Armen Sarkissian met with intelligentsia

ArmInfo. Armenia's President Armen Sarkissian met with representatives of the Armenian intelligentsia. As the press service of the RA President told ArmInfo, at the  beginning of the meeting Sarkissian announced that he expects to hold  an open conversation in an informal form. At the same time, he  expressed concern about the lack of public discussions with the  participation of the intelligentsia in the recent period, a  superficial approach to a number of problems in society, the lack of  deep analysis of the situation, and a more emotional approach to  pressing issues. The President of Armenia discerned in all this a syndrome of  superficial discussion of everything, which is very painful, or in  other words "headline syndrome". He also mentioned that there is another factor in Armenia that  worries him, it is connected with pretense, when we make pretense  that we have a lot things, for example, a developed sector of  information technologies, although in reality everything is  different, since having talented people in this industry is one  thing, and a developed IT sector is completely different. Sarkissian  stated that today about 20 thousand people are employed in this area,  while only 5-6 thousand are engaged in programming. Therefore,  according to him, talks about the possession of a developed IT sector  are just an imitation. The President of Armenia also spoke about the Hay Park project, which  is planned to be implemented on the territory adjacent to the  Tsitsernakaberd memorial complex and which, according to the  President, will become a kind of symbol of the unity of the Armenian  people. The meeting participants also touched upon the issue of the Armenian  language, pointing out the importance of showing the state's  attention to the language and respectful attitude, while maintaining  the purity of the language, literate speech and writing. Intellectuals expressed their concern about the change in educational  criteria, pointing to the importance of education, national image and  national values. Sarkissian said that education is one of the main  drivers of development of any country, especially Armenia, where the  education system is one of the most sensitive parts of the country's  social life. "It is not so easy to change a school textbook, methodology,  attitude. This process should go through a long-term public  discussion through public consent. National unity is not only an  army, not only culture, but also a textbook by which we teach a  child. If we do not have national unity, what can we teach our child,  then how can we reach agreement in the field of culture or the army,"  the President asked, adding that we need to be very attentive to  cultural and historical values, have a development strategy where the  key places will be occupied by education, culture and, of course,  health.