**COMMENTS AND PROPOSALS ON THE DRAFT PLANS FOR THE REORGANIZATION OF THE PEOPLE'S COMMISSARIAT OF EDUCATION**  
[No earlier than November 26 — no later than November 29, 1920]  

1) **First and Second Deputies**  
13) a) Main focus — verification of execution; systematic supervision over executors of tasks and fulfillment of plans; chancelleries;  

2) **Theoretical and Programmatic Center** (replacing the Academic Center)  

3) **Second Deputy** — Head of the Organizational Center...  
Relocation in agreement with the heads of departments (without "only").  

4) **Collegium**; under the leadership of the People's Commissar, it carries out unification and provides direction for all work, verifies the principled correctness of it, etc.  
All departments and centers are subordinate to the collegium. The collegium annuls their decisions, provides them with guiding instructions, etc.  

5) **Three Departments**  
Department of Social Education  
Department of Main Vocational Education  
Department of Main Political Education  

6) **Departments oversee**  

7) **Each department is divided into**  
αα) Administration of Affairs  
ββ) Sub-departments for specialized subjects and objects of activity  
γγ) Sub-sections: theoretical (programmatic) and artistic.  

b) Inspectorial work (instruction is conducted by departments), etc.  
c) Supply, etc.  
(i.e., up to 15 years)  
(preschool)  
and primary schools  

§ 5  
Department of Social Education (Main Education)  
Department of Political Education (Main Political Education)  
Department of Vocational-Technical Education or Secondary Schools (i.e., from 15 years) and Higher Educational Institutions (Main Vocational Education)  

II. **Academic Center** (center of general theoretical and programmatic leadership)  

§ 6. b) Extracurricular education  
(excluding vocational-technical courses, which fall under Main Vocational Education)  
% up to 15. The program remains in force.  

10) **Theoretical or Programmatic Center** is divided into a scientific section and an artistic section.  

c)  

§ 7. Each department consists of  
a) Administration of Affairs  
b) Sub-departments for specialized purposes (e.g., school and preschool in the first department; medical, technical, agronomic in the second department, etc.)  
c) Scientific and artistic sub-sections, subordinate to the corresponding sections of the Academic Center.  

**Academic Center**:  
Marxism  
Chairman: Pokrovsky  
Deputy: Schmidt  
Litkens: Chairman of the Scientific-Pedagogical Section, Chairman of the Main Artistic Committee  
2—1 from the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions  

Sub-departments or sections of Gus (Theoretical Center)  
10 a. Chairman: Pokrovsky  
I  
Scientific-Political — Pokrovsky  
Scientific-Technical — O. Yu. Schmidt  
Scientific-Pedagogical — Krupskaya  
L. R. Menzhinskaya  
Blonsky as a member  
Kalashnikov; young; syndicalist.  

Each Main Directorate is divided into:  
§ 7  
I. = Administration of Affairs  
II. = "Methodological Departments"  
?  
Special Departments:  
medical, agronomic, etc., technical schools, pedagogical, technical  
?  
III. "Section" (1 for each Main Directorate) of the "most important committees" of the "Academic Center"...  
a) Scientific sub-section  
b) Artistic sub-section  
(preschool)  
schools  
etc.  
i.e., a) Gus — State Academic Council  
b) Gokhkom — Main Artistic Committee  

Theo  
Izo  
Kino  
Lito  
Muzo conduct current theoretical work, order textbooks and review them, develop teaching plans under the general leadership of the "Academic Center"...  

§ 12: Organizational and administrative leadership for all departments and bodies of the People's Commissariat of Education is concentrated in the hands of the Organizational Center, Deputy 2.  
The second deputy should be  
13 | a and b | a 13 c = Grinberg  
M. N. Pokrovsky:  
Gap: Second Deputy: neither a center nor a Main Directorate, but there should be  
13 Sub-department a) control over the execution and implementation of the plan; accounting of personnel; distribution of workers of the People's Commissariat of Education, in agreement with the heads of the corresponding departments.  
Sub-department b) inspectorial instruction on issues within the competence of the Organizational Center; information, statistics; c) supply department (finances, social security, material supply, housing construction, etc.)  

§ 13:  
a) relocation of personnel and responsible provincial workers (to the supply department)  
According to M. N. Pokrovsky, the competence of the heads of Administrations should be expanded  
a 1 control over execution  

Specifically:  
or at least (as a minimum) in agreement with him.  
b Tsebin  
Central Bureau of Information and Communication  
= traveling inspectors, traveling and checking instruction by (specialties) departments will remain (M. N. Pokrovsky) — but here general instruction on administrative, organizational matters is meant...  
"congresses"?  

Note to § 5*  
All orders, appointments, relations, and any kind of papers must therefore be signed by the Deputy People's Commissar.  

§ 5... (First sentence)  
discussing  
theoretical and political questions of the work of the departments of the People's Commissariat of Education and the results of this work, the main task is...  
(not "plan" and not "in the plane" of "distribution"??)  

