Wasteland Jobs For Polish Students

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30480, 30 June 1964, Page 6

Wasteland Jobs For Polish Students

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copy right) WARSAW. Poland intends to draft university graduates this summer to state jobs in outlying country districts where labour is urgently needed.

For the third time in 10 years the Government will use coersion or strong persuasion to get the nation’s “brains” out of sophisticated employment in the cities and thrust them into pioneering areas; Poles who resist drafting are liable to sanctions which can involve repayment of half the cost of state tuition—a sum nowadays being assessed at about £7OOO.

There are many loopholes in the new regulations. The graduate who is the sole support of his parents, or ill, married, needed for postgraduate research, or. socially active in party or state associations can. claim exemption. “The news sent a shockwave of dismay and apprehension, through the 9600 students of Warsaw University, where many thought that the idea of drafting them had been permanently shelved. The State, which foots the

bill, is asking why should, it not have a say in how the nation’s qualified graduates are to be best employed in the national interest Polish graduates and the intelligentsia ’ are notoriously shy of venturing into the wastelands of the Polish interior. They seem to regard it as disgrace, exile or deportation. They call it Poland “B” .—the second-class Poland—dirty, shabby, small-minded and’ boring.

Officialdom gives the following example of wastage: out of 170 students of agriculture in Pbznan, 128 qualified but only 39 went to work on state farms. Many agricultural engineers who have been supported through college by grants from state farms, find work in other institutions, or in administration in towns after graduation. Some students say: What is the good of a university degree? An engineer earns only a few hundred zlotys more than a labourer. A driver can earn more than the director whom he drives. Better stay out of. university—and in Warsaw.