Published : 2023-12-30

A Group Portrait of Female Graduates of the Anna Sapieha Jablonowska State Girls’ Middle School in Bialystok (1922–1939)

Abstract

The article characterises female students of the Anna Sapieha Jablonowska State Girls' Middle School in Bialystok who took their school-leaving exams. The data of 370 women who passed the exams and obtained their certificates were quantitatively examined. The collective profile of women who graduated from the middle school in the interwar period is presented using the example of the only state girls’ middle school in Białystok. The age of female graduates was analysed, indicating that they were very diverse (from 17 to 23 years old). The age range of six years resulted from different educational experiences in particular countries and disruption in the educational process caused by the war. However, the age range decreased in the 1930s, undoubtedly facilitating educational and pedagogical process. The age of female graduates dropped from 20.37 in 1925 to 18.28 in 1939. The reduction of the arithmetic mean by two years should be assessed as a very positive phenomenon as it allowed better use of the potential and activity of young female graduates. The social mobility of families sending their children to secondary schools is also described. The article shows how a school teaching only Catholic pupils in the 1920s was transformed into an educational institution reflecting the complex religious composition of the city’s population. In the last school year before World War II, most of the graduates were of Mosaic faith. This was the effect of the activities of the school principal in the years 1928-1937, Justyna Dobek, who created a religiously diverse institution, shaping the female intellectual elite of that time. During the entire interwar period, 394 girls graduated from the school. Having completed their studies at such an elite school, a considerable number of female graduates could continue their education.

Keywords:

education in the Second Republic of Poland, school-leaving certificates, girls’ middle schools, education of women, quantitative research, Białystok, women’s emancipation



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Łopatecki, K., & Piłaszewicz-Łopatecka , M. (2023). A Group Portrait of Female Graduates of the Anna Sapieha Jablonowska State Girls’ Middle School in Bialystok (1922–1939). Biografistyka Pedagogiczna, 8(2), 251–284. https://doi.org/10.36578/BP.2023.08.31

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"Biografistyka Pedagogiczna" received funding for the years 2022-2024 from the funds of the Minister of Education and Science under the programme „Rozwój Czasopism Naukowych”.

Project duration: 2023-2024.

The amount of co-financing is 65 992,00 PLN

Contract number: RCN/SP/0434/2021/1