Abnormally high university entrance test scores, a possible phase-out of master’s programs, new barriers to studying abroad, and summer holidays spent in round-the-clock paramilitary camps – these are just some of the developments in Belarusian education in June, according to iSANS.
The main feature of June in Belarusian education is the start of summer vacation at all levels: at the beginning of the month, school students go on vacation, in the second half of the month, classes end at universities, and by the end of June, college students go on summer vacation. Monitoring studies in 2023 and 2024 showed that summer holidays do not mean a reduction in the ideologization and militarization of Belarusian education.
Ideological and militarized activities are a mandatory part of school camps. Moreover, officials and security forces use the free time of children and young people in the summer to set up round-the-clock militarized camps and hold various field training sessions. As the results of the current monitoring study show, the current summer holidays are also actively used by the authorities to hold ideological and militarized events with children and young people.
The news agenda of the official resources of the Ministry of Education also indicates the continuation of the processes of ideologization and militarization of Belarusian education. In June, 6 out of 24 news items (25%) on the official website of the Ministry of Education had an ideological bias, and 48 out of 158 news items (30%) on the official Telegram channel had such a bias. Thus, 30% of all messages on the ministry’s resources had an ideological slant, and this figure is only a few percent lower than in April-May, when we observed an extremely high level of ideologization in the education sector as a whole.
As for the general state of Belarusian education, the following features and phenomena were characteristic of it in June:
- Abnormally high results in centralized exams (CE) and centralized testing (CT)
- Confusion over the Ministry of Education’s decision to ban children living in Belarus from attending foreign schools
- Aliaksandr Lukashenkaэs exceptional influence on the Belarusian education system
- New obstacles from officials for Belarusians willing to enroll in universities abroad
- The ideologization of summer vacation and the imposition of an ideological component in the educational process at all levels of education
- Militarization of summer recreation for schoolchildren and the holding of militarized games at various levels of education
- Increased isolation of Belarusian education and further formation of a “common educational space” with Russia
- Dissemination of Russian narratives and perspectives on the war in Ukraine through film screenings at Russian Houses in Minsk, Brest, Homiel, and Hrodna
- Trips of Belarusian young people and teachers to Russia under short-term travel programs
You can read or download the whole monitoring of education in Belarus for June 2025 at this link.
Материал доступен на русском языке: Каникулы в круглосуточных военизированных лагерях. Система образования Беларуси в июне 2025
