site.btaEducation Minister: No Better Place than Bucharest to Launch Untold Stories of Bulgarians Programme

Bulgaria’s Education and Science Minister Galin Tzokov believes that Bucharest is the best place to kick off a new Education Ministry programme titled the Untold Stories of the Bulgarians. "There is no better place than Bucharest to launch this programme," he said in a BTA interview in Bucharest Thursday.

The programme will encourage pupils in the Bulgarian communities abroad to research their family history and find out about events and personalities of importance for the country where they live; or of importance for the Bulgarian history; as well as about present-day Bulgarians with a major contribution in any country in any field.

“The Untold Stories of the Bulgarians programme is open to all Bulgarian Sunday schools, lecturers who teach Bulgarian in foreign universities, students who study Bulgarian,” Tzokov told BTA.

He said that the aim of the programme is to involve Bulgarian communities across the world and gather information, which will then be analyzed in terms of three aspects. “The first aspect is the ancestral memory of a child, parent or family. The second is the presence of prominent Bulgarians in the respective country. And third is the contribution of Bulgarians to the history and development of the respective country. The main aim of the programme is then to make a repository of these Bulgarian stories from all around the globe and raise awareness of the contribution of Bulgarians across the world,” Tzokov explained.

He said that the day for the programme's kick-off, October 19, coincided with the feast day of St John of Rila the Miracle Worker. He sees a significance in this coincidence because that is “the patron saint of the Bulgarians, of enlightenment, of culture, of Bulgarians’ spirituality”.

“Bucharest is an emblematic place because it was here that the Bulgarian emigree community was created and then evolved [in the 19th century, under Ottoman rule] - and with it the idea of the Bulgarian Revival, the Bulgarian Enlightenment, and the Bulgarian revolution. That is why we believe that there is no better place than Bucharest to launch the Untold Stories of the Bulgarians national programme,” Tzokov said.

“The programme is not only aimed at instilling a sense of patriotism, an ancestral memory, and a patriotic education. The aims here are profoundly pedagogical, because through this programme and the Bulgarian Educational Routes programme, which is also open to Bulgarian schools abroad, we aim to transform the teaching approach. In both programmes, the main methods are interactive. Children are given the opportunity to conduct research: they can have lessons in an observatory under the Bulgarian Educational Routes programme, or study their family history and create a family map. Education will be more competence-oriented. That is the whole point of the reform of the whole education system," the Minister said.

His wish is to see the Untold Stories of the Bulgarians be also introduced in schools in Bulgaria, maybe next year.