The Peace Corps was invited to come to Bulgaria in 1991. Today, there are nearly 100 volunteer teachers, businessmen and -women, and ecologists. I teach English in a Russian language school. Most of the students and teachers have never met a native English speaker, much less one from the United States, so conversation is always very interesting. Here, grades are everything.
Students compete, via grades, for placement in the secondary school of their choice.
Language schools, which stress the learning of various languages, are considered to be the most prestigious since they require the highest scores. Few students take the SAT, but those who do rarely score lower than 1300. These accomplishments are achieved without the benefit of computers or science labs since few schools have either. The sciences are taught using textbooks, with no hands-on experience. When I asked my ninth graders how they could help their community, they instantly named a dozen or more ideas and were eager to begin.