Polityka oświatowa władz
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Date
2012
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Poznańskie Towarzystwo Przyjaciół Nauk we współpracy z Zakładem Historii Wychowania, WSE UAM
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The Educational Policy of the Authorities in the Process of the Introduction
Abstract
The problems discussed in the article concern the educational policy in Poland in the first years after
World War II (1944-1948). The article presents the educational concepts and postulates of different
political fractions and teachers’ circles, which already before the end of the War had formulated their
own educational programmes. The discussions about the shape of the post-war educational system,
particularly the organization of schools, the school structure, the ideological foundations, the
syllabus, school handbooks and teachers’ training, were carried out, among others, between the
representatives of the National Democrats, Christian-national groups, political parties, teachers’
organizations and school administration. Their attitudes to many problems varied considerably, and
thus, the situation required social debate and confrontation of opinions. The quality of those
discussions, the style in which the educational problems were solved as well as the direction of the
structural and ideological transformations in the post-war educational system, were significantly
influenced by the geopolitical post-war conditions and a strong position of the Left, consolidated by
the Soviets, in the policy of the Polish state. In the expansive struggle for the political leadership in
Poland, the Left used different forms of pressure and terror in order to eliminate the opposition. To
achieve social legitimization for its pseudo-democratic activities, the Left undertook attempts to
encourage other groups to co-operate. Particularly, the communists tried to attract cultural elites,
including teachers, who they wanted to use to start the process of rebuilding social consciousness
according to the rules of the ideology of Marxism and Leninism. These monopolistic ambitions, in
the first years after World War II, were reflected in the destruction of the underground state and the
development of administrative structures of the totalitarian system. As far as the educational system
is concerned, the policy of the Left was manifested in more and more apparent actions taken to
subordinate school to the communists’ interests, thus including education into the process of the
transformation of the political system. All those activities, were part of the phenomenon of structural
Sovietization, formed the foundations for the ideological offensive, planned by the communists and
conducted on a massive scale after the formation, in 1948, of the monopolistic Stalinian party -
PZPR (Polish United Workers’ Party).
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Educational Policy, Poland 1944–1948
Citation
Biuletyn Historii Wychowania, 2011, nr 27, s. 33-50.