Analysis and Perspectives for the Development of the Higher Education System in Bulgaria

The development of higher education's system in the recent years endured transformations and restructurings, having to answer number of challenges. On one hand, the main challenge was connected with the requirements of the labour market as well as with the rapidly changing outside environment. The established new requirements that regarded employers' increasing pretentions about the work positions as well as the competence of the experts, who have been "produced", are the main challenge in the new circumstances. Higher schools, put in active market relations, started looking for an answer to that new challenge. The responsibility of higher schools' adequate behaviour is their managements' and teachers' ability to react innovatively, quickly and adequately, put sometimes in extreme conditions. Very often, these days the question of which of these challenges put the Bulgarian higher schools in the unsatisfying condition to "cover" these environment requirements is asked. At first sight, the established new legal grounds, the opportunity for autonomous development and number of other circumstances gave them full opportunities for realization of these new circumstances. Actually, most of the higher schools couldn't effectively manage with the new assigned tasks, and reorganization and restructuring was happening in an administrative and inert manner. In most of the cases, the universities turned out being quiet and peaceful places for staying, without this "stay at the working place's" result being clear and specified. Bulgarian higher schools' development put forward some critical and basic questions for their teachers' competence, for the skills and knowledge their students get, for the financing models and in the long run, for the quality of the educational service they render