija claims that she doesn't want to relate the worrying data on the high rate of unemployed with higher education, but that "it should be borne in mind that higher education is a better job-finding guarantee, such as landing a permanent position,"

"Of course, it's possible to say that the employment rate would be higher if universities, by some automation, increased their quotas for the job-type deficit and reduced those profiles for which the employment bureaus take care of. In that sense, people often say Croatia's institutions and their enrollment policies aren't adapted to the labour market. However, the situation isn't quite that simple.

For example, the market seeks shipbuilding engineers, we have shipbuilding studies and a corresponding quota at the University of Rijeka, but there's a fall in interest for those studies. We can understand the students' fears about the situation with Croatia's shipyards, but the fact is that the need for this profession is still growing. Similarly, despite the lack of mathematics and physics teachers and the excellent studies we have, the interest doesn't match the employment opportunities,'' she explained.

The University of Rijeka decided to put seven studies ''into retirement'' this year, and isn't accepting students for them. Those are acting and media, dental hygiene, computer science in combination with professional studies of medical-lab diagnostics, mechanical engineering, shipbuilding, and electrical engineering.

On the other hand, there's a considerable level of interest in studies that don't guarantee quick and permanent employment at all, such as the arts, cultural studies, and psychology.

''Young people choose studies according to their personal interests, not just employment opportunities. They don't necessarily just want a permanent job, many of them are accustomed to gaining work experience in different institutions, at different places of work, and in different countries. More and more, they prefer to individually define the curriculum through courses and practical competences beyond their study program(s), which will make their expertise comparatively more special and desirable. In the midst of a sluggish and non-ethnological labour market, more and more students enjoy prolonged youthful relationships with their parents or rent apartments,'' says Snježana Prijić Samaržija.

"I don't want to run away from the responsibility of the university, we're constantly thinking about the jobs of the future, we're working on increasing the quota for the deficit professions and improving our students' competences to reduce the unemployment rate. However, time is needed to see the results of these measures because the higher education cycle lasts for at least five years. It should be understood that universities can't just simply increase quotas for occupations for which there's a labour market need because new employment is frozen,'' noted the Rector of the University of Rijeka.

As Croatia's paradoxical situation of having no work but plenty of jobseekers, yet plenty of work and no staff, it's hard to predict the outcome of education system reforms as the market and its needs can alter so rapidly. Will Croatian students simply continue to trickle away on the stream of a proverbial leaking tap out into Western Europe, leaving Croatia with the rather unenviable title of a country that educates its citizens for work abroad? It's likely such a scenario will continue at least for the foreseeable future. Whether or not Croatia will manage to make the necessary alterations to fix that aforementioned ''leaky tap'' in time remains to be seen.

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Click here for the original article by Mirela Lilek for Novac/Jutarnji

Statistics show that about 12,000 deaf people live in the Republic of Croatia, but unfortunately it is rare for them to complete their higher education.

As Ivan Tominac/Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 14th of April, 2019, Josip Ivanković was born in Čapljina, Bosnia and Herzegovina, but just one year after his birth, he was declared deaf, and this fact was one of his reasons for his relocation to Croatia. His move to Croatia certainly paid off as being the right move, and Josip, despite the diagnosis, managed to develop his speech and the technique of listening. That was, as Josip himself states, a painstaking and long process.

"The situation is that I have to treat speaking Croatian as if I was speaking a foreign language," Josip Ivanković explained.

For four years now, his speech and listening abilities have been being developed at the SUVAG Polyclinic, where Josip learned to speak with vibration, tone amplification, visualisation and by learning anatomy.

"When I learned to pronounce the letter ''r'', I had to touch the vocal chords of the logopad to feel a certain vibration and titration, then I'd lean my hand on my neck to feel the same vibration, so I learned to pronounce the letter ''r'' I learned to pronounce ''ž'' in a similar way, I just put my hand on my head. Generally speaking, the hardest letters to pronounce for the deaf are l,č,ć,đ,dž,lj and nj, and the reason for that is that such letters can't be visually identified. They're explained through the anatomy of the oral cavity, just like a doctor explains the heart's organs, or where the blood enters and where it exits,'' explained Josip.

After the kindergarten era ended, in which he learned the basics of socialisation, it was decided that he should attend a regular school.

