Kyiv Society for the Advancement of Elementary Education

Kyiv Society for the Advancement of Elementary Education [Київське товариство сприяння початковій освіті; Kyivske tovarystvo spryiannia pochatkovii osviti]. Society organized in 1882 by a group of Kyiv University professors and local teachers to spread enlightenment among the population of Kyiv and vicinity. Until 1902 it was called the Commission of Popular Readings. The society organized public readings (by 1900 over 700 had been held), literary evenings, and musical concerts, particularly by students from Mykola Lysenko’s music school. In 1895 it built the People’s Auditorium to house its events. From 1888 the society published 23 popular educational pamphlets with a total pressrun of over 130,000 copies. Many prominent Ukrainian activists and academics belonged to the society, including Oleksii Andriievsky, Volodymyr Shcherbyna, and Pavlo Tutkovsky. The society ceased to exist in 1918. In 1913 it published a book summarizing its first 30 years’ work.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 2 (1988).]