The Socialist Youth Union and the School

The Communist movement of the youth and children has more than a fifty-year-old tradition in our country. In the history of this movement there have been difficult periods, which, however, did not affect the continuity of the progressive development. Today the Socialist Youth Union and its Young Pioneers Organization follow up the best traditions of the youth and children’s movement, linking up its educational programme with the current tasks given by the development of Socialist society in the period of scientific and technological revolution and striving for a prognostic approach in determining further orientation of the movement. One of the conditions for high effectiveness in forming the character of the young generation is a co-ordination of influences exerted by all the educational institutions and factors. In this respect one of the key problems is that of finding out the optimal relationship between the school and the youth and children’s movement. The co-operation and division of work between the school and the Socialist Youth Union and its Young Pioneers Organization is an urgent task of the Communist education. In order to verify our hypothesis concerning «the optimal model of the cooperation between the school and the youth organization, we have carried out a sample research among teachers in 14 districts in Slovakia (N — 1040). The research results have confirmed our working hypothesis and have demonstrated that co-operation of the school with the Socialist Youth Union is good. As regards the tasks in the immediate future, it is desirable to solve some personnel, material and organizational problems and to improve the methodological direction of this co-operation.