Archive for 2008

  • Kyrgyz schoolboy. Photo by Ben Paarmann. Creative Commons licensed.

    Kyrgyzstan: Still Waiting

    Osh, KYRGYZSTAN | Looking back on the tumultuous events of March 2005, Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev once said that the Kyrgyz nation was “put on the edge of losing its […]

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  • Azerbaijan: Failing Grade

    Azerbaijan: Failing Grade

    BAKU, Azerbaijan | Many students in Azerbaijan now sit in modernized or brand new classrooms equipped with dramatically increased access to information technology, at a cost of millions of dollars […]

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  • Romania: Change for Change’s Sake?

    Romania: Change for Change’s Sake?

    Bucharest, ROMANIA | Thirteen-year-old Ionut Sim may well be one of the first generation of Romanian students to finish middle school after grade nine instead of grade eight. He would […]

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  • Macedonia: Learn to Forget

    Macedonia: Learn to Forget

    SKOPJE, Macedonia | Ivana’s homework has a familiar refrain: she memorizes lessons from physics, chemistry, math, and history classes. She does this until her head aches, she complains, “and that’s […]

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  • Romania: One More Chance

    Romania: One More Chance

    CLUJ-NAPOCA, Romania | It is 11:10 on a Thursday morning when a slightly unusual science class, the last of the day, begins at Nicolae Iorga School in the Iris industrial […]

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  • Students at the Plekhanov Russian Academy of Economics and other prestigious foreign university branches in Tashkent say they can’t get away with skipping class and paying teachers for good grades. Photo: Plekhanov Russian Academy of Economics in Tashkent.

    Uzbekistan: From Russia, With Luck

    TASHKENT, Uzbekistan | Anya entered the Tashkent branch of an expensive Russian economics university rather than one of Uzbekistan’s public universities, gambling that her choice would lead to a good […]

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  • Uzbekistan: The Philosopher-King

    Uzbekistan: The Philosopher-King

    TASHKENT, Uzbekistan | Here is a pop quiz: Who is the prolific author of the 15 volumes of books and speeches that are required reading for Uzbek students in a […]

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  • Kazakhstan: Not a Golden Ticket

    Kazakhstan: Not a Golden Ticket

    ASTANA, Kazakhstan | Kazakhstan’s National Science Fund recently rejected a job applicant because he was just too cocky.

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  • The plot of last year’s Macedonian Film “Shadows” involves the trade in human bones. Photo: Bavaria Film International.

    Macedonia: Macabre Market

    SKOPJE | Like a character in a crime movie, Olga walked through the dark alleys of the city’s Taftalidje district late one February night. Waiting in the shadows was a […]

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  • Montenegro: Getting its Story Straight

    Montenegro: Getting its Story Straight

    PODGORICA | Predrag Raznatovic quickly reads aloud through the part of the history book that states thousands of Montenegrins were killed by Serbs in 1918. He doesn’t believe what he […]

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