The “Mihai Eminescu” Theoretical High School in Ungheni — one of the largest schools in the country’s Centru region — is among the 20 institutions Moldova intends to modernize with European money. The plan was confirmed on Thursday, 19 June, after a meeting between the Minister of Education and Research, Dan Perciun, and a delegation of the European Investment Bank (EIB) led by Vice-President Karl Nehammer, in the context of signing the financing contract. Of the entire Ungheni district, “Eminescu” is the only school on the list.
The project is called “Rehabilitation and modernization of Moldova’s schools” and covers the renovation and equipping of 20 institutions from the so-called “model-school network”. The ministry put the total value at €51.5 million. The bulk — €40 million — is a loan from the EIB, that is, money the state will repay; added to it are a €3.5 million grant through the Neighbourhood Investment Platform and an €8 million contribution from Moldova through the Reform and Growth Facility. When the government approved the project, on 11 June, the package stood at €50 million.
How much will actually reach Ungheni
This is the first unknown. Neither the government’s statement nor the ministry’s says how much of the €51.5 million goes to each school. A simple division — €51.5 million across 20 institutions — gives an average of around €2.5 million per school, but that is only arithmetic, not the sum allocated to Ungheni’s “Eminescu”. The per-institution breakdown has not been made public.
What is known is the nature of the works. According to the government statement, the 20 schools are to have their buildings and learning spaces renovated, classrooms fitted with ergonomic furniture and digital technology, and physics, chemistry, biology and computer-science laboratories modernized. Libraries are to become resource centres with access to digital content, and the schools are to get internet connectivity, recreation areas, green spaces and conditions for the inclusion of pupils with special educational needs.
The district’s flagship — already refurbished once
The “Mihai Eminescu” high school was not chosen at random. It is one of the largest educational institutions in the Centru region, with around 1,300 pupils who travel in from more than 35 localities and about 100 staff; it is run by its head, Petru Langa. Within the ministry’s “model-school” network, it is the Ungheni district’s showcase.
Except that “Eminescu” has already been through a renovation in recent years. Between 2021 and 2024 the building was given an energy retrofit with European funds — an investment of almost €3 million (around 60 million lei): thermal insulation, new windows and roof, efficient lighting, heat-recovery ventilation and photovoltaic panels. The results reported at the time spoke of thermal-energy use cut by half. In other words, the building’s envelope is already done. That means the new European money most likely targets what is left inside — laboratories, furniture, digitalization, the library, inclusion. Exactly what, and on what timetable, neither the ministry nor the Ungheni Education Department has yet said.
Money for walls, fewer people at the blackboard
The investment lands against a backdrop that cannot be ignored. The Ungheni district enters the 2026–2027 school year with 73 teaching vacancies — the fifth-largest teacher shortage in the country. In mid-April there were 88. Three of the unfilled posts are at the very “Mihai Eminescu” high school that is to be modernized.
Behind the figures lies a deeper trend: the district has ever fewer pupils and ever fewer teachers — 11,061 pupils and 876 teaching staff in primary and general secondary education, both falling year on year, according to the National Bureau of Statistics. Modernizing a single flagship school, with laboratories and screens, thus runs in parallel with a problem that money for buildings does not solve: who stands at the blackboard in front of the pupils.
The “model-school” programme is part of a broader reform of the school network that concentrates resources in a few strong institutions while small village schools thin out. For Ungheni, that means, for now, a single school on the list of major investments — and questions whose answers are not yet public.
The list of 20 schools and the name of the “Mihai Eminescu” Theoretical High School in Ungheni come from the statement of the Government of the Republic of Moldova of 11 June 2026; the financial breakdown of the package (€40 million EIB loan, €3.5 million grant, €8 million state contribution) — from the Ministry of Education’s statement of 19 June. The average of about €2.5 million per school is our own calculation (€51.5 million divided by 20), not an official figure; the allocation for “Eminescu” and the works schedule were not public at the time of writing. Figures on the number of pupils and teaching staff come from the National Bureau of Statistics, and those on vacancies from the Ministry of Education, drawn from earlier Triunghi.md material. Details of the 2021–2024 energy retrofit come from the public communications of the programme that funded it.