I inquired regarding the changes which the Soviet Government had made
in the organization of this school. Some of the girls who were there
have been kept, but vacant places have been filled by Madame Lelina's
committee, and the institution has been required to take boys into the
day school, a plan which is carried out in most of the soviet social
and educational work. Much more freedom has been introduced in the
management of the institution, and the girls at table talk and walk
about, much as though they were in their own homes. The Soviet
Government requires that certain girls be permitted membership in the
teachers' committee, and the two communists accompanying me pointed to
this as a great accomplishment. Privately, the teachers informed me
they regarded it as of little significance, and apparently they were
entirely out of sympathy with the innovations that the new government
has made. Now all the girls are required to work in the kitchen,
dining room, or m cleaning their own dormitories, and certain girls
are assigned to the kitchen to over-see the use of supplies by the
cooks. However, the whole institution, from the uniforms of the girls
to the required form in which even hand towels have to be hung,
indicates the iron will of the directress. In one class we visited the
girls sat at desks and listened to a traditional pedagogue pour out
quantities of information on Pushkin's Boris Gudonov.
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