Against the background of the loss of most of Artsakh, the threat to the borders, and the deteriorating socio-economic situation, the issue of Russian schools seems to be secondary. But it just seems so. Of course, this can be seen as a diplomatic message to Russia, a country we completely depend on after losing in Artsakh. But here we must clearly calculate what we will gain by implementing such programs and what we will lose. After all, I suspect that Russia is putting a lot of pressure on our country on this issue, it is more likely that it is just a “bonus” given as a gift to the “metropolis.”
Let us remember one of the slogans of the Karabakh movement of 1988 – “Armenian school for Armenian children.” It meant a very simple thing: if a child is Armenian, they must think, speak, and write in the language that has helped us to remain Armenian for many, many centuries, and the future citizen must be prepared for official and professional communication in their mother tongue. Our foreign citizens must also be ready for communication in Armenian, but they must have the right to learn their languages in depth.
This slogan merged with the slogans of defending Artsakh and building an independent democratic state. Since we do not particularly succeed in the first or the second areas, they probably want to solve the language issue in this way.
The previous wave of language harassment was in 2015. There was a widespread public movement at the time: “We are against foreign language schools.” As in many other cases, the activists of that time have now become “passivists” and, occupying comfortable seats, either do not speak out or justify what they were fighting against: “Well, now it is a completely different Armenia” with such a convincing argument.
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I am very sorry that today’s young people do not know Russian and English well. It is impossible to become a more or less normal specialist in any field without knowing foreign languages. But it has nothing to do with opening Russian schools; it is a consequence of the poor quality of secondary education in the last 30 years. And that poor quality is also reflected in the teaching of the Armenian language and Armenian literature on the basis of bad, outdated stereotypes.
This situation, in turn, is due to the attitude of all the authorities of the Third Republic towards education. Do you want to have an idea about the country? Compare the salaries of teachers and police officers.
Aram Abrahamyan
