During the whole year, however, she thought about testing in Slovakia and came up with a plan for her own children’s education. She contacted the teacher who was helping Andrej prepare for the commission exams and told her about her idea. The teacher liked Maria’s idea, so she returned to Dublin and helped her find premises to rent in a local school.
“And that’s how the first class was created, where there were twelve children. They started to operate in a model that has proven itself to this day. Teaching took place two Saturdays a month with Slovak teachers,” says Elena, who today runs the Education Center in Dublin with her husband Andrej. The number of children kept increasing and Mária needed to open new classes. After a few years, the teaching was moved to new premises in Dublin’s Mount Carmel Secondary School.
Maria was contacted by two teachers who had a group of Slovak children in the city of Cork, and thus another branch was established. There was also a strong Slovak community at the opposite end of the country in Galway, where Mária’s parents contacted her saying they were interested in the school. It gradually opened four branches and recruited new and new people. The number of children increased and their number rose to 150.
A waitress during the week, a teacher on Saturdays
She got female assistants who interpreted for the children if they did not understand the teachers in Slovak or English. After some time, she began to actively collaborate with various other projects, helping with the preparation of new textbooks for children with Slovak as a second language, or with the Erasmus+ program, which in turn supported interns.
Years later, it extended cooperation to other centers under the ISEIA association. The international institute and association of Slovak educational centers unites Slovak educational centers and weekend schools all over the world. Only after this cooperation could Mária start promoting the interests of Slovak children living abroad and communicating with the Ministry of Education.
Mária quickly understood that finding high-quality teachers would not be as easy as she imagined, but she did not want to abandon her high standards. “So she was always looking for new Slovak teachers in Ireland who wanted to earn extra money. Many of them had jobs during the week, for example, in cafes and restaurants, and on the weekends they devoted themselves to what they had studied at school,” explains Elena.
Mária was also always attracted to teaching, but she didn’t have the space for it in Slovakia. At the age of forty, she finally made up her mind and sent in an application for college. She did not know how she would manage her studies in English, how she would take care of her son and manage the center. For months, she read English textbooks in the evenings, absorbed knowledge at lectures and prepared for exams.
After graduation, she did not leave the diploma lying in a drawer. Shortly after that, she opened a kindergarten with a focus on children from different cultures, because this was the topic she studied during her studies. In the Education Center, she started organizing theater performances, visits to St. Nicholas, Christmas, and creative workshops for children in order to preserve Slovak customs and traditions far beyond the borders.
The pandemic has shuffled the cards
Mária ran the center alone for years, but she died unexpectedly in October 2020. Andrej found himself in her place, who took over the leadership with the help of the teaching staff and Elena. At that time, the coronavirus pandemic was already raging in the world, and with it came the first difficulties years later, when the center was progressing.
All four branches closed overnight due to pandemic measures in Ireland. The children switched to online classes and the center began to function remotely. They had to change the teaching concept, shorten the lessons and divide them into shorter blocks. The children got used to spending Saturdays in the center and gradually started joining the lessons less and less.
They had already been working overtime for years when, in addition to the Irish school, they also went to the Slovak educational center. Even though the rules gradually began to relax and life returned to its old ways, it was difficult to lure children back to the school desks during the weekends. The number of registered pupils thus decreased.
The last census, which took place three years ago, showed that more than 20,000 Slovaks had moved to Ireland. It might seem that interest in Slovak culture and education will remain high. However, many families found themselves in a complicated financial situation. They lost their jobs during the pandemic, but housing costs are relatively high in Ireland.
The center therefore tries to accommodate them and many times agree on a membership fee so that the children do not have to stop their lessons. “When the parents then thank you that they are returning to Slovakia and their child does not end up two grades lower because he is lagging behind in Slovak, we know that it makes sense,” laughs Elena.
A generation of Slovak Irish
The Slovak community in Ireland was made up of families who came there twenty years ago and thus belong to the first wave of those who stayed in the country permanently. There are also mixed couples where one of the parents is from Slovakia or those who still hesitate where their real home is. However, they are united by their interest in maintaining the Slovak language in their children.
However, Elena and Andrej see that over the years the Center has split into two groups. Families who no longer want to return to Slovakia, and those who are still considering this option. In the last five years, according to Andrej and Elena, many parents have been reconsidering returning home. It depends on the current political situation and families calculate where it is more worthwhile for them to live.
One Saturday, two students left their class. One because they learned Slovak too much, and the other because it was not enough for him. At that time, Andrej and the entire teaching staff realized that, if they wanted to survive, they had to change the concept of the center again. So the game is that they will split it into two separate units. One will function as before, preparing children for commission exams or graduation, the other will only be for maintaining the language and tradition.
“It would be useful for those children who still speak primarily Slovak at home with their parents. Many parents want their children to have a relationship with the language, as they often have grandparents or extended family in Slovakia,” he adds, adding that more than half of the students now come from mixed families.
