Abstract:

The fourth goal of sustainable development, "Ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education and lifelong learning opportunities for all", set out by the United Nations General Assembly in 2015, has led to an active debate on the renewal of general education curricula in many countries. In the resolution “Transforming our world: the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”, and in our country the aspirations of the implementation of the provisions of the state progress strategy “Lithuania's Progress Strategy“ and "Lithuania 2030”, also supported it. The level of secondary education is widely studied in the scientific literature, emphasizing that it is at this level learners should consolidate the knowledge acquired at previous levels and, after graduation, be ready for an unknown but independent life, further higher education, vocational education, successful employment and career development (Dudaite, Dukynaite, 2017; Usan, Salavera, Pilar Teruel, 2019; Pascoe, Hetrick, Parker, 2019; Slot, Bronkhorst, Akkerman, Wubbels, 2020; Zanden, Zanden, Meijer, 2020). The importance of achieving goals such as promoting lifelong learning, developing key competencies, and promoting independence and social awareness has also been revealed (Kin, Kareem, 2019; Thole, 2020). However, there is lack of researches on how educational subjects, especially students, self-assess the personal achievement of secondary education goals, how their attitudes are aligned with educators, and how the situation is perceived by education experts who directly contribute to goal development. The main aim of the study is to reveal the attitudes of different educational subjects towards the implementation of secondary education goals. In order to highlight the diversity of approaches and their coherence or differences, a study of mixed methods (quantitative and qualitative) was chosen. The study involved 55 students from two schools, 31 of whom belonged to School X and 24 to School Y. Also, teachers and a national level education expert were interviewed. Quantitative research was conducted to determine students ’attitudes, using a questionnaire with defined, outcome criteria and indicators as a key tool. A semi-structured interview was used to reveal the views of educators and education experts, the transcribed data of which were presented in textual expression, further categorizing them in a certain coding system and thus discovering the meanings under study. Qualitative content analysis was performed. Relating the results of both studies, the following conclusions have been formulated: from the pupils' point of view, the goals of secondary education are only partially implemented, while according to the education expert and teachers, the aims and the expected achievements of secondary education are declared only at the theoretical level and there are no favorable conditions and opportunities for their practical implementation in the education system and in separate schools.

Keywords:

Implementation of secondary education goals, attitudes of educational subjects, secondary education.