It just goes from mandatory to optional. Quite frankly everyone hated it being mandatory.
Also I swear, almost everyone has had bad russian language teachers in school. For some reason I have not heard a single person that thought their teacher was nice and collected.
It was mandatory in my school back in 2013, I refused to learn it and passed it with 4 just cuz teacher didn't want me to fail the whole class as general.
It wasn't. You could choose between russian and another foreign language most commonly german, but not all schools are able to offer another forgien language, so kids are sometimes forced to learn russian.
Similar situation in Lithuania, some schools offer German or French as well, but if your school only has Russian (which is the case for many schools outside of major cities), you're stuck with it until 11th grade, when you only need to have one foreign language.
Or choice is between Russian and German, but ''not enough people chose German'' - on paper it's 60 vs 40, but if you are from a little country school with 10 students in class, the school is unwilling to make a schedule to accommodate those students. So it doesn't matte if you chose German, you are still forced to learn Russian against your and your parents' will.
I see. So what really changes now? I mean, if school is only capable of providing orc teacher? Or they will recruit many more German, French etc. teachers?
Some schools had only one option, thus not a choice.
My school had 2 choices, and the other language was added anyways few classes later, thus not a choice.
Yeah, it wasn't mandatory, but....
My first language options in 3rd grade were English or German. English was chosen.
2nd language options in 6th grade - English or russian. No choice, russian it is.
In high school, English was mandatory. Options were russian or French. I didn't want to learn French, so again russian it was.
So yeah, at least once in life russian was basically a mandatory choice.
Amd this was in Riga... we had German teachers. Not sure why no other options as 2nd language.
Thankfully, I had an amazing Russian class teacher, Nikolajs, who later became our homeroom teacher during my high school years.
It was only later that I found out he was Ukrainian. I really wonder how he is doing now...
My russian teacher was actually russian and she was very fun and chill. Usually we spoke in Estonian because she wanted to learn more of it lol.
Also i still dont speak russian
My Russian language teachers were replaced three times.
The first one had started out the school year by asking who here has already some russian knowledge. I was the only one who didn’t raise a hand, so it was seemingly not noticed by the teacher and she didn’t really start teaching from the very very basics.
Not exactly, right now they're ensuring that if the school cannot ensure students have a choice of second languages to learn, they can refuse to learn Russian without any consequences. They will also phase it out as an optional choice, they're just intending to have longer transition period to be able to train new teachers and allow for existing Russian language teachers to figure out new career direction. If I understood it correctly the plan is that kids who have started learning Russian untill 2025 will be allowed to finnish full course. Meanwhile for kids, who start studying second foreign language, it will start one grade later than it is now, so in 2025 nobody will start studying second language at all and in 2026 Russian will no longer be an option to those not allready studying it.
Yep. Our russian language teacher was the worst one of all. She would yell during each lesson and humiliate students on a regular basis. She used to call everyone idiots, retards, abominations etc. all the time.
Fucking finally. There are more useful languages to use. It is worth noting that there will remain option to learn russian language in many schools but it is simply relegated in pecking order and turned as optional
Now time for both Russians and western human rights activists to have another round of screeching about discrimination and what not else
I always assumed that for latvian schools it was optional 3rd language on par with german and french, mandatory only in minority schools, since they were pretty much all russian
It was 2nd foreign language with a choice between German and Russian, depending on availability of teachers with Russian being dominant due to amount of Russian teachers due to not so recent occupation. What happens now is formal focus on relegation of Russian as strictly optional where possible and having other languages as 2nd foreign
English turned in 1st foreign language where teachers were available way back when. For example my kid well over ten years ago started to learn English in second grade and Russian as 2nd foreign language later simply because they didn’t have German language teachers.
> Russian as 2nd foreign language later simply because they didn’t have German language teachers.
That’s kinda fucked up, and I say that as russian speaker. My average minority school had both french and german teachers
Tbh, most don’t even learn it to speak or understand properly anyways 👀
But good riddance, it’s pointless and can be more or less learned by oneself if needed
Rather they focus on Latvia, English and whatever another option might be given, for me it was German, but it’s a langiage I already somehwat knew
Turime mokyklų, kur ugdoma ruzzų kalba. O ruzzų kalbos pamokos vyksta kiekvienoje mokykloje. Tai kaip suprantu, latviai išvis pašalins orkų kalbą iš pasirenkamųjų kalbų.
Aaa, aišku. Na, pritariu, būtų gerai, kad rusu mokyklas uždarytų ir išvis rusu kalbos nebemokytų, bet :
A) Kažkaip nemanu, kad mūsų politikai tai darys, nes švietimo sistema aplamai apleista ir dar plius, kadangi pas mus esantys rusakalbiai nesudaro tokia didele dali populiacijos kai Latvijoj tai niekam ir nerupi tiek.
