secondary education

• Took a new direction

  1920's
• NEP


  Education was funded locally rather than by the Commissariat for Education
• Central government had difficulty controlling the curriculum
• Rather than follow the educational programme of polytechnic schools that had been outlined in 1918, local soviets took over existing schools by the Tsarist regime
• Schools tended to be dominated by children of the wealthy
• School attendance


  • 97% of students paid fees
  • Around 90% of middle-class students started secondary school
  • Only 3% of middle-class students actually finished secondary school
• Vast majority of teachers in the former Tsarist schools were trained before the revolution, therefore they continued to teach in the traditional way
• Their approach to subjects like history remained traditional
• Government wanted teachers to teach the history of class struggle and of the working class
• Teachers ignored this and continued to teach the achievements of the Tsar