The exhibition El Colegio «Estudio»: una aventura pedagógica en la España de la posguerra has been organized by the Fundación Estudio and the Sociedad Estatal de Conmemoraciones Culturales, coordinated by the Ministry of Culture. This exhibition presents the role played by Estudio and its teaching model, a string of educational experiences that began in 1876 with the establishment of the Institución Libre de Enseñanza (ILE), which inspired the actions of the Junta para Ampliación de Estudios e Investigaciones Científicas (JAE), founded in 1907 by the Ministry of Public Education. The JAE established the Instituto-Escuela (1918), an institution that, together with its other centers, spread the educational ideas and methods of the ILE in Spain. This experience was be truncated by the civil war of 1936, but this educational tradition was safeguarded by the teachers who founded Estudio during the adverse period following the war. Their ideas and methods strongly contributed to promoting education in post-Franco's Spain.  

 

The exhibition follows the life and work of Ximena Menéndez-Pidal (1901-1990), Ángeles Gasset (1907-2003), and Carmen García del Diestro (1908-2001), women of the generation of 27 who were trained as teachers at the Instituto-Escuela, a laboratory of pedagogy that incorporated the current and most advanced educational trends in Europe. They met at the Residencia de Estudiantes in the 30's, when the policies of some governments of the Second Republic gave a boost to public education as an essential tool for the modernization of Spain. They founded Estudio as a model against the authoritarian, Catholic public education system of Franco's Spain.

 

The exhibition explores the history of the Colegio since its founding in October 1939, exactly seventy years ago, in a small villa on Oquendo St., in Madrid. It explores a variety of its educational methods that emerged in the 50's and 60's, when Estudio had moved to the International Institute of Boston, a decision that ended its isolation and put the Colegio in contact with foreign schools. It ends in the late 60's, when Estudio started its consolidation phase in its new home in Valdemarín, next to the oaks of El Pardo and the blue peaks of the Guadarrama mountains in the background. The exhibit analyzes the key points and effectiveness of a pedagogical model that evolved following the changes in Spanish society, without sacrificing its essence.