List of education ministries

An education ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for education. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of Education, Department of Education, Ministry of Public Education, and so forth, and the head of such an agency may be a Minister of Education or Secretary of Education. Such agencies typically address educational concerns such as the quality of schools or standardization of curriculum. The first such ministry ever is considered to be the Commission of National Education (pl. Komisja Edukacji Narodowej, lt. Edukacinė komisija) founded in 1773 in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Following is a list of education ministries by country:

Africa

Of Education

The tractate Of Education was published in 1644, first appearing anonymously as a single eight-page quarto sheet (Ainsworth 6). Presented as a letter written in response to a request from the Puritan educational reformer Samuel Hartlib, it represents John Milton's most comprehensive statement on educational reform (Viswanathan 352), and gives voice to his views "concerning the best and noblest way of education" (Milton 63). As outlined in the tractate, education carried for Milton a dual objective: one public, to “fit a man to perform justly, skillfully, and magnanimously all the offices, both private and public, of peace and war” (55); and the other private, to “repair the ruins of our first parents by regaining to know God aright, and out of that knowledge to love Him, to be like Him, as we may the nearest by possessing our soul of true virtue” (52).

Influences

The influences at work in the tractate are an interesting blend of Renaissance humanism with its emphasis on the via activa, tempered by the more contemplative medieval concern with personal redemption. It is clear, however, that the overwhelming thrust of Milton's educational programme as outlined in the tractate is centred in the public objective. This is likely a reaction to the scholasticism that dominated the medieval university from the twelfth century, which still held sway in Milton's time (Ainsworth 25).