The System of Public Education in Elisabethpol Governorate in the Period 1868-1917. Part 1

This work investigates the system of public education in Elisabethpol Governorate in the period 1868-1917. The present part of the work examines the timeframe from 1868, i.e. the year the governorate was established, to 1884.A key source used in putting this work together is reports from the Trustee of the Caucasus Educational District for the period 1884-1914. The authors researched the reports for statistical data on the following: the types of the region’s educational institutions, the number of schools in the region, its library holdings, and its student body (information related to student demographics, including ethnicity, religion, social estate, and gender). The use of the statistical method helped identify some of the key distinctive characteristics of the development of public education system in Elisabethpol Governorate in the period 1868-1884.The authors’ conclusion is that by 1884, the system of public education in Elisabethpol Governorate was still in its incipience. Given the region’s idiosyncrasies, girls had access to primary education only. The total number of educational institutions in the region was 39, with 2 of these being secondary, 4 - lower, and 33 - primary schools. The region had just two primary schools for girls. Its two other primary educational institutions were mixed schools. The rest of the region’s educational institutions were for boys only. The total number of students in the region at the time was 2,789 - 2,492 boys and 297 girls. Over 57% of the student body was made up of Armenians (1,606 students), followed by Tatars - 23 %, Europeans - 13.8 %, and ethnic Russians - less than 5 %.