Educational policy is a complex social phenomenon which both determines and is determined by political, socio-cultural, economic or demographic conditions. It is treated as deliberate activities of state and local authorities strictly related to educational practice. Therefore, each educational policy should be a planned activity which is based on a broader programme and which takes into account developmental strategies not only of education but also of the region or state. The period following the system transformation in Poland has involved numerous activities which – from teachers' perspective – have been treated as unexpected or even threatening their professional situation or the whole education. however, J. Rutkowiak emphasizes that relations between politics and pedagogy result from social engagement of both educationalists and teachers in politics and, thus, it is indispensable to treat politics as a dimension of their daily functioning at work [1]. The following questions are raised: what are actual teachers' expectations from politicians and the educational policy? how do teachers assess the educational policy and situate it in their professional daily routine? Referring to Rutkowiak, is this policy a significant dimension of their daily functioning at work or a factor of unpredictable results which may appear at any time – the expected unexpected as the title suggests? what is presented in this study are some analyses of the data collected in the studies on educational policy and politicians, conducted among teachers in 2000–2014.

The present study is the first attempt at examining the perception and evaluation of 10 internationally known political and religious leaders’ English pronunciation. 40 Polish students’ assessed their speech samples in terms of the degree of foreign accentedness, comprehensibility and acceptability. We examine whether the following factors affect the assessors’ judgements: their personal attitude to the speakers, the students’ level of English proficiency and the genetic proximity between between the speakers’ and the listeners’ L1s combined with the raters’ familiarity with foreign accents of English. It is demonstrated that the listeners’ attitude to the speakers has no impact on the ratings of the samples’ comprehensibility and accentedness, but plays an important role in their evaluations of acceptability. The participants’ level of English proficiency is crucial for their assessment of comprehensibility, but not accentedness and acceptability. Finally, the genetic proximity between the involved languages and the listeners’ familiarity with varieties of foreign-accented English are shown to be relevant for all the presented accent jugdements.

In this close reading of the poem ‘Z La Manczy’ ( From La Mancha) by Jan Lechoń, written and published in exile in 1953, its historical and political contexts are examined in the light of the poet’s diaries. Lechoń, it seems, thought much of Charles de Gaulle and gave him, cast as a latter-day Quixote on horseback, a prominent place in the poem. This article explains and analyses the role of each of the historical and fictional characters (Don Quixote and Sancho Pansa, Joan d’Arc, the French kings and Napoleon) in the mythical structure of the poem and, last not least, addresses the issue of representing historical processes, politics and politicians in poetry.