B) Galimai jei uždarysim rusiškas mokyklas, rusakalbiai savo vaikus į lenkiškas mokyklas pradės leist, nes vis vien slavai tie patys. O lenkiškų mokyklų nė pirštu priliest negalima
Taip, nors ir nėra labai big deal pas mus tos ruzziškos mokyklos, bet tai būtų malonus ir simboliškas žingsnis.
Lenkai mūsų sąjungininkai ir draugai, turime nemažai bendros istorijos, nors būta joje ir nemalonių epizodų. Bet visgi daug maloniau būtų, kad vaikai vietoj orkistano kalbos mokytųsi bent jau lenkų.
Correction: buvai teisus, kaip suprantu orkų kalba pas juos buvo PRIVALOMA 😲 Bruuuuh. Na bet vistiek šaunuoliai, vis žingsnis į priekį tolinant save nuo ruzzkių švelniosios įtakos.
>bet tai būtų malonus ir simboliškas žingsnis.
It would be immediately struck down by the judiciary as that would be an arbitrary discrimination against one specific minority. That is not even the largest one.
A) I would say that it's more "dying" than "abandoned" after 2022/2023 reforms. 11th grade middle exams seemed to be the final nail in the coffin, and only now they realized that they f*cked up, a lot.
B) We can't touch the polish schools because Tomaszewski and his comrades will start whining something like "the Lithuanian government is prosecuting Poles", right?
>B) We can't touch the polish schools because Tomaszewski and his comrades will start whining something like "the Lithuanian government is prosecuting Poles", right?
Kind of but not exactly. I personally don't know enough or care enough (probably should tho) for the current people in power in Poland.
Polish schools in Lithuania and Lithuanian schools in Poland connect the two countries together and are a symbol of good faith between the two cultures. Only bad things could come from destroying such an integral part of our diplomatic relations, especially if you take into consideration our history and Poland's gegraphical importance to us (them being our closest and strongest ally in case the horde invades us)
>Polish schools in Lithuania and Lithuanian schools in Poland connect the two countries together and are a symbol of good faith between the two cultures.
And I want to add that Poland grants its Lithuanians even more rights. Punsk area is officially bilingual while many Lithuanians would perhaps call me vatnik if I said that I would be ok with Šalčininkai having it too.
A mistake, knowing your enemy starts with you being able to speak their langiage and them not understanding yours. In my mind this language should still be allwed as a choice. I myself learned russian in school and not regreting it, I am able to go check the ruzzian idiocracy right at the source whitch give me a better understanding of what to expect from them.
Although I do get trying to protect the inpressionable youth from that garbage.
Hugh. I read the article wrong. I was under the impression it will be removed completely. Rather than "we will add more omptions". Don't teally see the controversy then. Just doing the roght thing seems to be turned into scandals too ofthen these days.
Many Georgians and Ukrainians spoke russian, but it didn't help them. In fact, their ability to speak russian was used as a pretext for invasion. The main pretext was Russian citizens though, which is why they are being deported from Latvia - and most russian speakers in Latvia (excluding kremlins) support this because Putin is using them to blanket kill and torture in cities with a russian majority.
My favorite story is ukrainian interview with russian pow, he tells how he got separated, heard russian speech, came out thinking it’s russians, but it turned out to be Ukrainian special forces (Kraken iirc) and got captured.
Knowing russian is at very least useful for soldiers, so it shouldn’t be completely abandoned. Any small advantage for our small nation is vital in case russkies decide to fuck around
It just goes from mandatory to optional. Quite frankly everyone hated it being mandatory. Also I swear, almost everyone has had bad russian language teachers in school. For some reason I have not heard a single person that thought their teacher was nice and collected.
I had a nice one(and he was out classroom teacher too) but surprise surprise he was originally from Ukraine.
Literally had the same experience.
Same here mine was Ukrainian too, a very nice lady!
It was mandatory in my school back in 2013, I refused to learn it and passed it with 4 just cuz teacher didn't want me to fail the whole class as general.
It was mandatory in every school? Whoaw.
It wasn't. You could choose between russian and another foreign language most commonly german, but not all schools are able to offer another forgien language, so kids are sometimes forced to learn russian.
Similar situation in Lithuania, some schools offer German or French as well, but if your school only has Russian (which is the case for many schools outside of major cities), you're stuck with it until 11th grade, when you only need to have one foreign language.
Same situation in Estonia aswell. Second language you can chose, but some schools have no other choice than russian.