This period of schooling, without any curriculum adjustment, he adds, was defined by perseverance, and communicational misunderstandings are, in his words, quite normal and natural.

"The professors made me equal with my peers, and this proved to be a good thing because I learned so much about the world of those who can hear, and I learned how to gather information," said Josip. As stated, statistics show that about 12,000 deaf people live in Croatia, but it is rare for them to complete higher education. Josip was not one of them, and he completed a college which has some very demanding academic requirements for its students.

He enrolled at FER (University of Zagreb, Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computing), and the likelihood of him completing his studies was slim, yet Josip had different plans for himself.

"At the beginning of the semester, it was very difficult for me to adapt,'' recalled Josip. Before Josip's arrival, professors from Zagreb's FER didn't have any experience in working with people with impaired hearing. At the beginning, he failed several exams, but he didn't let that dampen his spirit, and later he turned to further consultations.

This combination led him to become the very first deaf person to graduated from that college.

"The professors were very approachable, and our relationship was very flexible and adaptable. I will never forget how Professor Brnetić, instead of me asking him, personally invited me to consultations during the holidays and showed me much he cared that I didn't miss anything from the lecture. On the other hand, one professor asked me during consultations why I didn't go to the lectures and asked me how I was learning. I told him that I don't go to the lectures because I can't hear them. I took out a 100-page notebook with my assignments, and the professor was surprised that I did all that without having gone to any lectures. He asked me to lend him that notebook and later I learned that he'd showed my notebook to all of the professors. Believe it or not, a year after when I came to his office, that copy of the notebook was still on his desk,'' Josip stated, recalling his faculty days.

In the end, none of the obstacles he faced along the way turned him away from his goal, and he passed 62 engagements that mostly relied solely on him and his level of dedication. This FER student didn't have to wait around long before a job opportunity came knocking, and it wasn't your regular offer. He started his working life at no less than Rimac Automobili as an Embedded Hardware Engineer. Rimac had no problems with his deafness and offered him a position after his interview.

''At the beginning of the job, I was given a pretty demanding project that I had to complete within a month, which was the length of my trial period, and when the project ended I realised that I was able to complete it and was given the green light to remain with the firm,'' Josip said. The work never stops at Rimac Automobili, and at the moment, Josip is working on a project for the development of electric car chargers.

"Communication skills are the most difficult for me, because I have to invest extra energy into lip reading and that's mentally challenging and difficult. Imagine a situation in which a colleague is referring to professional terms, and I need to decode them with and put them into context in order for me to have any understanding. Imagine switching off your ears, and focusing your eyes on their lips alone.

You aren't likely to understand because they're not using standard words, they're using technical phrases that are difficult to decode and recognise. At the beginning, it was very difficult for me to follow verbal communication and understand the complexity of the project. Of course, since working here I've changed a lot and become much more calm, more focused and concentrated on the small things. The worst thing is when a colleague does not know how to communicate with me properly, and this is where I'm concerned about information which is valuable to the project, and that's an extra effort. Each colleague has his own specific way of speaking and they aren't all the same in communication. With time, I somehow adjusted to them, and they also had to adapt to me, I accepted that this was all normal and there would always be a situation where they couldn't understand, but I'll always ask them to repeat themselves not just twice, but 1000 times!'' concluded Josip.

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Click here for the original article by Ivan Tominac for Poslovni Dnevnik

NP Krka is another one of those ''must visit'' places when in Croatia, and yes, there are many such destinations to be found here. The whole ''must see'' thing has become a little saturated over recent years, especially with the rise of self-proclaimed travel bloggers and social media influencers, however, there is much more to this stunning national park than just the ability to take artistic Instagram pictures.

NP Krka is involving itself in the education of school children in the Dalmatian county in which the park is situated through a praiseworthy project aimed at increasing kids' overall awareness of both protected areas and nature and the environment.

As Morski writes on the 3rd of April, 2019, the highly visited NP Krka actually launched the project "Let's fill up the school libraries" (Popunimo školske knjižnice), for primary and secondary schools of the Šibenik-Knin County back in 2007.

The aim of the project is to make the books published within the framework of this educational scope available to school-age children and other young people, so that they can contribute to their own respective awareness of the country's numerous protected areas and the need to take care of their surroundings, including the importance of the proper preservation of the environment.

