The School Which is Worthy of the Name

The School of Electrical Engineering “Nikola Tesla”, Belgrade

Perhaps the chroniclers will not agree with it, but the suspicion remains! That is, we will never find out whether the first generation of students of the School of Electrical Engineering “Nikola Tesla” was the last class of attendants of the Center for the Training of Signal Corps of the JNA, or it was about the forty enthusiasts and dreamers who enrolled, during the 1948/1949 school year, in the first Radiotechnikum in our country, which was newly established by the Statute of the Government of the FNRJ dated on September 28, 1948. It is not insignificant for this story to know what happened only five years after the death of the greatest scientist of Serbian origin, after which this Institution bears its name!

Nevertheless, it was the school for the 21^st century, even though many people did not know that, because the School of Electrical Engineering “Nikola Tesla” has been all this time our, Serbian (and Yugoslavian), response to the challenges of the new time and new technologies, which were unknown and inconceivable for that time.

The first generation of radio-technicians was able to satisfy completely the requirements of the state of that size and development, so the second generation consisted of students who dedicated themselves to the fields of telephony and telegraphy, as well as to the field of energetics (some modest songs at that time were sang about the electrification and getting out of the darkness).

This really had to be mentioned, since there are still many of those who associate the “Nikola Tesla” School with the old edifice in the Kraljice Natalije Street in Belgrade. It is correct, but not quite. The school has been located there for (just) half a century. But, let’s name one thing after the other.

In the location where the small St. Nathalie Church used to be, in the former Kraljice Natalije Street, at the very end of the not-paved-with-cobblestone Kosovke devojke Street, which toppled down from the Royal Court and the Kralja Milana Street, the cornerstone was laid for a new building, which was to be built according to the project by the architect Milica Krstic Colak-Antic, on October 19, 1932.

Today, after seventy-four years, despite the fact that the edifice is dilapidated under the burden of time, negligence and poverty, it brings about awe. Through this structure, which was built in the vaulted Serbian-Byzantine style, sixty-three generations of high school students have passed, which left the deep trace in the scientific, economic and cultural life of Serbia (and, frankly speaking, of Yugoslavia as well): we consider here the students of the former Second Female High School, the latter Fourth Belgrade High School and, especially, the students of the School of Electric Engineering “Nikola Tesla”, who moved into it exactly half a century ago, in 1956.

The first high school building which was erected in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia after the World War I was exactly this structure: the building operations started in May 1933 and ended in the following six months only, which would be a task to admire even today.

In less than six decades of its existence, it was the single school to genuinely follow the challenges of the times: instead of radio-technicians who maintained the equipment obtained from the allied troops, today the engineers of energetics, process management, electronics, telecommunications, multimedia and computer networks are “produced” here. All in all, 64 different but related vocations.

The knowledge of 1.825 students is taken care of by 139 teachers, through thirteen professional boards (departments), in thirty-two classrooms and the same number of studies and laboratories. They follow new technical achievements, according to director Branka Kamban, still their laboratories cry out for at least, slightly more up-to-date equipment.

Although the graduates of this school can momentarily be included into the working processes, most of them decide to continue their schooling, which mostly means that they continue their education in the fields of electrical engineering, mechanical engineering, business administration and management or economics... Although, one of the “Tesla’s” former students is presently assistant lecturer at the Faculty of Philosophy! Unfortunately, all efforts which were directed toward achieving the status of the Technical High School were without success, even though it would be certainly an appropriate one.

As far as the vocational skill is in question, it suffices to say that the School is really worthy of the name.