In mid-1973 problems inherent in the educational system of Bulgaria
continued to exist. One of the most serious was the inadequacy of funds
for education generally but particularly for higher education where the
need was the greatest. Another problem was that of overcrowding.
Although there was virtually no problem of teacher shortage, there were
far too many students in proportion to the number of schools. A third
problem lay in the area of foreign student exchange where relatively few
foreign students studied in Bulgarian universities and institutes and
few Bulgarian students were allowed to study abroad. Another problem on
the higher educational level was the discrepancy between students'
preference regarding their fields of specialization and government
dictates in this area. Although many students at the university level
were interested in the arts and social sciences, the government, feeling
the weight of the economy's demands, very often preempted their choices
and allocated many more places to the sciences than to the arts. The
most serious problem, however, in terms of higher education, was that
owing to a shortage of places at the university level only 20 percent of
the secondary students who applied for admission were accepted. This
shortage of places in higher education, coupled with the fact that
extremely few Bulgarian students were permitted to study abroad, meant
that a large proportion of potential students capable of serious work
were turned away from higher education altogether.

HISTORY OF EDUCATION

Until the late eighteenth century education made virtually no progress
in the country. Although schools did exist during the period of Turkish
rule, the Turks had no interest in furthering education among their
subjects, except insofar as it would benefit themselves. From the
fourteenth through the seventeenth centuries education remained at a
standstill. During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the Turks
allowed the Greek Orthodox Church to become predominant among Christians
in the area, and an intense hellenization campaign ensued with the
seeming purpose of assimilating the Bulgarians as a people into the
Greek society that surrounded them. The campaign, which was particularly
virulent in the 1750s, was successful in the schools, and the Bulgarian
language and customs were supplanted by those of the Greek.

By the late eighteenth century, however, a national revival grew in
force, stim