14% of schools in Estonia are Russian-speaking educational institutions.
Estonia by 2035 will stop teaching in Russian at schools. All subjects in educational institutions will be taught only in the state language.
This was reported by the Internet portal of the TV and radio company ERR.
The country has developed a “Plan for the development of the Estonian language” (2021-2035). One of its points is to switch to education in Estonian by 2035. Education in schools and kindergartens funded by the state and local governments should be conducted only in the state language.
The Minister of Education and Science Liina Kersna said that in Russian-language schools in Estonia, teaching in Estonian will be increased first to 40%, then to 60% and by 2035 to 75%. This is due to the fact that 25% of instruction in Estonian schools is foreign languages.
“25% of the volume of instruction in general education schools is already foreign languages. Therefore, we say that subjects should be taught mainly in Estonian, and the rest is in a foreign language. We want today's Russian-language schools, which make up 14% of all schools, to become immersion schools, where, step by step, more and more subjects would be taught in Estonian, “explained the minister.
Liina Kersna added that there are not enough specialists in Russian schools who could teach subjects in Estonian, and therefore the state has increased orders for universities to train new teachers.
This initiative provoked resistance from the defenders of Russian schools in Estonia. Therefore, they have already turned to the OSCE High Commissioner for the Rights of National Minorities and offered to return the OSCE permanent missions to Estonia and Latvia to monitor the situation with education in Russian on the spot.
