the
technical-vocational level are six-month training courses that are
organized by factories, cooperatives, and other enterprises. These
courses are designed to improve the workers' skills or to retrain
workers for other areas of specialization. These courses include both
theoretical studies and practical work.

Evening courses, correspondence courses, refresher courses, and special
research programs are also numerous in the country. Workers up to thirty
years of age who have not completed their elementary education are urged
to attend evening schools--known in Bulgaria as shift courses--or
correspondence courses. In both types of school the average length of
study is from one to three years, depending on the amount of elementary
education completed. Once these courses are completed, the worker may
continue in either a secondary polytechnic or a vocational school.
Eventually, he may go on to an institution of higher education.
Refresher courses, on the other hand, are at the higher education level
and are provided for industrial specialists in order to keep them
abreast of the latest developments in science and technology. Teachers
and researchers are encouraged to hold research fellowships that
function under the various institutions of higher education as well as
the Academy of Sciences.

The final component of specialized education is conducted by the party.
Based on Marxism-Leninism, it is geared to indoctrinate party members
but is provided for nonparty members as well. The objectives of this
form of education were summed up by Georgi Dimitrov, premier of the
country from 1946 until 1949, who stated that these schools are to
prepare "individuals in the fundamental principles of Marxism-Leninism
... in order that they become independent practical organizers and
leaders, capable of leading the masses in the struggle against the class
enemy." The instructors of party education are trained at the Institute
for Political Instruction of the Central Committee of the BKP, which in
turn supervises the work of the Central Leninist Party School. In
addition to the general dissemination of party policy by these
instructors, there are both formal study circles and political schools
that present two-year courses in the history of both the Bulgarian and
the Soviet communist parties.

CHAPTER 7

ARTISTIC AND INTELLECTUAL EXPRESSION

Bulgaria has a proud cultural heritage that dates to early medieval
times. During t