Prime Minister Edi Rama welcomed today, at the Prime Minister’s Office, the students who won National and International Olympiads in Mathematics, Biology, Chemistry, Language, Literature and other fields of knowledge.

“Have unwavering confidence in yourselves and, above all, believe with your eyes closed in the dream you see with your eyes open,” Prime Minister Rama encouraged them, as he expressed his gratitude and appreciation for the students, stressing that their success is a testament to the potential of Albania’s young people, as well as to the sustained efforts made over the years to improve the education system.

At the conclusion of the meeting, the winning students were presented with certificates and received symbolic gifts as a token of appreciation for their achievements and for representing Albania with distinction at national and international Olympiads.

***

Prime Minister Edi Rama: Thank you very much for being here!

I am very pleased that this meeting has finally been made possible. I say “finally” because the plan for this meeting had been in place since before the holidays, but it took its time to organise, and at last here you all are, so that I can say a few words to you expressing gratitude, respect and, naturally, appreciation, and then also give you not only a certificate, but a gift as well, because it would make little sense for you to leave with just a certificate in your hands. It is only right that we should also see you off with a gift which, I hope, you will like. In fact, it is very little compared with what you deserve, but with what we had available to us, we felt that we owed you at least this much.

It is certainly not a bad thing that this is happening today, just a few days after we received a piece of news that I personally was extraordinarily pleased with. There are not many occasions in the position I hold when you are given the opportunity to genuinely feel pleasure, and for a day or two to pass while you continue to savour what has given you that pleasure. This is one of those occasions.

The 2025 PISA test, which for me personally is a very sweet fruit of a very long and not at all easy process, with its ups and downs, to transform our education system, to transform the infrastructure of our schools, to transform the content of learning in schools by transforming the quality of textbooks, and to transform the situation of your teachers, who have always deserved more and still deserve more today. But in this long process, we first had to start with their psychological peace of mind: ensuring that they were in their jobs on the basis of merit, not for other reasons, and that they would not be removed from their positions for reasons unrelated to their profession or to merit, while at the same time continuously increasing the state’s contribution to teachers’ families through salary increases.

On the other hand, we had to create the conditions for teachers to continue an ongoing process of education and training, as well as to improve the quality of school leadership through a new institution we created, the School of Principals, where school leaders go to study, receive training, become certified and return to work with new knowledge, while some may not return if they are unable to obtain certification. And finally, we sought to create a more positive atmosphere in schools through other programmes as well: after-school activities, sports programmes, arts programmes, crafts and so on.

I believe this is a perfectly legitimate source of satisfaction arising from a result that is, unquestionably, above all the merit of the students. But students and you know this very well may be very good, yet if everything around them does not make their effort easier, then the results are not necessarily those they can achieve at their full potential.

In this context, of course, there are good students, there are very good students, and then there are the stars which is what you are. Stars are few, because otherwise they would not be stars. But, in truth, there are not so few of you if we count those among you who have won not only national Olympiads, but international Olympiads as well.

And to tell you how this opportunity for us all to meet came about, the truth is that it began with one student who, one fine day, became famous in Albania because of a result he achieved at a global mathematics Olympiad. I told the Minister, “We need to do something for this boy,” and the Minister said to me, “Of course, but he is not the only one. There are others who are winners at international Olympiads.” And that is unquestionably fantastic, and unquestionably an important indicator of the overall rise in the level of learning, because the level of teaching has risen as well.

You are children who come from different schools, from families with different social backgrounds, and from different parts of Albania. And I will repeat something I always say when I meet students at the medal ceremony we hold every year. I am convinced that among you, too, there are children who have problems in their families, whose parents may not be in a good social or economic situation, who do not have easy circumstances in which to remain fully focused on their everyday work, which is studying — in other words, children who have every possible excuse, and not merely excuses, but understandable excuses, if they do not want to study or if they do not achieve very good results, because they could point to their difficulties and simply give up.

