Cross Report (1888)

Background notes

The complete report (with the exception of pages 395-488 - see Notes on the text) is shown in this single web page. You can scroll through it or use the following links to go to the various sections.

Preliminary pages (page ii)
Contents, list of witnesses, synopsis, commissions etc.

Introduction (1)

Part I The existing law (3)
I Administration of education grant 1832-1858
II Newcastle Commission 1858. Codes from 1862 to 1870
III Education Acts 1870-1880
IV Codes and instructions to Inspectors 1870-1885

Part II The existing state of facts (45)

Part III Machinery of public elementary education (52)
I Supply of schools
II Structural suitability of present school supply
III School management
IV Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools
V Teachers and staff
VI Training colleges
VII Attendance and compulsion

Part IV Education in public elementary schools (112)
I Religious and moral training
II Curriculum of instruction
III Manual and technical instruction
IV Various classes of elementary schools
V Elementary schools and higher education

Part V Government examination, Parliamentary Grant, cost of public elementary education (172)
I Government examination
II The Parliamentary Grant
III Income and expenditure of schools

Part VI Local Educational Authorities (201)

Part VII Summary of conclusions and recommendations (208)

Reservations (224)

Minority Reports (237)
by E Lyulph Stanley, John Lubbock, Bernhard Samuelson, Dr Dale, Sydney Buxton MP, TE Heller, Henry Richard MP, and George Shipton

Appendices (489)
I Instructions to HMI under Code of 1882
II Instructions to Inspectors 1878
III London School Board Religious Instruction Syllabus 1885
IV Liverpool School Board Religious Instruction for Infants

The text of the 1888 Cross Report was prepared by Derek Gillard and uploaded on 5 May 2019.


Cross Report (1888)
Final Report of the Commissioners appointed to inquire into the Elementary Education Acts, England and Wales

London: HM Stationery Office


[title page]

ELEMENTARY EDUCATION ACTS



FINAL REPORT

OF

THE COMMISSIONERS

APPOINTED TO INQUIRE INTO THE

ELEMENTARY EDUCATION ACTS,

ENGLAND AND WALES


Presented to both Houses of Parliament by Command of Her Majesty

LONDON:
PRINTED FOR HER MAJESTY'S STATIONERY OFFICE
BY EYRE AND SPOTTISWOODE,
PRINTERS TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY

And to be purchased, either directly or through any Bookseller, from
EYRE AND SPOTTISWOODE, EAST HARDING STREET, FLEET STREET, E.C., and
32, ABINGDON STREET, WESTMINSTER, S.W.; or
ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK, 6, NORTH BRIDGE, EDINBURGH; or
HODGES, FIGGIS, & Co., 104, GRAFTON STREET, DUBLIN.

1888
[C.-5485.] Price 5s. 6d.


[page ii]

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page
LIST OF WITNESSES WHO HAVE GIVEN EVIDENCE BEFORE THE COMMISSIONiii
LIST OF RETURNS, &c. WHICH HAVE BEEN FURNISHED TO THE COMMISSIONvi
SYLLABUS OF POINTS FOR INQUIRYix
SYNOPSIS OF THE FINAL REPORTxii
ROYAL COMMISSIONSxx

INTRODUCTION TO THE FINAL REPORT
1
PART I. THE EXISTING LAW3
PART II. THE EXISTING STATE OF FACTS45
PART III. THE MACHINERY FOR CARRYING ON PUBLIC ELEMENTARY EDUCATION52
PART IV. THE EDUCATION AND INSTRUCTION GIVEN IN PUBLIC ELEMENTARY EDUCATION112
PART V. GOVERNMENT EXAMINATION, THE PARLIAMENTARY GRANT, AND THE COST OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS172
PART VI. LOCAL EDUCATIONAL AUTHORITIES201
PART VII. SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS208
RESERVATIONS224
REPORT OF THE HON. K. LYULPH STANLEY, Sir JOHN LUBBOCK, Sir BERNHARD SAMUELSON, Dr. R. W. DALE, Mr. SYDNEY BUXTON, Mr. T. E. HELLER, Mr. HENRY RICHARD, AND Mr. GEORGE SHIPTON237
RESERVATION250
FURTHER REPORT OF THE HON. E. LYULPH STANLEY, Dr. K. W. DALE, Mr. T. E. HELLER, Mr. HENRY RICHARD, AND Mr. GEORGE SHIPTON251
RESERVATION393
SUMMARY OF THE STATISTICAL REPORT394
LIST OF THE RECORDED DIVISIONS OF THE COMMISSION446
APPENDIX489


[page iii]

Alphabetical List of Witnesses who have given Evidence before the Commission

NameDescription
Adams, Mr. W. B.Head Master of the Fleet Road Senior Board School, Hampstead
Alexander, Mr. A.Director of the Liverpool Gymnasium, and Hon. Sec. of the National Physical Recreation Society
Allies, Mr. T. W.Secretary and Treasurer to the Catholic Poor Schools Committee
Anderson, Mr. W.Chairman of the Erith School Board, Kent
Arnold, Mr. O. T.Honorary Solicitor to the National Society
Arnold, Mr. M.Formerly one of H.M. Chief Inspectors of Schools
Aston, Rev. W.Vicar of St. Thomas', Bradford, Yorkshire
Atkinson. Rev. J.President of the Free Churches of the Primitive Methodist Society

Balchin, Mr. R.

Head Master of Nunhead Passage School
Barber, Ven. ArchdeaconArchdeacon of Chester
Baxendale, Mr. P.Head Master of Eastbrook British School, Bradford
Belsey, Mr. F. F.Chairman of the Rochester School Board
Birley, Mr. H.Member of the Manchester and Salford School Boards
Bodington, Professor N.Principal of the Yorkshire College, Leeds
Bourne, Mr. A.Secretary to the British and Foreign School Society
Bradbury, Mr. J.Head Master of the Abney British School, Mossley, Manchester
Brodie, Mr. B. H.H.M. Inspector, Worcester District
Bromilow, Rev. W.Principal of the Home and Colonial Training College for Mistresses, Gray's Inn Road
Brooke, Mr. J. A.Chairman of the Huddersfield and Saddleworth Church Day School Institution
Bruce, Rev. R.Congregationalist Minister, Huddersfield, and Member of the Huddersfield School Board
Buckmaster, Mr. J. C.Organising Master for the Science and Arts Schools in connexion with the Science and Art Department
Burges, Rev. R. B.Vicar of St. Paul's, Birmingham
Burgwin, Mrs.Head Mistress of the Orange Street Board School, Southwark
Buxton, Mr. E. N.Late Chairman of the London School Board

Calder, Miss F.

Hon. Sec. of the Liverpool Training School of Cookery, and Hon. Sec. of the Northern Union of Training Schools of Cookery
Castle, Miss A. M.Head Mistress of Duncton National School, near Petworth
Clark, Mr. D.Head Master of the Pensnett Board School, near Dudley
Clough, Mr. R.Chairman of the Bingley School Board
Combes, Mr. E., C.M.G.President of the Institute for Technical Instruction in New South Wales
Conway, Mr. L.Head Master of the Holy Cross Roman Catholic Schools, Liverpool
Cromwell, Rev. CanonPrincipal of St. Mark's Training College, Chelsea
Crosskey, Rev. Dr.Chairman of the School Management Committee of the Birmingham School Board, and one of the Hon. Secs, of the Central Nonconformist Committee
Cumin, Mr. P., C.B.Secretary of the Education Department
Cunynghame, Mr. H. H. S.One of H.M. Assistant Charity Commissioners

Daglish, Mr. W. S.

Representative of the North of England Voluntary Schools Federation
Daniel, Rev. CanonPrincipal of St. John's Training College, Battersea
Davenport-Hill, Miss R.Member of the London School Board
Davies, Mr. D. I.H.M. Sub-Inspector of Schools, Merthyr Tydvil District
Deane, Rev. Preb. MackeethRector of East Marden, and Manager of the Chichester and Brighton Training Colleges
Devonshire, Mr. J. H.Head Master of the Wesleyan School, Mintern Street, Hoxton
Diggle, Rev. J. R.Chairman of the London School Board
Duncan, Rev. J.Secretary to the National Society

Evans, Mr. B. G.

Secretary to the Society for the utilisation of the Welsh Language in Education, Cardiff

Fawcett, Mrs. H.
Fielden, Mrs.Todmorden, Lancashire
Finch, Mr. A.H.M. Inspector's Assistant, West Ham District
Fish, Mr. J.Head Master of the Blue Coat School, Durham
Fitch, Mr. J. G.H.M. Chief Inspector of Training Colleges for Schoolmistresses
Fox, Miss C.Head Mistress of St. Patrick's Infant School, Manchester


[page iv]

Gilmore, Rev. J.Chairman of the Sheffield School Board
Graham, Rev. Dr.Principal of St. Mary's Roman Catholic Training College, Brook Green, Hammersmith
Graves, Mr. A. P.H.M. Inspector, Taunton District
Greening, Mr. W. H.Member of the Birmingham School Board
Griffiths, Ven. ArchdeaconChairman and Hon. Treasurer of the Council of the Society for the utilisation of the Welsh Language in Education
Grove, Mr. J. W.Head Master of All Souls' School, Langham Place

Hance, Mr. E.

Clerk to the Liverpool School Board
Hanson, Mr. J.Vice-Chairman of the Bradford School Board, and Chairman of the School Management Committee
Harrison, Mr. H. E. B.H.M. Inspector of Schools, Liverpool District
Headdon, MissMember of the Association for the Promotion of Housewifery
Healing, Mr. T.H.M. Sub-Inspector, Romford District
Henderson, Mr. A. D. C.Head Master of St. Luke's Church of England School, Chadderton, Oldham
Holdsworth, Mr. D.Head Master of Clarence Street Wesleyan Schools, Newcastle-on-Tyne
Holgate, Mr. W.H.M. Inspector of Schools under the Local Government Board for the Metropolitan District
Horn, Mr. J. S.Clerk to the Burnley Union School Attendance Committee
Horsefield, Mr. E.Head Master of St. Saviour's School, Everton, near Liverpool

Jones, Mr. H.

Professor in the University College, Bangor

Keenan, Right Hon. Sir Patrick, K.C.M.G., C.B.

Resident Commissioner of National Education in Ireland
Kelly, Rev. C. H.Secretary to the Wesleyan Methodist Sunday School Union
Knowles, Mrs. S.Head Mistress of Dibden National School, near Southampton

Lambert, Miss A.
Lee, Mr. W.Clerk to the Leeds School Board
Leigh, Mr. W.Chairman of the Stockport School Attendance Committee
Lewis, Rev. D.Rector of Merthyr-Tydvil
Lingen, The LordFormerly Secretary of the Education Department

McCarthy, Rev. E. F. M.

Vice-President of the Birmingham School Board
McKenzie, Mr. J.H.M. Sub-Inspector on Supply
McNeile, Rev. CanonVicar of St. Paul's, Liverpool, and Chairman of the Liverpool School Managers' Conference
Magnus, Sir P.Organising Director and Secretary of the City and Guilds of London Institute for the Advancement of Technical Education
Manley, Miss L.Head Teacher and Mistress of Method at the Stockwell Training College
Mansford, Mr. C.Vice-Principal of the Wesleyan Training College, Westminster
Martin, Mr. W.H.M. Sub-Inspector, Marylebone District
Maul, Rev. R. G.Vicar of Hopesay, Aston-on-Clun
Menet, Rev. J.Vicar of Hockerill, Herts, and late Chaplain of the Hockerill Training College
Mitchell, Mr. C. T.Member of the Committee of the National Vigilance Association
Morris, Mr. E.Head Master of the British School, Menai Bridge, Anglesea
Morrison, Dr.Director of the Free Church Normal Training College, Glasgow
Murray, Mr. J.Head Master of St. Francis Xavier Roman Catholic Schools, Liverpool
Muscott, Mr. W.Head Master of the Garsington Church of England Mixed Schools, near Oxford

Napper, Miss S.

Head Mistress of Rochford Church School, near Tenby
Neath, Miss C.Head Mistress of Ditton National School, near Maidstone
Newbold, Mr. J.Late Head Teacher of a Wesleyan School, Manchester
Nickal, Mr. J.Inspector under the London School Board
Norris, Ven. Archdeacon, D.D.Archdeacon of Bristol
Nunn, Rev. J.Chairman of the Manchester Sohool Board

Oakelet, Mr. H. E.

H.M. Chief Inspector of Training Colleges for Schoolmasters
O'Donoghue, Mr. J. J.Clerk to the Kingston-on-Hull School Board
Osterberg, Madame B.Principal of Hampstead Physical Training College
Owen, Dr. I.Member of the Society for the Utilisation of the Welsh Language in Education


[page v]

Palgrave, Mr. R. H. InglisBelton, Great Yarmouth
Palmer, Mr. J.A representative of the Church of England Sunday School Institute
Parish, Rev. W. D.Vicar of Selmeston, Sussex
Parker, Mr. H.Chairman of the Birkenhead School Attendance Committee
Paton, Rev. J. B., D.D.Member of the Recreative Evening Classes Association
Powell, Mr. J.Head Master of the National School, Northill, Beds
Powell, Mr. T. E.A representative of the Working Classes
Price, Rev. N.Vice-Chainnan of the School Board, Bushey, Herts

Randall, Miss E.

Head Mistress of St. Philip's Girls' School, Heigham, Norwich
Richards, Rev. H. W. P.Vicar of Isleworth
Richards, Rev. W. J. B., D.D.Diocesan Inspector of Roman Catholic Schools, St. Charles' College, Notting Hill
Ridgeway, Mr. W.Head Master of the Staveley Works School, near Chesterfield
Rigby, Mr. T.Secretary to the Royal Manchester, Liverpool, and North Lancashire Agricultural Society
Robinson, Mr. J.Chairman of the School Attendance Committee of the Leek Union
Roe, Rev. PrebendaryRector of Poyntington, Dorset. Diocesan Inspector and formerly Lecturer of the late Training College at Highbury
Rogers, Mr. A. C.Assistant Teacher in the Bellenden Road Board School, Peckham
Roofer, Mr. T. G.One of H.M. Inspectors of Schools
Roscoe, Sir H. E., M.P.Member of the late Royal Commission on Technical Education

Sargent, Mr. E. B.

Toynbee Hall, late Secretary to the London Pupil Teachers' Association
Scotson, Mr. J.Head master of the Higher Grade School, Manchester
Scott, Rev. J. J.Rector of St. Clement's, Salford
Seabrook, Mr. J. F.Organising Master of the Rochester Diocesan Board of Education
Sharpe, Rev. T. W.One of H.M. Chief Inspectors of Schools
Sizer, Mr. G. J.Chairman of the School Attendance Committee, Tendring Hundred, Essex
Smith, Mr. C.Head Master of St. Thomas' Charterhouse Church School
Smyth, Mr. T.A representative of the Working Classes, Chelsea
Snape, Mr. T.Member of the United Methodist Free Churches
Stamer, Ven. Archd. Sir L.Chairman of the Stoke-upon-Trent School Board
Stevens, Mr. E.Head Master of the Hartlip Endowed School, Sittingbourne
Stevenson, LadyManager of Schools under the London School Board
Stewart, Rev. D. J.One of H.M. Chief Inspectors of Schools
Synge, Rev. F.H.M. Chief Inspector, Eastern Division

Tait, Mr. S. B.

Late Head Master of a Board School, Huddersfleld
Towers, Mr. E.Secretary of the Sunday School Union
Trevor, Miss P.Principal of the Bishop Otter Memorial College, Chichester
Twiss, Mr. C.Head Master of the British School, Warrington

Waller, Rev. D. J.

Secretary to the Wesleyan Education Committee
Warbubton, Rev. CanonOne of H.M. Chief Inspectors of Schools
Waymouth, Mr. S.Head Master of a Private School, Seven Sisters' Road, Holloway
Whittenbury, MissHead Mistress of the Sydney Road Board School, Homerton
Wild, Mr. R.Head Master of Byron Road Board School, Bromley, E.
Wilkinson, Mr. T.Late Head Master of a Board School, Harrow
Wilks, Mr. M.Member of the London School Board
Willes, Rev. CanonRector of Monk Sherborne, Basingstoke
Williams, Rev. C.Chairman of the Baptist Union, Accrington
Williams, Mr. H.Representative of the Working Classes, Gray's Inn Road
Williams, Mr. H. R.Chairman of the Ragged School Union
Williams, Mr. L., J.P.Chairman of the Cardiff School Board
Williams, Mr. R. B.Superintendent of the Visitors of the London School Board, East Lambeth Division
Williams, Mr. T. M.Member of the Society for the Utilisation of the Welsh Language in Education
Williams, Mr. W.H.M. Chief Inspector in Wales
Wingfield, Rev. CanonRector of Welwyn, Herts
Wright, Mr. T. G.Inspector of Board Schools, Bristol


[page vi]

LIST OF RETURNS, TABLES, AND OTHER PAPERS FURNISHED TO THE COMMISSION AND PUBLISHED IN OTHER VOLUMES OF THE REPORT

Returns, Tables, &c. furnished to the Commission by Mr. P. Cumin, C.B.

Vol. I
I. Relating to -
    (1) Buildings.
    (2) Progress in numbers, 1860 to 1885.
    (3) Income, maintenance, and annual grants.
    (4) School staff and average salaries.
    (5) Merit grants.
    (6) Tables 1870 to 1885.
518
II. Return obtained by Mr. H. H. Fowler, Sess. 1883, No. 107, with additional figures522
III. Return showing the amount of grant claimed per scholar in small schools524
IV. List of School Boards dissolved under section 41 of the Elementary Education Act, 1876525
V. School Board Schools (Religious Teaching), List of Parliamentary Returns525
VI. List of cases where annual grant was allowed -
    (1) Where School Board did not consider it to be required.
    (2) Where School Board did not dissent although school was unnecessary.
    (3) Dealt with before the Minute of 21st June 1878.
    (4) Where unnecessary so far as supply was concerned.
    (5) List of cases in non-Board districts treated as unnecessary under 21st June 1878, Code 1879, Art. 7c ; and Code 1882, Art. 91.
    (6) List of refusals of annual grant in School Board districts. Sec. 98.
525
VII. (Table A) showing the distribution of the population of England and Wales under School Boards and School Attendance Committees528
VIII. (Table B) showing the distribution of the population of England and Wales under Bye Law Standards529
IX. (Table C) showing duration of school life530
X. (Table D) Return, showing the cost per scholar, 1865-85 (under denominations)530
XI. Tables showing, for infant schools and classes -
(1) the average number of scholars in attendance (for payment); the percentage of schools and classes recommended for payment under Art. 106; and the average rate of claim per scholar (in average attendance; from returns of schools inspected for the year ending 31st August 1885.
(2) the same for "certain localities".
(3) Table showing -
    (i) for schools and classes for older scholars, the number of departments, the average number of scholars in attendance (for payment), the percentage of departments recommended for payments under Art. 109, and the average rate of claims for payments.
    (ii) the percentage of pupil-teachers recommended for payment under Art. 110; the number of small schools paid special grants under Art. 111, and the (total) rate of claim per scholar in average attendance (infants and older scholars); from return of schools inspected for the year ending 31st August 1885.
531
XII. Return showing, for Counties in England and Wales and in the Metropolitan District, the number of schools in which the accommodation is less than 60, the accommodation, and the average number of scholars in attendance in those schools, from Returns for year ending 31st August 1885534
XIII. Return showing, for Counties in England and Wales and in the Metropolitan District, the number of schools with accommodation for 60 or more in which the average attendance is less than 60, the average number of scholars in attendance, and the accommodation in those schools, from Returns for year ending 31st August 1885355
XIV. Table showing summary of merit grant in the Metropolitan Division, year ending 1885536
XV. Return moved for by Mr. Molloy, 1885 (Voluntary Schools)
"Return for the years 1869 to 1884, showing the following particulars for Voluntary Schools:
1. The average cost per child in average attendance.
2. The average grant per child in average attendance.
3. The average school fees per child in average attendance.
4. The voluntary contributions per child in average attendance."
537
XVI. Return moved for by Mr. Mundella, 1885 (Voluntary Schools)
"Return showing, during the period from 1870 to 1885, in each year:
1. The number of children attending voluntary Schools.
2. The total amount of expenditure.
3. The amount of school fees.
4. The amount of voluntary subscriptions.
5. The amount of Government Grant.
6. The amount received from other sources; and
7. The number of new Schools established."
537
XVII. Minute of the Committee of Council on Education approving of Time Tables538

Vol. II
XVIII. List of Local Authorities declared in default under the Elementary Education Acts, 1870, 18791004
XIX. List of public inquiries held pursuant to Sec. 73, Education Act, 18701005

Vol. III
XX. Return showing the number of School Boards dissolved under Sec. 41 of the Elementary Education Act, 1876. Handed in by Mr. Patrick Cumin, C.B.709
XXI. Return showing the number of pupil-teachers obtaining 60s and 40s respectively in Board Voluntary Schools. Handed in by Mr. Patrick Cumin, C.B.710
XXII. Return showing the inspectorial staff for the years 1871-86. Handed in by Mr. Patrick Cumin, C.B.710

Papers handed in by the Rev. J. R. Diggle, M.A., Chairman of the School Board for London

Vol. III
I. Table showing the accommodation, the number on the roll, and the average attendance, &c. at efficient schools in the school district of London1028
II. Table showing the number of children (in various standards) on the roll of the London School Board for the week ending 19th March 18861029
III. Return showing the ages of the children on the roll, by departments, in each division of the School Board for London on the 19th March 18861031


[page vii]

Vol. II
IV. Return showing the accommodation in efficient voluntary schools which were in existence in December 1874, but which have since been closed, and the reasons for closing. (Midsummer 1886)1031
V. Return of prosecutions, year ended 31st December 18861032
VI. Table showing the difference in the mode of assessment of the merit grant by various inspectors in the London School Board district1033
VII. Table showing the variation of the percentage of attendance with the fee of the school1035
VIII. Return of the School Board for London showing the number of pupil teachers and ex-pupil teachers, at present attending pupil teachers' schools, who have previously attended secondary schools1036
IX. Return showing the results of examination of pupil teachers, the reports on whom were received during the years 1881, 1884, and 18861036
X. Tables shewing the results of scholarship examination in 1885 and 1886 in the case of pupil teachers instructed at centres1036
XI. Tables showing the number of schools in poor and bad districts at which the "Excellent", "Good", and "Fair" merit grant has been earned1037
XII. Return showing the number of schools examined in drawing as a class subject during the year 18861038
XIII. Table showing the specific subjects in which children were examined by Her Majesty's Inspector, and the number who passed in each subject, during the year ended 25th September 18851039
XIV. Return of the number of cases of children whose fees are being remitted by the Board or paid by the guardians on the 25th of March 18871040
XV. A draft Bill to enable the School Board for London to grant superannuation pensions1040
XVI. Correspondence and report having reference to the building of a board school in Upper Kennington Lane, 18841041
XVII. Regulations of the School Board for London as to religious instruction1045
XVIII. Report of the School Board for London on the examination in Scripture knowledge for prizes offered by Mr. Francis Peek and the Religious Tract Society1051
XIX. School Board for London. Instruction in cookery: monthly accounts showing the amounts received for sale of food for the month ended 11th December 18861056
XX. Table showing the social condition of candidates for scholarships1057
XXI. Return showing the rating of board and voluntary schools in the school district of London1068
XXII. Return of all children above seven years of age admitted to schools under the School Board for London opened during the year ended September 30th, 18861090

Papers handed in by Witnesses to supplement their Evidence

Vol. I
I. Statement showing approximately the number of parishes in England and Wales which have populations not exceeding 500, according to the Census of 1881. Furnished by the Local Government Board539
II. Specimen Infants Time Table. Furnished by Mr. Sharpe540
III. Specimen Time Table Summaries. Furnished by the Rev. D. J. Stewart542
IV. Analysis of time table of the Fleet Road Board School. Furnished by Mr. W. B. Adams1016
V. Time table for boys in the Central Board School, Manchester. Furnished by Mr. Scotson1017

Vol. II
VI. Extracts from reports of H.M. Inspectors with reference to school gardens. Handed in by Mr. Wilkinson1020
VII. Draft of proposed Bill to make further provision for elementary education in day and evening schools. Put in by Dr. Crosskey1020
VIII. Extracts from Minutes of the School Board for London with reference to cases for prosecution. Handed in by Mr. Buxton1021
IX. Time table for central classes for pupil-teachers. Furnished by Rev. B. F. M. MacCarthy1022
X. Scheme of the Bradford School Board for religious observances and instruction. Put in by Mr. Hanson1023
XI. Notice of the Bradford School Board with reference to scholarships in the Higher Board Schools for the children of poor parents. Handed in by Mr. Hanson1025
XII. Scheme of salaries of the Bristol School Board. Put in by Mr. Wright1025
XIII. Statement of M. J. Barrington Ward, Esq., one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools, in reply to the evidence of Mr. David Clark1092
XIV. Statement of R. M. Fowler, Esq., one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools, in reply to the evidence of the Ven. Archdeacon Sir Lovelace Stamer, Bart.1092
XV. Statement of Mr. S. Baxendale, Eastbrook School, Bradford, in reply to the evidence of T. G. Rooper, Esq., one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools.

