Around ₴340 million is needed to complete the refurbishment of the grammar school in the centre of Mykolaiv

Restoration work on the historic façade of Gymnasium №2 in Mykolaiv, 2024, photo by NikVesti

A further 340.9 million hryvnias is required to complete the reconstruction of Gymnasium №2 in Mykolaiv.

The project to rebuild the school was entered into the DREAM digital system in August 2026, according to NikVesti.

The financial justification states that the total cost of the gymnasium’s reconstruction, following an audit as of December 2025, amounted to 441.3 million hryvnias. To date, work worth 100.3 million hryvnias has been completed — that is, approximately 22.75 per cent of the total estimated cost.

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The gymnasium is on the city authorities’ balance sheet. However, following Russian shelling, the Mykolaiv Regional Military Administration took charge of its restoration, as the work was funded from the state budget — specifically from the fund for dealing with the consequences of the war.

The first step was the preparation of the project documentation. In the summer of 2023, the Regional Military Administration’s Department of Capital Construction commissioned the preparation of this documentation for 1.4 million hryvnias.

Within a few months, a tender was announced for the restoration of the historic building. The contract was awarded to the company «Zhytloproombud-8», which offered to carry out the work for 145.5 million hryvnias.

The project involved more than just restoring the building itself following the Russian attacks. The contractor was required to carry out restoration work, install utility networks, landscape the grounds, fit out lightning protection, construct shelters, provide barrier-free access, landscape the grounds and carry out other work necessary for the educational institution to function properly.

However, construction work was halted in 2026. At that time, the regional military administration was unable to say when work would resume.

Renovation of Mykolaiv Gymnasium №2, photo by NikVesti

One of the problems was a lack of funding. Andrii Hreits, Director of the Department of Architecture at the Mykolaiv Regional Military Administration, explained that in order to be eligible for state funding in future, the project must be processed through the new public investment management system.

«It is impossible to say with 100 per cent certainty whether funding will be available this year or not. Now, in the third quarter, the city must include the gymnasium in the public investment projects. If the project is included in the portfolio, it will become one of the state’s priorities, and then we will again apply for funding to continue the work,» he explained.

The project has now partially passed this stage: DREAM states that the restoration of Gymnasium №2 has been included in Mykolaiv’s Unified Public Investment Project Portfolio.

The restoration of Gymnasium №2 has been included in Mykolaiv’s Unified Project Portfolio for Public Investment. Screenshot from the DREAM website

What is the Unified Project Portfolio (UPP) and why is it needed?

The Unified Project Portfolio of Public Investments is a list of projects that the state, region or local authority has selected for further funding. These may include schools, hospitals, roads, water mains and other facilities that need to be built, restored or modernised.

The UPP was introduced as part of the public investment management reform. The rationale is to first determine which projects are genuinely needed, how much they will cost and how ready they are for implementation, and only then decide where to allocate limited budgetary resources.

Public Investment Portfolios exist at various levels — national, regional and local. Therefore, the entry in DREAM regarding Gymnasium №2 currently means precisely that Mykolaiv has included its reconstruction in its public investment portfolio.

However, this does not yet mean that the city has received 340.9 million hryvnias to complete the gymnasium. Inclusion in the portfolio is a step towards funding, whilst the decision to allocate the funds themselves is taken separately.

At national level, for example, the portfolio forms the basis for the subsequent allocation of public investment during the budget preparation process. The Ministry of Finance explains that it is from the EPP that projects are selected for the allocation of state funds.

How does this relate to the EU?

Changing the approach to public investment is one of the reforms Ukraine is implementing as part of the Ukraine Facility Plan. This is a European Union programme under which Ukraine receives financial support whilst implementing reforms agreed with the EU.

One of the aims is to make it clearer where the state and local authorities plan to invest money and why they choose these particular projects. This is particularly important during the reconstruction process: there are many damaged schools, hospitals, roads and other facilities, but it is impossible to fund them all at once. Therefore, projects must undergo evaluation and selection, and those deemed a priority should be included in public investment portfolios.

You can see part of this process in the DREAM system. It contains information about the projects: exactly what is planned to be rebuilt, how much it will cost, who is responsible for the work and what stage the projects are at.

Restoration of Gymnasium №2. A bit of history

The issue of restoring Gymnasium №2 was raised even before the full-scale invasion. In March 2021, the gymnasium building was declared structurally unsafe. A petition was then launched on the city council’s website calling for the gymnasium to be kept in a usable condition, which was supported by over a thousand residents. Two days later, Vitalii Kim, head of the Mykolaiv Regional State Administration, stated that the regional authorities were ready to cooperate with the city authorities on the restoration of Gymnasium №2.

In May 2021, Oleksandr Pozdniakov, head of the capital construction department at Mykolaiv City Council, reported that two companies had responded to a commercial tender to assess the gymnasium’s structural integrity. It turned out that only part of the roof was in a state of disrepair, and there was no threat to teaching activities. The library and museum were then ‘relocated’ from that wing of the school.

Later, the mayor of Mykolaiv, Oleksandr Sienkevych, announced that they planned to carry out routine repairs at Gymnasium №2 by the end of 2021, whilst major works would be postponed for the time being.

Since the start of the full-scale war, the school has endured four enemy shellings. The first occurred in April 2022. The building was damaged by the use of cluster munitions.

Consequently, the restoration of the school was included among the four sites in the Mykolaiv region for which the government has allocated 1.2 billion hryvnias for reconstruction in 2024. Of this sum, 149.5 million hryvnias from the state budget have been allocated for the reconstruction of Gymnasium №2.

In July 2023, the Department of Urban Planning and Architecture of the Mykolaiv Regional State Administration commissioned a design, and subsequently launched a tender for the restoration of the building, which was won by the company «Zhytloproombud-8» with a bid of 145.5 million hryvnias. The contractor was due to complete the work by 31 December 2024, including the fitting out of a shelter and the restoration of the building following shelling. However, the work was not completed on time and has been postponed until 2025.