The alarm clock rings at eight o’clock sharp. Before classes start…a full half hour. There’s time to wash up, have breakfast, pack a briefcase… And then – two flights of stairs down, and you’re at school. Five more minutes until the call? So you can even score a few goals on the sports field.This is how every morning of the week begins for my sons, students of the school of the Russian Embassy in Colombia. Last summer, we transformed the skyscraper in the capital into the residential building of the embassy in Bogotá. Now we have an evergreen spring outside our window: sometimes hot, dry days, sometimes tropical showers. And instead of a Moscow school with a thousand students – a chamber embassy. Only 23 students! And two more are online.”Hooray! Now they check my homework every day, I do it for a reason. And finally they ask me when I raise my hand,” a fifth-grade son shared a month after classes started. Yet when there are only five students in the class instead of 32, everyone has time to ask.The eldest son was even luckier: they are only two in seventh grade. And he’s genuinely upset when a classmate is sick: seven 40-minute one-on-one lessons with the teacher are still tough.
The scale school
Our school was granted main school status last year. For a long time there was only one primary school, and only now a schedule for grades 5-9 has appeared. For which the parents of high school students, who are well aware of all the “charms” of distance education in quarantine and forced home education, are sincerely grateful to the Russian Ambassador to Colombia Nikolai Tavdumadze, to the director of the school Svetlana Vasilyeva and at the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
– I had to prepare a lot of documents to get a license for a basic school, – says Svetlana Viktorovna. – Now it remains to apply for accreditation from Rosobrnadzor to issue certificates of basic general education to ninth graders. In the meantime, two of our graduates are officially enrolled in the embassy school in Argentina.Fortunately, the guys won’t have to go to Argentina to take the OGE: our school is the official point to take the exams.All embassy schools are under the jurisdiction of the Foreign Schools Department of the Personnel Department of the Russian Foreign Ministry. They select teachers, approve funding, and purchase necessary textbooks.- Working in the system of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is quite comfortable: the program and subjects are the same, but there is less paperwork, clear reports, small classes, fixed workload. Otherwise, everything is like in a Russian school, only the scale is smaller, – says Svetlana Viktorovna.Before classes start…a full half hour. It’s time to wash up, have breakfast, pack a briefcase … And then – two flights of stairs down, and you’re already at schoolBefore her trip to Colombia, she worked in one of the educational complexes in the city of Zlatoust.
next door teacher
For the director of the school, teacher of Russian language and literature Svetlana Torgashova and her husband Nikolai, teacher of chemistry and biology from Engels, this is the second business trip. They had previously worked in Tunisia for four years.- All embassy schools are similar. In Tunisia, it’s the same: an apartment building, a sports field, a school on the ground floor, compact classrooms. I was surprised that there were no children of compatriots here at all, there were a lot of them in the Tunisian school, – says the director.Among the differences – a special relationship in the team.- We are much closer to each other here, all sorrows and joys are together. Like a family, – notes Svetlana Torgashova.This family includes both experienced teachers and spouses of embassy employees who have just started their teaching careers. You have to teach and advise. If not how?By the way, the issues that parents address to the school management are the same as in Russia: why they changed the schedule, we want to deepen the subject, we do not like how the teacher note, why the classes merged, we want more missions, we want less missions.. As far as possible, they try to find a compromise.Fathers and mothers are also well aware that there will be no other school and no other teachers. We are here like on an island, which is part of Russia, and around it is the Colombian “sea”.