Returns, Tables, &c. handed in by Witnesses

Vol. III
XVI. Table showing the number of cases of children whose fees were under remission by the School Board for London on the 18th March 1887, together with the periods for which the fees were remitted702
XVII. Return as to Church Schools in the borough of Bradford for the year ending 16th May 1887. Handed in by Mr. Leigh703
XVIII. List of members of the Stockport School Board, showing their occupations, for the years 1876-9. Handed in by Mr. Leigh704
XIX. List of members of the Stockport Borough School Attendance Committee, showing their occupations, 1887. Handed in by Mr. Leigh704
XX. Return of the Stockport Borough School Attendance Committee, showing the average attendance for the year 1886-7. Handed in by Mr. Leigh704
XXI. Official statement of the course of each school under the Birmingham School Board. Handed in by the Rev. B. Burges705
XXII. Comparative Return showing to what extent specific subjects are taught in Board and Denominational Schools, Huddersfield. Handed in by the Rev. Dr. Bruce706
XXIII. Comparison between Board Schools with other schools in Huddersfield with regard to the merit grant and grant per head. Handed in by Rev. Dr. Bruce706
XXIV. Return of the Huddersfield and District Pupil-Teachers' Examination Association. Handed in by Rev. Dr. Bruce706
XXV. Return showing the number of children sent to Industrial Schools from Huddersfield. Handed in by Rev. Dr. Bruce707
XXVI. Table showing comparison between the accommodation in Denominational and Board Schools in Huddersfield. Handed in by Rev. Dr. Bruce707
XXVII. List of schools in Bradford transferred to the Board with dates of transfer. Handed in by the Rev. Dr. Aston706
XXVIII. Table showing the rating of voluntary schools and of Board schools in Bradford. Handed in by the Rev. Dr. Aston708
XXIX. Return showing the number in each standard in the Bradford Higher Board Schools. Handed in by the Rev. Dr. Aston708
XXX. Return showing the average attendance in evening schools in England and Wales for the year ending August 1878. Handed in by the Rev. Dr. Paton708


[page viii]

Vol. III
XXXI. Statement showing the arrangements for the education of pauper children at various periods from the 25th March 1883 to 1st March 1887. Handed in by Mr. W. Holgate709
XXXII. Statistical statement illustrating certain facts mentioned in the evidence of Mr. W. Martin, H.M. sub-Inspector709
XXXIII. Three time tables for evening schools showing how recreative and practical classes can be inwoven with Code classes. Handed in by the Rev. Dr. Paton711
XXXIV. Table giving an estimate of expenditure and of income in a recreative evening school. Handed in by the Rev. Dr. Paton713
XXXV. Table showing actual receipts and expenditure in a recreative evening school at Gateshead. Handed in by the Rev. Dr. Paton713
XXXVI. Table showing the number of migrations, scheduling 1887. School Board of London, East Lambeth Division716
XXXVII. Education (Scotland) Act, 1878, sections 6 and 6. Handed in by Mrs. Henry Pawcett716
XXXVIII. Summary of the law, Elementary Education Acts, 1876 and 1880, as to the employment of children within the London School Board district. Handed in by Mr. Mitchell716
XXXIX. Extract from the Law of State of New York, 1876, as to the employment of children. Handed in by Mr. Mitchell717
XL. Memorandum upon the education of the working classes in Paris. Handed in by Mr. Cunynghame717
XLI. Copy of a set of rules drawn up by the Taunton School Attendance Committee. Handed in by Mr. A. P. Graves733
XLII. Specimen examination papers for candidates for the Irish inspectorate. Handed in by Sir Patrick Keenan, K.C.M.G.734
XLIII. A paper showing some comparative statistics of illiteracy in England, 1870 and 1887. Collected by the Rev. J. H. Eigg, D.D.735
XLIV. Table showing the population in each county, the population under School Boards the number of scholars on the registers, and in average attendance in the year 1885740
XLV. Table showing, for each county, changes in percentage of population on the registers and in average attendance between 1882 and 1885741
XLVI. Table showing the number of School Boards in each county, in parishes with a population of 100, 200, 300, 400, and 500, respectively742
XLVII and XLVIII. Tables showing names of parishes in each county with a population under 200 and 300 respectively, and the rate levied in each in 1885743
XLIX. Return showing the number of School Boards in parishes with populations under 400 or 500 respectively, in which the rates in 1885 were above 6d.744
L. Return showing the names of School Boards in parishes with populations ranging from 300 to 500, for which a rate of more than Is. in the pound was levied in 1885744
LI. Return showing the percentage of population between certain ages according to the census of 1861-71 and 1881744





[page ix]

SYLLABUS OF POINTS FOR INQUIRY

1. The existing law - how it grew up:

A. The law previous to 1870.

(a) The grants from Government, from 1832 to 1858.
(b) The recommendations of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission of 1858.
(c) The Codes, 1862-1870, following the Report (1861) of that Commission.

B. The Acts from 1870 to 1880.

(a) Principal provisions of the Act of 1870.
(b) Principal provisions of the Act of 1873.
(c) Principal provisions of the Act of 1876.
(d) Principal provisions of the Act of 1880.

C. The Codes and Instructions after 1870.

(a) The Code, 1871, adapting former Codes to the Act of 1870.
(b) The Codes, 1872 to 1881.
(c) The Code, 1882.
(d) Subsequent Codes.
(e) Instructions to Inspectors.

2. The existing state of facts, as to

(a) Buildings:
(b) Number of scholars:
(c) Income and expenditure:
(d) Staff and salaries:
(e) Comparison of voluntary and board schools:
(f) Merit grants:
(g) Small schools:
(h) Training colleges:
(k) Average duration of school life.

3. The working of the law:

The provision made -

(a) For the supply of schools:

(i) Sufficiency:
(a) How far is it attained?
(b) On what basis is it calculated?
(c) To what extent should provision be made for children
    Between 3 and 5,
    Between 11 and 13:
(d) To what extent should "babies' rooms" be supplied?

(ii) Suitability:
(a) By whom, in practice, is it determined?
(b) On what principles?
(c) What account should be taken of religious differences?

(b) For the management of schools:

(c) For inspection:

(i) Is familiarity with school-work management sufficiently considered in the appointment of Inspectors?
(ii) How far should they be drawn from the ranks of elementary teachers?
(iii) Is a uniform standard of examination fairly arrived at by Inspectors?
(iv) Welsh schools.
(d) For supply of teachers:
(i) Certificated teachers:
    (a) Is the supply sufficient?
    (b) In what way should it be kept up?

(ii) Pupil-teachers:
(a) Is the supply adequate for -
    Immediate service:
    Recruiting the ranks of certificated teachers?
(b) By shortening the period of their apprenticeship, might their ranks be recruited from young persons who have passed the Senior Local University Examinations?
(c) Is the teaching received by pupil-teachers satisfactory?
(d) Is the system of instruction at centres an improvement upon the old plan?
(f) Is the instruction imparted by pupil-teachers satisfactory?
(g) Is sufficient care taken to supervise the health of the pupil-teachers and eliminate those who are physically unfit?

(iii) School staff:
(a) On what scale should it be calculated?
(b) Should the principal teacher be reckoned in calculating the staff of large schools?

(iv) Is it desirable that a general system of superannuation pensions should be established; and if so, on what principle?

(e) Training colleges:
(i) Their efficiency:
(ii) Their cost:
(iii) Day training colleges (as in Scotland).
(f) For regular attendance of children:
(i) Compulsion:
(a) How is it carried out by -
    School boards?
    School attendance committees?
(b) To what extent has it increased -
    The numbers on the roll?
    Regularity of attendance?
(c) How far is the 22 weeks system as qualification for examination an improvement on the 250 attendances in inducing the teachers to interest themselves in regularity of attendance?
(d) What residuum of school population is left untouched?
(e) Would day industrial schools (as recommended by Royal Commission) be the best way of meeting the difficulty in such cases?
(f) Labour certificates?

(ii) Obstacles to school attendance:
How far are they due to -
(a) poverty or neglect on the part of parents?
(b) capricious migration from school to school?
(c) laxity of school authorities?
(d) working of Summary Jurisdiction Act, 1879, as affecting the collection of the fines imposed on the parent?
(e) attitude of magistrates?

(iii) should half-time standards be abolished?
    The working of the half-time system,

(iv) Should the 5th Standard be universally made the standard for total exemption?

4. The efficiency of our present machinery both central and local:

A. For average children:

I. Religious and moral training:

(a) What was the former, and what is the present practice as regards moral training and inculcation of morality?
Is there any tendency in the present system, as compared with the system in use before 1870, to lower the importance of religion and morality in estimation of managers, teachers, and children?
(b) Former and present practice as to religious observances and religious teaching in -
    (1) voluntary schools:
    (2) board schools:

(i) Time given to prayer and singing of hymns.
(ii) To reading of Bible, with or without comment.
(iii) To other religious instruction.
(iv) Is it at the beginning or end of school day? or at the beginning or end of a meeting for different standards?
(v) How far is religious knowledge tested by examination?
(vi) Are registers marked before or after religious teaching and observances?
(vii) Is religious teaching suspended or abridged for some time before the day of Government inspection?
(viii) How many children withdrawn from it?
(ix) Are time-tables generally adhered to on this subject?


[page x]

(x) Is conscience clause effective? any complaints from school authorities as to infringement? or from parents?
(xi) List of purely secular schools, with number of children. Returns as to religious teaching and observances.
(xii) Are religious teaching and religious observances neglected in schools on account of the pressure of secular teaching, rendered necessary to secure State aid under the provisions of the Code?
Effect of present system on religious and moral teaching of children.
What is general wish of teachers and parents?
Inexpediency of allowing religious teaching to be given by unbelievers.
How far does present system turn out the children well-principled and conscientious?
(c) The law as to religious teaching in English-speaking Colonies, and in America, and effect.

II. Secular instruction:

(a) The subjects of instruction:

(i) The three primary subjects:
Does reading receive sufficient attention? Linear drawing?

(ii) The standards:
(a) Are the present standards right in themselves?
(b) Are the present standards too exacting?
(c) Are any standards necessary?

(iii) The class subjects and the special subjects:
(a) Are they suitable? Are they in right relation to one another and to the primary? Are they reasonably to be called elementary?
(b) What substitutes for them are desirable in special cases?
(c) How far is the bilingual difficulty met in Wales?
(d) The Welsh language.
(e) How far are the class subjects within the reach of small schools?
(f) Should not the school authorities be allowed to determine for themselves in which and how many of the class subjects they would present children for examination?
(g) Should the special subjects be deferred till Standard V is passed?
(h) Should not some which are special in the Code be class subjects in special localities?

(iv) Elementary science:
To what extent can it be taught in elementary schools?

(v) Technical instruction:
"As grants are made in girls' schools for needlework, why not for mechanical drawing and handicraft in boys' schools." (See Report of Commission on Technical Education, Vol. I., p. 524.)

(vi) Effect of present grant for cookery: Is further enlargement desirable?

(b) The quantity of the knowledge demanded:
(i) Is it such as to cause over-pressure? Definition of over-pressure.

(ii) Does over-pressure still exist to any extent? If so, what does it arise from, in the case of -
    (a) teachers?
    (b) pupil-teachers?
    (c) scholars?

(iii) How is it to be remedied?

(iv) Is the amount of knowledge required more than average children can master thoroughly?

(v) Is due effect given by inspectors to the claims for exemption from examination allowed by the Code?

(vi) Is the amount required under any one head too much? or too little?

(c) The organisation of the school:
(i) Does the Code interfere with the freedom of the organisation? and, if so, how, and to what extent?

(ii) Is it desirable, and, if so, under what circumstances, to grade the schools in large places? and to have promotions from one to another?

(iii) In large centres of population, ought encouragement to be given to the establishment of higher elementary schools, and, if so, on what basis?

(d) The effect of -
(i) merit grants:

(ii) should a larger amount of the Parliamentary grant be made to depend on attendance, and less on individual examination?

(e) The effect of paying for education according to results tested by annual examinations -

(i) on teachers:
(ii) on scholars:
(iii) on schools aided on fixed standards under every variety of circumstances and requirements:
(iv) on inspection:
(v) on the quality of the education.
(f) Total educational result -

How far does the present system tend to turn out the children -

(i) Well-principled and conscientious?
(ii) Generally intelligent?
(iii) Capable of earning their living?
B. For exceptional children:

(a) The effect of the system on the dull and in any way deficient:

(i) Is there any tendency to neglect the dull for the clever?
(ii) Is any special provision for such children possible? or desirable?
(b) The effect on the clever and gifted:
(i) Is there any tendency to neglect the clever for the dull?
(ii) Could exhibitions be provided for enabling the clever to proceed to more advanced schools?

5. Board schools:

(i) Comparison between board schools and other public elementary schools in reference to -

(a) Buildings and playgrounds:
(b) Apparatus and general equipment:
(c) Attendance:
(d) Staff:
(e) Results: General: In selected districts.
(ii) Are there any, and, if any, what, characteristic differences between the working and results of board schools and of other inspected elementary schools, arising out of the different conditions under which the two classes of schools respectively are managed and maintained?

(iii) Are there educational and other reasons in favour of -

(a) The universal establishment of school boards?
(b) The transfer to school boards of the administrative power and financial responsibilities of denominational managers, leaving to denominational managers the provision of religious instruction in all denominational schools?
(c) The limitation of the education given by the boards in board schools to secular subjects, and the opening of the schools before and after the hours of secular teaching to the clergy and other representatives of the churches for purposes of religious instruction?
6. Special schools and their difficulties:
(a) Rural schools:
(b) Half-time schools:
(c) Welsh schools:
(d) Workhouse schools.
7. Relations of ordinary elementary schools to other schools - (a) How far does the present system prepare for, or encroach upon -
(i) Technical education?
(ii) Advanced general education?
(b) Evening schools:
(i) Should different standards of proficiency be recognised for town and country?
(ii) To what extent should the curriculum of work be a repetition, or extension, of that done in the elementary school?
(iii) Is the number of nights excessive that a school must be open to obtain a grant?
(iv) Ought some attendance at evening school up to 14 years of age to be made obligatory on those who have left the day school?

[page xi]

8. The burden of the cost:

(a) On the central Government:

(i) Is the system of protecting the national purse by inspection, &c. sufficient?
(ii) Might it be made less stringent, and larger authority given to local bodies, e.g., the proposed county boards?
(iii) Ought the 17s 6d limit to be removed? (Act of 1876, sect. 19 (1)).
(b) On the rates:
(i) Would it be possible to throw more on the rates? or less?
(ii) To what extent would the proper division of cost to be borne by the State and by rates depend on the amount of control exercised by a local authority (say the county board), and on the resources for taxation (personal property, licence duties) conferred on the latter?
(c) On voluntary subscribers:
(i) Could their burden be put directly or indirectly on the rates, without involving control by the general body of ratepayers?
(ii) If putting the burden on the rates involves control by the ratepayers, is this an objection or the reverse?
(iii) What is the financial condition of voluntary schools?
(iv) Are many in struggling circumstances?
(v) Is it chiefly the small schools which feel the pressure?
(vi) In view of the disadvantages under which small schools labour in earning grants, should there be an extension of the present grants (provided in the Act of 1876, s. 19 (2),) in all cases where the average attendance does not exceed 60?
(d) On the parents:
(i) Is the burden on parents unreasonable?
(ii) Does it damage the efficiency of the school by causing irregularity of attendance or the like?
(iii) Would it be possible to put this burden anywhere else, without involving further control by those who bore it?
(iv) If the burden be removed from the parents, and control by those who become the bearers of that burden follows, will this be an advantage to education or the reverse? Should parents have a voice in the selection of the persons having the control, and, if so, in what way, and within what limits?
(v) If the fee is to be retained, should the county court be made easily available for the recovery of fees in arrears?
(vi) To what extent are the fees of indigent scholars -
    (a) remitted by school boards?
    (b) paid by guardians?
    (c) left unpaid?
(vii) What better machinery could be provided for the payment of fees of indigent scholars than that now adopted?
(viii) What has been the effect on attendance of -
    (a) fees remitted?
    (b) fees paid by guardians?
9. School libraries and museums:

Should grants in aid be made to meet local contributions for these objects?

10. School boards:

(a) Should the present system of election be maintained?
(b) Should members be elected for a longer period than three years?
(c) How could the expense of these elections be curtailed?
(d) Do the conditions of transfer of voluntary schools need alteration?
(e) Enlargement or diminution of rating area of school boards:
(f) Should facilities for dissolution of school boards be increased?
(g) Position of managers under school boards:
    Should they be given further legal recognition with definite duties and powers?
    Should they be especially elected by the ratepayers or continue to be nominated by the board?
(h) School attendance committee contracting with neighbouring district.

11. Grievances:

Most of the grievances would come before the Commission under the foregoing heads; but there would be some which must be treated separately, more or less.

(a) The teachers complain -

(i) that they have nothing to look forward to; neither pensions nor career, nor means of laying by money.
(ii) that there is no adequate appeal against capricious dismissal; and also as to the present mode of dealing with their appeals.
(b) Employers complain that the education unfits the children for manual labour, and gives them a distaste for it.

(c) Parents complain that they lose the services of their children to an unreasonable degree; and that the compulsion is too rigid.

(d) Managers complain of -

(i) the difficulty of raising the necessary money;
(ii) the perpetually increased requirements of the Department, both in money and in standard of the children's attainment;
(iii) the rigidity of the system prescribed by the Code;
(iv) the rating of schools;
(v) the absence of adequate means of appeal against faults of inspection and imperfect reports of inspectors;
(vi) the capricious removal of teachers.
Are any of these complaints well founded? and remediable?

12. Committee of Council on Education:

Is the present constitution of the Education Department satisfactory?




[page xii]

SYNOPSIS

PART I

THE EXISTING LAW

CHAPTER I

The Administration of the Education Grant, 1832 to 1858

Education societies.
First Treasury Grants.
First meeting of Committee of Council.
Normal schools.
Minute of September 24th, 1839.
Minute of December 3rd, 1839.
Her Majesty's inspectors of schools.
Factories Regulation Bill.
Training colleges erected.
Maintenance grants.
Pupil teachers.
Management clauses.
Management clauses opposed.
Building grants to 1846.
Numbers then in school.
Condition of schools.
Pensions to teachers.
Grants withheld from secular schools.
Capitation grants.
Description of an educated lad of 12 years old.
Aided schools described by Mr. Norris.
Vice President created.
Prince Consort's Conference.
Bad attendance.
Principle of minutes, 1846.
Original Code.
Grants from 1839 to 1860.
Summary of minutes of regulations
Government expenditure from 1839 to 1860
Appointment of Royal Commission.

CHAPTER II

The Duke of Newcastle's Commission of 1858, Codes from 1862 to 1870

Duke of Newcastle's Commission.
Complaints against existing education.
Report on facts.
Quality of education.
Estimate of Commission questioned.
Recommendations of the Commission.
Two grants prepared.
From the State.
From the county rate.
Conditions for obtaining these grants.
Conditions for grant from the State.
School to be under certificated teacher.
Pupil-teachers.
County examination.
Grant from the county rate.
Dependent upon examination.
Scholars under seven.
County board.
Board in corporate and large towns.
Borough board of education.
Periods of election.
Inspector on each board.
Examiners.
Payment by individual results.
Support from local rates.
Mr. Lowe's Revised Code.
Revised Code.
Tendency of the Code.
Grants to normal schools reduced.
Objections.
Principles of revised Code.
The basis of present system.
Decline in grant.
Statements on both sides as to the effect of the revised Code on the grant.
Experience of working the revised Code.
Its tendencies.
Reduction of pupil-teachers.
Conscience clause.
Mr. Corry's Minute, February 20th, 1867.
Bills preceding Mr. Forster's Act.

CHAPTER III

The Education Act, 1870 to 1880

Legislation of 1870.
Principles of Mr. Forster's Bill.
The State powerless.
Objects of the Bill.
Changes made in passing through Parliament.
School districts.
School provision made obligatory.
Suitability as defined by Instructions to Inspectors.
School boards.
Provisions of the Act of 1870.
No preference to either class of school.
Sources of school board income.
School fund.
Proposed rate support to voluntary schools out of the rates.
Commuted for increase of grant.
Transfers.
Cowper-Temple clause.
Her Majesty's Inspectors.
Powers of school boards.
Restrictions on Parliamentary grant.
Unnecessary schools.
Grants made wholly for secular instruction.
Limits of grant.
Power to fulfil conditions of annual grants.
Diocesan and other inspection.
Compulsion.


[page xiii]

CHAPTER III - The Education Act, 1870 to 1880 - cont.

Minutes part of the law.
Summary of Mr. Forster's Act.
Act of 1873.
Lord Sandon's Act, 1876.
Compulsion.
Exemption.
Local authorities.
Exceptions.
Payment of fees by guardians.
Wastrel clause.
Day industrial school.
Provisions as to day industrial school.
Honour certificates.
Increased grants.
Limits of grant.
Power extended of making byelaws.
Administrative powers of Department.
School Attendance Committees in default.
Officers of local authority.
Attendance committee not a rating authority.
Local committee.
Urban sanitary authority.
Payment of fees.
Fraudulent declarations.
Two members to prosecute.
Agent answerable for offence.
Payment of fees for paupers.
Dissolution of school boards.
Administrative provisions of Act of 1870 extended.
Mr. Mundella's Act of 1880.

CHAPTER IV

Codes and Instructions to Inspectors, 1870 to 1885

Origin of Codes.
Codes laid on the table.
Codes acquire statutory force.
Code of 1871.
Conditions of grant.
Codes 1872, 1873 1874.
Code of 1875.
Code of 1876.
Grant for discipline.
Pensions to teachers.
Code of 1877.
The Child's School Book.
Code of 1878.
Code of 1879.
Recognition of "unnecessary schools".
Code of 1882.
Calculation of the grant.
Qualification for examination.
Changes introduced by the Code of 1882.
Merit grant.
Instructions to inspectors, 1882.
Classification.
Payment on results.
Instructions to inspectors.
Moral training.
Method of conducting examinations.
Excellent merit grant.
Home lessons.
Exemption from examination.
Instructions circulated.



PART II

The Existing State of Facts

CHAPTER I

The Existing State of Facts

Returns.
Earlier statistics exclude schools unconnected with Government. Building grants.
Training colleges.
Cost of maintenance.
Building grants.
Progress.
Numbers.
Proportion of scholars to population.
Average attendance.
Results.
Progressive cost of education.
Charge on Government grants.
Charge on local resources.
Aggregate expenditure.
Teachers.
Merit grant.
Average size of schools.
Small schools.
Comparison voluntary and board school work.
Population under boards and school attendance committees.
Age of leaving school.
Population under byelaws.
Duration of school life.
Growth of voluntary schools from 1870 to 1885.
Average attendance at voluntary schools from 1869 to 1884.


[page xiv]

PART III

Machinery for carrying on Public Elementary Education

CHAPTER I

Supply of Schools

School supply.
Supply generally sufficient.
Excess accounted for.
Further explanations.
Basis of calculation.
Command Paper No. 3,062 of 1883.
One-sixth of the population to be accommodated.
Children between three and five.
Is provision for infants excessive?
How are requirements ascertained?
School boards primary judges.
Non-school board districts.
Prior right to supply accommodation.
The view endorsed in Parliament.
Can boards give up their prior rights?
Exception.
Mr. Forster's intention.
Grievance stated.
Dan-y-craig case.
Ultimate decision should not rest with local bodies.
Opinion of counsel.
Conclusion.
Remedy for grievances.
Effects of abolition of all restrictions.
Suitability of schools.
Transfers.
Conclusion.
Supply of original deficiency.
Supply of future deficiency.
Summary.
Who may use the supply?

CHAPTER II

Structural Suitability of the Present School Supply

Sufficient accommodation in the gross.
Quality of school accommodation.
Minimum area of accommodation.
Seat room.
Rules of the Department.
Sudden demand for more ample accommodation undesirable.
Cubical measurement.
Conclusion.
School fittings and furniture.
Playgrounds.

CHAPTER III

School Management

End for which school exists.
Two branches of management.
Qualifications for each branch of management.
Management of voluntary schools.
Management by individual persons.
Departmental scrutiny of school accounts.
Personal supervision of schools.
Who should manage voluntary schools.
Local managers under school boards.
Local managers under Liverpool School Board.
Management of Birmingham board schools.
Local managers often dispensed with.
Local managers desirable.
Difference between board and voluntary management.
General comparison.
Liverpool conference of managers.
Liverpool Council of Education.
Co-operation of voluntary schools.
Conclusion.

CHAPTER IV

H.M. Inspectors of Schools

Staff of inspectors.
Examiners.
Inspector as assistant secretary.
By whom appointed.
Qualification of inspectors.
Rules for appointment of inspectors.
Rules for appointment of examiners.
Qualifications of inspectors' assistants.
Admission of teachers to Inspectorate.
Should inspectors have practical experience of teaching?
Wide and liberal training required for inspectors.
Inspectors' duties.
Conclusion.
Past instructions to inspectors.
Examinations by specialists.
Specialists sometimes required as examiners.
Conclusion.
Female inspectors.
Inspectors' assistants.
Increased area of inspectors' districts.
More frequent change of district.
Uniform standard of examination.
Are the same tests applied to all classes of schools?
Visits without notice.
Conclusion.
Publication of reports of inspection.
Complaints against inspectors.
Examination by inspectors non-competitive.
Complaints about dictation.
Complaints to the Department.
Particular books not to be prescribed.
Examinations not to be unduly protracted.
Conclusion.


[page xv]

CHAPTER V

Teachers and Staff

Steps taken to create efficient teaching staff.
Teaching staff of 1886 compared with 1869.
Is the present supply of teachers sufficient?
Quality of present supply of teachers.
Attempts to improve the efficiency of teachers.
Untrained teachers.
Provisional certificate.
Salaries of teachers.
Fixed and variable salaries.
Restrictions on teachers.
Endorsement of certificates.
Pensions.
Conclusion.
Is the Code minimum of staff sufficient?
Present staff in excess of Code minimum.
Should the head teacher count on staff?
Conclusion.
Proper size of classes.
Special value of female teachers.
Pupil-teachers.
What is said against the pupil-teacher system.
What is said in its favour.
The instruction of pupil-teachers.
Conclusion.
Difficulty of finding pupil-teachers.
Sources from which pupil-teachers should be drawn.
The centre system in London.
Centre system at Birmingham.
Centre system at Liverpool.
Effects of the centre system.
Suggested improvements in the pupil-teacher system.
Conclusion.
Grant in aid of special training for pupil-teachers.

