p There are undeniable facts to substantiate the great role being played by Soviet youth on the labour front. This is a logical consequence of the socialist system. Free labour, 58 which unites the interests of society and the individual, is the cardinal prerequisite for a full-blooded human life and the principal arena of a man’s creative efforts. The young man, embarking upon independent life, finds himself in a social and psychological atmosphere in which people assess a person by his industriousness and success in work. Therefore, it is only natural that the young man should assert himself primarily in the sphere of production and work.

p Does this mean, however, that socialist conditions exert an automatic influence? Does it mean that in every case these circumstances automatically help the young man embarking upon independent life to understand the lofty social and moral value of labour for the benefit of society and, consequently, make him willing to work efficiently to the best of his abilities? No, this process is neither simple nor automatic.

p This is why the Communist Party, guiding the building of socialism and communism, has, in compliance with Lenin’s instructions, always considered that one of its principal tasks is to conduct comprehensive educational work among the masses, particularly among youth. One of the most important aspects of this work is the bringing people up from early childhood in the spirit of the communist attitude to labour.

p Lenin said that such education should be based above all on conscientious and disciplined work. He pointed out that "only by working side by side with the workers and peasants can one become a genuine Communist".  [58•1 

p In the Soviet Union the process of developing a love for work begins in childhood. After joining the Leninist Young Pioneer Organisation, schoolchildren are taught socially useful work. Naturally, the work they do, the time and energy they spend and the "production results" they achieve cannot be compared with what awaits them after they graduate from school and begin independent life. The aim is rather to help the little man to understand the joy of work, to see what he can do with his own hands for himself and, simultaneously, for his people and his country.

p Usually the work done by young pioneers and 59 schoolchildren directly supplements their lessons. Many schools have their own fields where the pupils stage agrotechnical experiments. There are numerous other spheres as well where schoolchildren can apply their efforts and sense the joy of work: school shops, gardens and parks. Pioneers join "school forestries" and take care of forests, collect scrap metal, paper, medicinal herbs, wild fruit and berries. These small deeds acquire great significance if one remembers that they are conducted on a mass scale. Millions of children thus gain initial labour orientation and training.

p With students the process takes a different form. Student builders’ detachments are recruited from volunteers who agree to spend part of the summer vacations working at industrial enterprises or on farms. In 1969-71 nearly 700,000 students worked in such detachments. In three years they completed construction projects to the sum of over 1,000 million rubles.

p Students in builders’ detachments are, naturally, paid for their work, but this is not what prompts them to sacrifice part of the vacations. The sociologists of the Urals Polytechnical Institute and Leningrad University who investigated the motives why students join the builders’ detachments found that they wanted to be useful to society, to test their abilities in practical work and acquire the habits of working in a collective, which, as they correctly pointed out, all specialists should do. Moreover, they were attracted by the friendly atmosphere in the student detachments. In their answers to the questionnaires, the students said that work in the detachments encourages initiative, independence, fosters a feeling of responsibility, etc.

p So, as we have said, various categories of student youth are involved in diverse forms of socially useful activities which prepare them for independent work in the future.

p Thus, general labour orientation is supplemented by the formation of interest in definite forms of labour and this is precisely the goal pursued by schools and other organisations.

p Several years ago the Palace of Young Pioneers and Schoolchildren in Irkutsk inaugurated the Znaniye ( knowledge) society in which specialists lecture to schoolchildren, arrange practical work and inform them about the exact 60 nature of some of the professions. There are more than 20 sections with a total attendance of nearly 1,500. Children can freely pass from section to section until they find the subject that interests them most. When the time comes for school-leaving examinations, most members of the Znaniye society have already worked out definite plans for the future.

p In the geological section the lectures by prominent geologists and geochemists are supplemented by practical lessons in mines and pits, mineralogical museums, the local research institute, as well as by summer practicals in geological parties and expeditions.

