Young cadets play snowballs in front of the Kronstadt Naval Cadet Corps. The Corps admits boys from 11 years of age. It dispenses normal secondary education in addition to the basics of naval science under a naval discipline and order. For many families, especially from the disadvantaged areas, sending their sons to the Corps solves many social issues as the Navy takes full charge of the boys while protecting them from the temptations of the street. After graduation, the cadets must enlist in a naval school and then serve a certain term in the Navy as officers.
KRONSTADT - DREAMING OF THE PAST

Kronstadt – a Russian town with a German name – was founded in 1704 by the westernising Russian tsar Peter I on an island in the Gulf of Finland off shore St. Petersburg. It was designed by Peter and his engineers as a naval fortress to defend the maritime approach to St. Petersburg and has served as such for most of its history. Many important expeditions have set sail from Kronstadt, including the first Russian circumnavigation of the globe and the discovery of Antarctica in early 19th century. During WWII, it fiercely resisted the besieging Nazis and never surrendered. Today, when its days of glory are past, Kronstadt gives an impression of being asleep and dreaming of something more than the fate of a sleepy suburban town which it became. It dreams of seafaring, heroic feats, sea battles and bravery – everything it is associated with for most Russians. But decay, both economic and moral, is what reigns here these days: the Navy only keeps a few rusting school ships here, one of the biggest and oldest employers – the Kronstadt Dockyards – has shut. And as it is often the case in Russia, the town looks backward, not forward, trying to revive what cannot any longer be revived, and that makes it rather difficult for Kronstadt just as for the entire country to define a new identity and a future. -- 2008