year secondary education, called for the
establishment of a wide network of vocational, trade, and pedagogical
schools to prepare personnel, technicians, and skilled workers for the
various social, cultural, and economic fields. Another education law
adopted in 1948 provided for the further expansion of vocational and
professional courses to train skilled and semiskilled workers and to
increase the theoretical and professional knowledge of the technicians.

A further step was taken in 1950 to expand technical education.
Secondary technical schools were established along Soviet lines by the
various economic ministries. In 1951 three higher institutes of learning
were founded: the Higher Pedagogic Institute, the Higher Polytechnical
Institute, and the Higher Agricultural Institute, all patterned along
Soviet models. The Council of Ministers said that their purpose in
founding these institutes was to create conditions for further
development "according to the example of science, culture, and technique
of the Soviet Union."

In the 1949-54 period the school system was given a thorough Soviet
orientation both ideologically and structurally. Most textbooks,
especially those dealing with scientific and technical matters, were
Soviet translations. Soviet educators were attached to the major
branches of the Ministry of Education. The Russian language was made
compulsory as of the seventh grade, and Soviet methodology was applied.
Large numbers of students and teachers were sent to Soviet pedagogical
schools for study and training.

Courses for teacher preparation were established in which the Russian
language, Soviet methods of pedagogy and psychology, and
Marxist-Leninist dialectics were taught by Soviet instructors. A law
adopted in 1954 reorganized the Ministry of Education, renamed it the
Ministry of Education and Culture, and, among other things, provided for
the dissemination of Communist principles "supported by the school
experience of the Soviet Union." In 1957, when the State University of
Tirana was opened, a team of Soviet educators laid its structural,
curricular, and ideological foundations.

Parallel with the Sovietization of the school system in the 1950s, the
government made a concerted effort to implement the idea that education
must be directly connected with daily living. A large number of
white-collar and blue-collar workers were registered in evening and
correspondence courses in the various trade and p