Ethnical-lingusitic characteristics and family value orientations in an educational system for Hungarian minorities

Abstract

This paper is discussing the characteristics of minority education in Hungarian language in Bihor county, a western border region of Romania inhabited by a large number of ethnic Hungarians. Due to the fact that during communist rule the access of national minorities to native language education was more and more restricted, the educational level of Hungarian ethnics today is significantly lower compared to ethnic Romanian population. This situation might be corrected in the future by offering to Hungarians opportunities for attaining a fully fledged education in their native language (from kindergarten to university), which should not reduce, however, their chances of integration and upward mobility within the larger Romanian society.