What a beautiful weekend it was celebrating 20 years of Noored Kooli / Teach For Estonia!
This whole journey started with a slightly random meeting with Jerry Hauser, the former COO of Teach For America, in Washington in February 2006. (Here is a blog post, in Estonian, I published later that day.) Jerry heard about the work I was doing in Estonia and suggested I talk to Brett Wigdortz, who had set up Teach First in England just a few years earlier. As I was flying back to Estonia, I had a stopover in London and went to see Brett at his office. He and his team played such an important role helping us set up Noored Kooli later that year and figure out what we wanted to do. All of this happened before Teach For All even existed!
None of this would have happened without Helo Meigas. Helo had recently joined Hansapank (now Swedbank). She was much more ambitious and strategic about corporate social responsibility than anything we had seen before in Estonia. She was determined to make sure that her company’s investment would make a real, positive long-term difference to education.
My team at Heateo Sihtasutus / Good Deed Foundation was tasked with exploring whether a Teach For America / Teach First-inspired programme would work in Estonia. We interviewed a great many education experts school principals and employers, and ran focus groups with university students and recent graduates. A lot of people had doubts: “This sounds like a great idea, but it will not work in the Estonian context.”
However, when talking to university students, we felt that the idea captured their imagination – for many of them! We felt this could work!
The board of Hansapank / Swedbank decided to give the green light after the summer and provide funding for the first three years. Noored Kooli was established as an organisation by Hansapank and Good Deed Foundation on 29 November 2006.
We had a nerve-wracking few months recruiting the first cohort. A lot of the applications came in on the very last day. I still remember the sense of relief late that night when we saw we had received nearly 100 applications to join the programme. I went for a walk alone by the sea. That was a moment of great happiness.
13 recent graduates were selected to be part of Noored Kooli in that first cohort. Fast forward 20 years, and we now have more than 400 participants who have joined the two-year programme. More than 80% of our alumni continue to work in education.
Our first event with the first cohort of Noored Kooli in May 2007
Noored Kooli is so different today compared to where we were in the beginning. Our understanding of what educational inequity means in the Estonian context—and what great teaching and learning look like—has vastly improved. A lot of this has been fuelled by Teach For All, set up by Wendy Kopp and Brett Wigdortz soon after Noored Kooli. Teach For All now includes 63 partner organisations across six continents. More than 113,000 alumni have finished the two-year teaching commitment, and the majority of them continue to work for change in classrooms, schools, and school systems.
I had such a wonderful time celebrating with so many friends and colleagues. I feel a deep sense of gratitude—first to Brett and Wendy, but also to all the teachers, alumni, and staff members of Noored Kooli.
Starting something is not easy, but the real credit goes to everyone who continues to work every day towards our vision: that one day, all children in Estonia will be able to attain an excellent education that enables them to shape a better future for themselves and all of us. You are all my people.
After the weekend, I’ve been reflecting on where we’d like to be in 20 years’ time with Estonian education. With this question in mind, I’d recommend reading this recent report about the long-term impact of Teach For America in three cities.
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