A few weeks ago, in an article about wills from the late 19th and early 20th centuries, I wrote that Dr. Georgy Ivanovich Tkachev bequeathed part of his considerable fortune to Kharkiv University (75,000 rubles, to be exact). Two awards and seven scholarships were established in our city using the interest from this sum. Students could receive them if they met the following conditions:
…Scholarships are awarded to Orthodox residents of Rostov-on-Don who are of purely Russian descent and who demonstrate diligence, academic success, and good character
…In the event of poor academic performance or unacceptable behavior on the part of a scholarship recipient, the scholarship may be revoked…
Such discrimination on the basis of ethnicity or religion was far from uncommon in the universities of the Russian Empire at that time. And there were quite a few interesting aspects to the process of gaining admission. So that’s what we’ll be discussing today.
So, let’s start by noting that scholarships, as well as grants and awards from Kharkiv Imperial University, can be divided into several categories.
— Government scholarships, which were awarded for one year. They were approved by the university administration for students of limited means based on information submitted by the faculty regarding the student’s academic performance and a favorable recommendation from the vice rector regarding the student’s conduct. To receive them, a special application was submitted to the rector, accompanied by the following documents:
a) a certificate of financial need, completed according to the form in use at the time;
b) various proofs of academic achievement.
Scholarship recipients were under the special supervision of the dean and faculty members. To retain the state scholarship for the following academic year, confirmation from the dean was required that the student had consistently fulfilled all conditions. In the event of inappropriate behavior or poor academic performance, however, the student was deprived of financial support.
Admittedly, in the case of these students—who, to use modern terminology, were “state-funded students”—there was also a factor of discrimination. Paragraph No. 12 of the “Rules on the Awarding of Scholarships and Grants to Students from State Funds and on Their Exemption from Tuition Fees” clearly stipulated that financial support from the State Treasury was awarded only to students of the Christian faith.
Upon graduating from the university, all former scholarship recipients were required to work one and a half years in a government position assigned by the government for each year of scholarship received. This requirement could be avoided in three cases:
- If, within six months of receiving a diploma, the state did not provide a job.
- If a sum equal to the value of the degree received was paid.
- With special permission from the Minister of Public Education.
By 1913, there were the following number of government scholarships at Kharkiv University:
— 20 from the “Western Region,”
— 13 medical schools,
— 10 from the Ministry of Public Education,
— 6 from the “Caucasus Region,”
— 4 named after Saints Cyril and Methodius.
All of them exempted students from paying tuition. At the same time, paragraph 6 of the “Rules for the Use of Scholarships in the Caucasus Region” states the following:
Caucasian scholarship recipients are subject, on an equal footing with other government scholarship recipients, to the conditions and rules in effect at the university for recipients of government scholarships, and they take the same courses as the others, with the sole exception that those scholarship recipients who are not of Russian origin may, if they so desire, be exempted from exams in Slavic languages and from attending lectures on Slavic languages and literature.
What amazing tolerance when it comes to national and linguistic issues, I tell you!
In addition to government scholarships, there were also numerous private scholarships, which were funded by interest earned on donations made to the university, including those bequeathed in wills. However, not all students were eligible to receive them. The terms and conditions included a host of restrictions: for example, some named scholarships were reserved for students of a specific faculty. There were class-based restrictions—for instance, only students of noble descent in the medical faculty were eligible for financial support. Sometimes the terms explicitly stated that the scholarship was awarded to students of limited means from a specific province, district, or city. But this is quite normal when wealthy compatriots look out for their own in a foreign city. Sometimes the conditions were even more intriguing. For example, scholarship recipients were not always selected by the university administration. Who would receive the scholarship named after Roman Osipovich Rubinstein—a hereditary honorary citizen and merchant of the First Guild—was decided by the eldest representative of that family. And the awarding of the scholarship named after the former mayor of Kharkiv, Yegor Stepanovich Gordienko, depended solely on the will of his son. Often, people who bequeathed funds to the university to establish scholarships in their name specified in the terms and conditions that their relatives be eligible to receive them. The 120-ruble scholarship named after the widow of the Kharkiv merchant Evdokia Prokofievna Abramova could be awarded, by decision of the board, to students from all faculties of the Orthodox faith—though with one curious stipulation.
…If E. P. Abramova’s grandchildren—Vladimir, Nikolai, and Leonid Kislichenko—or any other of them enroll in this university, the aforementioned scholarship shall be used to pay for her grandchildren’s tuition…
The same was true of several scholarships named after the Tikhotsky noble family, which specified that they were to be awarded primarily to relatives. Even people with the same last name were not overlooked and were included in such cases. All in all, there were indeed quite a few of these “family” scholarships at Kharkiv University. Although, you have to admit, if you don’t look too closely at the details, it all looks quite nice: helping poor students, philanthropy, and a scholarship named after one’s beloved self.
It was not uncommon for the mandatory requirements for a student of limited means to earn a degree—as stipulated by the donors—to include, in addition to good conduct and high academic performance, Russian ancestry and the Orthodox faith. This seems quite strange, considering that the Russian Empire at that time—and our beloved city—was home to many peoples practicing various religions.
Other donors, on the other hand, managed to specify several nationalities in the eligibility criteria. For example, several substantial scholarships named after Vasily Ivanovich Theologos were available only to Russian, Ukrainian, or Greek students. However, I have, alas, never come across any other scholarships at Kharkiv University where Ukrainians are listed as recipients.
And, by the way, some patrons didn’t really dwell on Orthodoxy, opting instead for the more tolerant phrasing “Christian faith.” The Gelferichs, for example, did just that. On the other hand, some wealthy individuals, when establishing scholarships in their own names, explicitly stated: “Regardless of faculty, nationality, or religion.”
It is truly heartening that representatives of other nationalities and faiths did their best not to forget their own people and to help them in our city. For example, only the poorest Armenians from the city of Nakhichevan were eligible to receive the scholarship named after Basakov, a former chairman of the Nakhichevan Society and State Councilor, in the amount of 275 rubles per year at Kharkiv University. The 600-ruble scholarship named after Mariupol merchant Kirill Spiridonovich Tamanov was awarded only to the children of poor Greeks from the city of Mariupol and the surrounding district.
Financial support for Jewish students also existed, albeit on a small scale. The scholarship named after the late wife of the Pyatigorsk merchant Margarita Markovna Mezhebovskaya was awarded exclusively to students of the Jewish faith enrolled in the medical school.
And thanks to a large donation from Kyrgyz people living in the Syr Darya Region, students of that ethnicity received financial aid at Kharkiv University.
To be honest, I don’t know how the Orthodox faith or Russian heritage could have influenced a student’s level of giftedness and academic success to such an extent that it was an indispensable condition for receiving a named scholarship. However, it seems quite logical that members of other ethnic groups would try, to the best of their modest abilities, to support their own. It’s fair to say that in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the situation regarding government and private scholarships in our city was quite ambiguous…
