Johann Gottfried Kletschke

Johann Gottfried Kletschke (born August 27, 1748 in Crossen an der Oder , † November 1, 1806 in Potsdam ) was a German Protestant clergyman.

Life

Johann Gottfried Kletsche was born the son of wealthy citizens.

He attended the community school in Crossen an der Order and then went to the Latin school in Guben ; after its completion in 1768 he began studying theology and philosophy at the University of Frankfurt (Oder) . In 1770 he went to further studies at the University of Halle and after its completion worked at the Schindler orphanage of Severin Schindler and at the Hecker secondary school of Johann Julius Hecker in Berlin.

In 1774, General Johann Albrecht von Bülow made him field chaplain of Infantry Regiment No. 46 appointed to Berlin. Through his administration the field provost Karl Andreas Friedrich Balk (1757–1779) became aware of him and appointed him with royal approval as his adjutant during the War of the Bavarian Succession .

On June 11, 1779, King Friedrich II appointed him field provost of the Prussian army, court and garrison preacher, field preacher of the Guard Regiment, inspector of the Great Military Orphanage and assessor at the war council.

He was an employee of the General German Library , but avoided drawing his reviews with his name. Furthermore he took a leading position in the Märkische Economic Society.

Johann Gottfried Kletschke campaigned intensively for the reorganization of the Prussian garrison school system and found a superior in General Friedrich Wilhelm von Rohdich who provided him with active support. First, the administration of the Great Military Orphanage and the associated catering, education and care for the orphans were reformed, then the two Potsdam garrison schools were reorganized, from which the court school at the time of the Great Elector Friedrich Wilhelm and the Lutheran garrison school were founded on October 21, 1721 and were no longer serving their purpose and were close to decay. Together with General von Rohdich he traveled to Reckahn to visit the model school of the pedagogue Friedrich Eberhard von Rochow and to gain impressions and experience reports. At Kletschke's instigation, the war council issued a rescript on September 20, 1780 , in which the garrison and field preachers were asked to exercise close supervision over the schools under their control and to report to the field provost in their annual report on their condition and circumstances.

On November 12, 1780, he submitted his proposals to the general to improve the garrison school; He recommended that the two schools be united, addressing the number of students, classes and teachers, the cost of books, writing materials and teaching materials, and maintenance costs. The general, experienced in dealing with the king, asked for a more detailed recommendation, so that on November 24, 1780, Kletschke presented his draft for the interior furnishings of the Potsdam garrison school . On December 17, 1780, the king approved the draft, so that he now worked out a school plan, a school law and a lesson plan for the garrison school, which the general then approved.

In February 1781 the newly founded four-level school for soldiers' children was opened with a principal as director. After a short time, the school was known beyond Prussia's borders and visitors came from Hesse and southern Germany to get to know the exemplary facility; the bishop of Warmia, Prince Karl von Hohenzollern-Hechingen , requested the furnishing plan.

In 1786 he submitted a promemoria to the king about the improvement of the soldiers' children's schools , in which he recommended setting up free schools for all regiments and having the teachers trained in a seminar, purchasing suitable school books and structurally improving the school buildings. In the following year the king transferred 20,000 thalers to the minister Karl Abraham von Zedlitz for the improvement of the Prussian school system, but the sum was not even enough to carry out the most necessary measures, so that Kletschke received no funds for the soldiers' children's schools.

At the beginning of 1788, King Friedrich Wilhelm II commissioned him to send in suggestions for improving the soldiers 'children's schools, and on February 3, 1788, he presented the monarch with unpredictable suggestions on how to improve the soldiers' children's schools . In this list he started from the idea of ​​setting up a central authority for the entire military school system, comparable to the high school college for civil schools founded in 1787 , to which the regimental school commissions should be subordinate. He also suggested setting up a seminar for garrison school teachers, acquiring appropriate textbooks and learning books, setting up their own school buildings and ensuring better salaries for teachers. The regimental schools should be two-tier or two-tier and be organically connected with industrial schools. In order to raise the financial resources, he proposed that a general military school fund be set up, from which the regiments should receive support. The king referred the proposals to the Oberkriegskollegium, which approved the proposals, so that the king issued a cabinet order on July 9, 1789 , in which he ordered the formation of a military school fund. The regiments' school fund monies had to be sent to the Upper War College , insofar as they did not come from legacies .

On September 22nd, 1788, King Friedrich Wilhelm II issued a foundation letter for the establishment of the Potsdam Garrison School, so that the school received not only its own house, but also its own school fund. Johann Gottfried Kletschke was now able to improve the condition of the school and improve its performance. He held monthly conferences with the teachers, led the promotion and public exams, and made sure that textbooks were useful and that the material conditions of the teachers were improved. Handicraft lessons were introduced for the girls and horticultural and drawing lessons for the boys. He attended village and town schools to gain further experience and wrote to General von Rohdich about these trips.

The implementation of the reorganization was delayed by the warlike and political events, so that Kletschke applied that the children of the soldiers who were in the field should receive free lessons in the local schools. On July 16, 1790, the king issued a corresponding cabinet order.

In the provinces of South and West Prussia newly acquired as a result of the partitioning of Poland, elementary schools were completely lacking and the higher schools did not serve their purpose. The individual troops now founded schools in their garrisons and it is thanks to Johann Gottfried Kletschke that they were given special support and that Lutheran and Reformed citizens' children were allowed to attend these schools. On February 9, 1797, the Cabinet Ordinance appeared on the regulation of the garrison and regimental school conditions and on the military school fund, so that on February 14, 1797 the Higher War College issued the implementing provisions that corresponded to its proposals of February 3, 1788. However, his suggestions for the creation of a central school commission and the seminar for regimental school teachers were not implemented.

King Friedrich Wilhelm III. commissioned him in 1798 to work out a plan in which the military and civil schools should be united. The King later approved this plan, but did not publish it; it was used in the drafting of the two school regulations for South Prussia on May 28, 1800 and for New East Prussia on July 31, 1805.

Due to the warlike development in 1806/1807 , most of the regiments and their schools were dissolved. The changed military constitution ruled out the establishment of independent schools, and special garrison schools remained in existence only in larger garrison locations, but over time these were also disbanded as inexpedient.

Works

• Last hours and funeral of Frederick the Second King of Prussia . Potsdam 1786.
• Collection of sacred songs for Christian soldiers in times of war and peace, plus an appendix . Berlin Decker 1817.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ADB: Kletschke, Johann Gottfried - Wikisource. Retrieved February 12, 2018 . 
2. ↑ Simone Austermann: Die "Allgemeine Revision": pedagogical theory development in the 18th century, p. 39 ff. Julius Klinkhardt, 2010, ISBN 978-3-7815-1735-6 ( google.de [accessed on August 20, 2018]) .
3. ↑ Anonymus AC09895512: History of the Royal Potsdam Military Orphanage ed. for 100 years. Foundation ceremony of the establishment in November 1824, p. 470 ff. Ernst Siegfried Mittler, 1824 ( google.de [accessed on August 20, 2018]).
4. ^ Robert Ostmann: History of the Royal Court and Garrison Church in Potsdam, p. 104 ff. 1862 ( google.de [accessed on August 20, 2018]).