Education in Poland

Abstract

After World War II, the Polish educational system was based on the following principles: (1) free education at all levels of schooling; (2) compulsory attendance at a seven-year (from 1961 this became an eight-year) primary school until the age of 17; (3) a uniform school system permitting the transition from lower to higher levels, with identical programs for particular types of schools; (4) secularization of education; and (5) state aid in the form of scholarships and dormitories for students attending secondary and higher schools. The effort undertaken to develop the educational system in the postwar years produced effects relatively quickly: * Illiteracy was liquidated at the beginning of the 1 960s. This was a demanding task, for before World War II about 20 percent of the total population over the age of 10 was illiterate. * The idea of universal primary education was put into practice. * The system of secondary, vocational, grammar-school, and higher and university education was expanded. * The educational system covered schooling for adults, special schools for physically or mentally handicapped or socially maladjusted children, and preschool education. As a result of free education and material help for pupils and students from large or lower-income families, access to learning became relatively common and upward social mobility was possible for a considerable number of young people from working-class or