Ministry of Education (Soviet Union)

The Ministry of Education was founded as the Ministry of Education of the Russian Provisional Government (Russian: ) on the basis of the Ministry of National Education (Russian Empire) in the Russian Empire (Russian: ). Later, it was founded as the People's Commissariat for Education (Russian: ) but was commonly called Narkompros (Russian: Наркомпрос).

It was the Soviet agency founded by the State Commission on Education (Russian: Государственная комиссия по просвещению) and charged with the administration of public education and most of other issues related to culture. In 1946, it was renamed the Ministry of Education.

Its first head was Anatoly Lunacharsky. However he described Nadezhda Krupskaya as the "soul of Narkompros".Mikhail Pokrovsky and Evgraf Litkens also played important roles.

Lunacharsky protected most of the avant-garde artists such as Vladimir Mayakovsky, Kazimir Malevich, Vladimir Tatlin and Vsevolod Meyerhold. Despite his efforts, the official policy after Joseph Stalin put him in disgrace.

Narkompros had a number of sections, in addition to the main ones related to general education, e.g.,

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