Since back in 2007, VHS tapes and later on, DVDs covering a wide array of topics related to NP Krka and its environment and native wildlife and birds have been shared around numerous local schools within the aforementioned county in Dalmatia. In February this year, a total of 49 books were distributed to thirty-six primary and thirteen high schools in the county.

NP Krka's administration and staff believe that this year's gift to local schools will be used by students and their mentors and teachers not only as an additional teaching aid for the classroom but that it will also encourage children to go out and get to know and further explore the rich natural beauty and the cultural heritage of the beautiful NP Krka.

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As Novi list writes on the 2nd of April, 2019, the democratisation of knowledge in this way is a true revolution and encompasses every person, from elementary and high school pupils, to college students and even corporation managers. Middle-aged and older people will also get an extraordinary opportunity to supplement their lifelong learning materials from the collection of this ever-expanding library. Meet Library of Croatia.

This spring, both residents and visitors to Croatia will be able to walk through Library of Croatia's ''vitrual doors''. Through this innovative platform for free and anonymous reading, which has been entirely developed by an interdisciplinary team of Croatian experts, anyone who finds themselves on the territory of the Republic of Croatia will have thousands of varied publications in many of the world's languages freely and readily available to them. From school books and world literary classics, to numerous tourist guidebooks and cookbooks, to poetry and love novels, an enormous array of titles will be available via Library of Croatia.

This season, Croatia will become first country that enables its residents and its visitors access to an unlimited virtual library through open digital platforms and related applications, available on all computers and mobile devices, including smartphones and tablets, Cover writes.

The Library of Croatia breaks the barriers between people and writing in all its forms, encourages the development of literary culture in unprecedented ways and creates new opportunities for virtually all sectors of society, both public and private, from culture, publishing, and education, to tourism and economy.

''This platform and product opens up a new world for the entire Croatian society,'' said Mirela Rončević, the author of the innovative idea whose global name is One Country One Library.

"We have created a circle from which we'll all benefit, and in doing so, provide people knowledge, regardless of their location and their purchasing power. Our partners support an innovative mission that is equally related to culture as well as to education and tourism, and they contribute to knowledge, expanding everywhere while improving their business,'' she added.

Library of Croatia is a library of the future coming to realisation in the present day, it's totally free and open to everyone, both in public places and in the privacy of their homes. Although many types of digital platforms have been launched in recent years on the foreign market, none have managed to merge various forms of publications into a single entity and open them up within the boundaries of a country, making them accessible to everyone without requiring any sort of identity verification.

The Library of Croatia is, in fact, unique in the world because it has succeeded in doing what nobody has ever done; to turn the entire country into a library, freely available to all people within its boundaries.

As stated, Library of Croatia offers all forms of content in one place: short stories, poetry, scientific publications, columns, tourist guides, Croatian and world classics, lectures etc. It also offers cutting-edge innovations in the digital world such as anonymous reading, font adapted to those with dyslexia, the ability to create and build private and public collections within the platform (so-called pockets), and the ability to self-disclose for independent authors.

The platform also provides a profound insight into reading analytics. According to the head of IT development project, physicist Duje Bonaccija, so far the key tool in measuring the success of a particular book has been its sales, but this indicator can't actually say anything about how much of those books were actually read.

Library of Croatia's team consists of experts from various fields, including IT, publishing, tourism, education, librarianship and marketing.

''For the first time in history, modern technology provides equal access to educational content to everyone regardless of the place or time of access,'' said sociologist Damir Kvesić for Cover, who joined the LoC team in an effort to point out the importance of this move for Croatia's education.

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As Morski writes on the 28th of March, 2019, this weekend, the island of Murter will host the first of two sets of field work of Zagreb veterinary students within the "Blue Project - Contribution to the development of the DKU Program at VFZS" project, carried out by the Argonaut association in partnership with the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine of the University of Zagreb, as well as the Pula Marine Education Centre.

The implementation of the project started back in April 2018, and the purpose of the project is to give the Zagreb veterinary students a chance to engage in socially beneficial marine environment conservation projects. Through the projects within the classes, and in cooperation with various civil society organisations, students will learn to properly identify the needs of the community and through the courses they undertake, develop potential solutions - projects that will see them engaged in the local community, according to a report from SibenikIN.

