"Real" Russian School

I thought after that last post was so heavy on text that I should put something up today that is a little easier on the eyes. This is the Russian school that is right around the corner from where I live. Six mornings a week, and often evenings too, I pass by to see the Russian school-kids busy playing on the playground. Most of the students are between 7-14 years old. I think that they have to choose a different school in a different building for the equivalent of high school.

My understanding of the Russian education system is a little shaky at times, but it seems that they really concentrate on what we would call technical or vocational training. Russian students don't go to a university and get a liberal arts degree and then go work as a business consultant or other unrelated field. Instead they get a degree in accounting and become an accountant or a degree in mangagement and become a manager. They are totally mystified when we, as Americans with a liberal arts education say, "I have a degree in English and I don't know what I want to be when I grow up." This concept is totally foreign to most Russians. The only possible exception is with language training. From talking with some students, it sems that if you can aquire good langauge skills, especially in German or English, you can get good jobs in Moscow with any degree. Appaerently only a tiny minority of Alexei's students at the Pedagogical [I can't say this word in in English, let alone in Russian, where it has an extra syllable and a -ski on the end] Institute actually become foreign langauge teachers, most of them take their langauge skills and market themselves in the business world.