1st disagreement:  
Almost agreement on three points (a) — Deputy People's Commissar (β) — revitalization and ordering of Gus (γ) — transformation of the organizational sector into an organizational center (δ) — abolition of Main Vocational Education "Sectors" or Main Directorates  

7 a a preschoolers?  
c? higher education — yes, training workers? no.  
(1) preschool (2) primary school (3) secondary school (Main Vocational Education) (4) extracurricular (Main Political Education) (5) higher education (1) preschool separate from school (2) primary school (8-13) (3) secondary school (13-16) (4) higher education [+ party school!] (5) extracurricular (Main Political Education) (merge with Main Vocational Education and Main Directorate)  

7. Note 1. Art is fragmented??  

2nd disagreement:  
+ mu  
Theater  
Theo  
Music  
Muzo  
Fine Arts  
Izo  
Literature  
Lito  
Artistic Sector  

10. 2 Methodological Department?  
Abolish, Section of the Academic Center? Abolish, 3rd disagreement:  
Instead of the Academic Center — Scientific-Pedagogical Council or Gus  

12. "Corresponding Center"??  

16. Theoretical development of pedagogical and educational issues.  
... scientific-pedagogical council...  
currently "Gus" — State Academic Council, inactive  
(a) scientific-pedagogical (?) artistic  

19. A special person, accountable to the Deputy People's Commissar — organizational center instead of the organizational sector.  

1 Questions of socialist culture occupied one of the leading places in the multifaceted state activity of V. I. Lenin. He paid much attention and provided practical assistance to the People's Commissariat of Education, on whose work the cause of public education largely depended. During the transition of the Soviet Republic to peaceful construction, new tasks arose before the People's Commissariat of Education, and its structure did not meet them. The question of a radical restructuring of the entire system of the commissariat arose. And this question was raised by Vladimir Ilyich. On his initiative, the Politburo of the Central Committee on November 24, 1920, created a commission to develop a plan for the reorganization of the People's Commissariat of Education, and on November 26 and 27, two draft plans for the reorganization of the People's Commissariat of Education were already presented, developed by: one — E. A. Litkens, the other — V. I. Solovyov. Having carefully studied them, as well as the comments of N. K. Krupskaya and other workers of the People's Commissariat of Education on these drafts, Lenin writes his comments and proposals (over 50); some proposals he also outlined in a letter to the People's Commissar of Education A. V. Lunacharsky on November 29, 1920, calling the drafts of Litkens and Solovyov "artificial." In Lenin's comments, the proposal on the position of Deputy People's Commissar and the concentration of administrative functions in his hands was removed, the Academic Center was defined as the center of general theoretical and programmatic leadership, the structure of its subdivisions in the form of sections of the State Academic Council and the Main Artistic Committee was outlined, then the fundamentally important definition of Main Vocational Education as the department of vocational-technical education was given. These and other moments of Vladimir Ilyich's published notes formed the basis of the new regulation on the People's Commissariat of Education, as they touched upon the very essence of the reorganization of the commissariat.  

2 M. N. Pokrovsky — a member of the party since 1905, a prominent Soviet historian, state and public figure. At this time — Deputy People's Commissar of Education.  
O. Yu. Schmidt — a member of the party since 1918, a scientist; was a member of the collegium of the People's Commissariat of Education, Deputy Chairman of Main Vocational Education.  

3 E. A. Litkens — a member of the party since 1904; in 1920 — Deputy Head of Main Political Education, from 1921 — Deputy People's Commissar of Education of the RSFSR.  

4 L. R. Menzhinskaya — a member of the party since 1904. In 1920 — Head of the Department of Unified Schools, then a member of the Scientific-Pedagogical Section of Gus of the People's Commissariat of Education.  

5 P. P. Blonsky — one of the leaders of the Academy of Social Education, then a member of the Scientific-Pedagogical Section of Gus of the People's Commissariat of Education.  

6 A. G. Kalashnikov — Head of the Department of Pedagogical Education of Main Vocational Education, then a member of the Scientific-Pedagogical Section of Gus of the People's Commissariat of Education.  

7 Z. G. Grinberg — a member of the collegium of the People's Commissariat of Education. He was elected chairman of the commission to review the structure and develop a specific plan for the reorganization of the People's Commissariat of Education.  

9*  

24479, 24480  
**NOTE TO I. V. STALIN AND PROPOSAL**  
[November 30 or December 1, 1920]  
To Stalin  
In my opinion,  
1) do not reduce shipments now: 5, not 5 (if 8 is not possible, then [illegible]).  
2) in the Caucasus, keep (and send there) not 12 infantry + 6 cavalry divisions = 18 (why so many?), but about half.  
Lenin  
[December 3, 1920]  
So, I am for 6 new divisions (transporting 5 trains per day).  
Lenin  

1 Written on the report of the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Republic S. S. Kamenev and member of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic K. H. Danishevsky to the Chairman of the Revolutionary Military Council of the Republic dated November 30, 1920. The report discussed that strengthening the Caucasus would be better achieved not by transferring new divisions there, but by increasing the number and improving the divisions already there.  
Lenin numbered the pages of the report, on page 1 he wrote: "To Stalin, see p. 4" and on page 4 he wrote the text of the note.  

2 Written on the note of I. V. Stalin on this issue dated December 3, 1920.