The Republic of Estonia is reforming its school system. Russian will gradually be phased out as a language of instruction by the year 2030. Soon all children will only be taught in Estonian – even children in the predominantly Russian-speaking areas in the North-East.
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00:00Wow, quite a lot going on here. The Republic of Estonia is reforming the school system.
00:06The Russian schools are being abolished. Soon all the children in the whole country will only be taught Estonian.
00:13In the Baltic states, many people live who have Russian as their native language.
00:17Especially in Latvia and Estonia.
00:20In the Estonian capital Tallinn, almost every second child grows up with Russian.
00:25In the northeast of the country, Russian is even more widespread.
00:30I'm on my way to Narva, Estonia's third largest city, right next to the border to Russia.
00:35Over 90% of the people speak Russian.
00:45Stalin had tens of thousands of Lithuanians, Latvians and Estonians deported to Siberia.
00:52In return, tens of thousands of Russians were settled in the Baltic states.
00:56Ethnic deportations and Russification went hand in hand.
01:01Russification continued even after Stalin's death.
01:04Thousands of industrial workers and soldiers settled in the big cities.
01:11The official language in the Soviet-occupied areas of the Baltic was Russian.
01:16With the collapse of the Soviet Union, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia regained their state independence.
01:22Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian replaced Russian as their official language.
01:30Today, the Baltic states fear that Putin is trying to manipulate the Russian minorities.
01:36Moscow-controlled TV stations were stripped of their licenses after the Russian attack on Ukraine.
01:42And Latvia and Estonia use Latvian and Estonian as their sole official language at all schools.
01:52The latest studies in Estonia show that almost half of the Russian minority is poorly integrated.
01:57This should change with the school reform.
02:04Nine out of ten people in Narva speak Russian as their native language.
02:07The city in the northeast belongs to Estonia.
02:09With a major school reform, everything will be converted to Estonian by 2030.
02:14What do the people here in Narva think about the fact that soon all school lessons will be held in Estonian?
02:20I'll stop by the city.
02:23Irina picks up her daughter Ella from school.
02:25Instead of Russian, Ella is now learning Estonian.
02:28It's a bit difficult at home.
02:30I have to help my student, because we were in a Russian kindergarten anyway.
02:39I think it's very right, because we live in this country and you just need to know the language.
02:45You need it everywhere.
02:47Dawn in the morning.
02:48Faina is on her way to school.
03:05The school reform is being observed by the Council of Europe.
03:08The goal is to protect the rights of minorities.
03:11Russian is spoken in Faina's home.
03:13Faina is the only one in the family who also speaks Estonian fluently.
03:18Because she switched from Russian to Estonian.
03:22New school day. I'm going to school now.
03:25I'm going to be a physicist.
03:28The new school building is cozy and modern.
03:31This also applies to the teaching methods.
03:33Physics teacher Kurling is working in a group.
03:36She's new here, too.
03:37She used to run the Narva waterworks.
03:40Kurling's mother tongue is Russian, but she teaches in Estonian.
03:57During the break, the young people speak Russian with each other.
04:01Faina is one of the chosen students.
04:06She still remembers her switch from Russian to Estonian.
04:24The biggest problem is the lack of teachers.
04:27Especially in the northeast of the country.
04:31Estonia invests massively in education.
04:34That pays off.
04:35In the European education comparison, the country has been at the top for years.
04:50Faina knows all the systems.
04:52The schools in Russia.
04:53The Russian-speaking school in Estonia.
04:56And now the Estonian school.
04:59I met a lot of different people.
05:03Even the teachers were on a different level in the Russian schools.
05:09But the teachers in Estonia are so kind and supportive.
05:20For me, it's never too late to learn a new language.
05:29A big topic in Estonia at the moment is the reform of the Russian schools.
05:34Until 2030, the entire school system will be completely in Estonian.
05:39I have an appointment with the Minister of Education, Kristina Callas.
05:43Hello. I was in all of Estonia and talked to people everywhere.
05:48They have questions and I brought them here.
05:51Welcome to Estonia.
05:52Thank you. Let's go for the interview.
05:54I brought you the first question from the ground.
05:56The first question from the ground. Let's start with the question of Faina.
06:12So, your answer?
06:13Maybe there was not enough political strength to do it.
06:17There was quite severe Russian interference.
06:19So, in a very sad way, actually, Russian full-scale aggression against Ukraine
06:24was the last straw that helped to kind of broke the resistance to this reform.
06:34They're still open.
06:35It's just that the children will be learning in Estonian.
06:37So, all schools will be the same, with the same program, with the same language of instruction.
06:47What is your reaction on that?
06:49My grave concern has been that the Russian language separate education system
06:53has been doing really negative results to the Russian kids themselves.
06:57Having this completely separate parallel education system
07:00resulted in Russian kids graduating from those schools
07:03to be completely out of Estonian future education opportunities and the labour market.
07:08So, we have to reform the school system and give much more equal access to Estonian language education.
07:14Regarding this integration strategy you have, what is the objective?
07:18For the generation born already in independent Estonia,
07:21that's a crucial fact that they would be the ones identifying themselves as Estonians
07:25and associating themselves with Estonian nationality
07:27without abandoning whatever ethno-cultural belief of being Russian.
07:33So, these are not mutually exclusive identities.
07:37Schülerin Feiner is now perfectly bilingual.
07:40And besides Russian and Estonian, she is also learning German and English.
07:44Her dream job is a career as a film director.
07:47Feiner knows where she wants to go.