Elementary school Otetz Paisii Bulgaria, Ruse

Elementary School Otetz Paisii in Ruse was established in 1867. It is one of the oldest elementary schools in our city. The school has been teaching students from 1st to 7th grade and children in two pre-elementary classes for 154 years. In the school year 2020/21 at school there are 755 students in 31 classes – two pre-primary classes, 13 primary classes and 16 lower secondary classes. There are 75 employees and 65 of them are pedagogical specialists.

As a modern school, Otetz Paisii Elementary School teaches and educates in accordance with the state educational requirements and standards of the European Union within the framework of democratic values; adaptation of the new curriculum to the requirements for building a civil society in our country; adequate orientation in the dynamically changing modern world and creation of highly responsible behavior for participation in public life. One of the main goals in our school is assimilation and formation of universal and national values, development of individuality and stimulation of creative talents, development and maintenance of physical capacity and preparation for an active and healthy lifestyle.

The main mission of the school is to achieve a quality educational process with the help of highly qualified teachers who have modern thinking and can successfully apply innovations in education. The school staff is a team that relies on collaboration and is able to provide quality education and upbringing of students, based on creativity and use of new technologies.

We support the personal development of students by acquiring social skills for communication, decision making, and taking responsibility.

Last year, the world faced one of the biggest challenges – Covid 19. The students were most affected by social distance and isolation, which resulted in education having the important task of preserving their emotional, mental and social activity. The mission of our school in this situation is to provide new, interesting, inspiring opportunities for students to have a desire to return to the present school life.

Our mission is the school to be an innovator and an example of quality education. We have set in our medium and long term goals to get involved in national and international partnerships for the exchange of good practices and the creation of different innovations in education. This will develop the skills and the competences of the pedagogical team of the school, but will also contribute to a better learning environment and better academic and non-academic results of the students.

We have participated in the project BG05M2OP001-2.004-0004 “Developing students’ abilities and increasing their motivation to learn through activities that develop specific knowledge, skills and competencies (Your class)”. The aim of the project is the development of students’ learning skills, competencies, creative and sports abilities in thematic areas that are beyond those included in compulsory school preparation. We have organized 38 clubs with specially developed curriculum and exercises for the aims of the program, including the development of social and emotional skills of the students. With the current project we aim to expand what we have developed and to do innovative curriculum with focus on Happiness for primary school age. Another relevant experience that we have is “Champion Design Program”, Foundation Bagra project – the project aims to implement “design thinking” skills in the schools through project based learning for constant change of the environment around you by improving it. It is driven by empathy for people, curiosity
about the world and creative confidence.

We have implemented that program in our primary school classes and we do various missions to invent new things, do research, negotiate, present ideas and develop the social and emotional skills of the students. We have another relevant experience in building up extracurricular activities in our school – in the project “Education for Tomorrow” – Training of teachers for teaching knowledge and skills in digital literacy – key digital skills – basic and advanced, new technologies, products and programs, media literacy, online content and introduction, etc. to increase the digital competence of students. We have 2 teachers who participated in the training and they have implemented Clubs by interests for students. The school is actively working in the area of the positive learning environment.

We have implemented the project “I love my school” and we invested in our premises to create beauty andbalance in shapes and color, to provide a comfortable and relaxing learning environment and to inspire every child to come to school with a smile and positive emotion. The development of social and emotional training with focus on the Happiness is the missing part for our team and it is our motivation to do this project for its development.