CHAPTER VI

Training Colleges

Statistics of training colleges.
Vacant places.
Inspectors of training colleges examined.
Testimony to good results.
Criticisms by inspectors.
Practice of students in neighbouring schools.
Other criticisms.
Complaints of restrictions in training.
Conscience clause proposed.
Reasons against imposing a conscience clause.
Conclusion.
Maintenance grants.
Conclusion.
Extension of training to third year.
A third year spent at a university.
Conclusion.
Greater facilities for training required.
Day training colleges.
Mr. MacCarthy's scheme.
Mr. Cumin's scheme.
Proposed terms of grant.
Comparison of cost with existing training colleges.
Advantages claimed for Mr. Cumin's scheme.
Relative merits of day and residential training.
Training colleges affiliated to the universities and local colleges.
Professor Bodington's scheme for training.
Utilising local university colleges.
Wales.
Conclusion.
Conditions to be fulfilled.
Day training colleges and home training.
Government and support of day training colleges.
Day students in residential colleges.
Terms of admission.
Advantages of day students.
Conclusion.

CHAPTER VII

Attendance and Compulsion

Increase of scholars on the roll.
Actual number of scholars on the roll.
Regularity of attendance.
Causes of regularity of attendance.
Compulsion.
Day industrial schools.
Truant schools.
Expedients for improving regularity.
The Selmeston plan.
Answers to Circulars A and D.
Prosecutions for irregular attendance.
Attendance officers.
Local committees.
Local authorities.
Feeling of parents.
Age of leaving school.
Remedies.
Mr. Oakeley's suggestion.
Replies to Circulars A and D.
Half-time exemption in rural districts.
Partial exemption in urban districts.
Circular, 16th March 1883.
Employment of children at theatres.
Summary of obstacles to attendance.
Replies to Circulars A and D.
Conclusion.


[page xvi]

PART IV

Education and Instruction given in Public Elementary schools

CHAPTER I

Religious and Moral Training

Altered relations of the State to religious instruction.
Private schools extinguished: children compelled to spend all school life in State-controlled schools.
Recital of terms of reference.
Commission unanimous as to importance of religious and moral training.
Witnesses in favour of religious education.
Opinion of the country generally takes the same view.
Voluntary schools.
School boards.
Testimony of witnesses before the Commission and of replies to Circulars.
Opinion of the Commission as to the object and principles of education.
Opinion of Commission that Christianity is the basis of morals.
Proceed to state evidence and to give conclusions arrived at by Commission.
Results of statistical inquiry on these matters.
Return A, voluntary schools.
Return A, board schools.
Return D, from schools indiscriminately, both voluntary and board.
Conclusion as to time of marking registers. It should be before, not after, religious observations and teaching.
What is the nature and value of religious instruction in public elementary schools?
I. Voluntary schools.
Religious instruction in the schools visited by diocesan inspectors.
Present religious instruction in voluntary schools effective and intelligent.
Inspectors of religious teaching in Roman Catholic schools.
Religious teaching in Wesleyan schools.
Religious instruction in board schools.
Meagre provision for religious instruction in not a few board schools.
Effect upon children of religious instruction in board schools.
Varying evidences of witnesses.
Conclusion as to the value of religious teaching in board schools.
Hope that all board schools will rise to high standard of many.
Need of inspectors in religious teaching in board schools.
Annual examination in subjects of religious instruction already adopted in Liverpool and elsewhere.
Facilities for days for religious inspection should be provided for board schools as now for voluntary schools.
Conscience clause.
State cannot be held to endow religious education under its present arrangements respecting religion.
Misconception as to object and scope of conscience clause in Mr. Forster's Act of 1870.
Its provision for securing rights of conscience were not intended to abolish religious influence.
Statistics showing the operation of the conscience clause throughout the country.
Is the conscience clause of Mr. Forster's Act loyally carried out by managers and teachers?
Conclusion that the conscience clause is carefully observed by managers and teachers.
Case of injury to conscience of parents, having only a secular school available, is not at present met.
Provisions of Lord Sandon's Act of 1876) providing stringent securities against breach of conscience clause.
Instructions of Education Department in 1878 to Her Majesty's Inspectors as to strict observance of conscience clause.
Evidence of those in favour of secular schools.
Their proposal to prohibit religious instruction.
Positive effects of negative provisions on this subject.
The contention of those in favour of secular schools is that religious teaching is an undue tax on the strength of the teachers.
Their contention that religious instruction should only be given by religious persons.
Their fear is that the Bible, having been used as a school book should lose in the estimation of scholars.
Positive arguments on the other side in favour of religious teaching being given by the teachers.
Views of parents of the country in favour of religious teaching in day schools.
Could children receive religious teaching elsewhere?
Parents unable to supply the void.
Two alternative proposals made by advocates of purely secular education in day schools:
1. That the children shall receive religious teaching in the school out of school hours at the hand of
volunteer teachers.
2. That the religious teaching should be remitted to Sunday schools and other voluntary agencies.
Would the children attend voluntary instruction in religious matters?
Where could voluntary teachers be found?
Could ministers of religion undertake the daily religious teaching of day schools?
Religious Education Society of Birmingham tried this scheme and failed.
As to the alternative, that religious teaching should be entirely remitted to Sunday school and other voluntary agencies, would the great mass of children be provided for by Sunday schools?
Two typical cases of large classes of population quoted:
1. Children of poor parents where there is no Sunday school.
2. Children of dissolute or criminal parents.
Conclusion that the mass of such children would receive no religious teaching and training if not in day schools.
General condition of public elementary schools as to moral training.
Misconstruction of Act of 1870 as to moral teaching.
It was not meant to place English schools in the same position as to moral training as the Paris schools.
Replies from typical counties and districts as to whether they were satisfied with the encouragement given by the State to moral training.
Her Majesty's inspectors have few opportunities of considering moral training in schools.
Many of Her Majesty's inspectors use visits without notice to inquire into moral tone.
Conclusion that much greater support should be given by State to moral training.
Recommendations respecting the fixed instructions respecting moral teaching.
Inspectors have not given attention to it in recent years which it requires.
Conclusion that, as first duty, inspectors should inquire and report thereon.
Action of other countries as to religious and moral training in schools.
Conclusions.


[page xvii]

CHAPTER II

Curriculum of Instruction

Scope of the inquiry.
Imperfect hold of knowledge gained.
Should standards be retained.
Advantages and disadvantages of standards.
Grouping of the standards.
Sample examination, and full grant for 75 per cent of passes.
Conclusion.
Reading.
Conclusion.
Writing and spelling.
Arithmetic.
Useless and unpractical arithmetic.
Conclusion.
Code syllabus.
Provision for alternative class subjects.
Text books.
Class subjects.
Conclusion.
Geography and history.
Geography.
History.
Specific subjects.
Drawing.
Conclusion.
Elementary science.
Conclusion.
Object lessons.
Technical instruction.
Needlework.
Cookery.
Music.
The Welsh language and the bi-lingual difficulty.
Physical training.
Limits of elementary education yet to be defined.
Essential subjects of instruction.

CHAPTER III

Manual and Technical Instruction

Definition.
Drawing and elementary science are proper parts of technical instruction.
Drawing in elementary schools, its history.
Useful for girls, but essential for boys.
Teaching of elementary science.
Present state of instruction in elementary science.
The present system turns out clerks rather than artisans.
Conclusion.
Science teaching.
Circulating science teachers.
Results of employing circulating science teachers.
In Liverpool.
At Birmingham.
In London.
Results.
Examination should be oral.
Signs of progress.
When manual instruction should begin.
Desire for some manual employment.
Opposing views on giving technical instruction.
School teachers.
Inspectors.
Chairmen of school boards.
Difficulties to be met.
Children between 7 and 10.
Rural schools.
Elementary scholars not sufficiently taught to take advantage of higher technical education.
The money difficulty.
Conclusion.
Further recommendations.
Advanced technical instruction.
Seventh Standard school at Birmingham.
Higher elementary schools in Manchester, Stafford, &c.
A danger pointed out.
Present efforts fragmentary and partial.
Voluntary effort to be encouraged, not supplanted.
What authority is to have control.
Committee or board of management.
Parliamentary grant.

CHAPTER IV

Various Classes of Elementary Schools

Voluntary and board schools.
Their relative efficiency.
Universal school boards.
The case of voluntary school managers.
Conclusion.
Small rural schools.
Small schools in rural parishes in Somerset.
Average attendance in these schools.
Special difficulties of these schools.
Conclusion.
Half-time schools.
Workhouse schools.
District schools.
Pauper children in public elementary schools.
Evening schools.
Causes of failure.
Modification proposed in the Code.
Moral effect of evening schools.
Compulsion in evening schools.
Should girls attend evening schools?
The annual examination of evening schools.
Who are to be the teachers?
Conclusion.
Certified efficient schools.


[page xviii]

CHAPTER V

Elementary Schools and Higher Education

Varieties in local circumstances.
Grouping of small schools.
Grading of schools.
Grading on the continent.
What the opponents say.
What the advocates say.
Higher elementary schools.
Higher elementary schools in Huddersfield.
In Sheffield.
In Bradford.
In Birmingham.
In Manchester.
The curriculum in higher elementary schools.
Voluntary higher grade schools.
Secondary schools and higher elementary schools.
Conclusion.
Exhibitions and scholarships to secondary schools.
Candidates ignorant of Latin.
Difficulty of the maintenance of the exhibitioners.
Official list of scholarships to higher schools.
St. Olave's Grammar School.
Manchester.
Leeds.
Bradford.
Birmingham.
Conclusion.



PART V

CHAPTER I

Government Examination

Visit of Her Majesty's inspector.
Effects on classification and teaching.
Conclusion.
Attendance qualification.
Conclusion.
Comparison of former and present method of examination.
Schools to be separately examined and inspected.
Methods of examination.
Individual and class examination.
Conclusion.
Exception schedules.
Over-pressure.
The teachers' evidence.
The managers' evidence.
The inspectors' opinion.
Over-pressure on teachers.
Conclusion.

CHAPTER II

Parliamentary Grant

Former system of distributing the grant.
The Code of 1862.
Payment by results.
What the teachers say.
Memorial of the National Union of Elementary Teachers.
The managers' view.
What the inspectors think.
Knowledge imparted soon lost.
Conclusion.
Present distribution of grant.
Proportion between fixed and variable grants.
Items of variable grant.
'I'he merit grant.
Conclusion.
The 17s 6d limit.
Complaints against it.
Proposed abolition of the 17s 6d limit.
Evidence on limits to grant.
Conclusion.
Special grants to small schools,
Economical limits.
Increased expenditure.
Limit of expenditure inexpedient.
Conclusion.
Infant schools.
Removal of teachers.
Grants towards circulating teachers.
Grants in aid of improvements.
Summary of recommendations.

CHAPTER III

Income and Expenditure of Schools

Growing costliness of elementary education.
The alleged causes of the increase in school expenditure.
The burden of the cost on the central government.
The burden of the cost on the rates.
The burden of the cost on voluntary subscribers.
Lord Lingen's plan.
Conclusion.
Voluntary schools to be assisted out of the rates.
Conclusion.
Prospective legislation.
The rating of schools.
Conclusion.
Burden of the cost on the parents.
Remission of school fees.
Payment of fees by the guardians.
Conclusion.
Should the Education Department fix the fees in particular cases?
Conclusion.
Total abolition of school fees.
What the advocates for the retention of fees say.
Mr. Cumin's opinion.
Conclusion.


[page xix]

PART VI

Local Educational Authorities

Two local educational authorities.
Election of school boards by cumulative vote.
Anomalies of cumulative vote.
Single transferable vote.
Conclusion.
Expense of candidature.
Interference in elections.
Time for which boards should be elected.
Conclusion.
Universal school boards.
School attendance committees.
Local committees.
Conclusion.
New areas for educational authorities.



PART VII

Summary of Conclusions and Recommendations








[page xx]

FIRST COMMISSION

VICTORIA, R.

Victoria, by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Queen, Defender of the Faith: To Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Sir Richard Assheton Cross, Knight Grand Cross of Our Most Honourable Order of the Bath, one of Our Principal Secretaries of State; Our trusty and well-beloved the Most Reverend Cardinal Archbishop Henry Edward Manning, Doctor in Divinity; Our right trusty and right well-beloved Cousin and Councillor Dudley Francis Stuart, Earl of Harrowby, Keeper of Our Privy Seal; Our right trusty and right well-beloved Cousin and Councillor Frederick, Earl Beauchamp; the Right Reverend Father in God, Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Frederick, Bishop of London; Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Charles Bowyer, Baron Norton, Knight Commander of Our Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint George; Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Anthony John Mundella; Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Sir Francis Richard Sandford, Knight Commander of Our Most Honourable Order of the Bath, Under Secretary to Our Secretary for Scotland; Our trusty and well-beloved Sir John Lubbock, Baronet; Our trusty and well-beloved Sir Bernhard Samuelson, Baronet; Our trusty and well-beloved James Harrison Rigg, Doctor in Divinity; Our trusty and well-beloved Robert William Dale, Esquire, Doctor of Laws; Our trusty and well-beloved Robert Gregory, Clerk, Master of Arts, Canon of Our Cathedral Church of Saint Paul, in the city of London; Our trusty and well-beloved Benjamin Frederick Smith, Clerk, Master of Arts, Honorary Canon of Our Cathedral and Metropolitical Church of Canterbury; Our trusty and well-beloved Thomas Daniel Cox Morse, Clerk; Our trusty and well-beloved Charles Henry Alderson, Esquire, Second Charity Commissioner for England and Wales; Our trusty and well-beloved John Gilbert Talbot, Esquire, Master of Arts, and Honorary Doctor of Civil Law of the University of Oxford; Our trusty and well-beloved Sydney Charles Buxton, Esquire; Our trusty and well-beloved Thomas Edmund Heller, Esquire; Our trusty and well-beloved Bernard Charles Molloy, Esquire; Our trusty and well-beloved Samuel Rathbone, Esquire; Our trusty and well-beloved Henry Richard, Esquire; and Our trusty and well-beloved George Shipton, Esquire, Greeting!

Whereas We have deemed it expedient that a Commission should forthwith issue to inquire into the working of the Elementary Education Acts, England and Wales:

Now know ye, that We, reposing great trust and confidence in your knowledge and ability, have authorized and appointed, and do by these presents authorize and appoint you the said Sir Richard Assheton Cross; Henry Edward Manning, Cardinal Archbishop; Dudley Francis Stuart, Earl of Harrowby; Frederick, Earl Beauchamp; Frederick, Bishop of London; Charles Bowyer, Baron Norton; Anthony John Mundella; Sir Francis Richard Sandford; Sir John Lubbock; Sir Bernhard Samuelson; James Harrison Rigg; Robert William Dale; Robert Gregory; Benjamin Frederick Smith; Thomas Daniel Cox Morse; Charles Henry Alderson; John Gilbert Talbot; Sydney Charles Buxton; Thomas Edmund Heller; Bernard Charles Molloy; Samuel Rathbone; Henry Richard; and George Shipton, to be Our Commissioners for the purpose aforesaid.


[page xxi]

And for the better effecting the purpose of this Our Commission, We do, by these presents, give and grant unto you, or any six or more of you, full power to call before you such persons as you shall judge likely to afford you any information upon the subject of this Our Commission; and also to call for, have access to, and examine all such books, documents, registers, and records as may afford you the fullest information on the subject; and to inquire of and concerning the premises by all other lawful ways and means whatsoever.

And We do further, by these presents, authorize and empower you, or any six or more of you, to visit and personally inspect such places in Our United Kingdom as you may deem expedient for the more effectual carrying out of the purpose foresaid.

And We do by these presents will and ordain that this Our Commission shall continue in full force and virtue, and that you. Our said Commissioners, or any six or more of you, may from time to time proceed in the execution thereof, and of every matter and thing therein contained, although the same be not continued from time to time by adjournment.

And We do further ordain that you, or any six or more of you, have liberty to report your proceedings under this Our Commission from time to time if you shall judge it expedient so to do.

And Our further will and pleasure is, that you do, with as little delay as possible, report to Us, under your hands and seals, or under the hands and seals of any six or more of you, your opinion upon the several matters herein submitted for your consideration.

Given at Our Court at Saint James's, the fifteenth day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-six, in the forty-ninth year of Our Reign.

By Her Majesty's command,
RICHD. ASSHETON CROSS.




[page xxii]

SECOND COMMISSION

VICTORIA, R.

Victoria, by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Queen, Defender of the Faith:

To Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Sir Richard Assheton Cross, Knight Grand Cross of Our Most Honourable Order of the Bath; Our trusty and well-beloved the Most Reverend Cardinal Archbishop, Henry Edward Manning, Doctor in Divinity; Our right trusty and right well-beloved Cousin and Councillor Dudley Francis Stuart, Earl of Harrowby; Our right trusty and right well-beloved Cousin and Councillor Frederick, Earl Beauchamp; the Right Reverend Father in God, Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Frederick, Bishop of London; Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Charles Bowyer, Baron Norton, Knight Commander of Our Most Distinguished Order of Saint Michael and Saint George; Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Sir Francis Richard Sandford, Knight Commander of Our Most Honourable Order of the Bath, Under Secretary to Our Secretary for Scotland; Our trusty and well-beloved Edward Lyulph Stanley, Esquire, commonly called the Honourable Edward Lyulph Stanley; Our trusty and well-beloved Sir John Lubbock, Baronet; Our trusty and well-beloved Sir Bernhard Samuelson, Baronet; Our trusty and well-beloved James Harrison Rigg, Doctor in Divinity; Our trusty and well-beloved Robert William Dale, Doctor of Laws; Our trusty and well-beloved Robert Gregory, Clerk, Master of Arts, Canon of Our Cathedral Church of Saint Paul, in the city of London; Our trusty and well-beloved Benjamin Frederick Smith, Clerk, Master of Arts, Honorary Canon of Our Cathedral and Metropolitical Church of Canterbury; Our trusty and well-beloved Thomas Daniel Cox Morse, Clerk; Our trusty and well- beloved Charles Henry Alderson, Esq., Second Charity Commissioner for England and "Wales; Our trusty and well-beloved John Gilbert Talbot, Esq., Master of Arts and Honorary Doctor of Civil Law of the University of Oxford; Our trusty and well-beloved Sydney Charles Buxton, Esq.; Our trusty and well-beloved Thomas Edmund Heller, Esq.; Our trusty and well-beloved Bernard Charles Molloy, Esq.; Our trusty and well-beloved Samuel Rathbone, Esq.; Our trusty and well-beloved Henry Richard, Esq.; and Our trusty and well-beloved George Shipton, Esq., Greeting!

Whereas We did, by Warrant under Our Royal Sign Manual, bearing date the fifteenth day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-six, authorize and appoint certain noblemen and gentlemen therein named, or any six or more of them, to be Our Commissioners to inquire into the working of the Elementary Education Acts, England and Wales:

Now know ye, that We have revoked and determined, and do by these presents revoke and determine, the said Warrant, and every matter and thing therein, contained:

And whereas We have deemed it expedient that a new Commission should issue for the purpose specified in such Warrant of the fifteenth day of January, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-six.

Further know ye, that We, reposing great trust and confidence in your ability and discretion, have appointed, and do by these presents nominate, constitute, and appoint


[page xxiii]

you, the said Sir Richard Assheton Cross; Henry Edward Manning, Cardinal Archbishop; Dudley Francis Stuart, Earl of Harrowby; Frederick, Earl Beauchamp; Frederick Bishop of London; Charles Bowyer, Baron Norton; Sir Francis Richard Sandford Edward Lyulph Stanley, commonly called the Honourable Edward Lyulph Stanley; Sir John Lubbock; Sir Bernhard Samuelson; James Harrison Rigg; Robert William Dale; Robert Gregory; Benjamin Frederick Smith; Thomas Daniel Cox Morse: Charles Henry Alderson; John Gilbert Talbot; Sydney Charles Buxton; Thomas Edmund Heller; Bernard Charles Molloy; Samuel Rathbone; Henry Richard; and George Shipton, to be Our Commissioners to inquire into the working of the Elementary Education Acts, England and Wales.

And, for the better effecting the purpose of this Our Commission, We do by these presents give and grant unto you, or any six or more of you, full power to call before you such persons as you shall judge likely to afford you any information upon the subject of this Our Commission; and also to call for, have access to, and examine all such books, documents, registers, and records as may afford you the fullest information on the subject; and to inquire of and concerning the premises by all other lawful ways and means whatsoever.

And We do further by these presents authorize and empower you, or any six or more of you, to visit and personally inspect such places in Our United Kingdom as you may deem expedient for the more effectual carrying out of the purpose aforesaid.

And We do by these presents will and ordain that this Our Commission shall continue in full force and virtue, and that you. Our said Commissioners, or any six or more of you, may from time to time proceed in the execution thereof, and of every matter and thing therein contained, although the same be not continued from time to time by adjournment.

And We do further ordain that you, or any six or more of you, have liberty to report your proceedings under this Our Commission, from time to time, if you shall judge it expedient so to do.

And Our further will and pleasure is that you do, with as little delay as possible, report to Us, under your hands and seals, or under the hands and seals of any six or more of you, your opinion upon the matter herein submitted for your consideration.

Given at Our Court at Saint James's, the tenth day of March, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-six, in the forty-ninth year of Our Reign.

By Her Majesty's command,
HUGH C. E. CHILDERS.




[page xxiv]

THIRD COMMISSION

VICTORIA, R.

Victoria, by the Grace of God of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland Queen, Defender of the Faith: To Our right trusty and right entirely beloved Cousin Henry, Duke of Norfolk, Knight of Our Most Noble Order of the Garter, Greeting!

Whereas We did by Warrant under Our Royal Sign Manual, bearing date the tenth day of March, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-six, appoint Our right trusty and well-beloved Councillor Sir Richard Assheton Cross, Knight Grand Cross of Our Most Honourable Order of the Bath, together with the several Noblemen and Gentlemen therein mentioned, or any six or more of them, to be Our Commissioners to inquire into the working of the Elementary Education Acts, England and Wales:

And Whereas one of Our Commissioners so appointed, namely, Our trusty and well-beloved Bernard Charles Molloy, Esquire, has humbly tendered unto Us his resignation of his appointment as one of Our said Commissioners:

Now know ye, that We, reposing great confidence in you, do by these presents appoint you, the said Henry, Duke of Norfolk, to be one of Our Commissioners for the purpose aforesaid in the room of the said Bernard Charles Molloy, resigned, in addition to and together with the other Commissioners whom We have already appointed.

Given at Our Court at Saint James's, the fifteenth day of June, one thousand eight hundred and eighty-seven, m the fiftieth year of Our Reign.

By Her Majesty's command,
HENRY MATTHEWS.




[page 1]

ROYAL COMMISSION ON THE ELEMENTARY EDUCATION ACTS,
ENGLAND AND WALES

FINAL REPORT

INTRODUCTION


TO THE QUEEN'S MOST EXCELLENT MAJESTY

MAY IT PLEASE YOUR MAJESTY.

We the Commissioners appointed to inquire into the working of the Elementary Education Acts, England and Wales, humbly lay before Your Majesty the following Report.

On the 15th January 1886 we received Your Majesty's Commission, and on 20th January 1886 we held our first meeting. Since that date we have sat on 146 days, 95 of which have been devoted to hearing the oral evidence of 151 witnesses, and 51 to the consideration of the Report.

Shortly after the commencement of our sittings, the Right Hon. A. J. Mundella, finding that the official duties he had at that time to perform would not admit of his remaining upon the Commission, resigned his seat; as his substitute, Your Majesty appointed the Hon. E. Lyulph Stanley on 10th March 1886. At a later period Mr. Bernard C. Molloy, for reasons wholly unconnected with this Inquiry, withdrew from the Commission. His place was filled by the Duke of Norfolk, who was appointed a Commissioner on the 15th of June 1887.

At an early stage of our proceedings an exhaustive syllabus was prepared for our guidance, which included almost every branch of the subject into which we were to inquire, and has helped us materially to deal separately and in detail with many important matters.

The existing law and the existing state of facts being the first points to which we directed our attention, it was thought desirable to obtain from Your Majesty's Education Department a number of documents and returns which, in addition to the oral testimony we have received, have enabled us to place before Your Majesty a short account of the state of Elementary Education in England and Wales before and since the passing of those Acts.

Whilst we were receiving oral and documentary evidence certain of our number consented to serve on a sub-committee to superintend the statistical part of our Inquiry. The Sub-Committee was appointed on 14th April 1886, and consisted of the following members: The Earl of Harrowby (Chairman), Cardinal Manning, Sir Francis Sandford, Hon. E. Lyulph Stanley, Dr. Rigg, Canon Gregory, Dr. Morse, and Mr. Heller.

After considering the numerous applications received from persons desiring to give evidence before us, we determined to summon representatives of all public bodies who were in any way concerned with the administration and working of the Elementary Education Acts, and of all classes of persons whom these Acts most immediately affect, in addition to such other witnesses as, either from their special knowledge or from their experience, we thought likely to furnish valuable information. So far as was possible throughout a long and protracted inquiry, we endeavoured to group together the representatives of each class of witnesses; and without absolutely


[page 2]

declining to hear evidence on any subject connected with elementally education from those who have appeared before us, it has been our endeavour, generally, to confine each one of them to those points with which he is specially conversant. No representative witness, so far as we know, has been precluded from giving evidence before us.

Mr. Patrick Cumin, Secretary to Your Majesty's Education Department, was the first witness called, whom we heard at great length on the earlier heads of the syllabus, reserving the remainder of his examination for a later period of our Inquiry. We next examined several of Your Majesty's Chief Inspectors of schools; and these witnesses were followed by representatives of the leading educational societies. After hearing the evidence of the principals of Training Colleges we adjourned for the summer vacation in August 1886.

