History

Our school was founded in 1882 by the name of «Eastern Vra?ar Mixed School». (It originated from the former Girls' School in Krunska Street). The word mixed was used to signify that the school was attended both by girls and by boys, which was not very widespread at the time. By that time there had been separate schools for boys or for girls. The teaching took place in two private houses, rented for that purpose, and that remained so until 1906, when the first building was built in Risticeva Street (Svetozara Markovica Street today). The second building, in the same yard, with the entrance from Kralja Milutina Street, was finished in 1930.

At that time it was customary to name schools after Serbian rulers, so in 1931 the school was christened «Elementary School», «Emperor Uros», at Eastern Vracar. The chronicles of this school tell about the extraordinary successes of its pupils and teachers, about school performances that had made an impression on the people of Belgrade, but also about special cooperation between the parents and the teachers, who by mutual effort introduced the course of the French language and brought two teachers of French from Paris. That is how the tradition of learning French was initiated, which distinguished us from other schools.

During the Second World War the teachers, in the most troublesome times, kept teaching their pupils, till the moment when the building (the one in Risticeva Street) was bombed and destroyed in 1944.

When the war ended, the school became «School No. 8», and in 1952 it changed its name again, to Elementary School «Aleksa Santic», after the famous Serbian poet from Mostar. Elementary school «National hero Slobodan Princip Seljo» was built from the ruins of the destroyed school, and so there were two schools, side by side, until 1975, when they were merged into one, by means of a new building. That's how a new school was formed, a school with over 2000 pupils, by the name Experimental Elementary School «Vladislav Ribnikar». The word experimental suggested something innovative and it referred to the intensive French language teaching from the first to the eighth grade, the project which has been continuous for thirty years.

Vladislav Ribnikar was a gifted journalist and courageous warrior, awarded by Legion of Honour of France, a descendant of a famous family who founded the major Serbian newspaper, Politika.