Ukrainian Teachers' Mutual Aid Society

Ukrainian Teachers' Mutual Aid Society (Взаємна поміч українського вчительства or ВПУВ; Vzaiemna pomich ukrainskoho vchytelstva, or ; VPUV). A professional organization of Ukrainian elementary-school teachers, founded in 1905. Initially it operated only in Galicia, but eventually it had four district branches in Bukovyna. Its membership in 1906 was 865 teachers out of a total possible membership of 4,000, and in 1914 some 710. In 1922 the society became a union of all the Ukrainian teachers in Polish-ruled Ukraine. In 1930 and after, because of the growth of the teachers’ professional movement, the society expanded rapidly; that year it had 2,792 members out of a possible 3,500, and in 1938, 2,162 members, with 44 branches and 20 delegations. The headquarters was in Lviv. The society published the biweekly journal Uchytel’s’ke slovo, the pedagogical-methodological monthly, later a quarterly, Shliakh vykhovannia i navchannia, and a series entitled Pedahohichna-metodychna biblioteka (A Pedagogical-Methodological Library). The society had a central pedagogical library, a research commission, a pedagogical consulting service, a credit union (Vzaiemna Pomich) relief funds for teachers, widows, and orphans, two buildings in Lviv, one building in Mushyna, and vacation resorts in Vorokhta and Cherche. Among the leading members, of the organization were Andrii Alyskevych, Ivan Stronsky, M. Moroz, O. Vlasiichuk, Ivan Yushchyshyn, Andrii Zeleny, H. Koval, I. Lylyk, and D. Stelmakh. With the arrival of the Soviet Army in 1939, the organization was disbanded. In 1941–4 the society operated as the Ukrainian Teachers' Labor Alliance, a section of the Ukrainian Central Committee.

Ostap Skrypnyk

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 5 (1993).]