An irreplaceable source in study of many problems of secondary and higher professional education in the end of XIX - the beginning of XX century is statistic material that form a complex of documents in which systematic quantitative data on main phenomenons of historical reality are registered. Statistic of a studied period was imperfect due to the lack of single system of statistic data collection, so data on education was distributed among various bodies and organizations. While studying statistic sources most frequently we are forced to pay attention to published data as the majority of initial statistic materials hasn´t persisted. On the whole an organization of statistic function in pre-revolution Russia did not provide us with a necessary material quality.
A significant source for an implementation of comparative analysis of professional education development in Kazan in comparison to all-Russian trends, are statistic collections that were published by central institutions. The education department of Ministry of trade and industry (further - MTI) in 1910 released the «Collection of statistic data on condition of secondary and basic professional education in Russia» [2] that consisted of two parts. Its first part contained aggregate tables and the second - data on each educational institution in particular with regional allocation. The provided data was characterized by accuracy as it was formed on basis of single questionnaires that were composed by education department of MTI and in the beginning of 1910 sent to all governors (excluding Finland) for the further distribution to all secondary and basic professional education institutions. Filled tables were being received by the education department up to June 1910 and in July it got down to aggregation of the received data. The «Collection» is the most systematic statistic source, its material allows us to compare data on Kazan and the province with the data of other regions, define the role of Kazan professional school in the system of the country´s professional education system. Similar collections that contain information of only professional schools that belong to MTI were released in 1908-1917-ies [3] as tables. They contained: general data (year of foundation, education period, number of classes, education fee size, etc.), data on property (value of buildings, size of reserved capital, debts, etc.), data on income and expenses, information on students (their number, allocation on classes, religion, nationality, etc.), data on tutors (number of pedagogues on general and special disciplines).
An important statistic data is contained in annual reports of educational institutions. They allow us to define social, religious, age content and number of students, level of tutors´ education and wages, condition of budgets and material base of educational institutions, etc. An investigation of a number of each educational institution´s reports allows us to see a dynamics of alterations and formulate the questions on the reasons of undergone transformations. A certain difficulty is represented by the fact that statistic data, provided in reports was formed on different criterions and sometimes even within the same educational institution. «Surveys» of Kazan province [1] in category «National enlightenment» contains data that reflects a number of professional educational institutions, number of students, sums that were discharged for a maintenance, etc. Statistic data was placed in the second part of «Surveys» as tables-registers. In «Memorable books» of Kazan province an information on a number of educational institutions in the province and cities is provided.
Statistic data allows us to define the number of educational institutions in the province, outline those that trained specialists for economy, specify a number of students and clear the process of training within a studied period, characterize the professional education system in the province. A disadvantage of statistic sources is that all quantitative characteristics are conditional. It makes in necessary to apply to their comparison to other sources. In this case it is important to use mathematic methods in the formation of tables. Besides, in order to define a statistical source reliability, we need to establish the initial authorship of the provided data - was it received from a questionnaire that was completed by an individual, personally interested in a certain elucidation of the studied phenomenon, or from a statistic who is obliged to accurately fix the received data.
References
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Survey of the Kazan province of 1911. - Kazan: Typography of the province authority, 1913. - 156 p.
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Collection of statistic data on the condition of secondary and basic professional education in Russia: V.1. - SPb.: Typography of A.V. Orlov, 1910. - 94 p.
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Collection of statistic data on the condition of educational institutions that are under jurisdiction of Education department of Ministry of trade and industry of 1914-1915 academic year. - Pg.: issue of Education department of Ministry of trade and industry. - 1917. - 279 p.
The work was submitted to international scientific conference «Fundamental and applied research. Education, economics and law», Italy (Rome, Florence), September, 12-19, 2011, came to the editorial office on 15.06.2011.