No heat, collapsing roofs, and buckets for toilets While Russia spends billions on the war in Ukraine, its schools are literally falling apart
Russia’s school buildings are collapsing one after another. In the last month alone, it’s happened both in Vladivostok, where a roof caved in and sent a 12-year-old student to the hospital, and in the Novosibirsk region, where part of a school building collapsed during a weekend. Both schools officially passed building inspections before the start of the academic year. Journalists from the independent outlet 7×7 compiled a list of all the Russian schools that have collapsed over the last two years. Meduza shares an English-language summary of their findings and analysis.
In the last two years, according to media reports reviewed by 7×7, at least 31 schools in Russia have had a wall, roof, or ceiling collapse during the academic year. All of these buildings had undergone annual safety inspections.
According to the data journalism project To Be Exact, almost one quarter of schools in Russia were in need of major structural repairs in 2024. Most of these schools were in the Murmansk (77 percent), Kirov (69 percent), Karelia (65 percent), and Kabardino-Balkaria (64 percent) regions.
Nor did all schools have basic amenities. At a school in the Karelian village of Voloma, the bathroom didn’t have running water for a year, forcing students to use a bucket instead. The school’s principal defended the situation to a local activist, arguing that “the first graders were more used to” a bucket than a toilet.
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As of 2024, five percent of school buildings in Russia lacked central heating and running water, while six percent had no sewage system. In some regions, the numbers were far higher: more than half the schools in the Tuva Republic and 41 percent of schools in Dagestan and the Sakha Republic were without sewage infrastructure. These same regions also topped the list for the highest percentage of schools without running water, according to To Be Precise.
Additionally, in the Tuva Republic, 68 percent of schools had no central heating. The figures were also high in Kalmykia (35 percent) and Ingushetia (31 percent).
In 2024, there were 510 schools across Russia officially classified as unsafe or structurally unsound. The Tuva region had the highest proportion of these schools, with 10 percent deemed unfit to attend. Dagestan followed with six percent, and the Sakha Republic with five percent.
Irina Abankina, director of the Institute for Education Development at Moscow’s Higher School of Economics, explained that most schools are municipally owned, and local governments often lack the funds to maintain them. “Municipalities vary widely in terms of budget capacity,” she said. Rural schools are in particularly poor condition, as authorities see them as having little long-term potential. With low student numbers, these schools are often overlooked when it comes to funding for repairs.
A recipe for disaster
The school in the Novosibirsk region that collapsed earlier this month was first opened in 1937. In the 1990s, there were plans to build a new facility, but construction was never completed. Authorities finally revisited the idea in 2023, but progress has been slow due to high groundwater levels. After the old building’s collapse, officials promised to complete construction of the new school in time for the 2026–2027 school year.
According to students and staff, the old building had been deteriorating for years: the concrete stairs and walls were unstable, dust and debris regularly fell from the ceiling, and the windows rattled in their frames.
Some parents said they had complained to the principal about the building’s condition, but received no response. Others claimed the principal had written to the authorities herself, warning that the school wouldn’t survive another school year.
A teacher who served as principal of a different school in the Novosibirsk region until 2018 told 7×7 that school directors who push for building repairs can face serious repercussions. According to him, the commission that conducts building inspections before each academic year often overlooks issues and pressures the principal to sign off on their reports.
The teacher said inspectors typically suggest either conducting a follow-up assessment or postponing the repairs until the next school break, and school administrators often agree to these terms. But if a principal refuses to sign the report and insists on getting repairs done before the school year starts, they’re told: “Just sign it. If you don’t, we’ll find someone else who will.”
