Putin’s Push to Standardize Russian History Textbooks Speeds Up – and Experts See Trouble Ahead

Paul Goble
    Staunton, Nov. 22 – Having mandated a single permitted Russian history textbook for grades 10 and 11 this year, the Putin regime plans to do the same thing for grades five through nine next fall, a standardization that the Kremlin hopes will help it shape the next generation but a move that critics say won’t have the impact Moscow expects.
    There are a variety of reasons for that conclusion, educational specialists surveyed by Novyye Izvestiya say, among which the most prominent is the following: most students don’t read the textbooks but rather rely on the lectures of teachers who will continue to push their own ideas (newizv.ru/news/2024-11-22/kak-vo-vremena-sssr-v-shkolah-vvodyat-edinyy-uchebnik-istorii-pedagogi-protiv-434546).
    But over time, this standardization of textbooks will reduce the ideas teachers will draw on, leading to more uniformity, and make it more difficult for them and their students to keep up with the latest historical research. Indeed, these critics suggest, that may be the unspoken intention of the Kremlin which wants a single version of Russian history.
    However that may be, many expect parents, pupils and teachers to like the new system because it will help those who have to take school-leaving examinations pass them even if it makes it even more likely that Russia’s schools will increasingly teach for the test rather than anything else.