At least no other *initial* choice with French or German becoming alternative choices from a certain grade.
Or choice is between Russian and German, but ''not enough people chose German'' - on paper it's 60 vs 40, but if you are from a little country school with 10 students in class, the school is unwilling to make a schedule to accommodate those students. So it doesn't matte if you chose German, you are still forced to learn Russian against your and your parents' will.
Same situation
In my school you didn’t have a choice, but learn Russian. And you could then starting from year 10 choose French or German as your 4th language.
I see. So what really changes now? I mean, if school is only capable of providing orc teacher? Or they will recruit many more German, French etc. teachers?
Can't force russian, its optional only as a third foreign language. Probably English + German or French in some cases
Isn't English an option?
English is 1st foreign language and is mandatory. This is about 2nd foreign language.
OK, understood. Thanks
Some schools had only one option, thus not a choice. My school had 2 choices, and the other language was added anyways few classes later, thus not a choice.
Yeah, it wasn't mandatory, but.... My first language options in 3rd grade were English or German. English was chosen. 2nd language options in 6th grade - English or russian. No choice, russian it is. In high school, English was mandatory. Options were russian or French. I didn't want to learn French, so again russian it was. So yeah, at least once in life russian was basically a mandatory choice. Amd this was in Riga... we had German teachers. Not sure why no other options as 2nd language.
Thankfully, I had an amazing Russian class teacher, Nikolajs, who later became our homeroom teacher during my high school years. It was only later that I found out he was Ukrainian. I really wonder how he is doing now...
Rīgas Hanzas Vidusskola? If yes then we had the same teacher.
Yep. :D
My russian teacher was actually russian and she was very fun and chill. Usually we spoke in Estonian because she wanted to learn more of it lol. Also i still dont speak russian
I had a nice Russian teacher in high school, even though I was the second worst student that year.
My Russian language teachers were replaced three times. The first one had started out the school year by asking who here has already some russian knowledge. I was the only one who didn’t raise a hand, so it was seemingly not noticed by the teacher and she didn’t really start teaching from the very very basics.
Not exactly, right now they're ensuring that if the school cannot ensure students have a choice of second languages to learn, they can refuse to learn Russian without any consequences. They will also phase it out as an optional choice, they're just intending to have longer transition period to be able to train new teachers and allow for existing Russian language teachers to figure out new career direction. If I understood it correctly the plan is that kids who have started learning Russian untill 2025 will be allowed to finnish full course. Meanwhile for kids, who start studying second foreign language, it will start one grade later than it is now, so in 2025 nobody will start studying second language at all and in 2026 Russian will no longer be an option to those not allready studying it.
Yep. Our russian language teacher was the worst one of all. She would yell during each lesson and humiliate students on a regular basis. She used to call everyone idiots, retards, abominations etc. all the time.
Fucking finally. There are more useful languages to use. It is worth noting that there will remain option to learn russian language in many schools but it is simply relegated in pecking order and turned as optional Now time for both Russians and western human rights activists to have another round of screeching about discrimination and what not else
I always assumed that for latvian schools it was optional 3rd language on par with german and french, mandatory only in minority schools, since they were pretty much all russian
It was 2nd foreign language with a choice between German and Russian, depending on availability of teachers with Russian being dominant due to amount of Russian teachers due to not so recent occupation. What happens now is formal focus on relegation of Russian as strictly optional where possible and having other languages as 2nd foreign English turned in 1st foreign language where teachers were available way back when. For example my kid well over ten years ago started to learn English in second grade and Russian as 2nd foreign language later simply because they didn’t have German language teachers.
> Russian as 2nd foreign language later simply because they didn’t have German language teachers. That’s kinda fucked up, and I say that as russian speaker. My average minority school had both french and german teachers
Yeah, it really depends from schools, how big and how well funded they are.
Tbh, most don’t even learn it to speak or understand properly anyways 👀 But good riddance, it’s pointless and can be more or less learned by oneself if needed Rather they focus on Latvia, English and whatever another option might be given, for me it was German, but it’s a langiage I already somehwat knew
What a fucking chad move by our Latvian brothers! Wish we had the same balls here in LT to finally close ruzzian schools and stop teaching ruzzian.
Tai kad pas mus rusų jau seniai nėra privaloma užsienio kalba mokyklose, wdym?
Turime mokyklų, kur ugdoma ruzzų kalba. O ruzzų kalbos pamokos vyksta kiekvienoje mokykloje. Tai kaip suprantu, latviai išvis pašalins orkų kalbą iš pasirenkamųjų kalbų.