In the following November, when we resumed our Inquiry, 13 consecutive meetings were exclusively devoted to the evidence of Elementary Teachers. During this group of sittings, and subsequently, we have examined in all 20 head masters, nine head mistresses, as well as assistant teachers, and ex-teachers of public elementary schools. The remarkable solidarity which characterised the testimony offered by these teachers did not fail to strike us. In many instances, doubtless, they expressed the views of a large and influential organisation of their professional brethren, whose carefully formulated opinions had been at an early stage of our Inquiry placed in our hands.

The Management of Public Elementary Schools was the subject which next occupied our attention; nine managers of different kinds of schools appeared before us, and gave us the benefit of their long and varied experience.

After these, the representatives of School Boards were called. On behalf of the School Board for London, among others, the Chairman and the late Chairman of the School Board appeared. Witnesses were heard from the school boards of Birmingham, Liverpool, Manchester, Sheffield, Bradford, Leeds, Hull, Bristol, and Erith.

Our next group of witnesses consisted of representatives of voluntary schools. These gentlemen were followed by an equal number of members of School Attendance Committees, who gave us information with regard to the enforcement of the compulsory clauses of the Act by those bodies.

The Welsh bi-lingual difficulty has received our attention; we have examined witnesses on this question.

Full evidence has also been tendered to us on the subject of the Religious Instruction given in public elementary schools, and Diocesan Inspectors have detailed, at length, the results of their experience. Six of the leading advocates of the policy of separating religious from secular instruction in day elementary schools, five of whom belong to different Nonconformist bodies, also appeared before us. The subjects of technical instruction, of science, of teaching cookery, of physical training, and of school banks have received our careful attention; and we have had evidence from persons specially acquainted with the carrying on of half-time schools, day industrial schools, workhouse schools, and evening schools. We have also examined witnesses with regard to the employment of children in theatres; we have received evidence as to the transfer of voluntary schools to school boards; and several schemes have been submitted to us for the better training of elementary teachers and for improving the instruction given to pupil teachers. Sir Patrick Keenan, resident Commissioner in Ireland, has given us an account of the administration of the educational system in that country; and information with respect to those in force in France and Australia has been furnished to us by independent witnesses. We have also had the advantage of hearing Lord Lingen, whose long connection with Your Majesty's Education Department, as Secretary previous to 1870, has rendered him a most important witness. Lord Lingen's evidence was followed by evidence from another group of Inspectors of schools; and the further examination of Mr. Cumin brought the oral testimony to a conclusion, enabling us to adjourn for the Summer vacation on 26th July 1887.

During the period in which we were engaged in hearing evidence, we conducted an important statistical inquiry on an extensive scale. Having come to the conclusion that the opinion of the Country, as a whole, on the working of the Education Acts ought to be ascertained, and that valuable documentary information might be obtained from managers and head teachers of public elementary schools, both voluntary and board, as well as from school boards, we obtained permission to employ a


[page 3]

staff for this purpose under the superintendence of a statistical officer. We accordingly issued Circulars in certain typical localities containing series of questions addressed to managers of voluntary schools, school boards, and teachers. A Circular was also addressed to the principals of all the existing training colleges.

The replies to these Circulars have been tabulated, and are published in a separate volume; many of these Tables, we trust, will prove of permanent interest. Valuable information regarding the systems of education in Foreign countries and in the Colonies, obtained through Your Majesty's diplomatic agents, and the Agents General for the Colonies respectively, is published in a further volume.

This our Final Report is divided into seven parts.

Part I consists of four chapters, which deal with the Existing Law.

Part II relates to the Existing State of Facts.

Part III, which is divided into seven chapters, treats of the Machinery for carrying on Elementary Education.

Part IV, containing five chapters, is confined to the Education and Instruction given in Public Elementary Schools.

Part V, which is divided into three chapters, deals with Government Examination, the Parliamentary Grant, and Income and Expenditure of Schools.

Part VI treats of Local Educational Authorities.

Part VII consists of a summary of our Leading Conclusions and Recommendations.

PART I

The Existing Law
Chapter I - The Administration of the Education Grant, 1832 to 1858.
Chapter II - The Duke of Newcastle's Commission of 1858. Codes from 1862 to 1870.
Chapter III - The Education Acts 1870 to 1880.
Chapter IV - The Codes and Instructions to Inspectors, 1870 to 1885.

CHAPTER I

THE ADMINISTRATION OF THE EDUCATION GRANT, 1832 to 1858

It is now above a quarter of a century since the first Education Commission appointed by Your Majesty concluded its inquiry, and presented its exhaustive Report. This Report was prefaced by an historical survey of the rise and progress of elementary education in England, sufficiently comprehensive to render it superfluous for us to traverse the same ground in detail. We deem it sufficient, therefore, before proceeding to a detailed account of the changes that have taken place since that period, to recall the leading facts in the history of public elementary education previous to 1858. The history of public elementary education in England is no exception to the law which seems to characterise the growth of many of our national institutions, in that it originated in the convictions and efforts of individuals or private bodies, and only


[page 4]

when it appeared to have outgrown the means or the powers of the original promoters did the State step in to gather up their work and to place it on the basis of a national institution.

Thus, at the beginning of the present century, an impulse was given to popular education by the formation of two great educational societies - the British and Foreign School Society in 1808, and the National Society in 1811, both supported entirely by voluntary contributions, the work of furthering elementary education in connexion with the Church of England having been undertaken previously to 1811 by a Sub-Committee of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. Public attention began henceforth to be more and more directed to the subject. In 1816 a Committee of the House of Commons, of which Mr. Brougham was Chairman, reported that "they had found reason to conclude that a very large number of poor children were wholly without the means of instruction". It was in one of the reports of this Committee for the first time publicly asserted that the education of the people was a matter in which the State had a vital concern.

Down to 1833, the new schools for the people which had been springing up throughout the country were established and supported entirely by voluntary contributions and school fees. In that year, being the year after the passing of the Reform Act, the Government undertook for the first time a share in the work, and made a grant towards it of £20,000, which was continued yearly down to 1839. This grant was applied by the Lords of the Treasury to the erection of school-houses. It was distributed on the recommendation of the two great educational societies, and given in aid of the voluntary contributions of the locality. The conditions are fully set forth in the Treasury Minute of 30th August 1833.*

In 1835 the subject of national education was brought by Lord Brougham before the House of Lords, and the defects of the existing provision having been already shown before various Commissions of Inquiry, the Government resolved to intervene directly in the matter. In 1839 the annual grant was increased from £20,000 to £30,000, and on the 10th April 1839 an Order in Council was issued appointing a Committee of Council to "superintend the application of any sums voted by Parliament for the purpose of promoting public education". In his letter to Lord Lansdowne, then Lord President of the Council, announcing Her Majesty's intention to form such a Committee, Lord John Russell stated that "while of late years the zeal for popular education had increased, yet much remained to be done". Among the chief existing defects were reckoned the insufficient number of qualified school-masters, the imperfect methods of teaching, the absence of any sufficient inspection and examination of schools, and the want of a model school. Lord John Russell further stated that among the first objects to which any grant might be applied would be the establishment of a Normal School for the training of Elementary Schoolmasters. These proposals of the Government were very fully and severely criticised in the House of Commons, and were carried only by a majority of two votes in an important division.

*Copy of Treasury Minute, dated 30th August 1833

My Lords read the Act of the last session by which a sum of £20,000 is granted to His Majesty, to be issued in aid of private subscriptions for the erection of schools for the education of the children of the poorer classes in Great Britain.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, feeling it absolutely necessary that certain fixed rules should be laid down by the Treasury for their guidance in this matter, so as to render this sum most generally useful for the purposes contemplated by the grant, submits the following arrangements for the consideration of the Board:-

1st. That no portion of this sum be applied to any purpose whatever except for the erection of new school-houses, and that in the definition of a schoolhouse the residence for masters or attendants be not included.

2nd. That no application be entertained unless a sum be raised by private contribution equal at least to one-half of the total estimated expenditure.

3rd. That the amount of private subscription be received, expended, and accounted for before any issue of public money for such school be directed.

4th. That no application be complied with unless upon the consideration of such a report either from the National School Society, or the British and Foreign School Society, as shall satisfy this Board that the case is one deserving of attention, and there is a reasonable expectation that the school may be permanently supported.

5th. That the applicants whose cases are favourably entertained be required to bind themselves to submit to any audit of their accounts which this Board may direct, as well as to such periodical reports respecting the state of their schools, and the number of scholars educated, as may be called for.

6th. That in considering all applications made to the Board a preference be given to such applications as come from large cities and towns in which the necessity of assisting in the erection of schools is most pressing, and that due inquiries should also be made before any such application be acceded to, whether there may not be charitable funds or public and private endowments, that might render any further grants inexpedient or unnecessary.

In these suggestions My Lords concur.


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The Committee of Council on Education met for the first time on the 3rd June 1839, and made, inter alia, the following report:

"The Committee are of opinion that the most useful application of any sums voted by Parliament would consist in the employment of those moneys in the establishment of a Normal School under the direction of the State, and not placed under the management of a voluntary society. The Committee, however, experience so much difficulty in reconciling conflicting views respecting the provisions which they are desirous to make in furtherance of your Majesty's wish that the children and teachers instructed in this school should be duly trained in the principles of the Christian religion, while the rights of conscience should be respected, that it is not in the power of the Committee to mature a plan for the accomplishment of this design without further consideration; and they therefore postpone taking any steps for this purpose until greater concurrence of opinion is found to prevail." They decided, however, to make no grants to Normal Schools or to any other schools unless the right of inspection were secured.

The history of the unsuccessful attempt to found a Normal School on a basis of religious comprehension is fully given by Sir J. Kay Shuttleworth, then Secretary of the Education Department, in his evidence before the Duke of Newcastle's Commission. The first controversies, he says, with respect to elementary education arose in connexion with the constitution of this proposed school. It was proposed that the religious instruction should be divided into general and special. The former was to consist of such general truths of Christianity as are common to all Christian communions in England; the latter was to include doctrinal teaching. In the words of Sir James Kay Shuttleworth, "A very great controversy arose as to the constitution of this Normal School, which was conceived to be an indication that the Government desired to establish common schools for the country, founded upon a basis of religious equality. The Church of England in particular entered a most emphatic protest against a general system of education founded upon such a basis. In consequence of these discussions, of the inadequacy of the majority in its favour in the House of Commons, and of the strong protest proceeding from a large section of the House of Peers, the Government withdrew the scheme of a Normal School."*

A Minute of the Committee of Council, dated 24th September 1839, lays down the leading principles on which they intended to act in carrying on their work. The following are specially deserving of notice: (1) The right of inspection was required in all cases; (2) Applications for grants were to be made through the inspectors, or though the National or the British and Foreign School Society; and, as a general rule, if the school were not in connexion with one of these societies, the Committee would not entertain the case. In the Instructions to Inspectors, issued in August 1840, the following important declarations are made: "In superintending the application of the Parliamentary grant for public education in Great Britain, their Lordships have in view the encouragement of local efforts for the improvement and extension of elementary education, whether made by voluntary associations or by private individuals. The employment of inspectors is intended to advance this object. ... It is of the utmost consequence you should bear in mind that this inspection is not intended as a means of exercising control, but of affording assistance. ... Their Lordships are strongly of opinion that no plan of education ought to be encouraged in which intellectual instruction is not subordinate to the regulation of the thoughts and habits of the children by the doctrines and precepts of revealed religion."† By a Minute of the 3rd December in the same year, grants in aid of the erection of school buildings were rendered accessible to schools not connected with the Established Church of England or with the British and Foreign School Society, in places where proof was given of a great deficiency of education in the locality.

From the first the schools in union with the two great educational societies were placed under a separate body of Inspectors, and each Inspector was appointed with the concurrence of the Archbishops of Canterbury and York, or of the authorities of that Society whose schools he was appointed to visit. It was considered desirable that Inspectors should enjoy the confidence of the religious body with which the schools under their inspection were connected, so long as the State took cognizance of the religious as well as the secular instruction, an arrangement which was only terminated by the Education Act of 1870.

*Duke of Newcastle's Commission, Vol. 6, p. 301, Q. 2310.

†Minutes of the Committee of Council, 1839-40, pp. 22-4.


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Between 1839 and 1842, no new steps of importance were taken by the Committee of Council with the exception of some slight increase in the grant, and in the number of Inspectors. In 1842, an attempt was made by Sir James Graham, then Home Secretary, to add certain educational clauses to the Factories Regulation Bill. This was opposed by the Nonconformists, and the scheme was withdrawn in consequence of that opposition. Objection was taken to support being given out of the rates to schools in which the management was to be largely in the hands of the established church, and in which the teacher was required to give special instruction in its formularies, both in the day school and on Sunday. The experience gained by the events of 1839 and 1842 as to the attitude of the various denominations led the Committee of Council to rely henceforward for the growth and extension of national education chiefly upon the voluntary efforts of individuals, and the religious zeal of the country, assisted by contributions from the Government. In November 1843, the Committee announced that they were prepared to make grants towards the providing or enlarging of houses for school teachers, towards school furniture and apparatus, grants in aid of the cost of the erection of Normal Schools, and grants larger than elsewhere were made towards the provision of schools in poor and populous places.* For the next few years the work of the Committee mainly consisted in "steadily encouraging all voluntary effort, in making itself a central influence in order to guide and develop that effort, and in completing its own method of administration as its experience increased."‡

Between 1839 and 1847 many attempts were made in various parts of England and Wales to improve the methods of teaching and the general condition of elementary schools. Among efforts of this kind were the training institutions in connexion with the National Society, for masters at Westminster, and for mistresses in Smith's Square; the foundation of Battersea Training College, and subsequently of St. Mark's College, of the Cheltenham Church of England Training College, of the Chester Diocesan Training College, of Colleges for the training of schoolmistresses at Whitelands, Salisbury, and Warrington, and of Normal Schools in the Dioceses of York, Ripon, and Durham. This period witnessed the enlargement and improvement of the British and Foreign School Society's Normal School in the Borough Road; the erection of buildings for Normal Schools connected with the Church of Scotland in Edinburgh and Glasgow; and the establishment of similar institutions for the Free Church in both these cities; the introduction of a considerable number of Glasgow-trained Wesleyan schoolmasters to take charge of the day schools of the Wesleyan body; the foundation of the Training College at Homerton by the Congregational Board of Education,† of a Nonconformist training school for mistresses at Rotherhithe, and of another for Welsh teachers at Brecon, which was afterwards removed to Swansea. Somewhat later, a training college was established at Walworth by the Voluntary School Association. These training colleges were all founded either by societies or by individuals. The scheme of the Committee of Council for establishing a Normal School on the basis of religious comprehension having failed, Parliament soon afterwards began to make grants towards the cost of building training colleges of a denominational character. Sir J. Kay Shuttleworth stated in evidence before the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, that the constitution of the Battersea Training College was one of the fruits of experience, the result of which he defined to be a deeper appreciation of the exceeding strength of the religious principle of this country, which devoted so large a portion of charity to the school regarded as a part of the religious social organization and as a nursery for the church or the congregation. In answer to the question of Mr. Lake - whether he meant that the reason for changing from the form of religious comprehension, which he had originally suggested, to one of a denominational character, was that he found that a denominational character, so to speak, was more in accordance with the feeling of the religious people in England - Sir J. Kay Shuttleworth replied, "Certainly."§

The year 1846 marked an important epoch in the progress of the work of the Committee of Council. In that year, Lord Lansdowne being the Lord President, a portion of the annual Parliamentary grant in aid of elementary schools was for the first time applied directly to their maintenance. "The decision then

*Report of Committee of Council, 1842-3, pp. ii and iii.

†Homerton Training College dates from 1845.

‡See Four Periods of Public Education, page 507.

§Report of Duke of Newcastle's Commission, Vol. VI., page 306.


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arrived at", said Sir J. Kay Shuttleworth, "amounted to the abandonment of the idea of a common school, and to the adoption as, in the main, the only practicable mode of procedure, of the denominational system."* At the same time the Government while determining to co-operate with the advocates of this system, took an important step towards popularizing and laicizing the management of these schools by the enforcement, as a condition of assistance, of the new management clauses - a determination which led to a protracted controversy. By the Minutes of August and December 1846, grants were to be made in direct augmentation of the salaries of elementary teachers, the amount of which was regulated by their place in the certificate examination, and by the salaries they received from their managers; while the payment of these grants was made conditional on the annual report of the Inspectors as to the zeal and success of the teacher. Further allowances were also made to those teachers by whom apprentices were being trained. Power was taken to grant pensions to facilitate the retirement of superannuated certificated teachers, a system which was discontinued in 1862 (when these augmentation grants also ceased), and subsequently revived in the year 1875 to meet the cases of those teachers who were attracted into the profession by the promises formerly held out. These Minutes also laid the foundation of grants in aid of the maintenance of Normal Schools, and gave a new and powerful impulse to the work of establishing training colleges. The Wesleyan Training College, Westminster, where for many years both male and female students were trained, was opened in 1851. Hammersmith Roman Catholic Training College was opened in 1854, and the Liverpool Training College in 1856. A very large number of Diocesan Training Colleges of the Church of England were within a few years established.

At this time the system of apprenticing pupil-teachers was now first introduced, the idea having been borrowed from Holland. Its object was at once to reinforce at moderate cost the teaching staff of the school, and to provide for the future a continual supply of suitable candidates for training in Normal Schools. The pupil-teachers were apprenticed to the principal teachers, who were to receive special allowances for their instruction; their salary was to be paid by Government during the five years of their apprenticeship, while at the end of that time those who could successfully pass an entrance examination were to receive, under the title of a Queen's scholarship, the right to partake at the public cost of the benefits of training at any college willing to receive them. In addition, these Minutes offered certain subsidiary grants in aid of the cost of hiring field gardens, of erecting workshops in which handicrafts might be taught, and in providing school wash-houses or kitchens for the instruction of girls in domestic economy. A year later grants were offered in aid of the purchase of suitable school books, maps, and diagrams. Throughout these Minutes one principle seems to have been consistently maintained, viz., in distributing public money "to pay for the means of education rather than to attempt any method of payment which should be determined by results".†

In a Minute dated June 28th, 1847, the Committee of Council introduced certain "management clauses" for insertion in the trust deeds of Church of England schools. These clauses evoked an angry controversy extending over a period of three or more years. From 1833 to 1839 the whole responsibility of determining the constitution of Church schools had rested with the founders. In their Minutes for 1839-40 the Committee had published four specimens of trust deeds (with varying clauses) adapted to four different cases. These were at first merely suggested for adoption: in 1847, however, one or other of these clauses was required to be inserted in the trust deeds of all schools which received building grants. Their chief object was to secure for the lay subscribers to schools a due share in their management. The points to which exception was taken related mainly to the constitution of the Committee of Management, and to the appeal provided in case of disagreement among the school managers. At a later period, the constitution of Wesleyan, Roman Catholic, Jewish, and undenominational schools was similarly provided for by model trust deeds, and the insertion of one of these management clauses was made a condition obligatory on the receipt of building grants.

The course pursued by the Committee of Council met at first with much opposition. It was a new thing for the State directly to intervene in the extension of education. The controversies of this period turned ultimately upon the respective rights of the State and of the various religious bodies promoting education. The State desired to introduce new machinery of its own for the promotion of the instruc-

*Report of Duke of Newcastle's Commission, Evidence, Vol. VI., page 307.

†Evidence of Sir J. Kay-Shuttleworth, Vol. VI., page 308, Report of Duke of Newcastle's Commission.


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tion of the people, whereas certain religious denominations maintained their exclusive right to be recognised as instruments for this purpose. Education, it was said, was beyond the sphere of Government. Its claim to freedom from all interference on the part of the State was at this period strongly and extensively asserted. For several years after 1846, efforts of various kinds were made to dispense with assistance which involved the interference of the State. A large section of Nonconformists contended, as earnestly as the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church, for the principle that education must be kept strictly under voluntary direction, and be free from State control. Some Non-conformists, as well as Churchmen, who resisted the control of the State, also declined its aid, and attempted to carry on their respective schools entirely on the voluntary system.

The total amount granted by Government in aid of the building of schools between 1833 and 1846, was £955,365. The average grants extending over the whole of the period were about £120 for each school. The number of school buildings erected in this period with aid from the Parliamentary grant was about 3,200, and it is estimated that probably 1,300 more were built without such aid.

In 1846 the number of scholars in schools in connexion with the National Society was estimated at 911,834.* At the same period in schools connected with the British and Foreign School Society, there were probably upwards of 200,000 scholars. In the following year the Roman Catholic Church was admitted for the first time into co-operation with the Committee of Council, and the "Catholic Poor School Committee" was then established to represent the Roman Catholics of Great Britain. In 1850, the Wesleyan body had 397 schools and 88,623 scholars.

Some schools, a few years after the Minutes of 1846 were adopted, reached a high standard of efficiency, having availed themselves to the fullest extent of the assistance offered by the Committee of Council. Generally, however, the condition of the schools, both in town and country, was much less satisfactory, and these schools formed by far the larger number. The total number of schools under inspection in 1858 was only 6,897, while there were 15,952 schools not under inspection. The failure to place schools under Government inspection was generally due to poverty of resources, to indifference, or to an aversion to accept State assistance. While some of the uninspected schools before 1850 were undoubtedly good, yet, from the reports of H.M. Inspectors, we gain a fair idea of the deplorable condition of many of them. At one time we read that "the school was held in a miserable room over the stable"; at another, "in a dark miserable den under the town hall"; at another, "in a ruinous hovel of the most squalid and miserable character". Many instances might be quoted of schools of a similar description in all parts of England and Wales. The quality of the instruction was what might be expected in such surroundings. In the village schools it frequently consisted of nothing more than a little practice in reading, writing, arithmetic, and some instruction in Holy Scripture and the rudiments of religious knowledge. Many of the teachers were themselves unable to read and write correctly. A large number of schools in villages and towns were kept, as a means of livelihood, by dames who were unable to impart any real instruction. On the other hand, examples are occasionally afforded of the education given in the better class of elementary schools then existing, which show that even at this early period a liberal curriculum existed in some cases where individual promoters of schools entered heartily into the work and gave personal superintendence to it.† But however great and successful were the sacrifices made in the course of these voluntary efforts in the cause of education, it became more and more evident that such efforts alone were unequal to the task of supplying the wants of the whole country. It was increasingly felt that to provide a complete system of education it was necessary that some force more steady, more enduring, and more universally present than that which already existed should be brought into play.

In August 1851, a new Minute was issued relating to grants for retiring pensions to teachers. Referring to the former Minute published on this subject in December 1846, the Committee resolved to define the extent of the charge on the Parliamentary grant thus created. It was determined to limit the amount to £6,500 in any one year. They called attention to the fact that the Minute of 1846 gave them power, but did not pledge them to grant such pensions.

Among the correspondence of the year 1853, an important letter is printed in the Report of the Committee of Council in which their Lordships, in answer to a

*Report of Committee of Council, 1846-7.

†C. C. Greville's Journal of the reign of Queen Victoria, 1837-52, Vol. II., page 86.


[page 9]

memorial addressed to them for aid to a secular school, replied "that education grants had not hitherto been applicable to schools exclusively secular, and that they believed that such a decision was in accordance with the views of the great majority of the promoters of education. Under these circumstances, they had no intention of rescinding the rule on which they had hitherto acted."*

Up to 1853, although money had been given in order to provide or augment the stipends of the teaching staff or to supply apparatus, no direct payments had been made out of the Parliamentary grant to the annual income of the schools. But in this year, when Earl Granville was Lord President, it was provided by a Minute of the Council, dated 2nd April 1853, that on condition of a fixed number of attendances being made by a child in a school in an agricultural district or unincorporated town (not containing more than 5,000 inhabitants), a capitation grant should be paid to the school funds on its behalf. This grant was intended to be in lieu of aid which a Bill entitled the Borough Bill, introduced during the same year by Lord John Russell but not accepted by Parliament, had proposed to grant to schools in corporate towns out of the local rates. Shortly afterwards the limitation of the capitation grant to schools in agricultural districts and in unincorporated towns was removed, and that form of grant became universally an integral part of the Government system, incidentally serving as a premium on regularity of attendance.

The Rev. F. C. Cook, one of Her Majesty's Inspectors, describing in 1854 what boys of twelve learn in a good school, reports that:

"A boy, of fair average attainments, at the age of twelve years, in a good school, has learned -

1. To read fluently, and with intelligence, not merely the school-books, but any work of general information likely to come in his way.

2. To write very neatly and correctly from dictation and from memory, and to express himself in tolerably correct language. The latter attainment, however, is comparatively rare, and has been one which I have specially and repeatedly urged upon the attention of school-managers.

3. To work all elementary rules of arithmetic with accuracy and rapidity. The arithmetical instruction in good schools includes decimal and vulgar fractions, duo-decimals, interest, &c. Much time and attention are given to this subject, but not more than are absolutely required. Indeed, when I have been consulted upon alterations of the time-tables. I have invariably recommended a larger proportion of time for this subject.

4. To parse sentences, and to explain their construction. But the progress in English grammar is not satisfactory, and, though much time is given to the subject, it is not taught with sufficient energy and skill in a large proportion of schools which in other respects are efficiently conducted.

5. To know the elements of English history. A good elementary work on this subject is still a desideratum; but the boys are generally acquainted with the most important facts, and show much interest in the subject.

6. In geography the progress is generally satisfactory. In fact, most persons who attend the examinations of good schools are surprised at the amount and the accuracy of the knowledge of physical and political geography, of manners, customs, &c., displayed by intelligent children of both sexes. Well-drawn maps, often executed at leisure hours by the pupils, are commonly exhibited on these occasions.

7. The elements of physical science, the laws of natural philosophy, and the most striking phenomena of natural history, form subjects of useful and very attractive lectures in many good schools. These subjects have been introduced within the last few years with great advantage to the pupils.

