In Bolesławiec, as a result of the reform of the school system (the abolition of lower-secondary schools), initiated on 1 September 2017 and introduced by a resolution of the Bolesławiec City Council dated 29 November 2017, five eight-year primary schools operate in six buildings. In the 1980s there were ten. Schools began to disappear, either being closed as a result of successive reforms or because the number of pupils was declining.
In 1945, Bolesławiec had ten former German school buildings. Some were 90% destroyed and unfit for use; others were occupied by the Red Army.
The Dorotheenschule building, an evangelical school for girls (on present-day Armii Krajowej Street), was only 40% destroyed in 1945; it had 31 classrooms and three residential rooms and was fit for use. A primary school operated there. The school was closed at the beginning of the 21st century because of demographic decline and the building’s poor technical condition. In 2008, city councillors handed the derelict building over to the county authorities; today it houses the county office, in a modern building adapted to the needs of county administration.
Number Ten is the youngest school in Bolesławiec, built in 1986. From 1 September 2007 it was Municipal School Complex No. 2, with Lower-Secondary School No. 1, and after 2017, following the abolition of lower-secondary schools by resolution of the Bolesławiec City Council, it has operated as the eight-year Primary School No. 1 named after Janusz Kusociński in Bolesławiec.
In 1976–1986, Number Nine was located on Ceramiczna Street. After 1999, by resolution of the City Council, it became “Number Three” and continues to operate under that number today. Interestingly, in 1946–1947 it was the Public General School in Tylinów, Kraszowice commune, Bolesławiec county. Then, from 1948 to 1958, the building housed the Primary-Level General School in Bolesławice. It was not until 1973 that the primary school received No. 9; as an eight-grade primary school, it accepted children from the Bolesławice district, along with the following streets: Sportowa, Rajska, Pomorska, Bobrowa, Niecała, Gen. Bema and Kazimierza Wielkiego. As a comprehensive school, it also accepted children from Dobra. In 1982, it occupied three buildings: the main building on Ceramiczna Street, a building on Widok Street and a building on II Armii Wojska Polskiego Street (today Gen. Nila Street).
Number Eight is the former Maritime School named after the Fighters for Freedom and Democracy on J. Słowackiego Street; today it is Primary School No. 2. To this day, the former assembly yard at the school is adorned by the “People of the Sea” monument—a gift from Polska Żegluga Morska: a 10-ton anchor from the Karkonosze supertanker.
This unique “millennium school” was established in Bolesławiec in 1964, during the socialist era, and was a model school. It hosted the Polish and East German ministers of education and national defence, ambassadors of the USSR and Germany, consuls, and guests from Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and many other European countries. Let us give the floor to Paweł Śliwko, who wrote in Głos Bolesławca:
“It was to this school that the greatest contemporary statesmen wrote—UN Secretary-General Dr Kurt Waldheim (who, at Number Eight’s request, was awarded the Order of the Smile), US President Ronald Reagan, and USSR President Mikhail Gorbachev (also a Knight of the Order of the Smile, at the request of Bolesławiec’s children). The only Gallery of Contemporary Painting and Graphic Art in our city, named after Dr Tibor Csorba, was established here, as were the Gallery of African and Asian Peoples’ Sculpture, the Mining, Maritime and Antarctic Museum (the only one in the country), the Indian and Indonesian Rooms, the Kashubian Room and dozens of others. It was the first school in the country to be awarded the Honorary Officers’ Cordon of the Navy aboard ORP “Błyskawica” and the Honorary Mining Sword; it also received 40 medals and badges of unique value. A school with a tradition, its own publications summarising its wide-ranging achievements, and its own school medals, “Primi inter Pares” and “Friend–Patron.”
For now, of all these wonderful stories and exhibits, we can admire only the 10-ton anchor. We have unconfirmed information that some of the surviving school collections, currently held at the primary school, will be transferred to the Museum of Ceramics and will finally be available for viewing.
Primary School No. 7 is the County Complex of Special Schools and Institutions, located on Zgorzelecka Street in the palace of Count Eduard von Pückler, built in 1857 and devastated during that period. “Number Seven” moved in 2019 to the building on Bankowa Street (the building previously belonged to the Municipal Comprehensive School, and later housed Primary School No. 5 with integrated classes). Pückler’s Palace was taken over by the Museum of Ceramics, which obtained more than 17 million from Norwegian funds for the renovation of the historic building. The Museum’s new headquarters will open in April 2024.
“Number Six” was located on Dolne Młyny Street and in the 1970s and 1980s served as a three-year practice school for the Janusz Korczak School and Educational Institutions Complex (today II LO). Future teaching staff were educated at the Complex. When the Complex was dissolved in 1990,
Primary School No. 5 was created in 1999 by transforming “Number Six”. The school continues to operate today.
Primary School No. 4 on Mikołaja Brody Street was formerly an evangelical school for boys and has operated as a Bolesławiec primary school since 1958. Since 2017, it has occupied two buildings, on Mikołaja Brody Street and Bielskiej Street (in the former lower-secondary-school building).
Primary School No. 3 was merged in 1999 with Primary School No. 5 and transformed into today’s Primary School No. 2. The former Primary School No. 3 on Bankowa Street occupied the impressive building of a former girls’ secondary school, erected in 1912 according to a design by city architect Ernst Balzer. It is a distinctive building on Bolesławiec’s architectural map, with a decoratively shaped façade featuring architectural details referring to Art Nouveau and Neo-Baroque styles. Particular attention is drawn to the main portal, crowned with the city’s coat of arms and flanked by fully sculpted depictions of children. In 2013, the city authorities transferred the building to the Piarist Order, thus creating the order’s first public primary school in Lower Silesia.
Primary School No. 2 on J. Słowackiego Street occupies the building of the former outstanding maritime “millennium school” on J. Słowackiego Street, which no longer exists.
To conclude this overview of Bolesławiec’s primary schools, it should be added that the State Music School has operated in Bolesławiec since 1983, educating talented children and young people to a high standard. The educational landscape of the city of ceramics is completed by the private Oxpress School, with a kindergarten, primary school and secondary school, and the aforementioned school of the Piarist Order.