EN
In Austria there is considerable discrepancy between the educational rights of particular national minorities. There is no single legal regulation concerning minority education. The situation of each group is regulated individually. Two such groups - the Slovenian and Croatian minorities enjoy the biggest rights. The basic document in Carynthia, a region with the Slovenian minority is the act on minority education of 1959. In the case of the other group, appropriate legal regulations were adopted much later. In Burgenland, where there are numerous communities of the Croatian minority, the law in force is the act of minority education of 1994. The above mentioned acts are based on the National Treaty of 1955. It provides among others for the possibility of teaching classes in the Slovenian and Croatian languages. The present law, apart from bilingual education in state schools, provides also for establishing private educational institutions, including nursery schools, and enables assistance from public funds. The latter are allocated for research on language, the writing and publication of school textbooks or teacher training.