Culture and education should be recognised as identical. Culture should affect education and education should prepare individuals and society to receive and create culture. Therefore, education has to shape young people's cultural identity. The author presents students of the Polish socialist secondary school from the period between 1945 and 1989, starting from this perspective. The article shows the role of the overall environment, and the educational context in particular, in shaping a student's identity in a cultural context. The problem is presented through the dynamics of the influence of the totalitarian system on the secondary school and its students in Poland. The temporal frame (1945-1989) covers the historical period of the Polish People's Republic when Poland belonged to the Eastern Bloc and remained under the influence of communist ideology. At that time the general secondary school was strongly affected and controlled by the Polish United Workers' Party. The party authorities indoctrinated young people through teaching and the school-related environment. The author addresses the question: what was the impact of the socialist school's teaching programme and upbringing on the student and the creation of their cultural identity? She characterises socialist education, the socialist student, and cultural identity. Research is predominantly based on archival sources from The Central Archives of Modern Records in Warsaw, The Archive of the Ministry of National Education, and The Institute of National Remembrance. The author also refers to literature on the subject. Archival research and literature analysis were supplemented by the behavioural-based interview method (interviews with former teachers and students who taught and studied in the years 1945-1989).