2002 Volume 69 Issue 4 Pages 494-505
The present paper aims to trace the changes of the concept of 'free, state-run Early Childhood Care Russia in the 1920s, and to consider the main factors of forming the ECCE system in modern society.The abouve concept was proposed by the head of ECCE administarators at the end of the 1910's.My main sources are the minutes of the Second and Third All-Russian Congresses on ECCE held in 1921 and 1924, the Third all-Russian Conference on ECCE held 1926, and unpublished materials in the archives of Moscow and Kirov.As a result, the following respects were clarified.1)The above concept dissolved tothe point where it consisted of a comparatively small network of mainly fee-charging public and private ECCE institutions by 1926.2)The enrollement rate in oermanent ECCE institutions 4.2% in te autumn of 1920on the maximum, so it seemed for ECCE administrators that the concept pf ECCE for all infants was approached achievement.However, the enrollment rate then dropped sharply to about 1% under the influence of the reduction in the ECCE budget by which the New Economic Policy(NEP) caought in the spring of 1921.The concept of ECCE for all infants clearly collapsed.3)The same conditions of NEP reversed the concept of free ECCE and all ECCE instituteions regardless of private, public, and the national began to charge tuition fees in 1925.4)The discussion of the concept of a state-run ECCE system was prolonged.The issue became how for to allow the expansion of the right to open private ECCE institutions.Let us enumerate the following people and organizations to be granted this right : (a)Soviets, the Communist Union of Youth, the Communist Children's Organization, labor union, cooperative associations of various kinds, factory committees, agricultural committees-(b)enterprises, factories, agricultural communes-(c)groups of people, residents and parents-(d)individuals.In 1926, after all, the above right was extended to all groups of people, not jest to individuals.5)After the trial and error more than half a century later, the concept of ECCE based on the principles of the modern public education had been achieved to some eztent in the 1970's and the 1980's.
