The independent experts' project will be presented in the coming days for consultation to the Ministry of Education and Science, the Embassy of Ukraine and institutions and organizations related to the education sector. It is a response to the growing every day influx of refugees. According to estimates, more than 20,000 Ukrainian children were enrolled in Polish schools in the first decade of March, the number of which could reach several hundred thousands in just a few months.

To meet this challenge, we need to organize the education of Ukrainian children in a thoughtful way, which requires good cooperation of many circles and institutions, rapid systemic changes and better coordination of this process by the state. We can no longer act ad hoc on the principle of “we're acting on the spur of the moment – it will work out somehow” ,because such an approach will have disastrous consequences. We present our concept  to create schools in exile and adaptation-preparatory classes in Polish educational institutions, hoping to start an urgent discussion aimed at finding the best final answers,” MISO President Mateusz Komorowski said.

The concept, prepared in early March by experts from several organizations, envisages the possibility of creating in all educational institutions and organizations operating in the field of education - both public and non-public -  adaptive-preparatory classes and special Schools in Exile that would continue teaching according to the Ukrainian program, as well as teaching the Polish language and bringing some information on Polish culture and traditions.

The purpose of adaptation classes is to learn the language, which would enable further education in a Polish school, as well as to provide students with war trauma with a sense of security, create conditions for relieving tensions and returning to normal psychological condition. Each of them would be provided with psychological and pedagogical support, lessons would be taught based on the Ukrainian or Polish core curriculum, and a teacher would only need to have a qualification for  early childhood education.

The draft also provides for the creation by local governments or other organizations involved in education, such as foundations or associations, of special schools for students with war refugee status, which would continue teaching according to the Ukrainian curriculum. Their staff is to be recruited from among teachers coming from Ukraine, hired and paid on the basis of regulations created for refugees, and the school year is to end with a Polish language exam and a semester report being a basis for continuing education at a school in Poland or Ukraine.

According to experts, what is needed above all is better coordination of activities related to organizing the education of Ukrainian children, today scattered and carried out by many entities. One of them will be a special nationwide online platform intended for supporting, among other things, the hiring of Ukrainian teachers.

- Its purpose is to provide necessary personnel, identify  needs of students and possibilities for support by educational institutions. Through it, Ukrainian teachers looking for work and parents willing to send their children to school in Poland will be able to obtain information on where refugee classes exist, what kind of classes and teaching staff are available - Wojciech Dąbrowski, president of EduTech Fund and one of the participants of  the project, said.

The first of the planned adaptation and preparation classes will start on Monday at Warsaw's Edison Primary School. Eleven students from Ukraine will begin studying there. This is part of Edison's campaign to support refugees from the east. After the outbreak of war, the school decided to dedicate one of its buildings for them, which was turned into a temporary housing facility. It sheltered 25 people, including 16 children with their mothers and grandmothers. Thanks to fundraising among the students' parents and external donors, which is still continuing, the first necessary equipment, clothing and food were collected. Older children were provided with schooling, while younger ones stay in bilingual kindergartens run by the institution.

According to Agnieszka Olszewska, Edison School Founder, and at the same time President of the EduTank Foundation, one of the initiators of the new idea for education of Ukrainian children, establishing classes in which those children will adapt to their new environment is a condition for their return to normality.

- In order for them to reabsorb knowledge, develop intellectually and emotionally, they need to feel safe again and get expert support at the start. That's why we will put a very strong emphasis, in addition to learning the Polish language, on physical activities, sports and recreation, cultural and artistic activities, so that they can forget stresses of war as soon as possible. Adaptation classes of this type offer a chance to bring children back to normal life, and I hope they will be started in other Polish cities as well - Agnieszka Olszewska, President of the EduTank Foundation, said.

The project’s initiators announce that they will seek support for it from donors who are not indifferent to the fate of children and young people from embattled Ukraine. - They are among the most victimized people of Russia's barbaric aggression, and we must do everything we can to provide them with a normal life again and an opportunity to continue their education - they indicate.