Education Minister Sorin Costreie defends dual ministry structure in Romania

During a televised interview, Education Minister Sorin Costreie addressed questions about his independence within the government, given that the Social Democrats have placed a delegate for pre-university education in the ministry. He asserted that all education policies will be formulated with the prime minister’s approval, not the PSD’s. Costreie described the dual-minister setup as a standard European model, citing France, Sweden, Poland, Denmark, Finland and Spain as examples where education is divided between pre-university and university sectors, sometimes with separate research ministries.

He emphasized that Romania’s two organic laws, enacted in 2023, already distinguish the two levels, and that a split ministry would allow each system to operate without a single imposed vision. While acknowledging one outlet structure includes two ministers, he suggested that moving to two fully independent ministries would be advantageous for the Romanian education system.