Jan Evangelista Purkyně’s Reform Proposals for the Establishment of Schools With Natural Science Orientation

In the history of the Czech cultural life Purkyně represents a research scholar whose significance extends far beyond the narrow field of domestic life. He enriched it with the perspectives of European- -orientated science in the spirit of neo- -humanistic education. He rendered a direct service to the Czech medical science as the founder of its domestic organization on the basis of experimental discoveries of modern physiology. He transferred this principle also to the science education reforms in his cyclical system of the new uniform types of “real gymnasiums” (i. e. secondary schools with a balanced science and arts orientation). This man of genius arrived at a synthetic plan of school education including its initial stage, ranging from pre-school establishments and elementary schools to secondary education as the basis for establishing the National Academy of University with a whole range of natural science institutes and institutes of literature and philosophy. The establishment of the academic state in connection with the Czech National Museum meant not only the education of gifted scholars, but also a living school for the broad masses of the young Czech bourgeoisie, because it disseminated the popularization of sciences, especially the natural sciences and those connected with the fine arts. Purkyně got over his youngish inspirations of “nature-philosophy” by absorbing them in his creative scholarly discoveries. In this sense, unlike Amerling’s “Teacher’s Budeč”, he was able to extend his efforts for the national revival to a large social group including doctors and the intelligentsia in the Arts Club (Umělecká beseda). Politically, he was able to promote these ideas as Member of Parliament for the districts of Slaný and Liberec, and last but not least, in the conception of modern national education and people’s education. Czech pedagogues are making a contribution to the research into Purkyně’s work by including his reform proposals in the context of the development of pedagogical ideas in the 19th century.