School without a number but with a name

On the eve of Teacher’s Day, Pavel Terekhov, director of the Pokrovsky Quarter Moscow school, became the absolute winner of the All-Russian competition “Director of the Year – 2022”.

We decided to turn to statistics to find out what kind of school it is that has a name, but no number. And who is he, her current director.

First, a little history. Approximately ten years ago, an active movement began in the metropolitan education system to unite several educational institutions into large complexes. Such centers either took some abstract number that would not be associated with one of these schools, or chose the name of a famous person, for example, a school named after. Kaptsov, or were named on a territorial basis, for example, the Vorobyovy Gory school, a school in Kapotnya. By the way, the Pokrovsky Quarter school was named according to this regional principle.

Ten years ago, by decision of the Department of Education and Science of the city of Moscow, school No. 2095 included more than twenty schools and kindergartens. One of the schools – “School of Health” No. 661 was located on Pokrovka Street, Building 10, Building 5. In 2014, the Charter of School No. 2095 “Pokrovsky Quarter” was approved. And almost immediately, the educational institution was simply renamed the school “Pokrovsky Quarter”.

At the moment, the school includes 11 buildings of kindergartens, 9 buildings in which schoolchildren of different parallels study. The total number of students is more than six thousand children and teenagers. In 2021, Pavel Terekhov was appointed director of the school. As the director himself says, “all adults were children, just not everyone remembers it. The Pokrovsky Quarter team is trying to make a school where we would like to study ourselves. Admission to leading universities, victories in competitions, the opportunity to try, make mistakes and change decisions on the way to success – this is about our residents. We help our children to communicate with each other, participate in volunteering, sports, the work of the school television studio and the media, events that they create themselves!

The school participates in all metropolitan city projects, traditionally takes high places in the ranking of the best educational institutions in the capital. Its graduates show high results in all subject certifications, olympiads and competitions.

As Pavel Terekhov said, for several years the school has been the base platform for the distributed lyceum of the National Research University Higher School of Economics. And he conducts training in ten areas, in particular, natural sciences, economics and mathematics, jurisprudence, psychology, design, and oriental studies.

By the way, the life motto of Pavel Terekhov: “Aim at the Moon, but go to her with earthly steps.” According to the director of the school, he himself went through all the steps in the education system: from the cleaner of the gym in the ninth grade to the director. And starting from the third year of the institute, he worked as a teacher, head of a structural unit, deputy director.

– I periodically have such moments in my life when I really need an additional drive in order to continue to work effectively and not go to burnout in the profession. Ten years ago, when I was finishing my job as a teacher, a similar “push” was the transition to the position of school principal. And I think that it was a very right decision, because it became interesting for me to work, to develop an educational institution, to improve its work, – says Pavel Terekhov.

— What did participation in the competition give you??

– Victory is, of course, very nice. But more important is communication with a circle of professionals and like-minded people, with directors who also participated in the competition. And, which is also important, with those who were members of the jury, in particular Maya Maisuradze, director of the Primakov Gymnasium, Maxim Pratusevich from St. Petersburg. This professional communication during the competition is no less important than its results. In such communication, you are always charged with new ideas.

— Winning the competition for school directors is a very high level. What could be next?

– I have been working at the Pokrovsky Quarter school for a year and a half. She “got” me in a very good condition, but I’m still sure that I have something to offer for its development, increasing its competitiveness. So the life cycle in the “Pokrovsky Quarter” is definitely not over yet. What’s next? Just like ten years ago, when my teaching position was transformed into a managerial position, so, perhaps, in a few more years, as Isaac Kalina said, I will need to rise to a higher captain’s bridge. And that will be interesting too.

Mona Platonov.