No, it's a different issue. I did my BSc in Poland, then MSc in Germany and now finishing PhD in Switzerland. There is a huge difference in the quality of teaching caused by decades of bad practices, lack of respect towards students, conservative mindset of faculty that prevents modernization effort, and lack of motivation caused by high teaching load and poor compensation. On top of that, you get the negative selection in Polish academia that results in filling positions with mediocre and passive researchers.

Our students are not less independent or less inteligent than Germans and Swiss. It's our faculty and teaching staff that is often neither able nor willing to implement good teaching practices.

Can't speak for Poland but further east this extends to basic education too. The primary mode of education is memorization, teachers routinely insult pupils, and there is just a startling lack of understanding of how to enable a person to learn. They would much rather blame the student than look at their own methods.

I have often wondered what causes this huge difference in efficacy of teaching between eastern and western Europe. Past influence from the Soviets? Wealth difference? Other cultural influences?

But didn't USSR also produce some of the best minds in arts, science and technologies?

The best minds produce themselves, really.