Fifty Years of Vocational Schools in Czechoslovakia

1. Vocational training of young people in the 1918—1945 period predominantly took the form of practical training for a trade; apprentices attended school only 8 hours a week on an average. After the liberation in 1945 school attendance was extended. Practical instruction and theoretical instruction were being gradually unified in a single organizational whole — the working youth centre, which also included training in apprentice homes. This development was broken up in 1951: state labour reserve training centres were set up covering about 40 per cent of apprentices, who were very well provided for, especially from the material point of view. The remaining 60 per cent of apprentices, who learned their trade directly in factories were given much less care. Following the criticism of this state, the forms and programmes of apprentice training were given a uniform pattern in 1958. Several changes have since taken place in the proportion between theoretical instruction and practical training. Apprentices learning the trades requiring a three-year training now spend at school, in the first two years of training, nearly a half of their working hours, while in the third year it is one day a week. Compared with many other countries, this proportion of theoretical instruction is considerably high. No fundamental changes in the system of training apprentices can be expected within the next eight or ten years. Theoretical foundations are now being prepared for a further stage of development, and these are going to be experimentally tested. 2. Technical Schools spread considerably in the Czech lands after 1918; in Slovakia they had to be built from the start. Four-year technical schools represented the main type. The quantitative growth of these schools has been extremely high since 1945. The number of pupils being very great, school buildings have been packed beyond their capacity, in spite of an extensive construction programme. Requirements of the entrance examinations have had to be lowered. Therefore, it has been impossible to maintain the high pre-war level of these schools. Curricula have changed: fields of study have been changed, some new subjects have been added (e. g. physical training, which did not exist as a subject at these schools before the war), the content of technical subjects has changed as a result of changes in technology and especially economics. Besides, new types of schools have been set up, such as health service schools. In the years 1952—1955 part time study of employed persons was introduced, which lasts one year longer than full-time study. As regards perspectives, approximately the same can be said as what has been said in part one, but there is a difference: the present transition to a five-day week at school involves considerably greater problems in this area. 3. The theories underlying the two areas dealt with in this article are developing very slowly, which is connected with the inadequacy of the institutional basis.