Some 3 million Romanian pupils and high-school students returned to school on Monday with the new school year seeing Holocaust studies introduced into the core curriculum.
Students will study the Jewish history and the Holocaust in the eleventh grade when they are 17 years old.
The Ministry of Education collaborated for a few months with the Elie Wiesel National Institute for the Study of the Holocaust in Romania about the topic, and experts from the National Museum of Jewish History and the Holocaust in Romania.
There is a general lack of knowledge in Romania about the Holocaust and Romania’s role in the atrocities which is why Holocaust study became part of the school curriculum.
The Elie Wiesel International Committee for the Study of the Holocaust published a report in 2004 saying that Romanian authorities were responsible for the deaths of 280,000 to 380,000 Jews and 11,000 Roma from 1940 to 1944 during World War II.
Next school year, 2025-2026, the „History of communism in Romania” will become compulsory for high school students and „History, slavery and deportation of Roma” ( as optional subjects according to a law that came into effect on Sept. 3. There is widespread ignorance about the communist era among the younger generations, while prejudice against Roma is also common.
The 2023-2024 school year will be 36 weeks and long and have five sessions.
School holidays are:
October 28, 2023 – November 5, 2023;
December 23, 2023 – January 7, 2024;
One week anytime between February 12, 2024 and March 3, 2024
April 27, 2024 – May 7, 2024;
June 22, 2024 – September 8, 2024.
The end of the last school year was marked by industrial action. Baccalaureate exams were postponed by a teachers’ strike.
More than 150,0000 teachers in Romania went on strike in May, the first time since 2005, with unions demanding an increase in salaries, overtime pay, and more supplies.
A Romanian teacher’s starting monthly salary is the equivalent of just over $520 about half the national average.
Romania’s government adopted a memorandum that says teachers will receive an increase in their salary from 1 January 2024.
Romania postpones school exams as thousands of teachers strike for better pay
