Knowledge Day 2018

Happy Knowledge Day.

This one had something new in it. The New Ukrainian School reform reached the first grade — a redesigned curriculum, retrained teachers, classrooms rearranged so children sit in groups rather than rows facing forward.

Education reform is the slowest thing a country can attempt. The children starting first grade under it will finish school in the 2030s, and the effects will be argued about for a decade after that. No government gets credit for it within its own term, which is precisely why it is so often postponed.

That Ukraine started it anyway, in a difficult period, is worth a sentence on the first of September.

To every child with flowers today, and to the teachers who spent the summer learning to teach differently: a good year.