School "School"

Pavel Shmakov is 57 years old, he devoted most of his life to schools from which he was usually fired. In 2000, he was fired from the college, which he himself created. In 2013, they kicked out, threatening the criminal case, from the lyceum to which the mayor of Kazan personally invited him. In December, his new school can also be deprived of a license

The building of the Sun school is tiny, a place here is saved on everything. The locker room is under the stairs, and classes sometimes take place in the corridor - there are only ten audiences for the whole school. Director Pavel Shmakov does not have a separate office, he shares it with his colleagues. A boxing pear hangs next to the office. Paul shrugs: "We do not have a gym, we must somehow change children." The walls are painted with drawings of animals and flowers - this is the cleaning lady in his free time.

The toilet, according to Paul, is “a special reason for shame” - only one works of two booths, and the students of the “sun” stand at breaks in line. Now the school began to repair it for the money of parents. “But this is not the worst,” says Pavel and leads me into the street. He points to cracks in a retaining wall that supports the soil under the school. “The builders said that she would most likely be simple for another year,” Paul explains. - But people go past our school, the wall can fall on them. To repair it, you need more than a million rubles. When there will be money, it is incomprehensible. ”

Pavel Shmakov in his office. Photo: Sergey Karpov for TD

There is no money for the salary of teachers. Almost every of them says that the balance of a bank card is checked occasionally, and in general - the money is not the main thing, for this, many of them have part -time jobs. When asked why they are delayed, they are usually asked with a smile in response: "Don't you understand?"

Only one year of one hundred and a hundred and fifty students were accepted "either for money or with fear" Twisting this quote Pavel opens a notebook similar to a barn book. On the cover with a pencil it is written “Reception”. Several pages are neatly torn, on the surviving - lists in three columns and business cards attached by a stapler. In the first column, the names and surnames of officials are recorded, at whose request in the Lyceum named after Lobachevsky at the Kazan Federal University - an elite school at the largest university of Tatarstan - they received children. Then - the names of the received, Paul covers them with his palm and says that “the children are not to blame,” and their entrance points. Judging by the notes, only one year from one hundred and a hundred and fifty students were accepted, according to Shmakov, "either for money or with fear." He found a notebook in the director of the director in 2011, when, at the invitation of the mayor of Kazan, Ilsur Metshin returned to his hometown to the post of director of the Libachevsky Lyceum.

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In 2000, Shmakov left Kazan, then he was fired from the Academic College, which he created and headed. Teachers say that he quarreled with the Office of the Education of the city, because he did not follow the “valuable instructions of the leadership”. The college decided to reorganize.

Shmakov announced a hunger strike: he sat on the Square of Freedom before the building of the government of the republic and collected signatures from eight in the morning to the last passerby. After twenty -one days of protest in the building near the square, the President of Tatarstan and the acting President of Russia Vladimir Putin met. One of the college students decided to transfer the letter to Putin asking for a problem and, realizing that she would not be noticed in the crowd, shouted: “Uncle Volodya, take it!” He asked to miss the child, read the letter and asked Shaimiev what kind of school was in question. “Everything will be in order with her,” he answered readily. After that, Shmakov realized that the hunger strike would not change anything. Soon he left for Moscow, met a girl there, and they moved to her homeland - to Finland.

At a break, Pavel Shmakov communicates with the students in one of the offices of the Sun school photo: Sergey Karpov for TD

For several years he hoped to go back - if not to Kazan, then at least to Russia. During this time, he gradually learned the Finnish language, got a job as a teacher of mathematics at school, and in 2009, students chose his teacher of the year with secret vote. “It is clear that this is an unofficial title, but I burst into tears on the stage,” recalls Shmakov. So he met Ilsur Metshin, the new mayor of Kazan, who came to Finland and asked him to show him the best teachers. “I was brought into the classroom, and, to my surprise, he said in his native Russian that, I am the best teacher,” Metshin recalled in an interview with “Echo of Moscow”. - Probably a year and a half has passed, the teachers of the Lyceum of Lobachevsky came to me and said that their director went to increase, and is it possible to return Pavel Shmakov? ”

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He was returned to the Academic College, which during this time combined several educational institutions and began to be called the Lyceum named after Lobachevsky. Shmakov is sure that the notebook with the inscription "reception" was left in the office not by chance, but handed it over to him. “It is believed that the new director continues the affairs and policy of the former. This is right. But when the previous one was seen in something unclean, it is generally accepted that this continues. The notebook was handed to me as part of the policy of the lyceum. ”

Six months after his return, they continued to call him. “Once the prosecutor of one of the regions of Kazan called and asked for a child to take a child in the country. "The prosecutor of one of the regions of Kazan called and asked to take a child's child in the country" Twisting this quote I said: "Well, at least bring it." He replied: “Why? I introduced you to you. " Okay, at least I would ask for himself, but for a friend in the country? " - Schmakov is angry.