8. The principles of political economy, with especial reference to questions which touch on the employment and remuneration of labour, principles of taxation, uses of capital, &c., effects of strikes on wages, &c. are taught with great clearness and admirable adaptation to the wants and capacities of the children of artizans, in the reading-books generally used in the metropolitan schools. I have found the boys well acquainted with these lessons in most schools which I have inspected in the course of this year.

9. Drawing is taught with great care and skill in several schools by professors employed under the Department of Science and Art.

That any addition can be advantageously made to this list I do not believe, considering the age of the children; nor am I of opinion that any of these subjects could

*Report of Duke of Newcastle's Commission, page 206.


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be omitted without practical detriment to the schools."* This amount of instruction however must have been rare, to judge from the reports of the Committee of Council and of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission.

The following description drawn from the Report in the year 1850 of the Rev. J. P. Norris, Her Majesty's Inspector of Schools, now Archdeacon of Bristol, who appeared before us as a witness, more nearly represents the condition of the ordinary school at that time.

"If I were asked to describe generally what the annual grant schools of Cheshire and Staffordshire were accomplishing in the way of education, I should say that schools of this sort were now within reach of about one-half of the population, and that they were giving a very fair elementary education to one-fourth part of the children who passed through them, or, more briefly, that we had reached one-half, and were successfully educating one in eight of the class of children for which the schools were intended."‡

No new principle was introduced by the Committee of Council into the distribution of the grant during the next few years, nor, indeed, were any important changes made in its administration until the passing of the Revised Code in 1862.

In 1856 the office of Vice-President of the Committee of the Privy Council on Education was established, whereby was created an office filled by a Minister responsible to the House of Commons for the expenditure of the grant, which was increasing rapidly from year to year.

An important influence was exercised on the progress of elementary education in England by a conference which was held in London in 1857, presided over by His Royal Highness the late Prince Consort, to consider the question of imperfect attendance of children at school, and the early age at which they were removed. In his opening address the Prince stated that, although great results had been achieved, they were only an instalment of what remained to be done. It appeared that out of the two millions of children in attendance at school -

42 per cent attended less than one year.
22 per cent attended one year and less than two.
15 per cent attended two years and less than three.
9 per cent attended three years and less than four.
5 per cent attended four years and less than five.
4 per cent attended five years and less than six.
A few years before this Conference took place, Mr. Horace Mann, in his report on the Educational Census of 1851, had come to the following conclusion: "that work and wages are not the chief causes of absence from school. The condition of many of the free schools, where no payment is demanded of the scholars, seems to show that poverty is not an adequate explanation of the children's absence. In many free schools, though located in the midst of populous neighbourhoods, the attendance of scholars is less numerous and much less constant than in schools which require a fee." The Committee of the Conference of 1857 recorded their opinion that the main defect in the existing state of popular education in this country was not so much the lack of schools as the bad attendance of the children of the working classes, many never coming at all and others being removed when nine or ten years old.

From the foregoing sketch of the work of the Committee of Council from 1839 to 1858 it will be seen that the Government system of aid to education grew up piecemeal; that it was tentative and provisional, and mainly of a denominational character. According to the opinion of Sir J. Kay Shuttleworth, "the intention of the minutes of 1846 was to give an impulse to the growth and improvement of the system founded by the religious communions"; and the grants made under the conditions set forth in them, "drew every religious communion, except the Congregational dissenters and bodies allied with them, into co-operation with the Government, and created a vast denominational system which firmly established popular education on a religious basis."§ The management clauses of 1846, by the infusion of a lay element into the direction of elementary schools, also helped to strengthen the denominational system.

The rules which regulated the proceedings of the Committee of Council on Education had been embodied in Minutes passed in successive years during the period referred

*Report of Committee of Council, 1853-54, page 45.

†Minutes, 1854-55, p. 393; Report of Committee of Council, 1854-55, page 237. [The reference to this footnote is missing from the text.]

‡Minutes, 1859-60, p. 111.

§Memorandum on Public Education. 1866, by Sir J. Kay Shuttleworth, page 8.


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to. In April 1855, however, an abstract of all former Minutes of Council was moved for by Mr. Adderley, now Lord Norton, and published as a Parliamentary Paper. Subsequently, in 1860, Mr. Lowe, now Lord Sherbrook, put forth the same matter arranged in chapters according to subjects, which acquired the title of "The Original Code", and which has served as a framework on which all succeeding codes have been constructed. The first of these, in 1862, was the well-known "Revised Code".

The following table, a summary and analysis of which will be found below, shows the amount of money annually voted by Parliament from 1839 to 1860, 1839 to 1860, inclusive:

YearGrant
£
YearGrant
£
183930,0001850125,000
184030,0001851150,000
184140,0001852160,000
184240,0001853260,000
184350,0001854263,000
184440,0001855396,921
184575,0001856451,213
1846100,0001857541,233
1847100,0001858663,435
1848125,0001859836,920
1849125,0001860798,167

It may be convenient to present a summary of the system of State-aided education at the point which it had reached in 1858. The minutes and regulations of the Committee of Council may be classed under two general heads: first, those which prescribe the conditions on which grants would be made, and secondly, those which define and regulate the various objects which would be assisted.

It was provided, as it has been already stated, first, that the right of inspection should in all cases be secured to the Committee, and that in Church of England schools the names of inspectors should be approved by the Archbishops of Canterbury or York, similar arrangements being made with other religious bodies; and secondly, that the site of every school to which a building grant was made should be conveyed by a sufficient deed for the purposes of education.

The various objects which were to be assisted by grants are included in the following enumeration; they were to be made:

For building, enlarging, improving, and furnishing elementary schools.
For providing books, maps, and diagrams.
For providing scientific apparatus.
For paying the stipends of pupil teachers, and gratuities for their special instruction.
For augmenting the salaries of certificated schoolmasters and schoolmistresses.
For paying the stipends of assistant teachers.
For capitation grants.
For grants for industrial departments, and for evening classes forming part of, or being under the same management as common day schools; also for instruction in drawing.
For building and maintaining normal or training colleges for persons intending to become masters or mistresses in schools for the poor.
For pensions for teachers incapacitated by age or infirmity.
For grants for certified industrial and ragged schools.
For school libraries.
Nothing more clearly conveys to the mind the extent of the operations of the Committee of Council in the distribution of the Education Grant during the period now under review, and the great cost to the State at which the system had been built up, than the following table showing the total amount of the grants for various purposes which had been made from 1839 to 1860. as they are set forth in the report of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission.


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The grants made in aid of the educational objects specified in the foregoing table had been more or less proportioned to the amount of local effort, in other words, help was given to those who could help themselves. Accordingly, assistance was obtained by the most prosperous schools, but the dense ignorance in the lowest parts of large cities and in the outlying country districts was left almost untouched. Sir John Pakington, in moving the appointment of a Commission to inquire into the actual state of popular education in the country, stated on February 11, 1858, that, after the evidence which he quoted, he had a right to assume, first, that there were large masses of our population in a deplorable state of ignorance, and secondly, that there were considerable portions of this country, both in the rural districts and in the towns, where there were either no schools at all, or where the schools were so inefficient as not to be adequate to the purpose for which they were intended; and he proposed that an inquiry should be made whether the system then in force was or was not sufficient for its object. The Vice-President of the Committee of Council, Mr. Cowper, in opposing the motion in this form, said, "the present system might have many defects, but it had sprung out of the habits of the English people. In some respects it might be inferior to the continental systems, but he believed that it was as fitted to the English people as the German system to Germans. The demand for children's labour was so enduring and so urgent that he despaired of seeing any measure adopted by which the children of the working classes might be induced to remain at school as long as was necessary for their education. ... Schools must be adapted to the circumstances of those for whom they were intended." But the motion was carried, and the Royal Commission, over which the Duke of Newcastle presided, was appointed on June 30th 1858 "to inquire into the state of popular education in England, and to consider and report what measures, if any, were required for the extension of sound and cheap elementary instruction to all classes of the people."*

*Report of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, Vol. 1, p. 570.


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CHAPTER II

THE DUKE OF NEWCASTLE'S COMMISSION OF 1858

CODES FROM 1862 TO 1870

The Commission on Education, which has since been popularly connected with the name of its chairman, the Duke of Newcastle, consisted of the following members: Sir John T. Coleridge, formerly Justice of the Queen's Bench; the Rev. W. C. Lake, at present Dean of Durham; Rev. W. Rogers; Mr. Goldwin Smith, at that time tutor of University College, Oxford, and Secretary to the Oxford University Commission; Mr. Nassau Senior; and Mr. Edward Miall.

Their first duty was to inquire into the complaints made against the existing system. The most prominent of these were - that the cost of education was excessive and still increasing, that it failed to penetrate the rural districts, and that the instruction given even at the best schools was of an imperfect character. The system had confessedly accomplished great and beneficial results. Was it to be regarded simply as tentative and provisional, or did it admit of being developed into one which should be definite and final, and which should become the basis of a permanent and national system?

After three years of assiduous labour, the Duke of Newcastle's Commissioners presented their report in March 1861.

They reported that -

1. One in every eight of the population was at some time in some school or other.
2. Of the estimated number of 2½ millions who ought to be at school, only 1,675,000 were in public schools of any sort.
3. Of the pupils in public schools only one half were in schools receiving any grant, or under any sort of inspection.
4. The attendance in inspected schools was estimated at only 74.35 per cent of the scholars on the books.
5. The number of assisted schools amounted to 6,897, containing 917,255 scholars; while 15,750 denominational schools, and about 317 others, containing together 691,393 scholars, were outside the range of the operations of the Department.
6. Of the pupils in inspected schools not more than one fourth of the children were receiving a good education; the instruction given being too much adapted to the elder scholars, to the neglect of the younger ones.
Such, however, being in the view of the Commission of 1858 the facts of the case regarding the number receiving elementary education, they proceeded further to form an estimate of its quality and efficiency. They reported -
1. That they had strong testimony to the marked superiority of inspected over uninspected schools, and to the stimulus which inspection supplies, subject to the remark that inspections often lead the teachers to dwell on matters of memory rather than of reasoning, and rather on details than on general principles, or on general results; and also subject to a further remark as to the inconvenience of differences in the standards adopted by different inspectors; and also that while inspection quickens the intellectual activity, and raises the condition of the whole school, the inspectors are tempted to attend to the state of the upper more than of the junior classes, and to estimate the whole school accordingly.

2. That, even in the best schools, only about one-fourth of the scholars attained the highest class, and were considered by the inspector to be "successfully educated".

3. That there was a tendency in teachers to neglect both the more elementary subjects and the younger scholars, and that these last appeared to be capable of receiving a far better teaching in reading, writing, and arithmetic than had hitherto been given to them.

4. That the religious and moral influence of the public schools appeared to be very great - to be even greater than their intellectual influence; that in the opinion of the Commission a set of good schools civilizes the whole neighbourhood, and that this - the most important function of the school - was that which they best performed.


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5. That in point of literary instruction it would be a mistake to suppose that the existing system had failed because it had hitherto successfully educated too small a proportion of the scholars. It had succeeded in establishing a good type of education. In good schools the senior classes had turned out scholars really well taught. What was still required was to extend this type of education to a larger body of inferior schools and inferior scholars.*
It is by no means universally admitted that the proportion of scholars brought under the influence of effective education was rightly estimated by the Commission of 1858. Mr. Cumin stated in evidence before us that he thought the Commission had overstated the numbers under education. Mr. Stewart, Mr. Sharpe, and Mr. Matthew Arnold, all of whom were actively employed at the time as Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools, concurred, on the other hand, in stating that they could not accept the conclusion of the Commission, that even in good schools not more than one-fourth of the scholars were successfully educated. "This assertion", Mr. Matthew Arnold said, "was made without sufficient proof, and in many cases it would turn out not to be true."

After stating the conclusions at which they had arrived as to the extent and quality of existing elementary education in England and Wales, the Commissioners proceeded to give in detail the "plan" which they recommended for extensive alterations and additions to the then existing system, and in their concluding remarks on this head they stated, that in proposing to enable the Council Office to extend its operations over the whole country, they wished to preserve the leading features of the existing system, and that they especially adhered to the principles to which it was, in their opinion, indebted for no small part of its success, viz.:

(a) Non-interference in the religious training which is given by different denominations of Christians:
(b) Absence of all central control over the direct management of schools; adding, that it might become the duty of the Council to make provision for insuring to the children of the poor the benefit of education, "without exposing their parents to a violation of their religious convictions".
They recommended that all grants from the Parliamentary Fund should be paid directly to the managers, and not as before, in part to the teachers and pupil teachers, and that these should look henceforth exclusively to the managers for their remuneration; and they further presented a general plan for modifying and extending the existing system of grants in aid of elementary schools. Its general principles were described as follows:
1. That all assistance given to the annual maintenance of schools shall be simplified and reduced to grants of two kinds.

The first of these grants shall be paid out of the general taxation of the country, in consideration of the fulfilment of certain conditions by the managers of the schools. Compliance with these conditions is to be ascertained by the Inspectors.

The second shall be paid out of the county rates, in consideration of the attainment of a certain degree of knowledge by the children in the school during the year preceding the payment. The existence of this degree of knowledge shall be ascertained by examiners appointed by county and borough boards of education herein-after described.

2. That no school shall be entitled to these grants which shall not fulfil the following general conditions.

The school shall have been registered at the office of the Privy Council, on the report of the Inspector, as an elementary school for the education of the poor.

The school shall be certified by the Inspector to be healthy and properly drained and ventilated, and supplied with offices; and the principal school-room shall contain at least 8 square feet of superficial area for each child in average daily attendance.

3. That there shall be paid upon the average daily attendance of the children during the year preceding the inspector's visit as the Committee of Council shall fix from time to time, the sum specified in Part I, Chapter 6, for each child, according to the opinion formed by the inspectors of the discipline, efficiency, and general character of the school.

*Duke of Newcastle's Commission Report, p. 273.


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4. That there shall also be paid an additional grant of 2s 6d a child on so many of the average number of children in attendance throughout the year as have been under the instruction of properly qualified pupil teachers, or assistant teachers, allowing 30 children for each pupil teacher, or 60 for each assistant teacher.

5. That every school which applies for aid out of the county rate shall be examined by a county examiner within 12 months after the application, in reading, writing, and arithmetic, and that any one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools under whose inspection the school will fall, shall be entitled to be present at the examination.

6. That, subject to recommendation 7, the managers of all schools fulfilling the conditions specified in Rule 3, shall be entitled to be paid out of the county rate a sum varying from 22s 6d to 21s for every child who has attended the school during 140 days in the year preceding the day of examination, and who passes an examination before the examiner in reading, writing, arithmetic, and who, if a girl, also passes an examination in plain work. That scholars under seven years of age shall not be examined, but the amount of the grant shall be determined by the average number of children in daily attendance, 20s being paid on account of each child.

7. That the combined grants from the central fund and the county board shall never exceed the fees and subscriptions, or 15s per child on the average attendance.

8. That in every county or division of a county having a separate county rate there shall be a county board of education appointed in the following manner: The court of quarter sessions shall elect any number of members not exceeding six, being in the commission of the peace, or being chairmen or vice-chairmen of boards of guardians; and the members so elected shall elect any other persons not exceeding six. The number of ministers of religion on any county board of education shall not exceed one-third of the whole number.

9. That in corporate towns, which at the census last preceding contained more than 40,000 inhabitants, the town council may appoint a borough board of education, to consist of any number of persons not exceeding six, of which not more than two shall be ministers of religion. This board shall within the limits of the borough have the powers of a county board of education.

10. That where there is a borough board of education the grant which would have been paid out of the county rate shall be paid out of the borough rate, or other municipal funds.

11. That the election of county and borough boards of education shall be for three years, but at the end of each year one-third of the board shall retire, but be capable of re-election. At the end of the first and second years, the members to retire shall be determined by lot. The court of quarter sessions, at the next succeeding quarter sessions after the vacancies made in the county board, shall fill up the places, but so as always to preserve as near as may be the proportion between the number chosen from the commission of the peace, and from the chairmen and vice-chairmen of the boards of guardians and the other members. The vacancy in the borough boards of education shall be filled up by the town council, at a meeting to be held one calendar month from the day of the vacancies made.

12. That an inspector of schools to be appointed by the committee of council, shall be a member of each county and borough board.

13. That the boards of education shall appoint examiners, being certificated masters of at least seven years standing, and receive communications and decide upon complaints as to their proceedings.

With a view to make the teaching in schools more effective and more evenly distributed among the scholars, the Commission recommended what has since been known as "payment by results". "There is only one way", the Commission reports, "of securing this result, which is to institute a searching examination by competent authority of every child in every school to which grants are to be paid, with a view to ascertaining whether these indispensable elements of knowledge are thoroughly acquired, and to make the prospects and position of the teacher dependent, to a considerable extent, on the results of this examination."*

Of these recommendations, that one which proposed that education should be supported partly by means of a local rate bore no immediate fruit. The other main suggestions,

*Duke of Newcastle Commissioners' Report, page 157.


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viz., that the Parliamentary grant should be paid directly to the managers, who should arrange all questions of stipend with their teachers, and that this grant should be made to depend largely on the record of individual examination of the scholars, formed the backbone of Mr. Lowe's Revised Code.

In moving the annual Education Gi-ant on the 10th July 1861, Mr. Lowe, the Vice-President of the Committee of Council, referred to the Report of the Commissioners, and said that they had brought charges against the existing system. In the first place, they had denounced it on the score of expense; the second charge they had made was that the instruction given was of too ambitious and superficial a character; thirdly, they had contended that it was too complicated. They had recommended that grants should be given to all schools in which the pupils had attained a certain standard in examination, and that it should not be restricted to those schools which employed certificated teachers. The Government, he said, would do their best to provide a remedy for the evils before complained of, both as regarded greater economy and more efficient administration. In less than three weeks afterwards a minute was issued, dated 29th July 1861, abolishing unconditionally all the former minutes and regulations of the Committee of Council, adopting some of the recommendations of the Commissioners, and putting forth the new Code which some of its details from the Code of the previous year. This code underwent protracted discussion, and its provisions were in the end considerably modified. When it first appeared in the summer of 1861, a vigorous opposition was raised throughout the country against many of its conditions. This agitation was not without some effect. An extension of time was granted before the Revised Code was brought into operation, and in this interval it was submitted to and discussed by Parliament.

The Revised Code (as submitted to Parliament by Mr. Lowe in 1861) was an attempt to deal with the following representations made by the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, viz.:

1. That the appropriation of the Grant to individual members of the school staff involved ever-increasing administrative difficulties, which threatened to break down the whole system.
2. That the educational results were incommensurate with the expenditure of the Government.
3. That the distribution of the Grant had hitherto been limited in its range, reaching comparatively but few schools.
To remedy these defects the Revised Code proposed -
1. To abolish all Government payments to individual teachers; to mass all payments to a school into a single Capitation Grant, leaving the managers to make their own bargain with the members of their staff.
2. To base the amount of the Grant on the number of passes in rudimentary subjects made by children under 12 years of age as the result of individual examination.
3. To open the Grants to schools taught by teachers of a lower order of attainments.
Accordingly the Revised Code enacted that -
(a) Payments to teachers holding certificates of competency should cease.
(b) That managers should engage and pay their own pupil teachers, a fine of £10 being levied for each one short of the regulation number, which was to be less in proportion to scholars than before.
Payment for results was to be calculated on the following scale, viz.:
(a) A penny for every attendance after the first 100 attendances, with
(b) A deduction of one-third for every failure to pass in each of the three subjects of a standard, regulated according to the age of a child.*
(c) A deduction ranging from one-tenth to one-half for imperfect teaching, discipline, and school appointments.
With a view to extend the operations of the Grant to a wider field -
(a) The Revised Code instituted a lower class of certificates than those previously existing.
(b) It allowed, as before, the examination for certificates of untrained acting teachers well reported of by the inspector.
(c) It licensed ex-pupil teachers for seven years service in charge of schools of less than 100 in average attendance, abolishing the bonus of £10 which had been offered by the Minute of July 26, 1858, to certificated teachers to take charge of this class of schools on leaving the training college.
*The action of this age requirement was, however, from time to time suspended, and was ultimately abolished in 1882.


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(d) It enabled certificated teachers to have their certificates raised every five years according to reports made on their schools.
(e) It permitted day school teachers to teach in evening schools and to give the stipulated instruction to their pupil teachers during those hours.
The tendency of these provisions, it was contended at the time, was to lower the qualification of the teacher, to diminish the size of the staff, to reduce the importance of teaching any subjects beyond the mere rudiments, to restrict the total amount of the Grant, and to take away the inducement to keep children at school after 11 years of age. On the other side, it was contended that under this Code every child would receive the educational attention to which it was entitled, that public money would be paid for educational results alone, that the managers and not the State would in future be responsible for the teachers, and that a door was opened for a humbler class of schools to connect themselves with the Government system, and to receive public grants.

At the same time Normal schools under the new regulations suffered considerable loss. No grants were in future to be made for building and improving the premises of training colleges. Annual grants were to be made to them only under the following heads -

(a) Certificated Assistant Teachers.
(b) Lecturers.
(c) Queen's scholarships.
(d) Allowances to students at the end of each two years of residence.
(e) The same grants to the departments of their practising schools as to any other elementary school fulfilling the conditions of the Parliamentary grant.
It could hardly be expected that such sweeping changes could be effected without encountering strong opposition. Teachers maintained that there was a moral obligation on the Government to continue the money payment conditionally due on their certificates. Managers urged that by paying grants only for reading, writing, and arithmetic, the Code could not but be directly or indirectly injurious to religious instruction and to the progress of popular education; that "payment by results" was a delusive test when applied to moral and intellectual labour; that the most valuable results of this kind were, from their very nature, incapable of being thus tested, while the examination by age was still more strongly objected to. There were others, however, who expressed themselves in favour of the measure. Among these was the Rev. James Fraser, one of the sub-commissioners and Lord subsequently Bishop of Manchester, who said "that he had convinced himself that the Code was a good Code, which, in its essential features and subject to modifications in detail, he hoped would be maintained. The system was growing too ambitious and too costly." The two provisions which he singled out as specially worthy of approval were payment by results, and simplification of administration.

On the 13th February 1862 Mr. Lowe laid on the table of the House a revised Minute of the Committee of Council, with some further proposed amendments. These amendments, he said, were the result of six months' controversy. After replying to some of the objections that had been made to his scheme, he pointed out what he conceived to be some of its advantages. "The religious element", he said, underlies the whole system of Privy Council education. The Inspectors of the Church of England schools, which are four-fifths of the whole number of schools under the administration of the Privy Council, will therefore continue to inspect the state of religious instruction in those schools. They had no power and no wish to alter this in the slightest degree. The Revised Code", he said, "dealt with individuals, not with classes. It gave the managers almost entire freedom, made the interest of the school identical with the interest of the public, tested thoroughly the work done, and gave Parliament a complete control over the education grant. It proposed to give capitation grants on each attendance above a certain number - say 100, to be subject to reduction upon failure in reading, writing, or arithmetic. It was said that by this plan we were degrading education. The truth is, what we fix is a minimum of education, not a maximum. The object of the Privy Council is to promote education among the children of the labouring poor. Those for whom this system is designed are the children of persons who are not able to pay for the teaching. We do not profess to give these children an education that will raise them above their station and business in life - that is not our object - but to give them an education that may fit them for that business."

The Government having modified some of the provisions of the Code, and having agreed to give up grouping by age, and to propose a new scheme for the payment of


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pupil teachers, with a few minor alterations tending to introduce more certainty into the income of the school, the Revised Code, as amended, came into operation in every school inspected after the 30th June 1862. Since then many of its provisions have been altered or withdrawn, but one important principle, though greatly modified and relaxed in its application - payment by results - has been for four and twenty years the principle to which the Education Department have adhered as the groundwork for the distribution of the Parliamentary grant in aid of education.

The immediate result of the application of the Revised Code proved to be a substantial and progressive reduction in the total amount of the Grant. From £842,119 in 1861 it declined in the first year to £774,743, partly owing indeed to a discontinuance of the grant for books and apparatus, but more largely owing to the alterations made in the building grants. "We attribute", says the Report of the Committee of Council for 1862, "the reduction of expenditure under the head of building to reduction of rate, exclusion of normal schools, satisfaction of demand, and (in some degree) to stricter administration." But in the next year, when no such special causes of decline were operating, the grant again fell to £721,386, and this was explained to be more directly the consequence of the new system of "payment by results". In 1864 the grant had further fallen to £655,036, and in 1865 a still further reduction occurred of £20,000. Thus the promise of Mr. Lowe to the House of Commons, that education, under his system of administering the grant, should, if not efficient, at least be cheap, bade fair to be realised, so far at least as the second of these alternatives was concerned, since the cost to the country of the annual grants steadily diminished. This will be seen more clearly from the following table:

Average
Attendance
Parliamentary
Grants
£
1860803,708724,403
1861855,077813,441
1862888,923774,743
1863928,310721,386
1864937,678655,036
18651,016,558636,806
18661,048,493649,307

Various causes were assigned for this decline in the amount of the Government grant. It was contended by the supporters of the Revised Code that this did not necessarily indicate any falling off in the quality of education. They pointed out that formerly there had been no alternative between paying the grant in full and refusing it altogether, a course from which inspectors naturally shrunk except in extreme cases, but that the Revised Code worked automatically in reducing the grants in proportion as the results of examination showed a falling off. According to this view, the application of a more searching test by individual examination was simply unmasking a pre-existing unsoundness in the children's knowledge of the simple rudiments, and was an inevitable condition of laying a more solid foundation for the future. It was further alleged that when the elementary attainments of the scholars were compared with their age by individual examination, the results fell lamentably short of what might reasonably be expected; for in 1863-4, when the Revised Code was in force, 41 per cent of the number of scholars in average attendance were individually examined; and 86 per cent of those over 10 years of age were examined in standards too low for their age.* To bring this state of things to light, it was argued, was of itself a great step on the road to a better system, though it inflicted for the moment pecuniary loss on the schools.

