Teachers, Revolution, and Counter-Revolution

On November 11, 1928, the Council of Ministers granted Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk the title of “Head Teacher of the Nation Schools.” The decree regarding this was published on November 24, 1928. We celebrate November 24 as Teachers' Day. 

What were the Nation Schools, and for what purpose were they established? How did the Republic grasp the importance of the teacher in its early founding years, how did it view the teacher, and what has the counter-revolution turned the teacher, education, and society into today? Let us summarize briefly.

The Republic and the Enlightenment Revolutions are a process that enabled the transition from servitude to free individuals, to a nation, to the equality of citizens, to reaching the level of contemporary civilization, and to development and progress in every field. One of the main supporting pillars of the Republican Revolution is education. Today, we are under the heavy attack of imperialism and counter-revolution. We are the orphaned children of a half-finished revolution. Therefore, in order to bring the Enlightenment Revolutions of the Republic back to life, it is useful to look at education and the teacher through the principles of Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.  

The War of Independence was a process of congresses. Let us note the congresses before the landing in Samsun on May 19, 1919. It begins with Amasya, and the Turkey Economic Congress convened in İzmir is the final founding congress. While the war was continuing in between, and enemy armies had reached as far as Polatlı, the convening of the Maarif (Education) Congress in Ankara between July 15-21, 1921, clearly reveals the importance Gazi Mustafa Kemal Pasha placed on education and the teacher.

In the words of our professor, Prof. Dr. Bilsay Kuruç: “Wherever there is a development move, materially or spiritually, there is a need for a guide, a teacher.”

The landscape of teachers in Turkey in the early years of the Republic is as follows:

There are 38 thousand villages in Turkey. At least 50 thousand teachers are needed for these in a short time. However, there are only 17 thousand primary school teachers in the country. Half of them are in cities and towns. Existing teacher training schools graduate only 150 teachers per year. Therefore, a new form of school, a new style of education and training, and a new and inexhaustible source of students for these schools are needed. This necessity first finds itself as the Nation Schools with the suggestion of Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. Atatürk's suggestion was as follows: 

“Until we train enough teachers, let us first appoint head teachers responsible for the villages from among the existing teachers. When we were in the army, we were making smart children artillerymen. During the artillery fire, they all learned to do calculations. Let the head teachers educate these children, and they, in turn, can teach in their villages.” (1)

With this suggestion, the Nation Schools were born. As he emphasized in his 1922 parliamentary opening speech, the first goal of the education program is to give the peasant, in general, enough geographical, historical, religious, and moral knowledge to read, write, and introduce them to their homeland, nation, religion, and the world, and to teach the four operations (addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division).

The Nation Schools were established in 1928, but the basic goals were determined as early as 1924. On March 3, 1924, the Law on Unification of Education (Tevhid-i Tedrisat Kanunu) was enacted. In those years, the world of pedagogy was under the influence of the American Prof. John Dewey. Prof. Dewey came to Turkey in 1924, examined the state of the schools, and wrote a comprehensive report.  

“There is no difficulty in determining the path to be followed in the Turkish educational organization. This path is the development of Turkey as a lively, free, independent, and secular Republic, as a perfect organ among civilized nations. Schools should lead men and women to protect national sovereignty, to manage themselves economically, and to progress in terms of art; they should encourage them to be creative, to reason for themselves, to think scientifically, and to cooperate in a social manner for the common good. It is not enough for schools to teach students only certain subjects. Schools, especially in rural areas that have remained far from the active currents of social life, should constitute the center of social life. Schools should be the health center of the place where they are located. In schools, subjects related to general health and the fight against infectious diseases should not only be taught to students, but should also be taught to the entire village population by cooperating with health officers and doctors. School grounds should be large enough and equipped with various tools to be a center not only for students to receive physical education, play games, and do sports, but also for the public to have fun and do sports.

Intelligent and self-sacrificing men and women should be attracted to the teaching profession. Teacher salaries should be increased rapidly and at a very large rate. Teachers should be provided with housing within the school garden in village schools and near the schools in cities. Teachers who will teach in teacher training schools should be the most developed teachers in the country. Teachers should be sent to foreign countries to conduct systematic studies. (2)

The Nation Schools were proposed by Atatürk for the period until enough teachers could be trained; they are the father of the Village Institutes idea. Later, they transformed into Village Institutes. In addition to the Village Institutes, great breakthroughs were made in secondary education and universities. Very valuable scientists fleeing Nazi fascism in Germany came to Atatürk's Turkey. 

