About the school
State upper secondary schools
Pelgulinna State Upper Secondary School (Pelgulinna riigigümnaasium – PERG) is one of the three new state upper schools opened in Tallinn in September 2023. The building is situated on Kolde puiestee, and construction ended in August 2023. On the first year, 360 pupils were admitted and enrolled in the 10th grade. As two other recently opened state upper secondary schools in Tallinn, Pelgulinna is also meant for gymnasium level only, i.e for grades 10-12. The school started work with the 10th grade only and will grow gradually. In its full capacity in 2025, the school will offer education for 1080 pupils, therefore becoming one of the biggest upper secondary schools in the country.
For providing high quality general secondary education and ensuring a more efficient school network, the Ministry of Education and Research has initiated the establishment of state upper secondary schools where studies are pursued in grades 10-12 in regional centres. Pelgulinna State Upper Secondary School is part of the network of state upper secondary schools and collaborates with other state upper secondary schools to offer high quality general education together with variation and possibilities.
Focus theme and curriculum
In Pelgulinna State Upper Secondary School pupils learn to solve social problems that have a wider influence, and the focus is on sustainability from both social and environmental aspect. In addition to a wide general education, every pupil can form their own learning route thanks to the varied choice of elective subjects while focusing on natural sciences, social sciences, humanities or merging different study fields.
The development of the pupils is supported by a mentor. In addition to mandatory subjects (arising from the state curriculum), every pupil can choose from a variety of elective subjects that are included in the optional modules covering different areas from media to theatre and mathematics to programming. The wide choice of elective subjects stems from the collaboration between PERG and different organisations (NGO-s) and other educational institutions such as the local universities.
The main values and principles that were considered while creating the school are:
- We are responsible for our influence.
- We work together and are flexible.
- We focus on solutions instead of problems.
- We are not creating a boring school with boring ways, we are venturous.
Read about us in the Guardian.
School building
In the architecture of the school building, sustainability was kept in mind, and the main building material is local wood. At the time of the opening, the school building was the biggest wood building in Estonia with surface area spanning over 8200 m2.
The interior and atmosphere of the building is natural. There are real trees growing inside the building (in the foyer, in the open hall area and library), there are laboratories for natural science classes, music class, classrooms for projects and bigger auditoriums. There are also gyms and yoga room for practicing movement and sports of different kinds (both in the frames of official curriculum and after school training lessons).
The school building is surrounded by an open park together with an open air gym, ball court, ping pong tables and exhibition area. All of the above-mentioned are open to the local community and visitors as well. There are parking spots for several hundred bicycles at the open park area.
The building was constructed by the project of the Estonian architectural bureau Arhitekt Must and their vision “Seven brothers”. The authors of the project are architects Ott Alver, Alvin Järving, Mari Rass, Jõnn Sooniste, Katrin Vilberg, Lisett Laurimäe, Karoliine Kuus ja Kaire Koidu. The building has been awarded with several Estonian architectural awards.
The building was funded by the state budget and the European Regional Development Fund.