On the other hand it was contended, that the operation of the Revised Code tended to contract instruction within the limits of the pure rudiments, and thus favoured the abandonment of those higher subjects, on a due infusion of which depended the training of the intellectual faculties. The Rev. D. J. Stewart, then one of Her Majesty's Inspectors, in his general report for the year 1866, expressed a very unfavourable opinion of its operation. He reported a general decline throughout his district, not only in the extent of the subjects of instruction, but in the success with which the purely elementary ones were taught. "When I speak of a decline in the

*Report of Committee of Council, 1882-83, page xv.


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general standard of instruction throughout the district - the counties of Cambridge, Bedford, and Huntingdon - I do not mean that the number of subjects of instruction is reduced so much as that the purely elementary ones are not taught as thoroughly as they used to be three years ago. ... The failures in the examination prescribed by the Revised Code have been consequently greater in 1866 than in 1865, and there are very few schools in which the old rate has been maintained." The falling off in the standard of work done in these schools might, he said, be traced without much difficulty to the following causes:

1. The employment of inferior teachers;
2. The reduction of the teaching staff;
3. The employment of monitors instead of pupil teachers.*
In the opinion of Mr. Stewart, therefore, the Revised Code, so far as it had produced these effects, had not only discouraged attention to grammar, history, and geography, but had failed to improve the instruction in elementary subjects. It was also alleged that the scale of payments under the Revised Code necessarily resulted in a lower grant per head than was earned under the previous system.

The Education Department, no doubt, strove from the first to obviate these drawbacks. They instructed their inspectors to judge of a school, as before, by a standard embracing its "religious, moral, and intellectual merits". But, as so large a part of the grant depended on rudimentary knowledge, there was a danger lest, in spite of the influence of inspectors in the opposite direction, the subjects which paid the school best should receive more than a due share of the attention of teachers.

Another immediate effect of the Revised Code was the reduction of the staff of pupil teachers. Previously, when they had been in the direct pay of the Government, there was every inducement held out to a school to multiply their number. But when, by the Revised Code, all payments for the staff came directly out of the school purse, it was but natural that economies should be practised in that direction. And the further apprehension was not unreasonable, that not only would the weakening of the staff impair the instruction, but that it would tend to cut off the supply of teachers at the fountain head, by seriously reducing the number of future candidates for training.

While experience was being gained as to the general results of this change of system, a question was brought into prominence which presented a new phase of an old controversy. Considerable difficulty having often been found in providing schools in very small parishes not large enough to maintain more than one school, the Committee of Council were desirous that a conscience clause should be introduced into such schools, so as to relieve the children of Nonconformists from the obligation of learning the Church Catechism and the distinctive doctrines of the Church of England. In a letter dated the 16th April 1862, and again on November 27th, 1863, the Committee of Council proposed to the National Society a new management clause, providing that in a parish where one school only could or ought to be maintained, the children of parents not in communion with the church or denomination with which the school was connected might be admitted to participate in its benefits. It was nowhere formally stated what proportion the Nonconformists were to bear to the Churchmen in any particular parish, but it seems that if the minority was equal to one-seventh of the population this rule was to take effect. The new clause was then to be inserted in every trust deed which the Committee of Council had to approve for a school about to be built by aid of the Parliamentary Grant in districts where there was no room for a second school. The following are the terms of the clause in question, as communicated by Mr. Lingen, now Lord Lingen, then the Secretary of the Education Department, to the National Society on February 8th, 1864: "The said Committee (that is, of schools accepting the clause) shall be bound to make such orders as shall provide for admitting to the benefits of the schools the children of parents not in communion with the Church of England, as by law established; but such orders shall be confined to the exemption of such children, if their parents desire it, from attendance at the public worship, and from instruction in the doctrines and formularies of the said Church, and shall not otherwise interfere with the religious teaching of the said scholars ... and shall not authorise any other religious instruction to be given in the school." The Committee of the National Society replied that they felt unable to accede to the request made to them, as they were not prepared to alter the terms of union with the Society, as proposed in that letter.

The earliest operations of the Committee of Council having been carried on in large towns and populous parishes large enough to maintain more than one school, the need of

*Report of Committee of Council, 1866-67, page 210.


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a conscience clause had not at first been much felt, but, when the smaller parishes began to apply for grants in aid, it became inevitable that differences of opinion would arise upon the constitution of a common school. The clause in the form in which it was proposed was, indeed, new, but the principle which it embodied appeared very early in the relations between the Church of England and the Committee of Council. From the very earliest times that Committee held itself free to make grants to Church schools other than those in connexion with the National Society. In the Minute dated 24th September 1839, and in that of 3rd December in that year, it is stated that while, as a general rule, the schools aided must be in connexion with the National Society or the British and Foreign School Society, yet, whenever a case was treated as a special one, preference would be given to those schools in which, while the religious instruction was of the same character as that given in the schools of those two societies, the school committee and trustees did not enforce any rule compelling children to learn a catechism or to attend a place of divine worship to which their parents on religious grounds objected. The conscience clause, therefore, was logically the result of an attempt to act upon the conditions set forth in those early Minutes. The controversy in regard to management clauses, which went on from 1847 to 1850, had turned upon the question what was to be the proper form of trust deed for a National School erected with the aid of a building grant. The controversy on the conscience clause raised the question whether a school in union with the National Society, being the sole school of the district, was or was not a fitting school for a grant.

By 1867 sufficient experience of the working of the Revised Code had been gained to warrant its modification in several important particulars. On the 20th of February 1867, under Lord Derby's Government, a Minute was issued and afterwards laid on the table of the Houses of Parliament by the Vice-President of the Council, Mr. Corry, having the following objects:

1. To relieve the proportionately larger expenses of small schools.
2. To encourage the presentation of a greater number of scholars for examination in elementary subjects and in standards better corresponding to their respective ages.
3. To encourage instruction beyond the elementary subjects.
4. To increase the existing proportion of teachers to scholars, by requiring a greater number of apprentices, and this not only for the purpose of directly promoting the objects previously specified, but also for the purpose of providing a more adequate supply of candidates for training as teachers.*
As a means of effecting these objects, an increased grant was offered beyond the ordinary existing rate, which, when it came to be fully earned, would amount to £8, on the following conditions, viz., that the staff exceeded the minimum in a fixed ratio; that two out of three passes in the rudiments were secured; that one-fifth of the passes were obtained in a standard higher than the fourth; and that one specific subject at least was taught in addition to the subjects required by the Revised Code. In addition, each Queen's Scholarship obtained by a pupil teacher was to bring to the school a pecuniary reward, and, on the attainment of a certificate by such pupil teacher after residence in a training college, a further bonus was to be paid to the school in which the pupil teacher had been apprenticed. An upward movement in the grant soon resulted from the combined effects of the searching processes of examination enforced by the Revised Code, and of the liberal encouragements to go forward, offered by Mr. Corry's Minute. The courage and enterprise of the promoters of education began to revive. And while the plans of those who desired a general system of State education were being matured, the existing system was steadily spreading and strengthening itself.

Among the measures brought forward, which, during the period we have now passed under review (1862-1870), had been familiarising the public mind with ideas that were to find a leading place in the legislation of 1870 was the "Education of the Poor Bill", which was brought into the House of Commons in 1867 by Mr. Bruce, Mr. W. E. Forster, and Mr. Algernon Egerton, and which, indeed, must be regarded as the parent of Mr. Forster's Bill. There can be as little doubt that the real, though not so modern, or so well remembered, original of this Bill of 1867, was the "Manchester and Salford Boroughs Education Bill", which was brought into the House of Commons in the Session of 1851-2, by Mr. Entwistle, M.P. Mr. Egerton, whose name stood on the back of the later Bill, was the personal repre-

*Report of Committee of Council, 1866-69, page ci.


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sentative of the earnest and influential union of the friends of education in Manchester which brought forward this earlier Bill. Fourteen or fifteen years, indeed, had not passed without removing some who had taken an active part in preparing the Bill of 1851. But several still remained at their post ready to lend their best help to any honest endeavour to solve the educational problem of the nation. These, joined by other earnest friends of education, put the machinery into motion which in 1867 brought forward the Bill of Messrs Bruce, Forster, and Egerton. It is not possible, indeed, to read the projected Bill of 1851 without recognising that it contains the substance of the Bill of 1867. The chief points of coincidence between the two may be noted. Both were devised in Manchester; both had reference to individual boroughs (or districts); in both the local authority was to be the District Committee elected by the Town Council (or by the ratepayers in other than municipal districts); both gave such Committees authority to levy local rates; both adopted existing schools as the basis of operation, and only contemplated the establishment of new schools in order to supplement the others where there might be need; both provided for the transference on fair terms of existing schools to the District Committee; both assumed that in all schools under the District Committee the reading of the Holy Scriptures should be part of the daily instruction of the scholars; both enforced a conscience clause substantially equivalent to that which was required by the Act of 1870; both made provision for a system of local and subordinate inspection; both recognised the supreme authority of the Committee of Privy Council over the local schools and the local inspection. Adding to the Bill of 1867 the strong outline of administrative interference which, about the same period, Mr. Lowe sketched out as necessary in order to carry out the work of national education; adding, further, the compulsory clauses which Mr. (afterwards Sir Thomas) Bazley desired to introduce into the Bill of Messrs. Bruce, Forster, and Egerton, we have, in fact, all the characteristic principles of the Bill of 1870, as originally prepared by Mr. Forster. In his address, delivered at Edinburgh in November 1867, on Classical and Primary Education, Mr. Lowe expressed himself as follows:

I would say, commence a survey and report upon Great Britain parish by parish; report to the Privy Council in London the educational wants in each parish, the number of schools, the number of children, and what is wanted to be done in order to place within the reach of the people of that parish a sufficient amount of education. When that has been done, I think it should be the duty of the Privy Council to give notice to that parish that they should found a school, or whatever may be wanted for the purposes of that parish. If the parish found a school, then it would be the duty of the Privy Council to assist it, and that in the same way as it assists the schools already in existence. If the parish does not agree to do what needs to be done, then, I think, there ought to be power vested in the Privy Council, or the Secretary of State, or some other great responsible public officer, to make a compulsory rate on them to found that school. I think the schools they found should be entitled to the same inspection and examination as the schools already in existence, and receive the same grants for results.
Here we have in precise and full outline the provisions actually contained in the Act of 1870 with regard to the powers of initiation and interference possessed by the Privy Council for ascertaining the need and compelling the supply of education throughout the country. The super-addition of these provisions to the machinery for erecting and administering District School Committees (or Boards in the language of the Act of 1870) provided by the Bills of 1857 and 1867, would have converted the local and permissive Manchester proposals into a national measure, identical in all main points with that of Mr. Forster. It must be noted also that in 1868 the Duke of Marlborough, as a member of Mr. Disraeli's Government, introduced an educational measure into Parliament. This measure went almost wholly upon the old foundation of the then existing educational system of the country. The Government, however, was in no position to carry it through, and was succeeded very soon after by Mr. Gladstone's administration, as a member of which Mr. Forster introduced the measure of 1870.


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CHAPTER III

THE EDUCATION ACTS, 1870 to 1880

The year 1870 will ever be marked in the constitutional history of England as that in which a general provision for elementary education was first made by statute. Already, indeed, as we have seen, a vast network of elementary schools provided by the various religious bodies and aided in many cases by the State, had spread itself over England, though it had not adequately covered the land. The Committee of Council on Education had been constituted to aid and direct the instruction therein given. But the pivot on which the whole system of Government aid turned was that of voluntary enterprise, and the Education Department could not extend the range of popular education any further than the voluntary zeal of the country was minded to carry it. Previous to 1870 there existed in England no public authority charged with the duty of calling into being elementary schools in localities where voluntary zeal was unequal to the task, or armed with the authority to require that those already established should continue to be carried on, and carried on efficiently.

The Education Act of 1870, which will always continue to be honourably associated with the name of Mr. Forster, at that time the Vice-President of the Council, was directed to remedy these defects, and to found a national and comprehensive system of elementary education. The principles on which that measure was based and the objects it had in view were lucidly expounded in the speech delivered by its author on its introduction into the House of Commons. In moving the first reading of his Bill Mr. Forster contended that the question affected not only the intellectual, but also the moral training of the people, and from its importance he called on Parliament to divest itself of all party considerations. His primary axiom was that in the creation of any new system the lessons of the past should be considered, as well as the wants of the present. In setting forth the urgent necessity for such a measure, Mr. Forster estimated that the existing provision for effective elementary education in England included some million and a half of scholars, on the books of about 11,000 aided schools, of whom about a million were in average attendance. These numbers, however, represented not more than two-fifths of those children between 6 and 10 years old, and one-third of those between 10 and 12, who ought to have been at school. Thus, there were left outside the range of any educational institution of guaranteed efficiency not less than one million children between the former ages, and half a million between the latter. In confirmation of his estimate, Mr. Forster produced further figures drawn from the return to an inquiry ordered by the House of Commons in the previous year into the educational condition of four great towns, viz., Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, and Birmingham. "It is calculated", he said, "that in Liverpool the number of children between 5 and 13 who ought to receive an elementary education is 80,000; but, as far as we can ascertain, 20,000 of them attend no school whatever, while at least another 20,000 attend schools where they get an education not worth having. In Manchester - that is, in the borough of Manchester, not including Salford - there are about 65,000 children who might be at school, and of this number about 16,000 go to no school at all.* I must, however, add that Manchester appears to be better than Liverpool in one respect, that there are fewer schools where the education is not worth having. As a Yorkshireman, I am sorry to say that from what I hear, Leeds appears to be as bad as Liverpool, and so also, I fear, is Birmingham."

In making this statement regarding the educational needs of the country, Mr. Forster paid a high tribute to the great zeal and disinterested motives of those voluntary bodies by whose exertions, aided by the State, the existing provision for education had been made. Full justice also was done by him to the willingness that had been shown by parents to send their children to school. But, he contended that it was the inevitable result of having left the initiative in providing education wholly to volunteers, that just where help was most needed there had been least opportunity of procuring it. And whatever the readiness shown by parents generally to avail themselves of the opportunities of instruction for their children, where these existed, there remained a large number who either would not or could not send their children to school.


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The Bill, therefore, had a double object before it, namely, first, to cover the country with good schools, and, secondly, to get the parents to send their children into them. With a view to the accomplishment of the former object, Mr. Forster said:

There are certain conditions which I think honourable members on both sides of the House will acknowledge we must abide by. First of all, we must not forget the duty of the parents. Then we must not forget our duty to our constituencies, our duty to the taxpayers. Though our constituencies almost, I believe, to a man would spend money, and large sums of money, rather than not do the work, still we must remember that it is upon them that the burden will fall. And, thirdly, we must take care not to destroy in building up - not to destroy the existing system in introducing a new one. In solving this problem there must be, consistently with the attainment of our object, the least possible expenditure of public money, the utmost endeavour not to injure existing and efficient schools, and the most careful absence of all encouragement to parents to neglect their children.*
Many changes were made in Mr. Forster's Bill during its passage through Parliament, as was to be expected in a measure of such importance. Three editions of it were printed in each House; and we proceed to enumerate the principal points of difference between the Bill introduced on the 17th of February 1870, and the Act which received the Royal Assent on the 9th of August of the same year.

The number prefixed to each of the following paragraphs indicates the section of the Act in which the changes to which we have referred will be found.

7. This section defines a public elementary school, introduces a time table conscience clause, and provides that it shall be conspicuously put up in every aided school; omits the requirement that parents objecting to their children receiving religious instruction should state their objections in writing; and states that it shall be no part of the duties of Her Majesty's inspectors to inquire into the religious instruction given in a school or to examine any scholar in religious subjects (the Bill having permitted such inquiry and examination, at the request of the managers and with the consent of the Department).

S. 8. Requires that schools in course of being supplied shall, in the first inquiry into school supply, be taken into account in estimating the school provision of a district.

S. 9. Requires the Department to publish a notice of the school provision in districts in which there is a sufficiency of accommodation; the Bill having directed such publication to be made only in cases of deficiency.

S. 10. Reduces the time allowed for the supply of a deficiency in any district before a school board is compulsorily formed, from 12 to 6 months; and makes the election of a school board, when a deficiency is not supplied, imperative.

S. 12. Allows the Department to order the election of a school board, after due inquiry, but without waiting for returns under the Act -

(1) On the application of the council of a borough or the ratepayers of a parish;
(2) On the closing of a school which creates a deficiency in the supply of the district.
S. 14. Provides that no distinctive catechism or religious formulary shall be taught in any board school.

S. 16. Gives to the Department the final decision of any question whether a school board has or has not observed the regulations under which board schools are required by the Act to be conducted.

S. 20. Sets out in detail the procedure to be followed in the case of the compulsory purchase of sites by school boards.

S. 21. Contains regulations as to the purchase of land by managers of voluntary schools.

S. 23. Prescribes in detail the conditions under which a school may be transferred by the managers to a school board.

S. 24. Sanctions the retransfer of schools from school boards to managers acting under the old trusts.

S. 29. Provides that school boards shall be elected by burgesses (in boroughs) and ratepayers (in parishes) instead of by town councils and vestries, as originally proposed.

Introduces the cumulative vote.

S. 31. Fixes 5 to 15 as the number of members of a school board, in place of 3 to 12.

S. 37. Provides that there shall be one school board for London; that the chairman

*Mr. Forster's speech in the House of Commons, First Reading of the Elementary Education Bill, February 17th, 1870.


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may be paid; and that the number of members (to be fixed by the Department in the first instance) may be altered from time to time.

S. 57. Extends from 30 to 50 years the term in which school boards may repay loans.

Requires the recommendation of the Department for loans to be made to boards by the Public Works Loan Commissioners, and fixes the interest on such loans at 3½ per cent, per annum.

S. 58. Gives power to the London School Board to borrow from the Metropolitan Board of Works.

S. 60. Provides that the accounts of school boards shall be audited by the Poor Law Auditors, acting under the orders of the Poor Law Board and not (as at first proposed,) by special auditors appointed by and under the control of the Department.

S. 66. Gives power to the Department to dissolve a school board in default, and to order a new election.

S. 74. Fixes the age of compulsory school attendance at 5 to 13 (instead of 12); exempts religious instruction and holy days from the operation of byelaws; sanctions partial exemption from school attendance between 10 and 13; substitutes a distance not exceeding three miles (as each board directs) for a one mile limit, in which attendance may be enforced; provides for the publication of proposed byelaws in each district; and does away with the necessity of submitting byelaws to Parliament before they come into operation.

S. 76. Allows the examination of voluntary schools in religious knowledge, on one or two days, after notice.

S. 96. Prescribes (1) that no grants shall be made to schools which are not public elementary schools after 31st March 1871 (not 1872 as in the Bill); (2) That no building grants shall be allowed in any case, unless application has been made before the 31st December 1870.

S. 97. Provides that no annual grants shall be made -

(1) In respect of religious instruction.
(2) In excess of the income of a school from voluntary contributions, school fees, and other non-parliamentary sources.
(3) On conditions that give preference or advantage to any school because it is or is not a board school.
Reduces the special grant to be made to the school boards of districts in which a rate of 3d in the pound has been raised, from 10s to 7s 6d on the average attendance in the board schools.

Requires parliamentary sanction for new minutes of the Department.

S. 98. Subjects board schools to the same rule as voluntary schools, in respect to the refusal of aid if they are unnecessary.

Schedule II. Prescribes vote by ballot for the election of the members of the school board for London (except in the City Division).

Abandons proposed annual retirement of one-third of the members of each school board.

The most important provision originally found in the Bill, but omitted from the Act, is that by which (clause 22) school boards were to be empowered (1) to grant assistance to voluntary schools in their district, provided all such schools received assistance on equal terms; and (2) to withhold such assistance after 12 months' notice.

Among other differences between the Bill and the Act we may mention the following:

The Act (section 3) omits the provision that schools should be disqualified for receiving annual grants if the scholars are boarded and lodged; it requires (5) the school provision for every district to be efficient as well as suitable; it provides (15) that school boards may delegate any of their powers, save that of raising money, to managers appointed by them; it substitutes (22) the Department for the Charity Commissioners as the authority for controlling the sale, lease, or exchange of land by school boards; it provides (28) that boards may maintain as well as establish industrial schools; it assigns (31) to the Department the settlement of disputes as to the election of the members of a school board; it sanctions (36) the appointment of attendance officers; it prescribes (55) the dates up to which the accounts of school boards are to be made up; it orders (67) that the return of the school supply for London shall be made up within four months from the election of the chairman of the board; it gives power to the Department (70) to appoint officers to make returns as to the school supply of any district, where the local authority neglects its duty in respect of such returns; it directs (71) that the inspectors of returns shall inquire into the suitability as well as the efficiency of the schools in each district; and it prescribes


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penalties (88,92) for incorrect returns, personation of voters, forging or falsifying voting papers and corrupt practices at elections.

Mr. Forster's Act, as a first step towards providing efficient schools, mapped out the country into school districts, each separately chargeable with the duty of providing elementary education within its own borders, which were to be boroughs and parishes, or groups of parishes, the Metropolis being constituted a district by itself.

The most important provision of the Act of 1870 is to be found in its fifth section, which enacts that "There shall be provided for every school district a sufficient amount of accommodation in public elementary schools (as herein-after defined) available for all the children resident in such district, for whose elementary education efficient and suitable provision is not otherwise made." The clause, indeed, bristles with terms, which, as they have given rise to much controversy, require to be accurately defined. If we ask what is an "elementary school", the following is the definition supplied by the Act itself. "The term 'elementary school' means a school or department of a school at which elementary education is the principal part of the education there given, and does not include any school or department of a school at which the ordinary payments in respect of the instruction, from each scholar, exceed ninepence per week."* But a "public elementary school", as defined by this Act, has a still more technical meaning: A public elementary school is described in section VII, the first sub-section of which is as follows: "It shall not be required, as a condition of any child being admitted into or continuing in the school, that he shall attend or abstain from attending any Sunday school, or any place of religious worship, or that he shall attend any religious observance, or any instruction in religious subjects in the school or elsewhere, from which observance or instruction he may be withdrawn by his parent, or that he shall, if withdrawn by his parent, attend the school on any day exclusively set apart for religious observance by the religious body to which his parent belongs." It is required, also in such a school that a time-table should be put up in the school setting forth the time devoted to religious observances or instruction, which time-table must be approved by the Department through the inspectors. The school must be open at all times for the inspection of Her Majesty's inspector; and at the end of the third sub-section it is further provided: "That it shall be no part of the duties of such inspector to inquire into any instruction in religious subjects given at such school, or to examine any scholar therein in religious knowledge, or in any religious subject or book." The last sub-section provides "that the school shall be conducted in accordance with the conditions required to be fulfilled by an elementary school, in order to obtain an annual Parliamentary grant." In such "public elementary schools" the Act requires that accommodation shall be provided for all those children "for whose elementary education efficient and suitable provision is not otherwise made." By efficient schools, Mr. Forster said, in introducing his Bill, he meant "those that had good buildings and good teaching". Suitable schools, he defined to mean "such as parents could not reasonably object to on religious grounds".‡

The following extract taken from the Instructions to H.M. Inspectors of Schools, issued in May 1871, relative to the inquiries into the school supply of their respective Districts, serves to show the interpretation put upon the word "suitable", as applied to school accommodation, by the Minister responsible for the administration of the Act, when first put into force:

'Efficient and suitable provision will be held to be made for a district when there is efficient elementary school accommodation (1) within a reasonable distance of the home of every child who requires elementary instruction, (2) of which he can avail himself on payment of a fee within the means of his parent, (3) without being required to attend any religious instruction to which his parent objects.'

There appears to be some misapprehension with respect to the last clause in this sentence. It does not imply that every school in a district must admit all comers under the protection of a conscience clause. That will be required only in the case of the schools which seek annual aid. Nor does it imply that there must be such a school in every district. But, in every district, the minority, whether churchmen or dissenters, must be able, if they wish it, to obtain secular instruction for their children with such protection, either in the district itself or in an adjoining district.

*Section III.

‡Mr. Forster's Speech, February 17th, 1870.


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Under the Act, a district may have henceforth two classes of efficient schools:
(a) Public elementary schools, in receipt of annual aid, and worked under a time-table conscience clause by certificated teachers.

(b) Efficient schools (within the meaning of the Act), not receiving annual aid, either as being without certificated teachers, or as refusing to accept the prescribed conscience clause.

The school provision of a district will be suitable if there be some school or other under a conscience clause, within reach of every child whose parent wishes him to have this protection. A parent cannot present his child to the teacher of any particular school, and demand his admission to the secular instruction alone given in the school, unless the school is in receipt of annual aid, or held under a trust deed which secures the rights of conscience. The individual school may be recognised as efficient without a conscience clause. But every district must contain an efficient school with a conscience clause, if there is none near enough in other districts, which the children of any minority who require such protection can attend; and this school (or these schools if one is not large enough) must provide efficient accommodation for all the children of the minority.

So far, therefore, as the suitability of individual schools is concerned, the returns will show you with what denomination (if any) each school is connected, and which of them are worked under a conscience clause; while the managers will inform you if their schools are to be henceforth conducted as public elementary schools. So far as the whole provision of the district is concerned, the question whether it is "suitable" will not arise in any case where there is sufficient "public school" accommodation avail- able either for the whole district or for the minority who desire protection. Such accommodation is primâ facie "suitable" for every child. You will use your discretion as to the best means of ascertaining the numbers of the minority; and, in case of doubt on the subject, which is not removed by the information you may obtain from the school managers and others whom you meet in the district, reference may be usefully made to the overseers of the parish, or the clerk of the union, who will be able to give you some idea of the number of places of worship in the district, and the attendance at each. This will be a guide to you in judging of the number of the minority, or in considering any representations they may make to you on the subject of the school accommodation which they require.

