page_title: Luisenschule (Posen)
section_title: End of Luisenschule
hierarchical_section_title: Luisenschule (Posen) / End of Luisenschule
caption_attribution_description: English: Naczelna Rada Ludowa w Poznaniu, local Polish parliament 1918-1919
context_page_description: Luisenschule was a female school, open in Posen in the years of 1830–1919. Until 1873 it was operated as a private establishment, managed by the Luisenstiftung foundation; afterwards it was incorporated into the official Prussian education system. Its prestigious character attracted girls from high- and mid-range bourgeoisie; the school was particularly recognized for teaching music and arts in general. Since 1841 Luisenschule operated jointly with Lehrerinnen-Seminar, teachers’ training courses. The school was designed as a German-Polish institution, though since the mid-19th century the Polish ingredient went into decline; by the end of the century Luisenschule pursued a militantly patriotic Prussian education model. Periodically the Jews formed a significant fraction of the girls. Luisenschule students who became public figures in the realm of German politics, science and arts were Auguste Schmidt, Ida Barber, Elise Ekke, Margarete Gerhardt und Hedwig Landsberg. The best known Polish graduate was Walentyna Motty, later wife of Hipolit Cegielski.
context_section_description: In December 1918 the Prussian administrative structures in Posen collapsed and political power was claimed by the freshly emergent local Polish body, Naczelna Rada Ludowa. The well-organized NRL immediately dispatched to Luisenschule its representative, Maria Swinarska, a former Ursuline graduate. Technically she assumed the post of a beirat, an adviser to the headmaster Joachim Güldner, and was entrusted merely with introducing the instruction in Polish. In fact she became the grey eminence of the place, at the turn of 1918/1919 supervising cultural and political Polonisation of the establishment. It seems that at this stage the Poles did not have a specific plan for the school; for the time being their intention was to ensure continuity of teaching and to remove the German political flavor. Shortly after her arrival the German Luisenschule staff presented Swinarska with a number of conditions, amounting to splitting the school into a German and a Polish section; German teachers were to teach the German girls and the Polish teachers were to teach the Polish ones. Once Swinarska rejected the ultimatum they ceased to show up; in response and following consultations with NRL, Swinarska expelled all German students.
  As there were almost no Polish staff in school the instruction would have been largely fictitious, yet in the early 1919 the Germans started to resume teaching; also the German girls were re-admitted. Relations remained very tense, e.g. Poles and Germans did not shake hands. Indeed, in some age groups separate national sections were formed. Due to German numerical domination among the staff, the school kept conducting its business in German, including issuing of German-language documents. However, in the spring of 1919 Prowincjonalne Kolegium Szkolne, a newly formed provincial Polish schooling board, decided to break with the perceived Prussian and anti-Polish Luisian tradition and to find a new name for the school. Particular care was taken to emphasize Polish patriotic threads, links with the local Wielkopolska region and resistance to German pressure; eventually the school was named after a medieval princess Dąbrówka. The decision was formally adopted in May 1919.
  During the summer holidays most German teachers and an unspecified number of students left. Gaps were partially filled with Poles, and in September the school commenced the 1919/1920 school year as Państwowa Uczelnia Żeńska Dąbrówki with Maria Swinarska as its headmaster. Instruction was in Polish only; German textbooks were gradually being replaced with the Polish ones. Ethnic composition of students remains unclear; some sources claim that German girls kept prevailing, others maintain that they were in minority. None of the sources consulted provides any information on the number of Jews.
caption: Naczelna Rada Ludowa, Poznań
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