The Teachers' Union played important roles in explaining the revolutions and breakthroughs to the public. Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and İsmet İnönü would attend the Teachers' Union Congresses at every opportunity and give important messages. In the speech Atatürk made at the Turkey Teachers' Union Congress on August 25, 1924, he said his famous words.

“Teachers… The new generation will be your work. The Republic wants generations from you whose minds are free, whose consciences are free, and whose wisdom is free.” (3)

Atatürk, at the tea party given for him by teachers at the Samsun Independence School on September 23, 1924, emphasized the importance of education in terms of freedom, independence, and prosperity: “It is education that keeps a nation alive either as a free, independent, glorious, and high society, or abandons a nation to captivity and misery. (4)

AND THE COUNTER-REVOLUTION 

Breakthroughs in education went very well until 1946. The rest is well known. The Counter-Revolution first attacked education. In 1946, the architects of the education revolution, Minister of National Education Hasan Ali Yücel, were dismissed, and Nazi admirer Reşat Sirer was appointed in his place. He also dismissed İsmail Hakkı Tonguç, the father of the Village Institutes. In 1947, the ties of teachers working in villages to the schools were severed, in 1948 the Higher Village Institute, which trained teachers for the institutes, and in 1954 all village institutes were closed. In 1948, with the Marshall Plan, we left education, not just the economy, under the control of imperialism.

After September 12, 1980, the Turkish education system was shaped according to the Turkish-Islamic Synthesis, in line with the US Green Belt project. 

An education system that started during the AKP era with the slogan of raising a religious and vengeful generation and has been moving further back towards the darkness of the Middle Ages every year... In the last 23 years, the Turkishness in the Turkish-Islamic synthesis has also been forgotten. Arab culture began to be imposed. With the collapse of national consciousness, the collapse of the nation-state is aimed, and instead of demanding free individuals, the goal is to create servants who obey and pledge allegiance to everything said, through poverty and ignorance.

First, they lowered the quality of schools that train teachers, and then the quality and level of all schools, including from primary school to universities. The violence applied to students by the partisans they trained as teachers, who are far from merit, by imams they let into kindergartens, and by cultist charlatan hodjas, ceased to be isolated incidents and became almost ordinary. As a result, we began to live under the influence of an organized ignorance in every field. 

Along with high inflation, this education system manifested itself as a moral collapse in the social structure and an institutional collapse in the state. Its result in the economy was moving away from competition and productivity in agriculture, industry, and the services sector. We are still practicing primitive agriculture. The share of high-tech industrial products in exports is only 3 percent. 

When we look at the success stories of many countries in the economy, we see that what Gazi Mustafa Kemal Atatürk did in the field of education in the founding years of the Republic, different countries applied in the 1960s and 1980s and achieved great successes.

Without a deep-rooted education revolution, it is not possible to achieve peace in social life and prosperity in the economic field. Our most important economic asset is our young population and human resources. A deep-rooted education revolution that is far from rote learning, superstition, and vengefulness, that teaches analytical thinking, gives people a profession, raises free individuals and conscious citizens, and reinforces national consciousness with its history, language, and geography is a priority.

WITH GRATITUDE TO OUR TEACHERS…

On the occasion of Teachers' Day, I commemorate with gratitude all my teachers who contributed to me, my grandfather, a veteran of the War of Independence, head teacher the late Sait Köyatası, my late father teacher Rüçhan Köyatası, my late mother teacher Vedia Köyatası, my late aunt teacher Rayegan Köyatası, and I wish well-being to my other aunt, teacher Ayten Köyatası Bayrak, and offer my gratitude.

When it comes to the Republic's education move, I also commemorate with gratitude the first Ministers of National Education; Vasıf Çınar (1924), Mustafa Necati (1925-29), Reşit Galip (1932-1933), Saffet Arıkan (1935-38), Hasan Ali Yücel (1938-1946), and the most important architect-implementer of the education revolution, General Director of Primary Education İsmail Hakkı Tonguç, known in the education community as Tonguç Baba. 

(1) Şevket Süreyya Aydemir, The Second Man Volume II, (Remzi Kitabevi)

(2,3,4) İsmail Hakkı Tonguç, The Village to be Revived (İş Bankası Publications)