Medicinska fakulteta Univerze v Ljubljani 1919–1945 - Univerza v ...

compulsory practicals conducted to the fullest extent� Within
four semesters, the students mastered the modules required to sit
the first medical final examination, which covered the subjects:
general biology, experimental physics, inorganic chemistry and
organic chemistry, anatomy, histology and physiology� Exams
in physics and chemistry were theoretical only, whereas other
subjects involved both theoretical and practical assessment�
The first final examination was conducted in two parts� Exams
in biology and physics took place at the beginning of the third
semester or after two valid semesters� To be valid, a semester had
to involve 12 hours of lectures and practicals a week� Exams in
chemistry, anatomy, physiology and histology were taken in the
fifth semester, if the candidate had covered four valid semesters
and completed all the practicals�
Changed examination rules applied to students enrolled in the
1928/29 academic year or later; the chemistry exam was moved
to the first part of the final examination and could be taken
along with the exams in physics and biology after completing
the second semester� At the chemistry exam, the candidate had
to produce a positive report on his chemistry practicals which
was awarded for completing laboratory assignments and an oral
midterm exam� Failing this, he also had to take the practical
part of the examination� Candidates could sit exams in anatomy,
histology and physiology in that order after passing the first
part of the final examination and finishing the fourth or fifth
semester� To enter for the anatomy exam, candidates had to have
two semesters of practicals in dissection� Physiology exam requirements
included midterm exams in physiological chemistry and
experimental physiology� A candidate who failed these midterms
also had to take the practical part of the examination� In 1936, the
Decree on Medical Faculties was issued, which in some respects
introduced rather stricter regulations and was less advantageous
for the students� It was opposed by all the medical students� The
student protests were also supported by the professors� This
lead to a general strike of the whole university and Rector Kušej
closed the university� A revised decree of 1937 specified the main
or compulsory and secondary or elective subjects which were
categorised into five examination groups� In Ljubljana, students
could still take only the exams in the first two examination
groups� Exams in biology, physics and chemistry were taken after
the second semester on four alternative dates, and the exams
from the second groups, which covered anatomy, histology with
embriology, physiology with physiological chemistry and sensory
physiology were taken after the fourth semester and after passing
group I exams� Group I and group II exams were required to enrol
in the fifth and sixth semester, respectively�
The first final examinations at the Ljubljana faculty were
conducted in the 1921/22 academic year; a total of 23 were
taken that year� In the following years, the number of exams taken
127
from the first two examination groups available at the Ljubljana
Faculty of Medicine varied from a minimum of 13 in the 1928/29
academic year to a maximum of 132 in the 1940/41 academic
year� By this year, the prescribed examinations at the Ljubljana
Faculty of Medicine were passed by 768 students who then had to
continue their studies at foreign universities� Most of them went to
Zagreb, some to Belgrade, and those more affluent went to Graz,
Innsbruck, Vienna and other towns� For this reason, they always
passionately strove for the completion of the Ljubljana Medical
Faculty and, faced with constant threats of its abolishment, also
took part in the struggle for its preservation� It was the medical
students who played the crucial role in the development of a
complete Faculty of Medicine in Ljubljana�
1945 and the Establishment of a Complete
Faculty of Medicine
In 1945, liberation from the occupier’s supremacy and new
social circumstances brought changes to life at the university�
On 23 May 1945, a decree from the Education Ministry of the
People’s Republic of Slovenia unconditionally restored work at
the university� The old Yugoslav legislation remained temporarily
in force, but the new government gradually started taking control
of the university, which was already apparent in June when the
Yugoslav National Liberation Anti-Fascist Council legislated the
exclusion of the state’s faculties of medicine and pharmacy from
the universities and subjected them to the Federal Ministry of
National Health� Based on this act, the National Government of
Slovenia established a complete Faculty of Medicine in Ljubljana
with the Ordinance on dissolving the Faculty Council of the
Faculty for Medicine in Ljubljana and appointing new teaching
staff� The authors of a contribution about the medical faculty in
the miscellany on the university’s fiftieth anniversary characterized
the way in which the faculty was established as an unusual
measure even for those times, which was perhaps not the only but
certainly the shortest and surest path to realizing the century-old
demand for a Slovenian medical faculty. With this ordinance,
twelve full professors (Dr Alija Košir, Dr Albin Seliškar, Dr Franc
Hribar, Dr Igor Tavčar, Dr Božidar Lavrič, Dr Bogdan Derč, Dr
Ivan Marinčič, Dr Jernej Demšar, Dr Pavel Lunaček, Dr Leopold
Jerše, Dr Bogdan Brecelj, Dr Jože Rant), five associate professors
(Dr Hubert Pehani, Dr Valentina Kobe, Dr Josip Hebein, Dr
Sabina Praprotnik, Dr Milica Valentinčič) and three assistant
professors (Eng� Dušan Štucin, Dr Andrej Zupančič, Dr Ivan
Pintar) were appointed to the faculty� With the ordinance, the
Faculty of Medicine took an independent path for a few years,
though it would have preferred to stay with the constellation of
the university