With school districts in which the above conditions were fulfilled by schools already existing the Act of 1870 did not interfere. Wherever this was not the case, a new machinery was provided by the Act for supplying the deficiency, viz., the school board. Mr. Forster's reasons for calling into existence this organisation for compulsorily providing school accommodation where it was proved to be wanted are best given in his own words: "I have said that there will be compulsory provision where it is wanted - if and where proved to be wanted, but not otherwise. We come now to the machinery for its application where it is proved to be wanted. How do we propose to apply it? By school boards elected by the district. We have already got the district; we have found out the educational want existing in it - we see that the district must be supplied - we have waited in the hope that some persons would supply it; they have not done so. We, therefore, say that it must be supplied; but by whom? It would be possible for the Government to attempt to supply it by defraying the expenses from the taxes; and I believe that, one or two hon. gentlemen think that would be the best way. No doubt it would be possible for the Government to try to do this; but I believe it would be impossible for them to effect it. I believe it is not in the power of any central department to undertake such a duty throughout the kingdom. Consider also the enormous power it would give the central administration. Well, then, if Government cannot do it itself by central action, we must still rely upon local agency. Voluntary local agency has failed, therefore our hope is to invoke the help of municipal organisation. Therefore, where we have proved the educational need, we supply it by local administration - that is, by means of rates aided by money voted by Parliament, expended under local management, with central inspection and control."*

Accordingly, the Act of 1870 provided for the establishment of a school board in every school district which requires further suitable accommodation; making it a corporate body, having a perpetual succession and a common seal, with power to acquire and hold land for the purposes of this Act.† The number of members is to be not less than five or more than fifteen, as may be determined in the first instance by the

*Mr. Forster's Speech, February 17th, 1870.

†Section XXX.


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Education Department.* It rests with the Education Department to determine whether a deficiency exists in any school district in the public school accommodation.† Having published their decision on the wants of the district, the right of appeal is given within a month to a certain number of ratepayers or to the managers of any elementary school in the district,‡ and, if necessary, a public inquiry is to be held, and a final notice issued. After waiting not more than six months to see if the deficiency is in course of being supplied, a school board is to be provided for the district,§ which, if it fails to comply with the requisition within 12 months, will be deemed to be in default.|| A school board may, however, be created by the Education Department, without the existence of any school deficiency, on the application of those who would have to elect one, or where the Department is satisfied that a deficiency in school accommodation is imminent.¶ Provision is made for forming united districts, and for dissolving the same; the united school board being composed of members elected by the ratepayers of the constituent parts of the united district.** A parish judged by the Education Department too small to have a school board of its own may be added to another parish, to the school board of which it is entitled to send representatives.†† Lastly, school boards are to be elected by the ratepayers for a period of three years under the method known as cumulative voting.‡‡ To bodies thus constituted the Act entrusts the duty of completing and maintaining adequate school provision within each district.†† School boards are empowered, for the purpose of providing schools, to borrow on the security of the school fund and local rate with the consent of the Department, and to spread the repayment over not more than 50 years.‡‡ Their accounts must be yearly audited by the Local Government Board, and published.§§ School boards declared in default may be superseded by the Department, who may appoint other members in their place, to be remunerated out of the local rates.

In constituting this new provision for supplying the educational wants of the country by school boards, side by side with the existing system of voluntary schools, the Act provides that the two systems should stand on a footing of perfect equality in the provisions of the Code, and before the Education Department. It enacts "that the conditions required to be fulfilled by an elementary school in order to obtain an annual Parliamentary grant shall be those contained in the minutes of the Education Department in force for the time being ... but such conditions ... shall not give any preference or advantage to any school, on the ground that it is or is not provided by a school board."||||

The proposal to throw on the rates the whole cost of education was strongly pressed on Mr. Forster, as it has continually been urged since that time; but in introducing his measure he assigned the following reasons for rejecting it:

The school boards are to provide the education. Who are to pay for it? In the first place, shall we give up the school fees? I know that some earnest friends of education would do that. I at once say that the Government are not prepared to do it. If we did so the sacrifice would be enormous. The parents paid in school fees last year about £420,000. If this scheme works, as I have said we hope it will work, it will very soon cover the country, and that £420,000 per annum would have to be doubled, or even trebled. Nor would it stop there. This would apply to the elementary education chiefly of the working classes. The middle classes would step in - the best portion of the working classes would step in - and say, 'There must be free education also for us, and that free education must not be confined to elementary schools.' The cost would be such as really might well alarm my right hon. friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer. I hope the country would be ready to incur that cost if necessary; but I think it would be not only unnecessary, but mischievous. Why should we relieve the parent from all payments for the education of his child? We come in and help the parents in all possible ways; but, generally speaking, the enormous majority of them are able, and will continue to be able, to pay these fees.¶¶
In accordance with these conclusions, Mr. Forster's Act directs the formation of a school fund, including school fees, along with grants and money raised by rate, as the source of the income of a school board. Any sum required to meet the deficiency of the school fund, is to be paid by the rating authority out of the local rate.*** It leaves,

*Section XXXI (1).

†Section VIII.

‡Section IX.

§Section X.

||Section XI.

¶Section XII.

**Section XL, XLII.

††Section XLVIII.

‡‡Section XXIX.

§§Section LIX.

||||Section XCVII.

¶¶Mr. Forster's speech, February 17th, 1870.

***Section LIII.


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however, to school boards the power, not merely to remit the fees of poor children attending board schools, but, with the assent of the Education Department, to establish free schools wherever, from the poverty of any district, they may deem it necessary; a power which appears, from Mr. Cumin's evidence, not as yet to have been exercised in a single instance. Evidence, however, has since been given to us that a school exists in Birmingham attended only by children who have orders for free education granted them by the school board.

Special mention must be made of an option proposed to be given to school boards by Mr. Forster's Bill, as originally framed, although it was subsequently withdrawn, seeing that its revival in a somewhat altered form has since been advocated, Mr. Forster's Bill originally provided that in supplying deficiencies, school boards should have the option of providing all needful schools themselves, or of making grants out of the local rates towards the maintenance of existing schools, but the exercise of this discretion was fettered by the condition that they must either assist all voluntary schools in their district or none.

This proposal, however, was not pressed, and Mr. Gladstone in his speech of June 16, 1870, on moving to go into Committee on the Bill, enumerated the objections in deference to which the Government withdrew the clause. On the one side it had been objected to that proposal that the funds raised by rates would thus be made applicable to purposes of denominational religious teaching, and that the free choice proposed to be given to school boards to give or withhold grants would inevitably create discord in those bodies. On the other side it was contended that justice might not be done to voluntary schools, "through religious prejudice on the part of school boards against particular and possibly obnoxious communions"; and that at best any assistance given by a vote of a local board out of the rates to a voluntary school must be fluctuating and unstable in its character. But in withdrawing this provision for support to voluntary schools out of the rates which the Bill had originally contemplated, Mr. Gladstone promised that an equivalent should be provided in the Code, by means of such an increase of the parliamentary grant as would enable the voluntary schools to stand in competition with the board schools for which rates were to be levied by the new school boards to be constituted by the Bill.

Besides erecting new schools, school boards are empowered by this Act to accept the transfer of voluntary schools from their managers, and the latter are empowered on a resolution of two-thirds of their number, with the consent of two-thirds of their subscribers, to offer the transfer of schools under their management, notwithstanding any provision in their trust deeds to the contrary, due notice being given by the Department to the trustees, and to persons who have any interest in the property. And the property thus transferred, the school board are empowered, with the consent of the Department, and on the repayment of all moneys raised by loan and expended by the Board on the premises, to re-transfer to managers, similarly qualified as the original managers had been, if the school board resolve by a majority of two-thirds to do so.

In passing Mr. Forster's Act there remained, however, a religious difficulty about which rival contentions were found most difficult to reconcile. The principle of a conscience clause, indeed, as a condition of a school being recognised as a public elementary one, raised little opposition from the promoters of voluntary schools, so generally had some such provision been tacitly accepted in their practical working. But the sufficiency of a simple conscience clause to give practical effect to the principle involved in it having been called in question, a time-table conscience clause was proposed and carried by the Government in Committee, defining the hours to which religious instruction and observances should be limited, and restricting them to the beginning or end, or the beginning and end of each school meeting. "We propose a " time-table conscience clause", Mr. Gladstone said, on announcing this modification of the original proposals of Government, "founded upon the double principle of an entire freedom, as far as the interposition of the clause goes, in the matter of religious instruction, although the time for that instruction must necessarily be circumscribed, and an entire freedom on the part of the patient, corresponding with the freedom of the teacher to teach."‡ The battle raged more hotly around another question, whether school boards should be left, as Mr. Forster originally proposed, perfectly free to organise religious instruction in their schools in whatever way they pleased. Eventually the Government adopted, and Parliament accepted the clause - commonly called after the name of its proposer, the Cowper-Temple clause - which enacted that

‡Mr. Gladstone's Speech in the House of Commons on going into Committee, June 16, 1870.


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the discretion of school boards in this matter should be fettered by the single condition that "no religious catechism or religious formulary which is distinctive of any particular denomination, shall be taught in the school."

Inspection, which had hitherto been organised on denominational lines, and carried out by inspectors approved by the religious body whose schools they visited, was henceforth to be disconnected from all religious considerations. It was no longer part of the duty of Her Majesty's inspectors to examine the religious instruction, as they had previously done in schools connected with the Church of England, both elementary and normal. At the same time those concordats were abolished which had been established with various religious bodies by the advice of Sir J. Kay-Shuttleworth, as the only means at the time of introducing Government inspection into the country, "to whose exertions", Mr. Forster declared, in introducing this measure, "in the history of national education in England, it would always be admitted that its origin was mainly due."

Among the minor provisions of the Act of 1870 the following powers conferred on school boards ought not to be left unnoticed. Authority was given them to delegate to local managers any of their powers, except that of raising money; to contribute to or to establish industrial boarding schools; and last, but not least, to remit in their own schools and to pay in voluntary schools the fees of children of indigent parents. None of the provisions of this Act after its passing met with such serious opposition as the power thus given to school boards to pay the fees of indigent children in voluntary schools. The famous 25th clause was regarded by a large party in the State with the greatest hostility, as being a quasi-endowment of denominational religious teaching. In 1876, this section was repealed by Lord Sandon's Act, which imposed upon boards of guardians the duty of paying the fees of children, if satisfied of their parents' inability to do so, leaving to school boards the power of remitting fees in their own schools.

After March 31, 1871, the parliamentary grant was to be restricted to public elementary schools. No further building grants were to be made except such as were applied for before December 31, 1870.‡ These proved to be very large in number. Voluntary zeal, thus challenged by the Act to supply as far as it could with the help of Government existing deficiencies, rose to the occasion beyond all expectation. No fewer than 3,342 applications for building grants were made between the date of the passing of the Act, the 9th of August, and the 31st of December of that year. Of these, 376 were rejected, and 1,333 withdrawn. In 1,633 cases, grants were made to the amount of £268,724 16s 2d, by the aid of which 216,000 school seats were supplied at a cost to voluntary subscribers of some £1,000,000. It took some years before the Department ceased to pay the building grants which had been made under these conditions. But in 1882, after appearing in one form or other for 50 years, that item of expenditure finally vanished from the parliamentary grant.

An important restriction, which has since given rise to much controversy, was imposed by the Act of 1870 on the admission of schools situate in school board districts to participate in the annual grant, if they had not been in receipt of such aid before the passing of the Act, and if they should be deemed by the Education Department to be unnecessary.§ The discretion exercised by the Education Department in this matter has been vehemently called in question by witnesses who have appeared before us, and it will be our duty hereafter to refer more at length to that evidence, and to offer comments thereon.

A new character was impressed on the whole annual grant by section 97 of the Act, which provided that no grant was to be made in respect of any instruction religious subjects. The restriction, moreover, was at the same time removed which had hitherto excluded all purely secular schools from participation in the annual grant, and it was enacted that no requirement should be made that religious instruction should be given in a school as a condition of sharing in the annual grant.||

In the same section there was introduced from the Revised Code a limit to the amount of the annual grant (which was subsequently enlarged by the Act of 1876), so that no grant should exceed the amount locally contributed in the form of subscriptions, school fees, and income derived from sources other than the parliamentary grant, including rates and endowments.

In another section an important power was given to the managers of elementary schools enabling them, by the adoption of the conscience clause, to fulfil the con-

*Section XIV. [The reference to this footnote is missing from the text.]

‡Section XCVI.

§Section XCVIII.

||Section XCVII.


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ditions imposed for obtaining annual grants, any provisions contained in their trust deeds notwithstanding.*

A special provision was made in the Act authorising the managers of schools not provided by a school board, to set apart not more than two days in a year for the inspection of a school by an inspector other than Her Majesty's inspector.† This power has been taken advantage of very largely by voluntary schools to institute an annual examination of the schools in religious knowledge. The statistics of diocesan inspection which have been laid before us show that the system has been almost universally adopted by Church of England schools in every diocese of England and Wales, and we have it in evidence that in Roman Catholic schools a system of diocesan inspection has also been established by that communion.

The power granted by Mr. Forster's Act to school boards to compel attendance at school was (with the exception of the provision of half-time attendance under the Factory Acts) a new departure in English legislation; though the principle of compulsory school attendance had already been admitted in the Half-time Acts. The Education Act of 1870, in conferring on school boards the power of making byelaws, compelling the attendance at school of children between 5 and 13 years of age, limited that power by certain conditions. Such byelaws must not contain any infringement of the conscience clause, nor require of children attendance at school on days set apart for religious observance by their parents, nor must they be at variance with existing labour laws. They may provide, too, for remission of fees in cases of ascertained poverty. And they are to set forth certain standards to be passed for total and for partial exemption from school. But the following are declared to be reasonable excuses for absence - efficient instruction received in some other way, hindrance through sickness or other unavoidable cause, and the absence of any public elementary school within three miles. Such byelaws, after having received the approval of the Education Department, and after having been sanctioned by an Order in Council, have the force of law in the school district for which they are made, and they must be set forth in the next Annual Report of the Committee of Council.‡ But although, in putting forward his proposals for compelling children to attend schools provided out of the public purse, Mr. Forster argued that it would be unfair to force the taxpayers and ratepayers to pay for useless schools, he was not prepared to recommend universal compulsion. His proposal, the principle of which was eventually embodied in the Act, was thus expressed: "We give power to the school boards to frame byelaws for compulsory attendance of all children within their district from 5 to 12. They must see that no parent is under a penalty - which is restricted to 5s - for not sending his child to school if he can show reasonable excuse; reasonable excuse being either education elsewhere, or sickness, or some unavoidable cause, or there not being a public elementary school within a mile. These byelaws are not to come into operation unless they are approved by the Government, and unless they have been laid on the table of this and the other House of Parliament 40 days, and have not been dissented from."§ Compulsory powers, accordingly, were given under this Act to school boards, but it was within the option of the school board whether it should seek to be invested with such powers or not. During the passage of the Act through Parliament the age up to which compulsion might be enforced was raised to 13 years.

The Act of 1870 gave an authority to the minutes of Council on Education, which they had not possessed before. Previously they had been simply regulations for the distribution of the Education Grant assented to by Parliament from year to year. By Section XCVII of the Act, such minutes, after having been laid on the table of both Houses of Parliament, acquired for the time being statutory validity until they were superseded by succeeding minutes.

Briefly to summarise the main provisions of the Act of 1870, it abolished the building grant, but increased the grant for maintenance. Its object was, by means of school boards, to supplement, where necessary, the existing voluntary provision for efficient education. It removed the obligation of giving religious instruction as a condition of the receipt of annual grants, leaving such instruction unfettered by any restrictions, except those imposed by the Cowper-Temple clause, which affected board schools only. It separated religious from secular teaching, so that the latter might be accessible to those who could not on conscientious grounds take part in the former, and so that the parliamentary grant might be made wholly in respect of the secular instruction. It enabled school boards to remit fees, and, with the consent of the Department, to establish free schools in special cases. And it armed school boards with compulsory powers.

*Section XCIX.

†Section LXXVI.

‡Section LXXXIV.

§Mr. Forster's speech in the House of Commons, February 17th, 1870.


[page 31]

A short amending Act in 1873, amongst other provisions, made obligatory the attendance at school of children whose parents were in receipt of out-door relief, and it required the board guardians to pay their fees. It also repealed the section in the Act of 1870, relating to school-board elections, in regard to the taxation of costs charged by the returning officer. It had been found that school board elections were conducted too expensively, and there had previously been no effective power to limit the expense incurred. This Act accordingly gave to the Education Department a final decision on appeals regarding the taxation of the returning officer's costs.

The Act passed in 1876 by Lord Sandon, now the Earl of Harrowby, (39 & 40 Vict. chap. 79.), though in other respects of great importance, will, perhaps, in days to come, be chiefly memorable for the declaration which it placed on the English statute book, of the duty of every parent to educate his child. It enacts that "it shall be the duty of the parent of every child to cause such child to receive efficient elementary instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic; and if such parent fail to perform such duty, he shall be liable to such orders and penalties as are provided by this Act."* Thus, for the first time, a legal obligation was created, binding on every parent, to give his child an education sufficient to ground it in the rudiments of learning, and at least to equip it with the means of extending its knowledge in future years. A child under this Act, it may be remarked, is so called between the ages of five and fourteen years.†

With a view to enforce the obligation of attendance in an indirect manner, the Act of 1876 proceeds first to place restrictions on the employment of children until they have complied with certain educational conditions, and in the view of the Act the parent of a child who employs it for the purpose of gain is deemed its employer.‡ The fifth section makes it a statutory offence, with a penalty on conviction not exceeding forty shillings, on the part of any employer to take into his employment (a) any child who is under 10 years of age, and (b) any child over 10 and under 14, who shall not have attained such proficiency in reading, writing, and arithmetic as is afterwards specified in the schedules to the Act. Since 1881 the degree of proficiency required is that prescribed in the Fourth Standard defined by the Code of 1876. But, failing this educational qualification for employment, the Act further provides a loop-hole for invincible dullness, by which a child over 10 years old who cannot pass the required standard, and who might therefore be kept from labour till the age of 14 without any educational advantage, may still be qualified for work if it can produce a certificate of its regular attendance at a certified efficient school for a certain number of years previous. This qualification for employment, which is known by the name given to it by Lord Sandon of "the dunce's pass", is now fulfilled by 250 attendances after five years of age, in not more than two schools in each year, during five years, whether consecutive or not.§ No evidence has been brought before us tending to show that parents have availed themselves to any extent of this door of entrance to employment for their children, and it may well be doubted whether its existence is very generally known. At present, however, and since the passing of the Act of 1880, it affects those children only who at the age of 13 have failed to pass the standard for total exemption from school attendance, fixed by the byelaws of the district in which they reside.

From the restriction thus put on a child's employment there are special exemptions provided for all children allowed to go to work under those Factory Acts which demand half-time attendance at school, as well as for all who are attending school half-time under any byelaws of a local authority. At the same time the education of children employed in workshops is withdrawn from the operation of the Workshops Regulation Act, and transferred to that of the Factory Acts. These two Acts have since been consolidated.

The enforcement of these measures of indirect compulsion is committed by Lord Sandon's Act to local authorities, viz., to a school board in the district within its jurisdiction, and in other districts to a school attendance committee, appointed annually, if it be a borough, by the council of the borough, and if it be a parish, by the guardians of the union in which such parish is situate. The school attendance committee may consist of not less than six nor more than twelve members, one third, however, in the case of a committee appointed by the board guardians, is to consist of ex-officio guardians. Another duty of the local authority under this Act is to report any infraction of Section VII. of the Act of 1870, which regulates the times and conditions of giving religious instruction, commonly called the conscience clause. Power is also given to school attendance committees to appoint small local committees outside their own bodies in every school district, to aid them in their work; this power, however.

*Section IV.

†Section XLVIII.

‡Section XLVII.

§Section V.


[page 32]

appears to have been somewhat overlooked, and, at any rate, not to have been brought extensively into use.

Exceptions are made to these restrictions on the employment of children (a) in the case of those children who reside more than two miles from a public elementary school; (b) where the employment is at such times as not to interfere with the efficient elementary education of the child; (c) during a period exempted by special notice of the school authority for the necessary operations of husbandry and in-gathering, an exemption which may be extended over not more than six weeks in a year.*

The 25th section of the Act of 1870, which empowered school boards to pay fees in voluntary schools, as has been already observed, is repealed by the Act of 1876, and provision is made for imposing the duty on the guardians to pay, in whole or in part, the fees of children of indigent parents at any public elementary school chosen by the latter, but such payments do not carry with them any of those disqualifications attached to the receipt of parochial relief.†

The uneducated child having thus been prohibited from employment, the Act of 1876 next proceeds to bring him into school by means of what is known as the "Wastrel Clause".‡ The two classes of persons affected by it are, first, parents who habitually, and without reasonable excuse, neglect to provide efficient elementary instruction for their children, being over five years of age, and prohibited from full-time employment; and, secondly, children found habitually wandering, or not under proper control, or being in the company of rogues, vagabonds, disorderly persons, or reputed criminals. In these cases it is the duty of the local authority to complain to a court of summary jurisdiction, which may issue an attendance order, requiring the child to attend regularly at some certified efficient school willing to receive it, and named in the order. The following reasonable excuses, however, if they can be pleaded, are allowed, viz., that the nearest public elementary school is over two miles from the child's residence; or that the absence of the child from school has been caused by sickness or any unavoidable cause. In the event of the breach of such an attendance order, for the first offence the court may impose a penalty not exceeding 5s, or order the child to be sent to an Industrial School, according as the parent fails to satisfy, or succeeds in satisfying, the court that he has used all reasonable efforts to secure compliance with the order. On the second or any subsequent breach of the order, the court may either order the child to be sent to an Industrial School or impose a fine on the parents, or do both, at its discretion. A fine may be imposed for each breach of the order, provided that complaint be not renewed at any less interval than two weeks. Children so sent to an Industrial School shall be deemed to be sent under the Industrial Schools Act of 1866, and the parent shall be liable to contribute as under that statute.§ The local authority is bound to investigate any alleged case of neglect of children's education under the preceding section, and to proceed to enforce the prescribed penalties, unless it be deemed inexpedient to do so.|| A child thus sent to an Industrial School may, after one month's residence therein, receive a license to live out of the school (under Section XXVII, Industrial Schools Act, 1866) on condition of its attending regularly some certified efficient school willing to receive it.¶ Powers are also given to a school board to erect and maintain a certified industrial or day industrial school, and to borrow money for the purpose under the Public Works Loan Act of 1875.**

Day industrial schools which are established for the first time under this Act, as a result of the experiments made by Miss Carpenter in Bristol, are defined to be such as give industrial training, efficient education, and one or more meals a day.†† They may be established by order of a Secretary of State, if he deems it necessary for the proper training and control of the children of any class of the population, in the same manner as under the Industrial Schools Act of 1866. And a court of summary jurisdiction may commit children to such certified day Industrial School in the same manner as to an Industrial School under the last-named Act; and the child so committed may be detained during the hours named in any order (not being an attendance order), which order may be issued by a court, requiring a child's attendance at such a day industrial school, the school being for these purposes constituted a certified efficient school.

In the case of a certified day industrial school established under this section, the Act of 1876 provides that the prison authority shall have the same power over it as if it were a certified industrial school; and that a sum not exceeding Is. a week may be con-

*Section IX.

†Section X.

‡Section XI.

§Section XII.

||Section XIII.

¶Section XIV.

**Section XV.

††Section XVI.


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tributed out of the Parliamentary vote towards the cost of each child committed to it under this Act. Parents of children, or the guardians of the poor on their behalf (if the parent be unable to pay) shall be liable to contribute towards the cost a sum not exceeding 2s a week for children committed by order to a certified industrial day school, and children may be received without an order at the request of the school authority and the parent, on the latter undertaking to pay not less than 1s a week, to meet which the Secretary of State may order a contribution of not more than 6d a week out of the Parliamentary vote. The Queen in Council is further empowered to apply to a certified day industrial school the provisions of the Industrial Schools Act, or such modifications of the same as are found to be necessary or proper for the purposes of this Act, and may modify or mitigate the penalties of the former Act. A Secretary of State may make and alter the forms of orders for sending children to a day industrial school. He may also withdraw the certificate from such a school, if it becomes unnecessary, on laying his reasons before Parliament within a month. The contribution out of the Parliamentary vote to a certified day industrial school is made conditional on an examination being annually made of the children, according to the standards recognised by the Education Department in public elementary schools. The purpose of this enactment is best stated in the words of Lord Sandon, in the debate on the third reading of his Act: "The important clause having reference to day industrial schools comes in as a supplement to the action of the Government respecting wastrel children in our towns. I entreat the House to give their cordial support to that which is after all avowedly only an experiment. It is forced upon us by the existence of an enormous evil never yet dealt with, that is to say, the particular class of children who haunt our big towns, the wretched children who throng the worst parts of our cities. These are the children who, if they are girls, grow up to be the miserable women whom we pass with loathing in our back streets, and who are the despair of our workhouses; and, if they are boys, they become that peculiar stunted degraded class which prowls about our worst alleys, which emerges into light only at moments of popular disturbance, and which makes a constant home of our gaols. These poor children grow up to prey upon society, and to become the disgrace of our Christianity and our civilization. Ask the school boards in the big cities. They will tell you they elude their grasp, and, unfortunately, the ragged schools, which alone effectively dealt with them, have been much diminished, unintentionally, by the Act of 1870, and these are the very children for whose education the intervention of law is most needed. I earnestly hope, therefore, that Parliament will help the Government in the attempt - I confess it a difficult one - to cope with one of the most terrible evils of our civilization."*

The system of granting honour certificates instituted by Lord Sandon's Act, which carried with them free schooling for the past year, in the case of those older children whose attendance and proficiency reached a standard prescribed by the Education Department, was not destined to survive the five years for which it was first enacted. Lord Sandon said, in introducing this proposal: "There is another provision which may be considered a tentative one, and is proposed to be only enacted for five years. We have lately in our provisions respecting education acted solely, I may really say, on the system of forcing parents to send their children to school, and we are now proposing to interfere with the child's labour and earnings unless he is instructed. The scheme which the Government now offers to the House will endeavour to awaken a higher feeling in the breasts of children and parents, namely, that of honour and emulation. I feel strongly that it is most desirable, when we are putting such great pressure upon the people as to their children's instruction, to try as much as possible to lighten that pressure, to endeavour to excite a higher feeling as to education, and not to be satisfied with merely laying down hard rules, good though they may be, but to appeal to the higher and more elevating motives to which I have just alluded. The plan, therefore, which we shall propose to bring before the House is the following: Where a child takes a double certificate, that is, where a child at 10 years has passed Standard IV and also has a certificate of attendance for five years. we propose to give it an honour pass. This will be a great encouragement to the more intelligent and orderly child, and this honour pass will give the child a free education for the next three years. This is, I know, a new plan, but it is surely worth a trial. It is like a prize in the school for the children most remarkable for attainments and character, however poor they may be, and is, in fact, an exhibition

*Lord Sandon's Speech, House of Commons, August 6th, 1876.