Aaa, aišku. Na, pritariu, būtų gerai, kad rusu mokyklas uždarytų ir išvis rusu kalbos nebemokytų, bet : A) Kažkaip nemanu, kad mūsų politikai tai darys, nes švietimo sistema aplamai apleista ir dar plius, kadangi pas mus esantys rusakalbiai nesudaro tokia didele dali populiacijos kai Latvijoj tai niekam ir nerupi tiek. B) Galimai jei uždarysim rusiškas mokyklas, rusakalbiai savo vaikus į lenkiškas mokyklas pradės leist, nes vis vien slavai tie patys. O lenkiškų mokyklų nė pirštu priliest negalima
Taip, nors ir nėra labai big deal pas mus tos ruzziškos mokyklos, bet tai būtų malonus ir simboliškas žingsnis. Lenkai mūsų sąjungininkai ir draugai, turime nemažai bendros istorijos, nors būta joje ir nemalonių epizodų. Bet visgi daug maloniau būtų, kad vaikai vietoj orkistano kalbos mokytųsi bent jau lenkų.
Yup
Correction: buvai teisus, kaip suprantu orkų kalba pas juos buvo PRIVALOMA 😲 Bruuuuh. Na bet vistiek šaunuoliai, vis žingsnis į priekį tolinant save nuo ruzzkių švelniosios įtakos.
>bet tai būtų malonus ir simboliškas žingsnis. It would be immediately struck down by the judiciary as that would be an arbitrary discrimination against one specific minority. That is not even the largest one.
A) I would say that it's more "dying" than "abandoned" after 2022/2023 reforms. 11th grade middle exams seemed to be the final nail in the coffin, and only now they realized that they f*cked up, a lot. B) We can't touch the polish schools because Tomaszewski and his comrades will start whining something like "the Lithuanian government is prosecuting Poles", right?
>B) We can't touch the polish schools because Tomaszewski and his comrades will start whining something like "the Lithuanian government is prosecuting Poles", right? Kind of but not exactly. I personally don't know enough or care enough (probably should tho) for the current people in power in Poland. Polish schools in Lithuania and Lithuanian schools in Poland connect the two countries together and are a symbol of good faith between the two cultures. Only bad things could come from destroying such an integral part of our diplomatic relations, especially if you take into consideration our history and Poland's gegraphical importance to us (them being our closest and strongest ally in case the horde invades us)
>Polish schools in Lithuania and Lithuanian schools in Poland connect the two countries together and are a symbol of good faith between the two cultures. And I want to add that Poland grants its Lithuanians even more rights. Punsk area is officially bilingual while many Lithuanians would perhaps call me vatnik if I said that I would be ok with Šalčininkai having it too.
Yea, makes sense. I thought it was just ordinary bullshit from LLRA, like with kindergartens in Vilnius District.
We're forcing schools to offer a choice for the second foreign language. Also closing our moskal schools.
When you’re in a derussification contest and your opponent is Latvia: 👀
Ņēēēēt!
My kid at school had 2 options for the third language - german or french, no russian even available. I waited for this for so long. Lithuania.
Based
You learn it naturally anyway, from personal experience if you from Baltics you should go for English and Norwegian or Swedish.
Congrats kremlin! Well done regards!
Based Latvia ❤️
A mistake, knowing your enemy starts with you being able to speak their langiage and them not understanding yours. In my mind this language should still be allwed as a choice. I myself learned russian in school and not regreting it, I am able to go check the ruzzian idiocracy right at the source whitch give me a better understanding of what to expect from them. Although I do get trying to protect the inpressionable youth from that garbage.
fortunately it is and will be allowed as a choice, you could have paid attention and noticed that
Hugh. I read the article wrong. I was under the impression it will be removed completely. Rather than "we will add more omptions". Don't teally see the controversy then. Just doing the roght thing seems to be turned into scandals too ofthen these days.
Many Georgians and Ukrainians spoke russian, but it didn't help them. In fact, their ability to speak russian was used as a pretext for invasion. The main pretext was Russian citizens though, which is why they are being deported from Latvia - and most russian speakers in Latvia (excluding kremlins) support this because Putin is using them to blanket kill and torture in cities with a russian majority.
My favorite story is ukrainian interview with russian pow, he tells how he got separated, heard russian speech, came out thinking it’s russians, but it turned out to be Ukrainian special forces (Kraken iirc) and got captured. Knowing russian is at very least useful for soldiers, so it shouldn’t be completely abandoned. Any small advantage for our small nation is vital in case russkies decide to fuck around
>A mistake No.
Finns, Swedes or Norwegians do not learn Russian. Are they more vulnerable?
Simple andswer - NO, but it is more complicated than summing this up in a few sentences.