Russian School Curriculum Increases Focus on Military Training and State Ideology

Russian schools are maintaining over 1,300 hours of subjects categorized as propaganda across 11 years of education. This volume represents approximately 12.3 percent of the total academic load for a standard school with a five day week. The curriculum includes history, social sciences, spiritual and moral culture, the Basics of Security and Defense of the Motherland (OBZR), and the Conversations about Important Things program. According to calculations by Novaya Gazeta Europe, history is increasingly displacing social sciences and foreign languages. In grades 5 through 9, history now occupies 476 hours compared to 340 previous core hours. The curriculum has become more centralized, requiring the use of unified state textbooks for history in grades 5 through 9. These materials are guided by presidential decrees on traditional values and historical enlightenment, with instructions for teachers to include materials regarding heroes of the Special Military Operation. Additionally, the educational program now includes military teachings such as the handling of drones and offers for enlistment. Center left sources frame these changes as a systematic effort to promote state propaganda and a non objective vision of history.