Within this concrete project, the topics that are likely among the most interesting to the Zagreb veterinary students will be the methods and ways of monitoring populations and providing treatment to the Adriatic's protected marine animals, such as sea turtles and dolphins.

In addition to Murter, students will also visit Pula and the Marine Education Center at the Pula Aquarium in mid-April this year.

Students will develop their projects through selected mentoring programs which include but aren't limited to visiting habitats during the winter months and learning how to properly aid a sea turtle who has become too cold, learning about the friendly behaviour of sea turtles and dolphins, what to do when coming across a sick or injured dolphin or sea turtle, and what the procedure is should a dead dolphin or sea turtle be discovered.

At the workshop in Murter, the thematic workshop will focus on dolphins and students will be educated on the development of monitoring protocols, recording the occurrence of protected marine animals - dates, times, geographical positions, the number of animals, their ages, their conditions and the level of potential human impact (maritime traffic, tourism and fishing), as well as the basics of photographing these types of protected marine species.

The project aimed at the Zagreb veterinary students and their further education will go on for eighteen months, more specifically until October 2019, and is co-financed by the European Social Fund (ESF) in the amount of 854,018,21 kuna, with a total value of 1,004,727.31 kuna. The project leader is the Argonaut association from Murter, and the partners of the project are the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine of the University of Zagreb and the Pula Marine Centre. The project is being implemented in the area of Šibenik-Knin County, Zagrebačka, and Istria County.

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Click here for the original article by SibenikIN

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 23rd of March, 2019, Business Matchmaker, organised by the eSTUDENT student association and the Office for consulting and career development at Zagreb's Faculty of Economics, will be held on the 26th of March this year at Zagreb's Faculty of Economics (Trg JF Kennedy 6), beginning at 9:00. The completion of the official part is expected to be at 15:00.

This innovative project allows students to personally present themselves in a short four minute selection interview to a group of desired companies. Interviews will be held in the halls of the faculty, and the continuation of the meeting and greeting, to which all participants are invited, will be in "Kefi" after 15:00 that same day.

Business Matchmaker is an event which resembles the speed dating principle and is intended for EFZG students to represent themselves to their potential employers. After the interview, employers and students will evaluate each other and the best students can then expect another round of interviews, where they will be able to learn more and find out more about employment opportunities in their desired companies.

In this interesting and useful way, students on the lookout for an employment position are able to properly develop their self-presentation skills and get to know how the labour market works firsthand. This year's Business Matchmaker will see the participation of as many as 21 companies divided into five different groups.

Lucija Matašin shared her personal experience of last year's Business Matchmaker and what it did for her career-wise:

"By participating in Business Matchmaker, I got a student job, which is honestly everything but ''student'' style. Along with that [I got] a great reference for my CV and a lot of motivation and courage to make it easier to deal with stress in similar situations in the future. I met the people from the company, which I might once meet again, because the world is really small and who knows where I'll be tomorrow, and maybe I'll bump into some of these people again on my way. This eSTUDENT initiative and the Office for consulting and career development really provide EFZG students with something they don't get through their classes.''

The companies participating in the project are 24sata, Addiko Bank, Atlantic Grupa (Group), ATOS, British American Tobacco, Croatia Osiguranje (Insurance), Deloitte, DIV Group, EC, INA, Kaufland, King ICT, KPMG, L'Oreal Adria, mStart, Philip Morris Zagreb, Samsung, SofaScore, Syskit, Talentarium and Zagrebačka banka.

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There are people among us who create and emit light to others. For seafarers, they aren't people but lighthouses, and for the poor - these people are benefactors. The merciful light of charity has reached Tanzania, Africa, from where longtime volunteer, Croatian Zoran Jagec, told Morski his story.

For a long time now, Zoran Jagec has been building schools and thus bringing a hint of hope to those who need it the most. For us, school is a very everyday (and often unwanted) thing, but for the kids there, the idea of going to school on a daily basis is a very different thing indeed. School is a place for socialising, a place to learn, a place to play, and a place to be safe. Zoran Jagec considers the very fact that a bulb is lit up in front of the school all night to be yet another victory and says: "It reminds me of our lighthouses. There somewhere in the bush, you can see the lights of the school.''

