General information on our school

Founded in 1907, Szent László Gimnázium (Secondary Grammar School) is located in Kőbánya, Budapest’s 10^th District. The school’s building was designed by the renowned Hungarian architect Ödön Lechner, and has been in use since 1915.

Szent László Gimnázium runs 25 classes with eight specialisations. It also offers evening classes for adults. Therefore, the school’s enrolment is approximately 1000 students each year.

Our school is a UNESCO–associated school, which means that we teach a wide range of foreign languages, our students take part in many special programmes and competitions on the topic of foreign countries, our second-year students organise ‘UNESCO shows’ (see below) and many of our students participate in exchange programmes every year. This has become particularly important since Hungary joined the European Union.

The school strives to offer an ideal learning environment for its students. The modern classrooms, the computer rooms, the library, the biology and chemistry laboratories, the two gymnasiums and the sports facilities are all there to make teaching and learning easier and more effective. Our faculty works hard to maintain a high academic standard in order to provide a high quality education.

Specialisations

Currently, students at Szent László Gimnázium can choose to specialise in one of eight subjects as members of one of our five classes. Our five classes are marked A, B, D, E and F. The A, E and F classes have a 5-year curriculum. The B and D classes have a 4-year curriculum.

The A class is the Italian-Hungarian bilingual class. Students in this class have 12 Italian lessons a week, and from the second year onwards they study certain subjects (geography, history, mathematics, biology, Italian culture and civilisation, and art history) in Italian. They also have skills development lessons in Italian, as well. To maximise their opportunities to learn the language, they regularly have lessons with native Italian teachers and take part in various student exchange programmes. The school receives considerable help from the Italian Embassy in Budapest, as well as from the Italian government, in the form of books and other teaching aids.

One third of the students in the B class specialise in English. Students here have 6 to 8 English lessons a week, some of these with a native English-speaking teacher. By the time they leave the school, these students speak English fluently. Another third of the B class specialises in mathematics. These students have two or three extra maths lessons a week. The remainder of the class does not have a particular specialisation.

Class D is divided into three groups in a similar fashion. One third of this class specialises in German, one third in art and drawing, and the rest of the class follows a regular curriculum with no specialisation.

The E class specialises in the sciences. Students in this class not only study the theoretical background of biology and chemistry, but they also receive thorough practical training in these subjects. Many of these students love animals, and they even run a small ‘zoo’ on the third floor of the school. Many former Szent László students have gone on to become doctors and vets.

Half of the students in class F specialise in information technology (IT), and the other half in media studies. The training in both halves of this class is very practical. Our IT students spend many hours developing their programming skills, while the media students learn how to record and edit films, write newspaper articles and take professional-quality photos.

Due to changes in the curriculum, the school did not start a new C class in September 2008 and the last C class graduated in 2011.