Starty nadezhd

Starty nadezhd (Russian: Старты надежд) was the national children's multi-sport event in the USSR. Established in 1975, the competition was held between grades of all secondary schools throughout the country. Motto of the competition was "Olympians Are Among Us!" (Russian: Олимпийцы среди нас!).

Description

Soviet secondary school system

To describe competition format, first the structure of a Soviet secondary school should be overviewed. Typically about 1,000 children studied in one Soviet secondary school. Levels of education comprised 10 classes from the first to the tenth. And each class was divided into several parallel classes. They were numbered like 9 "A", 9 "B", 9 "V" and so on for parallel classes of the ninth class in this case. Usually a parallel class was also called just class. So, in one parallel class, like 9 "A" for instance, some 30 to 40 children of the same age studied together, while 9 "B" was a separate group of children, that had lessons in another time and place, although it had the same education program. Children of 10 "A" parallel class were one year older than children of 9 "A", and the education program was more advanced for them than it was for 9 "A", while children of 8 "A" were one year younger and had less advanced education program, than 9 "A".