OUT-OF-SCHOOL EDUCATIONAL ACTIVITIES PERFORMED BY EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS OF CHUVASHIA IN THE SECOND HALF OF 19th – EARLY 20th CENTURY

Abstract

The history of out-of-school education in Russia in the second half of the 19th – early 20th century is part of public education aimed at educating the population on the basis of the general availability principle through a number of cultural and educational activities. In domestic historiography, the term “out-of-school education” is customarily used to designate the educational activities of public bodies and individuals which developed in the second half of the 19th – early 20th century to meet educational needs of the population. To date, present-day supplementary education is the successor of out-of-school education, which gained explosive development in post-reform period. A great contribution to the evolvement of such an educational system was made by zemstvos (county councils), municipal dumas, various organizations, churches, individuals. However, schools also contributed to the public education.
 
 On the basis of the historicism principle and analysis the article examines the problem of out-of-school educational activities performed by the educational institutions of the Chuvash region of the second half of the 19th – early 20th century through organization of various readings and lectures. Various types and subjects of readings are traced. Such forms of out-of-school education played an important role in educating and broadening the horizons of the masses and students during the period under study. Popular readings and lectures, which spread in a short time in both urban and rural environments, gave impetus for the development of the common cultural space of Chuvashia in the post-reform period. Consideration of one of the aspects of out-of-school education with the involvement of new archival documents made it possible to reveal the state of the educational and cultural level of Chuvashia of that period.