And of course, among Albania’s children there are those who give up, or who settle for those excuses and do not make the effort to overcome those difficulties.

That is why, in this respect too, you are absolutely extraordinary in the power of your example. You are an example of how Albania as a whole should, in fact, think: that regardless of the difficulties, regardless of the backwardness that still objectively exists in certain areas because of our history, regardless of its small size, regardless, regardless, regardless — it must dare, it must aim to climb as high as possible and to climb as quickly as possible. And that is exactly what you are doing.

The power of your example is heroic in the true sense of the word, because being a hero does not simply mean giving your life in a war against an enemy, although that is certainly a sublime act. Being a hero means overcoming every obstacle that others, in the same circumstances, would not even dare to imagine could be overcome, let alone actually overcome. And, at the same time, it means radiating your example to others.

I know that perhaps you also have another problem: you are too good, too outstanding, to be the idols of your class. I am convinced that some of you suffer because of the voices and the things said about you out of envy, which is entirely human. But the fact that you are here shows that you simply turn a deaf ear to all of that, and it is good that you do. It is good that you continue to turn a deaf ear to it. 

The more successful you become, the louder the voices will be that try to tell you that your success is not real, that you are this or that, that the recognition you have received is undeserved, and so on and so forth.

And do not forget that we are all Albanians and, as Faik Konica used to say, “We are very good people and we forgive everything except someone else’s success.” We do not forgive the success of others, which makes success even harder to achieve under these circumstances. But you have achieved it.

And what I want to tell you today is, first of all, that for me personally you are an inspiration, because in the work I do, I need to draw inspiration from examples of people who achieve success under circumstances that are far from ideal for succeeding.

And when I think of those among you who, as I said, live with certain difficulties because of their families’ social circumstances, then for me that is an inspiration. If you can do it, then I certainly must do it too. And you are an inspiration just as those who are successful and in the spotlight are an inspiration, whether here or abroad.

You are not in the spotlight. Today, for a moment, you are benefiting from this stage, but afterwards you will continue your lives away from the spotlight.

And I want to tell you just one thing: have unwavering faith in yourselves and, above all, believe blindly in the dream that you see with your eyes open.

If, with your eyes open, you dream of reaching a summit where everyone else may tell you, “Hey…”, then do not listen to anyone who tells you, “That cannot be achieved.” Do not retreat in the face of anything that makes you feel powerless to achieve it.

Close your eyes and see only that summit you dream of with your eyes open, and follow it without the slightest hesitation.

Things will not always go well. You will have difficult moments. You will have difficult moments. You will have moments when you will not be winners, as you are today. You will have moments when a victory will slip from your hands, or when you will not be good enough against someone else who will be better than you.

You will have moments when life will test you by putting a major hardship in your path.

But it all depends on you and on your strength, so that even in the thickest fog and beneath the darkest cloud, with your eyes closed, you continue to believe that the summit you saw with your eyes open belongs to you, that only you can reach it, and that you will reach it

I can tell you this not from the height of my office, but from the height of my own experience.

Thank you very much for being here.

They have written many things for me here about how much we have done for you, but I will not tire you with all of that.

I will simply tell you that it is an honour for me to be here with you, and it is a privilege for this building to have within it people with your capacity to dream and your strength to pursue that dream.

Nurture that strength as much as you can, never give up, and never betray the dream you have, whatever that dream may be.

If someone here wants to go to the Moon, they should be absolutely convinced that they will go to the Moon. But they must also be ready, in order to reach the Moon, to face every kind of challenge that time, fate or God may place before them. Call it whatever you like.

I do not know whether you have read The Odyssey. I do not know whether you have seen the film that has come out. If not, reading it is the right choice, although it is rather long and you have many other things to read. The film is long too, but short enough to give you some inspiration in relation to what I have just said.

That fixation — “I will get there” — is everything. 

With that fixation, there is nothing that can defeat you. But the greater your fixation, the more prepared you must be to pay the price required to make it a reality.

Thank you.