Teachers were also nominated for places on local people's councils, and increasing numbers were declared eligible for election to the Grand National Assembly. To raise the standard of living for the teaching corps, a new wage system was introduced in 1969, which granted pay increases at all teaching levels, improved promotions, and raised retirement benefits. Government assistance was made available to all teachers for the construction of individual homes in either urban or rural areas in which they were assigned. EDUCATION OF MINORITIES Although the government has recognized in principle the right of the national minorities to use their native languages in education, the implementation of official educational policies has reflected a strong preference for the incorporation or integration of all minority groups into the general population. The dissatisfaction of the large Hungarian and German minorities with the inadequacies of minority education eventually surfaced in early 1969 at the national congress of educational workers, and since that time the regime has taken steps to reduce inequalities in the system by providing additional facilities, trained personnel, and teaching materials for the improvement of minority instruction. As a result of this increased government support, groups as small as six were made eligible to be instructed by a full-time teacher in any non-Romanian native language. High schools with instruction in Hungarian or German were set up in a number of the larger cities and towns that had sizable populations in those nationalities. In addition, sections or classes were organized in certain vocational and industrial schools for the teaching of selected subjects in minority languages, and candidates for admission to higher schools were permitted to take competitive examinations in either Romanian or their native language. By the opening of the 1971/72 school year the government reported that more than 280,000 minority students in 3,162 schools and sections were receiving instruction in their native languages from approximately 14,000 teachers. CHAPTER 7 ARTISTIC AND INTELLECTUAL EXPRESSION The arts and intellectual activity reflect Romania's position as a crossroads of Eastern and Western cultures. Elements of ancient Roman culture from the second and third centuries mingle with Byzantine elements (dating from the Middle Ages) and with Islamic elements (brought by the Turkish conquest of the fifteenth century) (see ch. 2). In more recent times, these were joined by elements of Western European culture. Underlying all these influences from abroad are elements of a native peasant culture that can be traced back to the Neolithic settlement found on the territory of the Romanian state. The mixing of all the elements has produced a cultural mosaic that, although it has much in common with the cultures of neighboring countries, is purely Romanian.