Secondary school from 1945 to 1953: the main trends of development (on materials of Magnitogorsk)

Author(s):  N.N. Makarova, candidate of Sciences, Nosov Magnitogorsk State Technical University, Magnitogorsk, Russia, makarovanadia@mail.ru

E.L. Kozhuhova, Nosov Magnitogorsk State Technical University, Magnitogorsk, Russia

Issue:  Volume 46, № 2

Rubric:  Topical issues of russian history

Annotation:  The problem of studying the Soviet school in the conditions of modernization processes in the education system is relevant. Particular importance should be paid to the problem of personnel in the secondary school system. The Soviet school in the late 1940s-early 1950s was still a model of the «Stalin school», but in these years the search for new forms and ways of solving problems in the education system were began. At the turn of decades the foundations of the subsequent transformations of the theoretical and organizational aspects of the school system were laid. In the conditions of post-war devastation the problems of the school became much more acute and required an early solution. One of the most difficult problems was related to staff. In this article the author on the basis of a complex of various historical sources, mainly previously unpublished, in line with an integrated approach and the method of «thick description» analyzes the situation in the secondary school of the city of Magnitogorsk, focusing on the pedagogical community as a special social group with a set of special corporate values. The author comes to the conclusion that the period of 1940 – 1950-ies was a transitional stage in the development of the Soviet school from the classical norms of the era of Stalinism to the search for new optimal forms of organization of school life. During this period the teachers of the city represented a unique social education, which was characterized by uniformity of values, norms and practices of behavior. The official discourse emphasized the special status of the teacher and his role in the life of each person and society as a whole, while in practice teachers were often far from «standards», and the failures of the educational process were evaluated as the results of inefficient work of teachers.

Keywords:  history, USSR, education system, school, teacher, Magnitogorsk.

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