Situation Center "Open Doors", which has been providing support to Ukrainians living in Bulgaria since the beginning of the war in 2022, continues to develop one of its main missions – providing Bulgarian language training for Ukrainian refugees.
"When the situation center started working, one of its first goals was to help the refugees start learning Bulgarian language. We told this to various media, including BNR. Many volunteers responded and came to our center,” the coordinator at the Ukrainian Education Center in Sofia, Elena Volkova, says. “These language courses continue to this day and thanks to these people, many of the children are now comfortable speaking Bulgarian. In addition to the volunteers, the children also study Bulgarian twice a week, together with teachers from Ukraine."
Currently the courses are held according to textbooks provided by the Executive Agency for Bulgarians Abroad.
The project called "Love Speaks Bulgarian" will allow 100 children from Ukraine to attend Bulgarian language lessons twice a week throughout the summer. The team of the "Open Doors" Situation Center hopes to collect 3,000 euros needed for this activity by May 15. The goal is to facilitate the removal of the language barrier for Ukrainian children, so they can communicate more easily with their peers in Bulgaria, as well as to fully integrate into Bulgarian society.
"Some of the parents have decided to enroll their children in Bulgarian schools during the next school year,” Elena Volkova says. "They are aware that unfortunately the war could continue for a long time and that they might have to stay in Bulgaria."
The Ukrainian educational center continues to work on another important task - its transformation into the first Bulgarian-Ukrainian secondary school. It has not yet been specified what methodology and textbooks will be used in it. Currently, the children have in-person classes in the building of the center, according to Ukrainian educational program in an online format.
Photos and video: Situation Center "Open Doors", personal archive
The Bulgarian national minority in Albania is one of the largest in the country, according to data from the latest official population census. A total of 7,057 individuals identified as Bulgarians. For comparison, 23,000 people identified as Greeks,..
From today, residents of Stara Zagora, young and old, can send their letter to Santa Claus. A letterbox has been set up in the foyer of the city's State Puppet Theatre to collect messages for Father Christmas. The cultural institution guarantees that..
A Christmas tree with Bulgarian decorations has been placed in a central location at the Griffin Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago. For the fifth consecutive year, Bulgarians living in Chicago crafted the lavish decoration of the Bulgarian..
Nuredin Nuredinaj comes from the historical-geographical region of Gòra in Northeastern Albania, where 90% of the inhabitants identify themselves as..
Partly Cloudy
Mostly Cloudy