Comparative analysis of the activity of student pedagogical brigades in the Mordovian ASSR and other regions of the USSR

Abstract

Soviet-era student brigades have been studied mainly in their construction dimension, while their pedagogical branch has been reconstructed fragmentarily and outside a comparative framework. Recent regional scholarship offers detailed accounts of individual territories, including the Mordovian ASSR, yet cross-regional comparison and the separation of the pedagogical and construction profiles of the movement remain underdeveloped. The aim of the study is a comparative historical-pedagogical analysis of the activity of student pedagogical brigades in the Mordovian ASSR and several other regions of the USSR. The comparative-historical method, a typology of organisational forms, periodisation and a content analysis of the historiography are applied; the chronological scope covers the period from the turn of the 1950s-1960s to 1991, with reference to post-Soviet dynamics. It is established that pedagogical brigades constitute a distinct sphere of activity linked to the professional training of teachers and to regional staffing, while inter-regional differences run along the institutional and staffing-distribution axes. The Mordovian model, combining the dominance of a pedagogical higher school with an orientation towards the national and rural school, produced the closest connection between brigade work and the subsequent placement of graduates. The persistence of pedagogical forms after 1991 is explained by their organic connection with the content of teacher education, which was preserved regardless of the organisational framework.