Janka Zirzen

[3] Janka Zirzen was born on 23 May 1824 in a family with a small estate in Jászberény, Hungary, where she was raised by her mother, a midwife.

She later started a small nursery school for girls at her parents' house in Jászberény, but she was not successful due to lack of money.

In the early 1870s, Eötvösto's successor, Ágoston Trefort showed interest in expanding the scope of women's education.

[2] He asked Zirzen to study the domestic and foreign industrial schools with aim of training female teachers, housewives and working girls.

In 1875, she visited Vienna, Paris and German cities to acquire professional knowledge on the functioning of industrial schools.

[3] On the direction of Trefort, a number of teacher training courses were introduced for upper secondary and civil schools.

[8][9] In 1877, Emperor Francis Joseph himself visited the training institute and conferred the Golden Cross of Merit with the Crown on Zirzen for recognizing her contributions in the field of women education.