A kolozsvári Marianum: rekrutáció és önreprodukció (1911-1923)
Students’ Social Background in the Marianum Roman Catholic School of Kolozsvár

Summary/Abstract: This study’s aim is to fi nd a connection between students’ social status and their educational choice, as well as their origins and later carrier. The research was carried out on pupils of the Marianum Roman Catholic School in Kolozsvár who studied there between 1911 and 1923. The aspects taken into consideration were: place of birth, religion and father’s occupation. These students attended the Marianum elementary and secondary school or its upper commercial course in the above mentioned period. Their place of birth was important in order to determine Kolozsvár’s cultural and educational role in Transylvania. As far as the city’s cultural magnetism is concerned, the results show that its importance as educational centre was quite widespread. Its attendants came mostly from neighboring areas, but there were also students from far away. The older the students, the higher the rate of those who came from remote regions. I considered students’religion important in order to fi nd out about different religions’ educational tendencies. Transylvania’s educational system was characteristic due to its colorful religious map. Most churches had their own schools and also people of different religions had different educational background, therefore I tried to establish a connection between pupils’ religion and their educational choices. The most conspicuous result was the high number of Jewish students which fi ts in with the tendencies of those times observed in Hungary, namely that Jews were overrepresented in educational institutions compared to their population rate. The father’s occupation was considered relevant in order to determine which social categories aspired to an intellectual status. While in the elementary school most children came from middle class families, those who graduated from high school were mostly children of the intelligentia. Therefore one can assume there was a considerable degree of reproduction within the high social strata. As a conclusion, it can be stated that the results obtained from this study mostly fi t in with the results seen in Hungary for the same period. This leads us to believe that this educational behaviour represented a general tendency for the whole of Transylvania.

• Details
• Contents