Morski brings us a good story, so that we can turn our attention away from Croatia's masochistic love of a daily dose of negativity, jitters, and politics, if just for a moment. Zoran Jagec came spoke from Tanzania after he successfully completed his project; he built another school for the children. He briefly described his praiseworthy humanitarian path.

''This is our third project. The first was in Cambodia in 2016 in the village of Tonleisar, where we gave the school a breath of new life by repairing the roofs, the doors, the windows, and we restored the walls. We brought with us a donation of toothbrushes and toothpaste, and the jerseys worn by the Croatian national team... After that, in the village of Pongro where I lived during last year's work, I got a local water pump and piping for the school. The next project was the building of a school in Masaai Village Mogero, Rujewa, Tanzania. The school is for pre-school age kids and the first two primary grades,'' stated Zoran Jagec.

Zoran Jagec then talks about what he is now engaged in.

''This project is also a construction (I call it a school) for preschool kids and the first two grades. There will be about 150 children (the exact number here is difficult to get) from three villages, Mwanza, Arusha and Maseramo.

How much does the light for the school cost?

''Every school gets a solar power system, that's always been the first electrical current in these villages! They're used to secure the school, so the lamps are bright in front of and behind the school all night, they remind me of our lighthouses. Somewhere in the bush you see the lights of the school. It's a bit poetic... like a roadmap for future generations to a better life.

They also have the ability to recharge their phones so they don't have to wonder where they'll be able to charge their batteries around the town,'' added Jagec.

''In this case, a large classroom and a teacher's office building are being built. Due to the lack of money we decided on this variant, by negotiating with the local authorities, teaching will take place in two shifts. That type of school is about 4,500 euros, maybe a little more if you're going to buy benches and chairs but that's not crucial. It is important that they get the school! The second type is a bigger school with two big classes and a teacher's office, and that costs about 7,500 euros. I must mention that a toilet for the kids and especially for the teachers is included.''

How many schools have been successfully built and what was your first urge to engage in this humanitarian gesture?

''It started since my first four-month trip to Southeast Asia; Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, in 2013/14. In Cambodia, I met my friend, Un Nhan (who has his own humanitarian organisation) who invited a couple of us tourists to tour the villages outside of the tourist areas where he showed us the reality of these people's lives. There, I also saw an English language school which had been set up by Un because they didn't have any organised classes in English language schools.

In conversation, he asked me if he would like to volunteer, and as it sounded a little bit far out, the conversation kind of stopped there. But... I started thinking about how and in what way I could help. Upon returning to Zagreb, I couldn't really stop thinking about it and as my desire grew, I came to the decision that in this way, by building or renovating schools, I'd be able to help the kids the most as that's the only way to get them an education. We know what this means for children in such societies - it's the only chance they have for a better life.'' stated Jagec.

''This is the second school that we'll build, along with the one that we refurbished. That's followed by the donations of jerseys, toothbrushes and toothpaste, school supplies, notebooks, rugs - everything is welcome!'' said Zoran Jagec.

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The scientists at Zagreb's Ruder Boskovic Institute are happy with their impressive developments, and the processes which follow will pave the way for the further use of their findings in the wider chemical industry.

As Lucija Spiljak/Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 29th of January, 2019, talented scientists working at the prestigious Ruder Boskovic Institute's green synthesis laboratory, the so-called ''green chemists'' Stipe Lukina and Ivan Halasz Ph.D., in cooperation with their colleagues from the European Synchrotron in Grenoble (ESFR), have managed to develop some brand new instruments designed for studying mechanochemical processes, thus opening up the path for their faster application in the chemical industry.

In layman's terms, these new processes are based on X-ray diffraction, and for the very first time, the newly developed method has enabled chemical reactions to be detected during trituration. The latest results have already been published in two highly respected scientific papers; one in Chemical Communications, and the other in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.

The Ruder Boskovic Institute's scientists stated that thanks to these developments, they have managed to explain some of the features of mechanochemical reactions when they resemble reactions in solutions.

The use of isotopically labeled solids, coupled with spectroscopic methods, showed up what was previously ''hidden'' chemical reactivity.

