Ellinogermaniki Agogi

Ellinogermaniki Agogi is an educational organization of private law, officially recognized by the state. Ellinogermaniki Agogi is a multi unit educational institution comprising 2500 students, 235 teaching staff and 330 administration. The school's educational planning has a basic core and is unified from the Kindergarten all the way to Senior High School.

Ellinogermaniki Agogi pursues with great interest and a restive mind the developments in the field of education; it constantly sets and invariably achieves new goals holding at the same time an eminent position in the educational vanguard. Using the most up-to-date facilities, an enriched curriculum, experienced and skilled teaching staff and, most importantly, through consistency on principles and respect towards pupils and parents, our school has been struggling for four decades for the edification and the multifaceted education of our students. The interaction of the school with academic institutions, the sharing of views among teachers and specialized scientists in a European framework, in addition to the use of information technology in the reality of the school aim at the creation of a school open to the world at large, of a school which not only responds to the challenges and requirements of our era, but also paves the way for effective innovation. Therefore, it is not a surprise that Ellinogermaniki Agogi, is considered an “Advanced” OSOS School. EA is one of the few EU schools which can act as a paradigm for other schools, regarding its openness level, as defined in the Open Schooling Roadmap. More specifically: Ellinogermaniki Agogi promotes the collaboration with non-formal and informal education providers, enterprises, parents and local communities to ensure relevant and meaningful engagement of all societal actors with science and increase the uptake of science studies and science-based careers, employability and competitiveness:

Ellinogermaniki Agogi has a very strong and proven experience in actively extending the dialogue between scientific and the educational community, enforcing the collaboration between schools and research organizations, centers and museums. Its work in EU projects over the last 15 years has established EA as a leading pioneer in innovative approaches to science education. EA has participated either as coordinator or as partner, in more than 150 national and international collaborative research projects and networks the majority of which have been concerned with the fields of science and new technologies in education.

Ellinogermaniki Agogi is continuously modernizing STEM education by promoting and creating user-driven learning environments for students and offering numerous opportunities for teachers’ professional development to be prepared and thrive in the landscape of unprecedented challenges and opportunities in the 21st century. Under this approach, Ellinogermaniki Agogi has taken up the challenge to embed innovative pedagogical practice that effectively uses a range of ICTs in STEM classrooms, as well as driving up student academic outcomes across the school. Moreover, a large range of previous projects were focused on developing and implementing technological tools which leverage both digital science repositories and IBSE/PBL learning.

In addition, Ellinogermaniki Agogi is a founding member of the European Science Education Academy (ESEA - http://esea.ea.gr/), which is promoting a European standard-based Inquiry Based Science Education (IBSE) competence framework that will facilitate the professional development of teachers in applying and implementing IBSE, as well as supporting the creation of a European community of practice among science teachers to modernize science education.

Overall, Ellinogermaniki Agogi is acting as an agent of community well-being by promoting responsible citizenship and enriching the science capital of its local community:

Ellinogermaniki Agogi’s students are regularly using collaborative environments in their classroom activities and co-create content with students from other schools. The aims are assigned according to the child's age. Familiarization with figures and natural laws is the first step which leads to the development of more complex skills, like the ability to analyze and synthesize. Experimentation, coming in touch with simple but interesting natural phenomena as well as comprehension through research and questioning are the key points of the lesson. The main element of EA’s modern teaching approach is the «discovering» model which aims to acquisition of knowledge through experience, observation, questioning, analysis and research, taking into account each child’s character, aptitudes, possible special needs and, above all, its personality. The Student Counselor provides both parents and students significant services, as it aims to improve communication between parents and their children through a series of private and joint advisory meetings.

Team spirit and solidarity are cultivated within children through various cultural activities. Numerous feasts, Greek and German speaking theatrical performances, the summer market, book exhibitions, visits of children's books' authors, as well as various humanitarian activities contribute to the well-rounded development of our pupils' personalities. Visits to theatres, museums, places of historical and archaeological value and also working areas make the children familiar with History, Art, Culture and Technology. Moreover, the school has a complete environmental programme the target of which is to sensitize the children as far as ecology and environment issues are concerned. With the guidance of teachers, the countryside is converted to a huge laboratory in which the children obtain first hand information about the environmental problems. Athletic activities at all grades of Primary school are intense and they include swimming in the schools' swimming pool and introduction to the basic techniques of various sports in the schools courts or in the schools' gym. In addition there are day-long sports activities on Sundays as well as many inter-school meetings. 

Ellinogermaniki Agogi is bringing real-life projects to the classroom which promote sharing and applying of frontier research findings in schools, supporting the developments of 21st century competences through creative problem solving, discovery, learning by doing, experiential learning, critical thinking and creativity:

In Ellinogermaniki Agogi learning does not take place only in the classroom but also in the Physics' and Computer science's lab, in the Music and Art room, in the video room and in the library. The school's special editions for the teaching of Greek and foreign languages are of great help to the pupils of all grades in Primary school. Science classes have a special meaning in all levels of education and especially in Ellinogermaniki Agogi as they help students to better understand the laws governing our world. Students come in contact with physical phenomena outside school life, at home, in the street, while playing and doing sports... This contact though with physical phenomena isn't systematic due to the fact that its order is coincidental and the child's primary aim is not to critically analyse and understand it. The way to face the phenomena isn't designed having in mind the reasons behind these physical phenomena and the learning objectives are not pre-set. On the contrary in school life, the curriculum/ materials that the students are presented with are specially designed and organised having as a base the teachers desire to achieve specific learning objectives.

Music, choir, theatre and craftwork arts provide the necessary motivation for inquiry and discovery of new means of communication and self-expression of the children. The students get in touch with various tools and instruments and work in a challenging and at the same time joyful environment. Teachers of such special subjects have the responsibility of making sure that the kids do get involved in a variety of creative tasks. The pupils also have the opportunity to remain at school after the morning classes on a daily basis, in order to prepare their homework under the supervision of specialized teachers or to select among the numerous activities which are provided by the school in various fields. Afternoon classes include English and German language courses, sports (Swimming, water-polo, basket-ball, football, tennis, gymnastics, tae-kwon-do, national dances, ballet), Art courses (theatre, choir, photography) and, finally, computer courses.