DONETSK: Students returning for the new school year in eastern Ukraine yesterday will get real-life conflict lessons as they take their seats in battle-scarred classrooms.
At one high school in rebel-held Donetsk, teachers, students and parents are refusing to allow the conflict to derail studies, joining forces to clear away rubble, replace blown-out windows and set buckets to catch leaks, a month after four rockets destroyed the roof.
Many students and teachers are returning to Donetsk for the start of the academic year after fleeing to safer areas during the height of the insurgency.
But with both sides violating a truce that took effect in early September — 13 new deaths, both military and civilian, were reported yesterday — the outlook remains uncertain.
Rain drips onto the floor at Donetsk’s prestigious High School 33, whose roof was hit by four rockets on August 27, sparking a fire.
“We are trying to save whatever we can, but of course we can’t resume classes here,” said the principal, Tetyana Denissenko. “We have to replace the roof, the heating. It will cost at least 10 million hryvnias (around $760,000)”.
Denissenko said she asked for help from the pro-Russian insurgents’ self-styled Donetsk People’s Republic, “but they don’t
have money.”
Instead, the school is appealing for donations from the private sector, posting a wish list on its website.
“A nearby school has an unoccupied floor, which we will use, dividing the school day into two half-days by age group,” she said.
The staff has not been paid since June, she added, lamenting: “It’s as if Kiev has forgotten us.”
Suddenly mortar fire erupts in the distance. Denissenko points towards the window and shrugs her shoulders.
The UN children’s agency Unicef says fighting has damaged 74 schools and 44 kindergartens despite the ceasefire in the Donetsk region and another rebel stronghold, Lugansk.
Even so, the separatist’s unrecognised education minister, Igor Kostenok, seems eager to
allay fears.
Last Thursday, he went to the National University of Donetsk with a plastic bag full of wads of money, described as a first salary payment to the professors.
“I paid 2,000 to 3,000 hryvnias to each professor,” he told AFP. “It’s not enough, but it’s a start.”
He said the rebels planned to model the university’s curriculum and those of other establishments after their Russian counterparts.
“But we won’t impose curriculums on the professors this year. They are smart enough to do it themselves,” Kostenok said.
“In our region, 90 percent of the people speak Russian. That said, if the students want to have classes in Ukrainian, they can,” he said.
AFP