p The medical section trains the children to be doctor’s assistants or nurses. During the three-year course they learn how to render first aid and take care of patients, they stay on duty in first-aid stations, and doctors take them to see patients being treated in polyclinics.

p By attending all these lectures and doing practical work in laboratories, clinics and geological expeditions, the children acquire knowledge and, more important still, love for the chosen profession. They come to know the routine work in the professions which appeal to them and acquire the necessary skill.

p It is particularly important to develop interest in the mass professions associated with industry and agriculture. Sometimes young men and women who are about to set out on independent life are quite prepared, on the whole, to work for the benefit of society, and are even eager to do so. Yet this eagerness tends to be limited to professions like nuclear physics, aviation, etc., rather than mass professions like lathe-operating, building, farming and servicing.

p It is necessary therefore to emphasise the social usefulness of all professions even apparently “uninteresting” ones.

p Speaking on the subject at the 24th Congress of the CPSU, Leonid Brezhnev stressed the importance of "correct and timely vocational orientation of young men and women, and education of the rising generation in a spirit of profound respect for work at factories, on farms and in the fields".  [60•1 

p This work is done, first and foremost, by schools and cultural and educational institutions.

p Three years ago school No. 19 in Cherepovets opened a vocational orientation club. The club’s work is planned by the children themselves. Its sessions, which are attended by no less than a hundred members, are devoted to meetings with representatives of diverse professions and graduates. The club arranges excursions to enterprises and educational institutions. In the beginning, membership was limited to pupils of the 8th, 9th and 10th classes, but then it became clear that the work could not be restricted to the seniors. Now the club acquaints younger children with the wonders of engineering and arranges get-togethers of young pioneers which are devoted to the professions of their parents, and the general glorification of labour. Similar work is conducted in other schools in the town.

p All the libraries in Cherepovets compiled special card indexes of literature which help the juveniles to select vocations. The libraries arrange book exhibitions, lectures and joint get-togethers with schools devoted to the question of choosing a vocation.

p The professional orientation of teenagers becomes effective when the production collectives, which have a genuine reason to be interested in the training of the rising generation, join in.

p In Cherepovets, for instance, this work in school No. 13 is done by the workers of the neighbouring plywood- andfurniture factory. The workers, whose children study in the school or some of whom have themselves graduated from it, often meet with the schoolchildren and tell them about the professions in the factory. The factory has opened vocational courses for the pupils.

p The experiment at the Kharkov Tractor Plant won recognition throughout the country. The workers there opened a special training shop where schoolchildren learn dozens of vocations. Moreover, the plant has set up production training sectors, engineering class-rooms and laboratories. All of them comply with modern engineering requirements and utilise the latest achievements in engineering, technology and labour organisation in industrial enterprises. In ten years the training shop has helped more than 8,000 schoolchildren to master diverse vocations. Every year half of the school graduates who pass through the training shop 62 find employment at the Kharkov Tractor Plant and other industrial enterprises in the district.

p The Bratsk Ferro-Concrete Works, one of the major building-material producers in East Siberia, is also actively engaged in vocational training. The factory’s engineers and advanced workers have replaced amateur circles by an organised system of vocational training. Together with their school-leaving certificates, the boys and girls are presented with diplomas as qualified electric welders, electric fitters, and crane operators. In the past eight years nearly 300 school-graduates have received such diplomas, and 121 of them decided to work in the chosen profession.

p One important side of vocational orientation is to develop young people’s interest in farm work. The rapid expansion of industry and the resulting urbanisation attract young people from the countryside to towns. The continual expansion of industrial production creates a constant demand for labour. At the same time, the mechanisation of agriculture reduces the need for manpower in the countryside. However, the army of agricultural workers needs to be continually replenished. So the job is to induce village young people to stay and work in agriculture.

p The scientific and technological revolution in agriculture is helping to solve this problem. Young people willingly remain on collective and state farms which mechanise their production, improve the organisation of work, apply scientific discoveries and advanced methods, and take care of the farmers’ cultural and living standards.

