Education on a gaming platform. A teacher about the realities of schooling during the war
"It is incredible to see kids playing football and on playgrounds again. Due to the war, almost all children left our settlement, and to see them return brings me such happiness," says Iryna Kornus, a chemistry teacher from a small town in the Kharkiv region. Iryna has worked in education for around 20 years. Her genuine love for children runs in the family: she works at the same school she attended and where her mother and grandmother taught many years ago. This school is located only 40 kilometers from the Russian border.
Even after the war broke out so close to her home, Iryna Kornus chose to stay in her hometown – to continue teaching at the school, take care of her 80-year-old father, and support the local community. Along with her colleagues, she persevered in educating children despite the numerous challenges of Russia’s brutal attacks. She is one of over 655,000 Ukrainian educators who have been able to keep teaching thanks to budget support from the United States. Over nearly two and a half years of the war, the U.S. government, through the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), provided $26.8 billion in direct budget support to the Ukrainian government to help cover essential non-military expenditures, such as school and university staff salaries.
During this time, the United States became the largest individual country donor of economic assistance to Ukraine, having already provided $26.8 billion in direct budget support.
Disbursed through the World Bank's mechanisms, American funds are directed into the Ukrainian state budget, reimbursing the government's expenditures on salaries for over 1.4 million workers whose uninterrupted work is most crucial for today's survival of Ukrainians and the future recovery of the country—first responders, healthcare workers, educators, and civil servants.
Thanks to US budgetary funding, the Ukrainian government also continues to support the most vulnerable members of the population by providing social assistance to internally displaced persons, low-income families, and others.
Hiding people, documents, and Ukrainian symbols
On the eve of February 24, 2022, Iryna’s school was preparing for temporary relocation. Its building needed to be renovated to accommodate more modern classrooms and a bomb shelter. Instead, in the early days of the invasion, it became an island of safety for the village's residents, who were constantly shelled by the Kremlin’s army.
Until mid-March 2022, the school building served primarily as a bomb shelter for residents. "It was a terrifying month," Iryna recalls. "Frightened people came seeking refuge from the shelling, some bringing elderly relatives who could barely move, along with children and pets." However, when a rocket struck nearby, the fear became too great for many, prompting most people to leave for other regions or even seek refuge abroad—those who remained moved to the bomb shelter under the local church.
Due to the proximity of danger, the teachers quickly realized the need to protect the children's personal files, educational documentation, and Ukrainian national symbols, such as the state flag, images of the Trident, and Kharkiv regional symbols. "In those first days of the war, we immediately gathered everything and took it home to keep it safe. We preserved it all, and even our building survived—everything is fine to this day," Iryna says.
She and her colleagues were among the first to volunteer in the city, assisting the mayor and supporting the local community. "We delivered aid to residents who couldn’t come to pick it up themselves, organized supplies, counted everything, and even fed animals affected by the explosions, just like the people," Iryna says.
In addition to their extensive efforts, they also offered moral support to the community.
"Perhaps the most important task during that time was to reassure people that they wouldn’t be left without help and that if evacuation were necessary, they wouldn’t be abandoned".
"Sometimes, that support was even more crucial than food," the teacher recalls. Her colleague, school psychologist Olena, worked with children, their parents, and other community members who needed assistance and care.
Support was especially vital when one of Iryna's students came under enemy fire while waiting for humanitarian aid with his father. The boy was injured when a shell fragment struck his leg, ultimately leading to an amputation. To assist him, the school staff rallied together to raise funds, and the school director later connected with someone who helped the boy get a prosthetic limb. Now, he is walking again and has returned to Ukraine.
With no light but with a great desire to learn
Despite everything, the school's learning process resumed on March 28, 2022. Fortunately, a remote system for this was established several years earlier.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the school's educators devised the idea of using Discord as a platform for distance learning. Popular among gaming communities, Discord offers voice, video, and text chat capabilities. Two of Iryna’s younger colleagues—both the school’s alums and teachers—spearheaded and brought the initiative to life. During the full-scale war, the platform proved useful for live lessons that could be accessed by any student, anywhere.
"We have classes there, similar to how we would have them physically at school. Access is restricted, so no one can enter the class from outside and disturb us. As a teacher, I can see if any students have not joined the class and can help them get to where they need to be. Also, the system is useful for homework and grading – we give feedback to the children in private messages so the mistakes are not visible to the whole class. However, the school administration and parents can check the messages too," explains Iryna. Thanks to this innovative system, in February 2023, the State Inspectorate of Schools of the Kharkiv Region recognized the school as one of the top five out of 83 evaluated schools.
The full-scale invasion deeply affected everyone, especially the children. They took photos of their surroundings—military equipment, planes, and the basements where they sheltered—and shared these images with one another to discuss what was happening. Therefore, teachers had to continually remind the children not to post anything that could jeopardize their safety. Additionally, they worked hard to provide psychological support to help the kids cope with the trauma of war.
Under these challenging conditions, it was crucial for the children to continue their studies and stay connected with their classmates. For teachers, this meant they had to become twice as creative as before to make the educational process as engaging as possible. "We strive to turn every lesson into an exciting event or activity, such as analyzing food products with chemical reagents or creating something with our hands," says the schoolteacher.
Now, in 2024, Iryna Kornus holds high hopes for the future. Some students have already returned, which brings her the greatest joy and inspiration: "For some time, there were almost no children left in the village and no mothers with strollers. It felt as if the village had died out." With people slowly returning, the school even planned to resume in-person classes this academic year – until the recent increase in shelling in September made the school put the decision on hold. "The children and we, the teachers, are eagerly looking forward to meeting at school. Everyone dreams of face-to-face classes. However, being just 40 kilometers from the Russian border makes it very dangerous. Those who have left truly long to return as soon as it’s safe," Iryna concludes.
Photo from the personal archive of Iryna Kornus.
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