To protect students from Russian missiles, authorities in the northeastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv have set up dozens of underground classrooms in metro stations. According to Mayor Ihor Terecow, 60 such rooms have been created with a view to the start of the school in September, in which a total of more than 1,000 children can follow personal lessons.
“The children will be able to meet, find a common language and talk,” says Iryna Loboda, a student mother, outside a subway station in the center of the country’s second largest city. “I fully support that,” she added.
Fighting in the suburbs again
After the start of the war, Russian forces initially managed to gain control of most of the city before being forced back after an initial Ukrainian counter-offensive. In the meantime, however, fighting has resumed, especially in the northeastern suburbs.
Online lessons because of war
Since the start of the war, schools in the big city have had to organize their lessons online for a large part. Russian missiles can sometimes reach the city in less than a minute, often leaving little time to escape from classrooms to bomb shelters.
1300 schools destroyed in Ukraine
More than 1,300 schools in Ukraine have been destroyed during the war so far, according to the UN Children’s Fund UNICEF. Russia’s continued attacks also meant that only about a third of school-aged children were able to attend regular face-to-face classes. In addition, many students would forget the material they had already learned.
“Within Ukraine, attacks on schools continue unabated, leaving children deeply distressed and without a safe space to study,” UNICEF said on Tuesday.
Before the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine started on February 24, 2022, more than 1.4 million people lived in the city. Parts of Kharkov are only about 30 kilometers from the Russian border.
Source: Krone
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