p The 21st Party Congress Collective Farm in the Blagoveshchensk district, Altai Territory, is noted for its high cultural and living standards. There is a secondary school, a boarding-school, a House of Culture, a canteen, and a dispensary. In recent years the village has been completely modernised. Gas and running water have been extended to all homes, the streets are covered with asphalt and lined with trees, and there is a fine park. The Party and the Komsomol organisations are very efficient; there are three Komsomol-youth dairy farms, and many young people work as machine-operators and builders. Attention is focused on farm vocational training and the mechanisation of work, which is becoming better organised, more efficient and better 63 paid. There are diverse opportunities for recreation. The House of Culture and the libraries sponsor all kinds of circles and sports competitions. The local branches of the Voluntary Society for Assisting Army, Air Force and Navy and the Nature Protection Society are very popular. Work and life in general on the collective farm is pervaded by an animated spirit. So it is not surprising that most schoolgraduates decide to stay on the farm, while those who continue their studies in institutes and secondary technical schools plan to return to the native village.

p But this provides only one of the prerequisites for solving the problem. Vocational training and orientation of rural schoolchildren are indispensable. It has been proved in practice, in the same Altai Territory, for instance, that apprentice production teams are best fitted for the job of inducing young people to remain in their villages.

p There are now 370 apprentice teams and nearly 100 school forestries in the Territory. The children grow grain and vegetables, and plant forest belts in the steppes. Scientists and specialists supervise their experimental work and help them to organise seed-farming. The best seed is sent to collective and state farms. The apprentice production teams bring in the best results when the heads and specialists of farms help them with machines, allocate fields, supply the seeds, and inspect their work.

p A secondary school in Ust-Pristan district organised its apprentice team a few years ago. The team was given 100 hectares of arable land, a few tractors and other farm machines. The school has also opened a vocational club with sections of agronomy, cattle-breeding, mechanisation, tradesmanship and medicine. Experienced specialists help the children to conduct experiments, compile technological charts and organise field work. That draws the school and production closer together and serves as the foundation of vocational training. In the past five years more than 150 schoolgraduates have decided to stay and work in the nearby state farms; 38 graduates joined an agricultural institute.

p In recent years the measures taken to raise the prestige of farm professions and the profound transformation of agricultural production have increased the proportion of young people engaged in farm work. In 1970, for instance, 64 there were 43,000 more Komsomol machine-operators than in 1969; the number of cattle-breeders increased by 18,000, and the number of specialists, by more than 12,000.

p In addition, much attention is being paid to the development of young people’s interest in services (trade, etc.). Until recently catering professions were not popular with young people. School-graduates preferred to work in industry, and there were few who agreed to work as sales assistants, cooks, and so on. Thus there was quite a shortage of people in these professions, while the demand was constantly rising because the Communist Party and the Soviet Government have decided to expand the sphere of services.

p Fulfilling their responsible assignment from the Party, the Komsomol organisations have sent many young men and women to work in the sphere of services. They have explained to young people the importance of these professions from the viewpoint of the national economy and the interests of society; young people are now more favourably disposed towards entering the sphere of services, and are quite willing to work in catering professions. Young caterers hold gettogethers and arrange all kinds of competitions. During the eighth five-year period the number of young people in the sphere of services went up by 400,000, i.e., by nearly 30 per cent. Most of them work efficiently, thanks to the high level of their education, culture and upbringing. Many of them are quite enthusiastic about the new jobs which formerly they regarded as uninteresting.

p Efficient vocational orientation and general labour training of schoolchildren help to recruit young people into new fields of national economy; they embark upon independent life with a developed interest in work and a deep understanding of the social and personal significance of labour— the primary prerequisite for the labour enthusiasm of the young builders of communism.

The Soviet people regard educating the rising generation for labour as one of its fundamental tasks. Young people grow up worthy of the senior generations. Now, as always in the past, Soviet youth stands in the vanguard of communist construction.