Kartografijos studijos aukštojo mokslo reformos išvakarėse.

In Lithuania, the only program of master studies has been introduced at the Faculty of Natural Sciences of Vilnius University in 2001. Graduates of the basic bachelor course of geography, geology and geodesy are admitted to this study program (80 credits; the course lasts for 2 years). Since 1977, cartographers have not been trained in Lithuania. For this reason, specialists of the Cartographic Centre at the Faculty of Natural Sciences in charge for these studies have always taken active interest in training similar specialists in West European countries. In 2002, supported by the German Scientific Exchange Foundation (DAAD), the staff and students of the Cartographic Centre had a unique opportunity to get acquainted with the German higher schools of cartographers. In 2003-2004, supported by the EU Leonardo da Vinci mobility programs, the Cartographic Centre together with other higher schools of the country and cartographic production organizations participated in the implementation of the project "Improvement of professional training quality in Lithuania oriented at technological innovations and Euro integration". In 2006-2007, a project of the same Leonardo da Vinci program, "The strategy of training geographical information specialists and professional qualification extension targeted at development of information society" was implemented. During the implementation of the mentioned projects, foreign universities training cartographers in 14 countries and 45 production institutions were visited. The article discusses the information collected during the visits concerning training cartographers and their possibilities in foreign markets. It is assumed that it would be expedient to switch from the model of thematic training of cartographers to the model of training specialists of geographical information because the demand for this kind of specialists is at present very high in Lithuania. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]