School
The school in Slovakia always starts at the first working day in September (1st of September is a national holiday – the day of Constitutional law) and lasts until the last working day of June. Yes, the Slovak kids have 2 months holidays every year.
Slovak schools are typically European schools with a large variety of subjects and classical style of education. Be prepared for learning quite a lot, but on the other side the teachers are very tolerant to exchange students and put much more stress on improving the Slovak language skills than being too strict within their subject.
Most of the schools in Slovakia are public schools, private schools build much smaller part (mostly private payed schools or free christian schools). The level of education is very similar among all types of school.
| Grades system in Slovakia | ||
| 5- grades scale | ||
| Grade | English expression | Slovak expression |
| 1 | Excellent | výborný |
| 2 | Good | veľmi dobrý |
| 3 | Fair | dobrý |
| 4 | Poor | dostatočný |
| 5 | Failed | nedostatočný |
Report of grades is given per half year (2 reports a year).
Classes
Students are divided into stable classes: it means you will have most of the lessons with the same classmates (and in the same classroom). Each class has a class teacher, who is responsible for the communication between students and school.
Lessons
There are mostly 5 to 7 lessons a day, rarely lessons in the afternoon (it depends on the school, large school sometimes divide the lessons into morning lessons and afternoon lessons). The Slovak speciality is the "0th" lessons (begins at 07:00 or sometimes even slightly earlier) – this is sometimes a solution if the school uses experts from not pedagogical sphere or if the schedule does not allow to arrange the lessons in other way.
Subjects
Most of the subjects are obligatory subjects and student can not cancel them (Slovak language and literature, Maths, History, Biology, Chemistry, Physics, Geography). As mandatory subjects, the schools offer several other subjects or additional lessons to the subjects above. You can also choose which foreign language you would like to learn.
School system: from Grammar school to Universtity
This is a simplified map of school system in Slovakia. Some Gymnasiums take 8 years (mostly the private ones or public with specification on some sports), so the student attends Grammar school only for 4 years. The basic study takes 12 to 13 years (before entering university, college or other higher education).
