Paulinum marks 100 years of education in Schwaz

The Paulinum secondary school in Schwaz is marking 100 years since its founding in 1926. The school has educated thousands of young people from across Tirol and beyond, ORF reports.

The Bishop’s Gymnasium Paulinum says it aims to combine tradition with innovation. Director Elmar Fiechter-Alber said its role was to support young people in building happy and meaningful lives and taking responsibility for their communities and the wider world.

The school began in a former riflemen’s barracks. Anton Weigl, now 93, was among its early pupils. He started there in 1943, when the school was no longer a Catholic private institution: after the 1938 Anschluss, the Nazis had taken it from the Church, dismissed its teaching staff and established a state secondary school for boys.

Weigl recalled a strict regime in which a pupil’s misconduct could lead to the whole class being punished with physical exercises. After US forces liberated Tirol in spring 1945, the school took on a religious character again. Reinhold Stecher, who later became bishop of Innsbruck, worked there briefly as an educator. Weigl remembered a first Advent concert in December 1945 as a striking change that made pupils feel almost at home.

After the war, the school resumed the name Paulinum. Its boarding school gave boys from rural Tirol and other regions, including Vorarlberg, access to a humanistic education. Latin and Ancient Greek remained part of its focus.

Another milestone came in 1988, when girls were admitted as pupils for the first time. The school’s history is also documented in a timeline and class photographs displayed in its building, spanning generations of students.