However, the children have found their advantages in it. Didn’t understand something in the lesson, didn’t write the assignment – you can always knock on the teacher’s door like a neighbor. I don’t know if the teachers are happy with such a neighborhood…
Lesson for “Cossacks-thieves”
– And I’m even glad that they come to run around so freely, – as if reading my mind Svetlana Torgashova. – The children of the embassies are more open, but also focused. Parents immediately direct them to serious studies, plan for the future.Svetlana Viktorovna adds:- It just seems easier to work in a small class. With us, each child is unique, and we try to find an approach. When there are 20-30 people in the class, there will always be someone who answers. And when one or two does happen, you ask a question, and a tense silence hangs… But you know for sure who learned what and what still needs to be worked on.82 foreign schools of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs teach Russian children around the worldAnd teachers are pleasantly surprised that no one here refuses to participate in school productions and competitions. We can talk for a long time about our holidays, our quizzes, our literacy weeks and our chess championships. What about school concerts and shows? The spectators-parents will cry and laugh, and will be sincerely surprised at the unexpectedly revealed talent of their child.In general, the children of the embassy are very friendly. And at the age of five, and at fifteen, they play dodgeball, “Cossack thieves” and “mafia” together. Here they are unlikely to be friends against someone, because their world, limited by a high fence around a residential building, is too small and therefore invaluable. For the door – only with an adult. There are sports sections and a music school, but there is a language barrier.- But here parents spend more time with their children, they try to go somewhere on weekends. Everything has its own price, – notes Svetlana Torgashova.OfficiallyThe children’s world, limited by the high fence of the embassy school, is too small and therefore invaluable. Photo: Natalia LebedevaSchoolchildren abroad will be able to receive education documents in 2023 based on midterm exams. Passing characteristics for the final exams have been approved by Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin. The decision affects students of embassy schools living abroad, as well as those studying remotely or through home education. If they cannot pass the final state certification (GIA) due to organizational difficulties caused by the actions of hostile foreign states, they will receive education documents based on the intermediate certification, that is ie based on the results of the quarterly assessments.In 2023, examination sites will be organized in 54 foreign countries.Folder “RG”
Schools attached to embassies
There are 82 Russian schools operating in Russian embassies and other foreign institutions of the Russian Foreign Ministry, the ministry’s website reports. Moreover, 48 of them are secondary, 10 are elementary and 24 are open to primary classes.Not only the children of embassy employees study in educational institutions, but also young compatriots and foreign citizens. Students who studied at other educational institutions or alone can also pass the final certification and receive documents on the education of the Russian state standard.The Russian Foreign Ministry explained that Russian schools abroad are recognized as specialized structural educational units in foreign institutions of the Russian Foreign Ministry that carry out educational activities. In addition, Russian schools are Russian educational organizations (their branches) established in accordance with international treaties of the Russian Federation and foreign educational institutions that operate in accordance with the federal state educational standard, when education is fully or partially built in Russian.Meanwhile, hostile actions by Latvian, Slovak, Czech and Slovenian authorities have led to the closure of schools in Riga, Bratislava, Prague and Ljubljana.
Where else can you get a Russian education?
In the academic year 2022-2023, more than 350 Russian teachers from 49 regions of the country are working in seven countries of near and far abroad: Vietnam, Kyrgyzstan, Mongolia, Serbia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Turkey. They went there to teach in 200 schools in the countries participating in the humanitarian project “Russian Teacher Abroad”.
It aims to promote the Russian language and Russian education around the world and has been implemented by the Russian Ministry of Education together with the national ministries of education of partner countries since 2017. The base site of the project is the famous “Interdom” by ED Stasova.Russian teachers, for example, work in five new schools in Tajikistan, built by Russia and working according to Russian curricula. I managed to visit one of them in Dushanbe. The competition there is no worse than in the prestigious Moscow gymnasiums. The Russian side here was responsible not only for the quality of construction, but also for textbooks, filling classes and laboratories, teachers’ salaries. The same state-of-the-art educational institutions have opened in Khujand, Kulyab, Bokhtar and Tursunzade.Since the start of the Russian Teacher Abroad project in 2019, our teachers have taught more than 10,000 children, received letters of thanks and many letters of appreciation from Russian and foreign authorities for their contribution to the development of the education system.
How to become a “Russian teacher abroad”?
Teachers of Russian language, mathematics, computer science, physics, chemistry, biology, geography and primary classes are particularly sought after. In addition to professionalism, you must have at least three years of teaching experience at the school, a diploma attesting to compliance with the specialty, a valid international passport and the absence of illnesses preventing work abroad.Russian teachers are guaranteed: official employment in accordance with the laws of the Russian Federation; workload of no more than 36 hours per week, including 18 teaching hours; timely payment of wages; provision of housing for the duration of the project; methodological support; compensation for travel expenses to and from work; provision of health insurance policy for persons traveling abroad.For registration in the personnel reserve, you must send a written curriculum vitae in any form, together with a copy of the educational diploma to the e-mail address [email protected] or interdom [email protected] by Elena Novoselova
