Varvakeio High School
The Varvakeio High School is a public Greek junior high school and high school located in Psychiko.
History
Varvakeio was founded by Ioannis Varvakis, who donated a big part of his fortune to the state, in order to build a public, fee-less high school. The realization of Varvakis' dream came true after his death as the building was opened in 1860, initially across from the present-day Varvakios Agora. Badly damaged in the civil war, the original Panagis Kalkos-designed building was demolished in 1955 or 1956. The school moved several times before settling on its current location in Psychiko in 1983. Originally all-male, the school became co-ed in 1979. Today, the school is recognized as one of the leading Model Schools in Greece. Admission is highly competitive and determined through entrance examinations.Notable alumni
The Varvakeio High School has produced, over the years, notable alumni in varied fields. Some of them include:Arts and literature
- Freddy Germanos, actor
- Georgios Drosinis, poet
- Dimitri Mitropoulos, composer and pianist
- Alexandros Papadiamantis, novelist and poet
- Antonis Samarakis, writer
Economics and politics
- Evangelos Averoff, former President of New Democracy party and Minister
- Leonidas Kouris, former Mayor of Athens
- Theodoros Pangalos, current Member of the Hellenic Parliament
- Alexandros Papagos, former Prime Minister of Greece
- Dimitrios Papadimoulis, current Vice-President of the European Parliament
- Yagos Pesmazoglou, former economist, Member of the Hellenic Parliament and MEP
- Konstantinos Tsatsos, former diplomat and President of the Hellenic Republic
- Nikolaos Vettas, AUEB professor of Economics
Science
- Constantinos Daskalakis, MIT professor of computer science
- Constantinos Apostolou Doxiadis, architect
- Christos Papakyriakopoulos, mathematician
- Christos Papadimitriou, Columbia University professor of computer science
- Mihalis Yannakakis, Columbia University professor of computer science
Other
- Kostas Axelos, philosopher
- Saint Nectarios of Aegina