Sasfi_Csaba_A_reformkori_gyori_gimnazium

The city of Győr was pioneering in both the process of embourgeoisement andthe subsequent bourgeois revolution in Hungary. The present study examinesthe role of the long-standing secondary school in the life of the town, which,in this respect, was progressive in the Reform Era. The overarching theme forthe present inquiry is the significance of post-elementary education (or “highereducation” to use the contemporary term) in upward social mobility in the lat-ter years of the Estate System. Previous research has shown that the secondaryschool in Győr was predominantly used by local families. The present study ex-amines the social composition of the local urban student cohorts. The sons ofGyőr burghers comprise one third of the whole student body, and two thirdsof the local cohort. The social composition by grade shows that the number ofburghers’ children decreases in higher grades, but it remains one third of all stu-dents, and firmly over half of all local students even in the two highest grades inthe humanities. Narrowing the scope, the study focuses on the top students whoreached the graduating class (second grade in the humanities) without repeti-tion of academic years, and went on to graduate successfully. The case of the topstudent of Győr revealed that the urban bourgeoisie was not only present in thelower grades of the school, but a significant portion of them completed their sec-ondary education and continued their studies in higher education. In addition,the study also shows that the Benedictine secondary school in Győr fostered theprevalence of Hungarian language use among the educated bourgeoisie, to anequal extent as the Piarists in Pest. Finally, it is observed that only a relativelysmall portion of the top students continued to live in Győr, which is explainedby the upward social mobility attained by their continuing education.