Pavel more than once publicly called people whose names were recorded in the notebook, and spoke about them Metshin, he smiled back. The list is the senior assistant to the prosecutor of the city of Kazan, the deputy dealer of one of the humanitarian faculties of the KFU, the heads of the Ministry of Education, the Internal Affairs Directorate, the Tax Service, the Presidential Council for Combating Corruption.

Pavel Shmakov and daughter Nastya near his office at the Sun school photo: Sergey Karpov for TD

Pavel is sure that because of this they hunted for a notebook. Once, his eleven -year -old daughter Nastya returned home, saw scattered things, shifted furniture, a painted refrigerator and the inscription on it “Hello” and, frightened, called her father. The police conducted an investigation and concluded that Nastya’s friend - Gulya entered the apartment. “She was interrogated four times - after this, anyone confesses to our police and anything, especially the child. Nothing disappeared from the apartment, there was nothing particularly valuable there, ”Shmakov grins. Anastasia also doubts the official version: “I know that Pope Guli once worked in the police, maybe he was forced to talk to his daughter. It seems to me that she was sincerely scared of what was happening. In my opinion, she has nothing to do with it. ”

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In the first year of Shmakov’s work in the Lyceum, thirteen checks passed. Pavel connects them with refusals to some officials, they stopped taking them “by call” in the lyceum. The new director gathered strongly lagging students in separate classes, calling them “creative”. “By 2011, approximately 240 out of 600 children were not held by the competition. Those who clearly did not have time, as well as hooligan children, we began to teach individually-in groups of five to six people. These are practically individual classes, while they do not interfere with the rest of the children, ”Anna Margulis, assistant Shmakova, explains the idea. For classes with creative classes, I had to invite new teachers, because some teachers from the lyceum said that it was impossible to separate children from each other, and they refused to teach them. The Lyceum was divided into two camps, the conflict increased sharply, part of the school began to demand the return of the former director, Elena Skobeltsyna, and part defended the new one.

Parent meeting photo: Sergey Karpov for TD

The reason for the conflict was that Shmakov’s methods were very different from the style of the last director. Her teacher management system is called "outdated." “Skobeltsyna introduced Soviet rules: I am the boss - you are a subordinate, I am smart - you are a fool. She began to adjust the school to standards where education is a service, not a state task. We did not conflict, but secretly announced her the “Italian strike” - we only did what was supposed to. In fact, we did not need it, ”says Svetlana Klochkova, a biology teacher. -There was a selection in the lyceum, but when I came to a class of thirty people, I realized that strong students there were three or five. What did the rest do in the lyceum, who positioned himself as one of the best in Tatarstan? There was an indicative case: once Skobeltsyna asked me to put the five to a child who barely pulled the three. She motivated that he would go to study abroad, and he needs good grades. I refused. She replied: “Do you understand that we can do this without you?” Put the five in free cells and correct the final assessment, to fake my signature is a matter of technology. I don’t know if they did it or not - the main thing is that I did not do. ”

Shmakov did not work in the lyceum for long-by 2013 he entered the top-25 of the best schools in Russia, but the atmosphere inside remained intense. “The last reception that could go to the Lyceum“ on the left ”studied in the ninth grade, they were still a giant number, they and their parents fought with me-they wrote letters, complained to the media and on the Internet. If I could hold out for five years, and they got out, I would regain my school, ”says Shmakov. “But this is too long, the lyceum was divided into two camps, and even the most sad, even the children participated in this.”

Notebook with lists of children who were demanded to accept photos to school: Sergey Karpov for TD

At first, he was offered to leave the post of director voluntarily: the mayor’s assistant to anti -corruption policy said that if he refuses, he will be instructed to criminal case for corruption. He referred to oral information that Shmakov was taking bribes, but promised:

"If necessary, I will find evidence." “I realized that I will have to either go back to Finland, or go to jail. But I did not want to throw a school where it was just beginning, ”says Shmakov. But they solved the problem differently, the lyceum was eliminated and immediately revived, including the university. Elena Skobellitsna became the director again.

Now Shmakov admits that he has underestimated the Russian realities: he believes that he should immediately open his school, and not "meddle in corruption."

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In the summer of 2013, when Shmakov and teachers, who decided to leave with him, were left without work, Kazan accepted World Student Games - the Universiade. “During an international event, the problem had to be hungry, we were given a building and hoped that we would die by ourselves. They thought that it was unlikely that the children would come to school without license, repairs and money, ”Paul is sure. - At the beginning of the school year, the boss from the education department approached me and asked: “Fifteen students scored?” In fact, there were eighty of them. ” So in Kazan a new school appeared-“Sun”, a specialized Olympiad and scientific center, and in the understanding of Shmakov-an educational institution for “intellectually enthusiastic children”.