In yet another display of Croatian talent which stretches across the board, from sport to the arts, to medicine and science, the praiseworthy work done by the scientists from Zagreb's Ruder Boskovic Institute has been properly recognised by the wider academic community and is currently in the top five percent of all published works in the world according to the sheer level of interest it has attracted since its initial publication.

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Click here for the original article by Lucija Spiljak for Poslovni Dnevnik

As Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 28th of January, 2019, throughout the course of this year, Varaždin County will continue to invest heavily in education and healthcare thanks to European Union money, in addition, the county is going to busy launching some brand new, important projects.

This year, Varaždin County, the first in Croatia to do so, begins with the implementation of a very significantt project, financing school meals for secondary school students at risk of poverty. This is one of the newer and by far most important projects foreseen in the budget for 2019.

"We first introduced free [school] transportation and textbooks, and we're also starting to finance meals for high school students who are at risk of poverty. As many as 30 percent of primary school students are at risk of poverty, and we've provided free meals for all of them.

Since everyone is continuing to study, this problem isn't just going to disappear, and it's also necessary to finance meals for the most vulnerable kids in secondary schools,'' said county prefect Radimir Čačić. In the budget for 2019, 3.45 million kuna is planned to go towards pupil nutrition. The continued implementation of another new project is still going on, which is student accommodation, for which 526,000 kuna was provided, almost twice as much as 2018.

Investments in the construction and in several cases reconstruction of as many as twenty different schools is anticipated.

"In 2019, 227 million kuna will be invested in school facilities, and health and social care facilities. The increase is best seen in the consolidated budget, which amounts to 1.2 billion kuna, representing 25 percent more than last year,'' added Varaždin County Prefect Čačić.

In other areas, an innovative incentive scheme for farmers through the use of EU funds is of particularly interest. Thanks to this, the number of farmers who secured their crops and livestock has increased from 5 back in 2017 to a very encouraging 357 in 2018, and this year, further increases in the number of beneficiaries is expected.

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In recent years, Split University has appeared on numerous lists of some of the most prestigious world rankings of higher education institutions, coming out as the leading university in the Republic of Croatia.

As Slobodna Dalmacija/Marijana Cvrtila writes on the 27th of January, 2019, the latest list published of the Best Global Universities Rankings by the American The News & World Report, has ranked Split University at 523rd place out of a total of 1250 top universities in the United States and eighty other countries across the world.

The Americans ranked Split University as the best Croatian university, with two other Croatian education institutions finding themselves placed on that same list: Zagreb University at 560th place, and Rijeka University in 1066th position (last year they weren't even on the list).

That is why Split found the second year in a row in front of Zagreb, although both universities had a slightly worse success in 2019 than in 2018: the University of Split was among the top 500, with a ranking at 487, while Zagreb took over 526 position.

Despite the fact that three Croatian universities have been listed among the best in the world, it's worth mentioning that universities in two neighbouring universities have been better placed on this list than our best university; Ljubljana University is at 384th place, which is progress when compared to last year when it was placed in 394th position, while Belgrade University came in at 427th place, which is down compared to last year (397th).

According to Best Global Universities Rankings, Serbia has four higher education institutions on the list, but the universities in Novi Sad, Niš and Kragujevac are ranked behind 1000th place, while Slovenia still has Maribor University in a decent 788th place.

There are no other countries in the former Yugoslavia on this scale at all. Of the new(er) EU member states, Split University is better ranked, for example, when compared to the best universities in Bulgaria, Romania, Lithuania, Latvia, or Slovakia.

Of course, the world's top universities are in America: Harvard, MIT (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and Stanford, while among the top ten of the only European higher education institutions are the United Kingdom's prestigious Oxford, at fifth place, and Cambridge coming in close at seventh place.

Over recent years, Split University is regularly getting placed ahead of Zagreb University, one of the most important international charts, the Times Higher Education, ranked it as such. Both of these charts are among the ranking leaders of various such institutions.

Split University has achieved some excellent placements in the categories of international cooperation, where it lies among the top eighty universities. However, the University of Zagreb is better placed towards global research reputation, which is the weakest point of Split University, which stands out in the field of physics.

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Click here for the original article by Marijana Cvrtila for Slobodna Dalmacija