Education

Motivation

• Modern technical skills could be taught

• Allowed spread of propaganda & ideology

• Helped fight against religion & superstition

Communists saw education as a right of the masses and would help reinforce equality

Techniques to Combat Illiteracy

• Red Army

  • Classes required in military training

• Liquidation Points

  • 10,000s created across USSR

  • 1920-26 5 million had taken courses

• Rabfaki

  • Remedial schools for uneducated industrial workers

  • Held in factories & attended by mils

• Literacy League

  • Promoted literacy with magazine “Down with Literacy”

• Zhenotel classes held to help women

  • 5x more illiterate (14/17million)

Impact of Literacy Campaign

1939

• Urban = 95%

• Rural = 86%

1959

• Urban = 99%

• Rural = 98%

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