Pavel Shmakov submits to the administration of Tatarstan acts on repair work in the premises of the school "Sun" photo: Sergey Karpov for TD

For Shmakov, it is important that the school, despite the fact that it takes away children, is open, you can come there by a free listener for lessons or for free circles. The selection is hard, there are tests both before the start of training and during, many do not come the first time. So here they check the motivation of students. In addition, in the “Sun”, every second teacher is the head teacher who is responsible for his direction: filling out magazines, olympiad or mugs. “The school should be managed not by officials, but by people who work with children,” Paul explains.

The “Sun” was opened in the fall of 2013, but from the very beginning it was accompanied by a series of misunderstandings, the building was unsuitable for studying, the first few months did not pay a salary to teachers. On October 29, 2013, after the inspections of Rospotrebnadzor and the fire inspection, the city court decided to close the school.

Two days later, a petition appeared on the Internet with an appeal to the President of Tatarstan and the Minister of Education Livanov, entitled “Do not allow the closing of the Sun school”. “If you dig a long time, then you can always dig up something,” says her author, student of the school Nikita Alkin. “We studied at a school that we liked, but which we did not give a license.” He sent a petition to friends, relatives, classmates. “I could not gain more than five thousand signatures,” Nikita recalls. “It was necessary to take some more measures.”

Mathematics lesson in the sixth grade
Photo: Sergey Karpov for TD Photo: Sergey Karpov for TD

After a couple of months, the case turned up, an unfamiliar girl called him, introduced herself as a graduate of Shmakov’s school and suggested “bring the petition to a new level,” she gave the phone member of the Communist Party, who invited him to a rally. “I checked: he was authorized, organized several activists, we made posters and decided to go. There I performed from the rostrum, that evening we were shown on local television, after which the number of signatures jumped up to 70-80 thousand in one day. "

This is another claim to Shmakov from his ill -wishers. Albert Khaliullov, a former student of the Academic College, calls Shmakov “a revolutionary for the revolution”: “And in the nineties, and now children's pickets are happening, they are positioned as the initiative of the children themselves. I think this is not normal. A schoolboy is a child, he cannot participate in political events. The director must solve these issues himself, and hiding behind children - just ugly. ” Nikita insists that the pickets are the initiative of the students: “The parents were not against it, we did not warn teachers and director that there were no complaints from the series“ send children to rallies ”. We were in despair, it was probably our last chance to try to change something. ”

Pavel leaves the car of his assistant photo: Sergey Karpov for TD

One way or another, they paid attention to the school, on May 29, 2014, Tatarstan President Rustam Minnikhanov issued a resolution "to solve all issues and report on the results." A month later, the “sun” received a license, and the checks stopped abruptly. Then the school divided the first place in the USE in mathematics with the best mathematical school in the city, a third of the students became winners of the district Olympiads. Pavel associates this with the fact that they were not interfered with working. “After the resolution, rumor went that they help us from above, which means that everything is in order, you don’t have to offend them particularly.”

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Now inside the school everything is as it was when opened two years ago. After the President’s decision, 13.3 million were allocated to the Sun for the repair of the building, the workers put the facade, the basement and the roof in order. The money on this ended. Now the school expects a planned check of Rosobrnadzor, it is planned for the middle of the school year.

Problems in the “Sun” solve a proven method - a petition in the name of the President of the Republic. This time, its authors are students of the 7AA grade who entered school a few months ago. “We decided that it is wrong to study in such conditions. I think we will not be allowed to go to rallies. High school students walked, and we, like, are small, ”says Anastasia, daughter of Paul and one of the creators of the petition. She explains the reasons seriously, bending her fingers. -Firstly, the noise worked last time, people became interested in the problem. Secondly, if it worked last time, then it may work in this. "

Anastasia’s daughter goes on vacation to Finland, Pavel will soon join her, but at the station he is always sad photo: Sergey Karpov for TD

It is difficult to understand the position of local authorities, the answers of the deputy chief Ilnar Hidiyatov were lost either in the press service of the city education department, or in the city hall. Ildar Mukhametov, Deputy Minister of Education and Science of Tatarstan, refused an interview, finally advised the text about the “sun” not to write, because “there are so many noise around them.”

In the correspondence of Shmakov with local bosses, there is also little concrete. The city education department sent him a letter: this year we do not plan to allocate additional money for repairs, if they close the school, students “will be sent to school No. 1”, and goodbye. “Any honest check will confirm that our building is not ready,” Shmakov admits. - But, if repairs continue, they can again wait six months. And if we study in an unreasoned room ... if they close, it will be very sad - it falls silent for a few seconds. - It seemed to me that the president, if there was not enough money, will allocate more, or people would work on credit. We are a public school. How can you make two -thirds of the work and leave? "