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Documents - Youth and Education in East Germany
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1.   Joint Appeal by the KPD and the SPD for Democratic School Reform (October 18, 1945)
In the Soviet occupation zone, the SPD [Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands] and the KPD [Kommunistische Partei Deutschlands] came out in favor of a thorough reconstruction of the....
2.   Founding Resolution of the Free German Youth [Freie Deutsche Jugend] (February 26, 1946)
On February 26, 1946, some members of the Central Youth Committee for the Soviet occupation zone of Germany expressed their desire to found the Free German Youth [Freie Deutsche Jugend or....
3.   Guidelines for School Policy for the German Democratic School (August 24, 1949)
The SED’s guidelines on school policy from August 24, 1949, made clear that schools in the future GDR were to play an important role in the creation of Socialist society, and that they had to adhere....
4.   The Immediate Tasks of Universities and Institutions of Higher Education: Resolution by the Central Committee of the Socialist Unity Party (February 1951)
At the beginning of the 1950s, East German higher education policy was shaped, on the one hand, by an urgent need for scientific-technical experts to advance the goals of the Five-Year Plan, and,....
5.   Two Pledges for the Jugendweihe (1955/1958)
In the 1950s, the state and the Protestant Church in the GDR struggled over the issue of influence on East German youth. The SED regime used coercive measures to restrict the church’s youth work....
6.   Political Guidelines for Party Organizations on Preparing and Implementing the Jugendweihe (1957)
After the Jugendweihe was introduced as a secular alternative to confirmation in the....
7.   Report by the Office of the Presidium of the GDR Government on University and College Admissions for the 1957/58 Academic Year (December 21, 1957)
In the 1950s, the GDR government, not least for economic reasons, sought to expand the university system, especially in the fields of science and technology. Nonetheless, the number of applicants....
8.   Law on the Socialist Development of the School System in the German Democratic Republic (December 2, 1959)
The reform of the GDR school system on the basis of Socialist principles reached a temporary conclusion in 1959. Henceforth, the ten-grade schools introduced at the beginning of the 1950s represented....
9.   Statute of the Free German Youth (May 12-15, 1959)
Whereas the Free German Youth [Freie Deutsche Jugend or FDJ], the central mass organization for youth in the GDR, at least formally embraced independence and non-partisanship in its early....
10.   Submission to the Secretariat of the Central Council of the Free German Youth: Gang Activity among Young People in Berlin (December 4, 1959)
At the end of 1959, the Central Council of the Free German Youth [Freie Deutsche Jugend or FDJ], the central youth organization in East Germany, spoke out against the increasing “rowdyism”....
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