The German occupation of Ober Ost during the First World War represented an undeniable incentive for further nation and state-building in the occupied lands. Although in the early 20th century education societies had already spread their networks, it was during the years of the German occupation that the centralisation and consolidation of the education network could take place. Regardless of the fact that some ideological divisions between education societies endured, both the limitations imposed by the occupying regime and the existence of a relief committee, the Lithuanian War Relief Committee, with the task to coordinate virtually all Lithuanian activities, functioned as means of rationalising the whole education system. Not only did the Lithuanian War Relief Committee try to overcome ideological divisions in the field of education, but its quasi-state structure also helped to create, finance and effectively direct the whole official network of Lithuanian educational institutions.