The Organization of the Educational Process in Kharkov Imperial University (1835–1863)

Abstract

This paper analyzes ‘The Review of Instruction in Subjects at Kharkov Imperial University’, an official document that regulated the organization of the educational process in Kharkov Imperial University. The work provides an insight into the evolution of modifications to the titles of this historical source for the entire period it was published. It examines the document’s substantive and formal characteristics such as structure, format, and data presentation. A quantitative analysis of data from the document helped establish a list of disciplines and courses taught at the university and measure the weekly academic load of students in Kharkov Imperial University (in hours), which made it possible to also measure this load across terms and for instructors as well. The study helped establish certain distinctive characteristics of the document – more specifically, the fact that it contained recommendations regarding scholarly and scholarly-instructional study guides that instructors were to use in their work. Such recommendations were eventually replaced with a list of recommended literature for each course taught at the university. The present paper also provides dynamic data on the quantitative composition of the teaching workforce in each specific department. The authors established the scholarly-pedagogical potential of Kharkov Imperial University in the period between Nicholas’s University Statute of 1835 and Alexander’s University Statute of 1863. It was established that, in addition to their primary duties at the university, professors also gave public lectures, which had them adapting their courses to the needs and interests of the public. As a rule, giving public lectures was not a burden on instructors, as it was voluntary in nature. Among other matters, the authors researched the nonacademic component of university education – more specifically, the teaching of the “pleasing arts”. Based on this, a conclusion was drawn that the model of higher education in the Russian Empire in the 19th century was focused on the all-round development of a person.