The problem is also that the children in the classes start speaking English after a while. The fact that they are in Irish school most of the time makes it difficult for them to speak longer in Slovak on Saturdays. “We are constantly working with it so that they tend to speak Slovak, but it is easier for them to switch to English,” says Elena.
The problem is female teachers and also finances
However, the functioning of the center is limited by finances. Part of the costs will be covered by contributions from parents and the other by grants from the Office for Slovaks Living Abroad, which they regularly apply for. “Although we can count on support from the office, money for the whole year comes to us only in the summer, which causes existential problems for the center,” he describes the common reality.
The center in Dublin is one of the largest and longest operating, which is also reflected in the amount of support from the government, but the process of processing the application is complex. According to her, they also have to undergo external evaluation and inspections, which naturally slows down approval. However, for the center it means an annual struggle for survival. This year was critical, the number of registered children dropped and Elena and Andrej had no way to cover the missing funds.
The problem is not the allocation of subsidies, but mainly their timing. For the first half of the year, Mária used to pay the teachers from her saved money. However, after the pandemic, the center was still not stabilized and payments began to be delayed. Many female teachers, who had traveled several hours to Dublin, left the center for them.
“I absolutely understand them, but at the same time I am very sorry. We were still sitting over the papers and calculating. For the last three years we have considered closing the center, it would have been easier. But we feel that we owe it to the children so that they can return to Slovakia one day. And Andrej does not want to lose what his mother built in Dublin,” Elena describes the reality.
Therefore, they combined several grades and reduced the fees for parents by half in order to keep them in the center. They currently have sixty children registered, which is significantly less than years before.
He also admits that they also encounter the fact that many parents decide not to pay the education fee, and the center is thus getting into more and more debt. “Now we have the funds for the salaries, we just need to find teachers again to come and educate the children. We are also reopening the branch in Galway, which worked years ago,” he describes the plans.
Elena says that, despite this, they compromise on quality and want teachers who will prepare children for the Slovak school system. They thus emphasize the academic side and functioning according to the Slovak curriculum and educational plans. At the same time, female teachers must know English perfectly, because English is already the primary language for Slovak children.
The grass is greener beyond the borders
Elena always knew that she would go abroad after school. She wanted to travel, try work, life in another European city and one day return home to Slovakia. She worked at the scout headquarters, regularly traveled to various conferences, did PR and managed social networks.
She met Andrej during one of the scout camps, as they were both keen scouts since childhood. They did not see each other for years and were in contact only sporadically. Until the pandemic started and they traveled together by car to Ireland. “I fell in love with that country. It sounds like a cliché when you say the grass is greener there, but it really is,” she laughs.
In addition to the capital city and nature, Andrej also showed her the educational center that he took over from Mária, and Elena spent many Saturdays there. She went to classes, communicated with parents, dealt with marketing and helped with the general management of the school. Finally, she packed up her two dogs and moved to Dublin.
However, the couple lives constantly on the road. They cannot leave Ireland, but they miss life in Slovakia very much. “We love Bratislava endlessly. Thanks to living abroad, we perceive what is good in Slovakia,” admits Elena, showing me photos from the wedding.
In a white dress, she stood on Náměstí slobody, and she and Andrej walked in the Slovak Radio building and along the streets of the capital. Elena says they have a nice life, housing, friends and background in Ireland. Ireland’s nature and the views they love constantly take her breath away. However, they miss home more and more.
Even far beyond the borders, life is not ideal. “There is an extreme housing crisis here. Rents are expensive and keep rising. There isn’t even proper public transport. They have a lot to learn from Bratislava,” laughs Elena. “Many children have grown up with us and need an educational center. We will return home one day, but now Ireland is still waiting for us,” he describes plans for the future.
They have dreams that they want to fulfill
In addition, both have ambitions that do not relate to the educational center. Andrej graduated in television directing and starts working on large foreign projects as a lighting engineer. Elena wants to work with dogs and train them. Despite this, they are still trying to find a way to get the Education Center back on its feet. They are looking forward to the moment when they return home to Slovakia. They don’t know when it will be.
“We both grew up in camp units and it’s close to us to do some form of non-profit work. We want to help the community and maintain Slovak culture,” says Elena as she gets into a car with Irish license plates and I’m surprised again by the steering wheel on the opposite side. She stayed in Slovakia during the holidays, and then she had to pack again, a long journey to the Irish home to meet Andrej with three animals in the back seats.
However, a few weeks after our meeting, I reconnect with my husband. They say that they are still looking for a new sustainable format that will bring students not only the Slovak language, but also our culture and history. They are considering going online and starting community meetings, theater performances or renewed creative workshops in an interactive form. After all, they are not looking for female teachers for now.
Moreover, as it turned out, the journeys between Slovakia and Ireland will soon become even more complicated for Elena and Andrej. “We are expecting an addition to the family, we perceive how important it is for us to build a relationship with the Slovak language, culture and identity in our children, wherever the wind takes us in the world.”
