Přijímací řízení na středních odborných školách v období socialistického Československa

The topic of this study is the issue of secondary vocational schools in socialist Czechoslovakia. The specific aim of this paper is to capture and interpret the course of the admission procedure and its transformation at this type of school during the 41-year rule of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia (1948–1989). The research is based on a historiographic approach to the history of everyday life. One of the research methods Studia paedagogica roč. 25, č. 3, 2020 www.studiapaedagogica.cz https://doi.org/10.5817/SP2020-3-3 70 MICHAL ŠIMÁNĚ, LENKA KAMANOVÁ used is an oral history based on interviews with witnesses: teachers who worked at secondary vocational schools during the socialist regime. Our research is further complemented by the study of period legislation and periodicals, such as Odborná škola and Nová škola, and archival sources obtained from the National Archive in Prague. The results of the study provide a previously unrevealed picture of the course and transformation of the admission procedure at secondary vocational schools in socialist Czechoslovakia. They show the ideological interventions of the Communist regime into the form of the admission procedure, for instance through the so-called comprehensive evaluation report of applicants and also through some members of the admission committee. The study pays particular attention to the role of the chairman of the admission committee, which in many cases was held by the headteacher of a secondary vocational school.