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founded by the State; but the trifling money advantage is its least important part. So far our legislation by compulsion, &c. has been all confined to driving the children to school; on this alone, I am strongly of opinion, we ought not to base our legislation. I have a good confidence that the honour certificate will not only do much more than mere compulsion to secure regular attendance at school, but that it will do a still more valuable work; it will awaken a keen sense of honour and ambition, and the invigorating feeling of distinction in many an out-of-the-way place in the country, as well as in many a back court in our towns, and will lay the foundation for the honourable success of many a child in after life."*

It has been stated in evidence before us by Mr. Cumin that, whatever the advantages of the honour certificate as a premium on regularity and an inducement to prolong attendance at school, as well as in its higher moral effect upon the children, the expense and the administrative difficulties connected with its award induced the Education Department to discontinue that part of the Government system of annual grants.† Some leading witnesses, on the other hand, have spoken of its useful results when it was in operation.‡

Considerable financial assistance was given to schools by the Act of 1876, and that in two directions. The annual grant which had hitherto been limited by the amount of local contributions, made up out of subscriptions, school pence, and any other sources of local income, was not any longer to be reduced by its excess over that limit, unless it also exceeded 17s 6d a head on the average attendance,§ which was estimated to represent half the average cost of a child's schooling at that time. Provision, also, was made to augment by a bonus of £10 (or £15) the annual grant to schools in districts where the school is the only recognised provision for public elementary education within a circuit of two miles, or where the population is under 300 (or 200); this bonus being not taken into account in any reduction of the grant worked by the two limitations of it already mentioned. A somewhat similar provision had already been made in the Code of 1875. The enactment of what is known as the 17s 6d limit was at the time regarded as a welcome relaxation of the existing restriction on earning annual grants; but abundant evidence has been brought before us to show that the object of fixing this limit seems now to have been forgotten, and that its operation is regarded as a grievance and a discouragement to efficiency, rather than as a boon.

By the Act of 1870 the power of making byelaws for directly compelling attendance at school was limited to districts under school boards. In 1876, Lord Sandon's Act required school attendance committees, on the application of the parishes concerned, to make byelaws compelling attendance within their limits, thus extending the option of adopting direct compulsion to every school district in England, though it stopped short of an universal system of direct compulsion.||

Power was at the same time given to the Education Department to issue regulations with respect to the form of certificates of proficiency and previous attendance at school, subject to the condition which attaches to the minutes of the Education Department, viz., that they should be previously laid before Parliament.¶ Registrars were required to supply needful information concerning the births and deaths of children on the requisition of the local authority, at a fee not exceeding two pence for each entry.**

The Act of 1870 had taken security for its provisions being duly carried out by school boards, through the power granted to the Education Department to declare a school board in default. This power is, by the Act of 1876, extended so as to apply to any failure in a school board to carry out this latter Act. And further, a school attendance committee which fails to carry out the Act of 1876 may by that Act be declared in default, and a person may be appointed by the Department, and if necessary paid, to supersede the committee for a period not exceeding two years; after which time a fresh school attendance committee is to be appointed by the town council or the guardians, as the case may be, to resume the same duties; any expenses incurred in remunerating the substitute being charged to the town council or board of guardians which elected the defaulting committee. But all such proceedings must be reported to Parliament.|| The Committee of Council on Education have thus the fullest power to secure that the school attendance committees fulfil their duties.

The Act authorises payment by the local authority of officers charged with the execution of the Act,¶ and power is also given to such officers, if authorised by a

*Lord Sandon's Speeches in the House of Commons, May 18th and August 5th, 1876.

† [This footnote is missing.]

‡ [This footnote is missing.]

§ Section XIX.

||Sections XXI,, XXII, XXIII.

¶Section XXVIII.

**Section XXV.


[page 35]

justice's order, to enter any place of employment in which there may be reason to think that the Act is being violated, and a penalty not exceeding 20s is enacted for impeding the officers.*

School attendance committees are debarred from creating a charge on the poor rate or the borough rate, as the case may be, in the execution of their work. This can only be done by the body appointing them, whether the Town Council or the board of guardians.†

To assist them in the execution of the Act, school attendance committees may appoint local attendance committees, but cannot extend to them the power of making byelaws or taking proceedings; such local attendance committees are to consist of not less than three persons, one or more of whom are to be members of the local authority.‡

Power is given to the Education Department to authorise the appointment of a separate school attendance committee by an urban sanitary authority; but it must not comprise any borough, and it must be coextensive with one or more parishes not within the jurisdiction of a school board, the population being not less than 5,000. The expenses are to be paid proportionally out of the poor rate of the parishes comprised within the urban sanitary authority. When the urban sanitary authority is not, and does not comprise, a borough, and is not wholly within the jurisdiction of a school board, and does not come within the foregoing provisions, it may elect members to represent it on the school attendance committee of its union.§ But the erection of a new school board within a district where a school attendance committee is appointed under these provisions, takes that district at once out of the jurisdiction of the committee.||

The clerk of the guardians is to be clerk of the school attendance committee Its expenses are to be regarded as relief of the poor, the school fees paid by the guardians being charged to the parish on behalf of which they are discharged.¶

Fraudulent declarations made to school attendance committees may be punished by legal proceedings, identical with those provided by the Act of 1870, and the obtaining the payment of fees by false representations is made a distinct offence, punishable by imprisonment.**

No legal proceedings for absence from school can be taken except by the direction of not less than two members of the school authority.

Where an offence against the Act, by the illegal employment of a child is proved to have been committed by an agent of an employer or by the parent of the child, the legal responsibility is transferred to the actual offender, and the employer is so far relieved of legal responsibility.††

The provisions for the payment of fees of pauper children, and for their attendance at school, as a condition of the parents receiving relief, made by the Act of 1873, are repealed by the Act of 1876, and clauses enacted effecting the same objects in connexion with the new educational machinery established by this latter Act.

Power to dissolve a school board is given to the Education Department, if they think it to be no longer required, on receipt of an application made by a two-thirds majority of the same persons as were entitled to make the original application for the formation of the school board. This can only be done if the Department is satisfied that the school board has acquired no property, that there is no deficiency of accommodation in the district, and that no order has been made on the board to supply additional accommodation. Such an application must be made within the last six months previous to the natural dissolution of a board, which is in any case to be allowed to run out its time. The order of dissolution will have the effect of an Act of Parliament, but the school board can hereafter be revived, if additional school accommodation be required. The reasons of the assent to such a dissolution given by the Department must be laid before both Houses of Parliament.‡‡ School boards were enabled under this Act to provide suitable offices for their meetings and work, and school boards were also enabled to fill up casual vacancies in their bodies by election, so as to do away with the expense of bye elections.§§

Generally, it may be said that the administrative machinery constituted by the Act of 1870 for working out the provisions of that Act in school board districts is extended by the Act of 1876 to all school districts.||||

In 1880 Mr. Mundella's Act was passed, which established universal direct compulsion by the school authority, in contradistinction to the optional compulsion of Mr. Forster's Act, and the indirect compulsion of Lord Sandon's Act. Mr. Forster's Act had made the adoption of byelaws, regulating the attendance of children at school, optional in school board districts. Lord Sandon's Act had extended this option to all other school districts

*Section XXIX.

†Section XXXI.

‡Section XXXII.

§Section XXXIII.

||Section XXXVI.

¶Section XXXIV.

**Section XXXVII.

††Section XXXIX.

‡‡Section XLI.

§§Section XLII.

||||Sections XLIII, XLV, XLVIII, XLIX, L.


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in England, and had aimed at securing education by enabling the school authority to forbid the employment of uninstructed children, and by stringent provisions against wastrel and idle children up to the age of 14. Mr. Mundella, carrying out in the Act of 1880 the intention announced by Lord George Hamilton, his predecessor in office, converted this option into an obligation on the part of every school authority. It did not, however, repeal the indirect methods of getting children to school which had been enacted in 1876. These remain side by side with the local byelaws as a collateral security for attendance, in the form of the prohibition of the employment of children who have not the legal qualification, and of penal clauses dealing with those, who being thus debarred from work, are habitually absent from school. These clauses of the Act of 1876 are still available to deal with absence from school where it is flagrant, binding over, in the first instance, the culprit to attend regularly in future. The byelaws, which have since the Act of 1880 been universally adopted, though varying in their provisions in different localities, take cognizance of the smallest deviations from regular attendance, and provide for summary punishment on the parent of the defaulter.

CHAPTER IV

CODES AND INSTRUCTIONS TO INSPECTORS 1870 to 1885

Before proceeding to state in detail the changes which the Code has undergone since the passing of the Act of 1870, it may be desirable to describe shortly the mode in which successive editions of the Code have originated and have come into operation. Mr. Cumin informs us that a record is kept in the Education Department of difficulties which may have arisen in the working of the Code and of complaints that may have been made to the office. These have in times past been considered by the Lord President, the Vice-President, and the Secretary, who have determined in what respects the Code may be improved. Changes in the Code, therefore, have been invariably the result of most careful preparation by the political as well as the permanent heads of the Department, after conference with persons practically interested in education, and after consideration of the ample annual reports of Her Majesty's inspectors. Latterly, however, there has been what is called a Code Committee, consisting of a certain number of the chief officers of the Department and of inspectors; all suggestions are brought before them; and after discussions, at which the President or Vice-President has filled the chair, any changes decided on are introduced. The Code of 1882 in this way underwent elaborate discussion before it was introduced by the Vice- President into the House of Commons in a speech in which he set forth its provisions, and showed how they fulfilled the pledges regarding alterations which had been previously given in the House.

Each successive Code must, in accordance with the Education Act of 1870 be laid on the table of both Houses of Parliament for a month before it comes into operation. But it does not appear that any modification in it has been made of late years as the result of objections taken in Parliament. Indeed it is in evidence before us that the difficulties are great in the way of any member of the House of Commons, who may desire to raise an objection, finding any opportunity for its discussion within the 30 days laid down by the law. It was stated by Mr. Cumin that members of Parliament do not always get the Code into their hands as soon as it has been laid on the table. And, as a matter of practice, it has happened, owing, in some cases, to the printing arrangements of the House of Commons and to the pressure on the printing department, that very few days elapse between the delivery of the Code to members and its becoming law; in addition to which, the attention of the House of Commons is so fully absorbed, that in this short interval there is actually no time available for debate upon any matter of controversy. It cannot be said, therefore, that the check provided by the Act of 1870, in respect to alterations in the law by the issue of a Code, has proved in practice an effective one.

Successive Codes previous to 1870 were, as has been already remarked, nothing more than the codified minutes of a department, setting forth for the time being the terms on which the Parliamentary Grant was to be dispensed. A new character, however, was imparted to the Annual Code by the Act of 1870. That Act provided that a public elementary school must fulfil the conditions laid down in the annual Code of Minutes last presented to Parliament.§ Thenceforward the Code, if no successful opposition

§Education Act of 1870, section 97.


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were raised to it in Parliament, became in effect an addition to the education law, until a new Code took its place. At the same time all Codes since 1870 have embodied regulations, framed by the Education Department, for carrying into effect the provisions of successive Education Acts.

The important changes which appeared in the Revised Code of 1871 were chiefly adaptations of the preceding Code to the new condition of things which had arisen under Mr. Forster's Act of 1870. By that Code the restriction was abolished which previously confined the grant to the promotion "of the education of children belonging to the classes who support themselves by manual labour."* Yet the omission indicated little real change in the destination of the grant, since a new condition nearly equivalent, though not quite so stringent, prescribed in the definition of a public elementary school by the Act of 1870, was embodied in this Code, viz., that no grant should be made to a school in which the ordinary fee exceeded ninepence a week.† Whereas, also, all previous Codes had required that every school aided from the grant must be "a school either in connexion with some recognised religious denomination, or a school in which, besides secular instruction, the Scriptures were read daily from the Authorised Version,"‡ in the Code of 1871 this condition was omitted, and it was provided in accordance with the Act of 1870, that no grant should be made in respect of any instruction on religious subjects.§ And, further, by the provision of this Code, no grants were to be made henceforth to schools which were not public elementary ones within the meaning of the Act of 1870, and the inspectors to whom such schools were to be always open were by the Code, as well as by the Act, relieved from the duty of inquiring into any instruction in religious subjects.|| Lastly, whereas, by the Act of 1870, byelaws might be enacted by any school board, compelling the attendance of children at school, the Code of 1871 further provided that no child should be refused admittance to any school receiving an annual grant, except on reasonable grounds. Besides these provisions which brought the administration of the grant into conformity with the education law, other important regulations occur, in the Code in 1871, many of which were of old standing, and have also substantially reappeared in all subsequent Codes. Among these may be mentioned the following, viz., that a school receiving a grant must not be conducted with a view to private emolument;¶ that school premises must be healthy and suitable to the purposes of education;** that girls must be taught needlework as part of their ordinary instruction;¶¶ that registers must be duly kept in accordance with the regulations of the Department;*** that there must be a sufficient staff, having regard to the number of children under instruction;††† and lastly that the principal teacher of the school must be certificated.‡‡‡ With a view to meet this last requirement permission was given to inspectors in the Code of 1871 for a period of three years to recommend for certificates, without personal examination, acting teachers of 35 years of age, who had been employed 10 years, and who had given satisfactory proof of their practical skill by the results of their teaching.¶¶¶

The Codes of 1872, 1873, and 1874 contained few changes of importance, except that by the first of these a further limit was placed on the amount of the grant, in addition to the two limits already existing, which were, first, its excess over the amount of fees and subscriptions, and, secondly, its excess over 15s a head on the average attendance. The grant became by the Code of 1872 liable to the further limitation that it should not exceed half the expenditure. But the Code of 1874 is, perhaps, chiefly remarkable for an omission which proclaimed the failure, after a hopeless struggle, of the effort to engraft on school arithmetic a knowledge and appreciation of the metric system. The footnote which had hitherto prescribed this, as one of the requirements of standard work, ceased to appear in 1874.

The Code of 1875 was more fruitful in changes. It introduced what are technically known as "class" subjects, for which a grant of 4s or 2s a head might be paid according as the instruction proved to be good or fair.‡‡ In this provision originated that tripartite division of "standard", "class", and "specific subjects", which still obtains in the curriculum of elementary education, and which it may be convenient here further to define. By "standard subjects" the Code understands the rudiments - reading, writing, and arithmetic - instruction in which is obligatory throughout the school, and in which the scholars are examined individually. By "class subjects" are

*New Code (1870), Art 4.

†Education Act, 1870, §3, Code 1871, Art. 4.

‡Code of 1870. Art. 8.

§Code of 1871, Art. 7.

||Education Act, 1870, §7(3), Code of 1871, Art. 6.

¶New Code (1883), Art. 92.

**New Code (1871).

¶¶Code of 1871, Art.

‡‡New Code (1875), Art. 19, c. 1. New Code (1875), 19 D.

***Code of 1871, Art.

†††Code of 1871, Art.

‡‡‡Code of 1871, Art.

¶¶¶New Code (1871), Art. 15.


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understood higher subjects of instruction, such as grammar, geography, and elementary science, the teaching of which is optional, but which, if taught at all, must be taught throughout the school, and which are judged and paid for, not according to the proficiency of each individual scholar, but according to the proficiency of classes as a whole. "Specific subjects" are those more advanced subjects which may be taught to individual scholars, and in which they are to be individually examined, including mathematics, various branches of science, and languages.* At the same time that class subjects were introduced by the Code of 1875, the schedule of standard subjects was entirely recast. Another new feature of this Code, was the encouragement given to small schools in thinly-peopled districts, by the offer of additional grants of £10 (or £15) to a school favourably reported on, when it was the only elementary one within reach of a population of 300 (or 200) souls. Grants of 40s (or 60s) were then offered for the first time in respect of pupil teachers who passed their annual examination fairly (or well). At the same time the limit to the grant of 15s a head on the average attendance was abolished by the Code of 1875.†

For the first time, by the Code of 1875, a separate portion of the grant had been made to depend on the inspector's report on the discipline and organisation of the school.‡ This Article derives additional importance from the further endeavour made in the Code of the succeeding year, under the head of discipline, to secure increased attention to the moral training of the scholars. The Code of 1876, while continuing to offer the grant of 1s a head for good organisation and discipline, required the managers and teachers "to satisfy the inspector that all reasonable care is taken, in the ordinary management of the school, to bring up the children in habits of punctuality, of good manners and language, of cleanliness and neatness, and also to impress on tho children the importance of cheerful obedience to duty, of consideration and respect for others, and of honour and truthfulness in word and act."§ This important summary of the moral aspects of discipline has since undergone vicissitudes which may serve to illustrate the changes to which any particular Article of the Code is liable. It continued to appear in the body of successive Codes down to 1882, when it was removed from the Code and placed as a foot note in the Instructions to Inspectors. Subsequently it reappeared in the Code of 1883, but only as a foot-note; and in 1884 it was once more incorporated into the text of the Code, in which it has since maintained its place, as an exposition of the moral considerations to be kept in view by inspectors in awarding the grant for discipline.

Apart from the interpretation of "discipline", the Code of 1876 is chiefly noteworthy as having dealt with the subject of pensions to such teachers as had been employed in that capacity when the Minutes of 25th August and 21st December 1846 and 6th August 1851 were cancelled. An annual sum, not exceeding £6,500, was again, as in 1851, set apart to meet, as far as it would go, the claims that had arisen under the Minutes referred to.||

In the meanwhile the Education Act of 1876 had passed, and the Code of 1877 had to be adapted to its provisions. Administrative effect was given by the Code to the 19th section of that Act, which allowed the grant to rise to 17s 6d a head on the average attendance before it became liable to be reduced by its excess above the local income arising from subscriptions and fees. The special grant, likewise, offered to schools in small populations was exempted from being reckoned in any reduction caused by these two limits.

To carry out the requirements of the Act of 1876 regarding attendance at school, "The Child's Book" was instituted by the Code of 1877 for the purpose of officially recording the age, attendance, and proficiency of each scholar; a book which each scholar was bound, in passing from school to school, to deposit with the teacher.¶ Great practical difficulty, however, was encountered in keeping up the entries and preserving the books, and, with very general acquiescence, the Code of 1882 omitted this requirement. The Code of 1877, again, introduced two important alterations in the composition of the school staff. It limited the number of pupil teachers who could be recognised by the Department in any school to three for each certificated teacher,** a provision which was further modified in 1882 to the extent that only one additional pupil teacher was allowed for each certificated assistant.†† The second alteration introduced in 1877 consisted in the introduction of a new class of teachers under the name of Stipendiary Monitors, who should teach during one-half of the day and be taught during the other;

*New Code (1875). Art. 21.

†New Code (1875), Art. 32.

‡New Code (1875), Art. 19 (A).

§New Code (1876), Art. 19 (B).

||New Code (1876), Art, 118.

¶Elementary Education Act (1876), §24. New Code (1877), Art. 119. B. 6.

**New Code (1867), Art. 70 (9), foot-note.

††New Code (1882), Art. 42.


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but this arrangement failed to commend itself to managers, and, as it had never been largely taken advantage of, the Article was withdrawn in 1882.*

The Code of 1878, with the exception of an article on grants to unnecessary schools, which will be referred to presently, was substantially a reproduction of its predecessor. The only other new feature of any importance was contained in an Article which gave to teachers through their managers, a right of appeal to the Department, before a certificate could be recalled, suspended, or reduced.†

An important modification of the article on grants to unnecessary schools, which had been first introduced in 1878, appeared in the Code of 1879. Whereas it had been provided in the former Code that no grant is to be made to any school which is not previously in receipt of an annual grant, if the Department deem that the school is unnecessary, in the Code of 1879, this provision is repealed in respect of schools in districts not under school boards, which, in fact, is its present form. An account of the origin of this enactment is given in evidence by Mr. Cumin. It appears that in districts not under a school board, and therefore entirely supplied by voluntary schools, after sufficient accommodation had already been provided, a fresh school was not unfrequently set up, which became a successful rival to those previously existing in the district. At first the Department was inclined to protect the previously existing schools against such competition, by refusing an annual grant to the intruder. But cases occurring in which the unnecessary school became the popular one, the opinion gained ground with the Department that it would be useless, under such circumstances, to continue to refuse the grant, when once the school had given evidence of its being likely to be permanent. Accordingly, in the Code of 1879, it was conceded, that, if such an unnecessary school could establish its position by obtaining recognition from the Department as a certified efficient school for 12 months, and if it had during that time an average attendance of not less than 30 scholars, it should no longer be refused a share in the annual grant. This important provision survives to the present day, and bears on the wider question of the recognition of unnecessary schools generally. It will be remarked that this provision of the Code of 1879 is limited to districts not under school boards. In school board districts it is held by the Department that the duty of supplying any deficiency in the school accommodation is imposed by the Education Act of 1870 on the school board, which cannot give up a school once established, as volunteers can, without the consent of the Department. On that principle a school board is held to be protected from competition with new rivals within the district which it has fully supplied, if it decides to object to their being admitted to receive the annual grant. On the equity of this regulation, and the controversies which have arisen through its operation, we have received much conflicting evidence, on which this is not the place to offer any comment.

No further alterations of importance in the Code took place until 1882, when it was entirely remodelled. In one respect the Code of 1882 indicated a new departure, in that it was laid before Parliament before it was finally settled, and opinions on it were invited by the Department from all those who were actively engaged in the work of education. From the summary already given of the growth of successive Codes, it will have been made apparent how intricate and cumbrous a document the Code must in the course of time have become, after the continual modifications and additions which its several articles had undergone. To recast, and, as far as possible, to simplify its form was, therefore, the first object in view in framing the Code of 1882. A new principle of payment was likewise introduced in order to meet a difficulty which had arisen in calculating that part of the grant which had hitherto been paid in respect of individual scholars. It had not unfrequently occurred, as Mr. Cumin has informed us, that, some years after the grant had been made, the conditions on which it was earned in regard to some individual scholar turned out not to have been fulfilled, and not being considered by the Public Accounts Committee a legal payment, it had to be refunded by the managers. This naturally became a source of much irritation, and to remove a cause of serious complaint, arising from the system of audit applied to the public accounts, the Code of 1882 ceased to take cognisance of individuals in apportioning that part of the grant: in other words, the grant was to be assessed on the basis of the average attendance, and no longer in respect to the individual scholar examined.

By this alteration another grievance was abated, if not entirely removed. Under the former system of grants in respect to individual scholars, we have been informed by Mr. Cumin that complaints were frequent of the loss entailed by the absence

*New Code (1877), Art. 70 (9).

†New Code (1878), Art. 69.


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on the day of inspection of scholars qualified to earn money, who were kept away through sickness or some other unavoidable cause. The substitution of the average attendance for the year as the basis of payment went far to eliminate this source of uncertainty. The other factor in the grant, viz., the rate at which payment was to be made on the average attendance, the Code prescribed should be determined by the percentage which the actual number of passes bore to the whole number which could possibly be obtained by all scholars liable to examination. By fixing the full grant for the three elementary subjects at a hundred pence, an amount which approximated closely to the former rate of payment, the percentage of passes expressed in pence the rate of grant.

In defining what scholars should be liable to examination. in place of the previous requirement of 250 attendances in the year, the Code of 1882 substituted that of the retention of a scholar's name on the registers for 22 weeks previous to the examination. It was contended at the time - and the contention has been frequently repeated in evidence before us - that this new condition gave no security for any adequate attendance of the scholar, for whose examination the teacher was nevertheless held responsible. On the other hand, since "the grant was now to be based on the average attendance of all the scholars, and would be adversely affected by failure in examination of backward scholars", it was thought necessary by the Department to take fresh security that none of those who could "fairly be taken to be the products of the school" should be withheld from examination. An additional reason for this change is best explained by the following extract from Mr. Cumin's evidence:

"It was a great temptation, of course, to a teacher when he got the attendances up to 245 just to put a few more strokes down; and the result was that he got 12s 6d, or whatever the sum was, in respect of that child. To get rid of the temptation to fraud arising from the fact that the right to be examined and the right to earn a grant. for a school depended upon the individual child having made a certain number of attendances, in short, it was thought expedient, and so it was proposed, to pay upon the average attendance. Unless a child has made 250 attendances he cannot be examined, and cannot earn any grant for the school. If, therefore, the attendances of any child approach 250 it is the master's interest to risk the falsification of the registers by adding a few marks; whereas if the payment were made upon the average attendance, the falsification must be of a wholesale character. Thus a school meets generally 440 times, and the whole number of attendances divided by 440 gives the number in average attendance. Hence, although by means of a slight falsification the number in average attendance might be increased by one, no further addition could be made unless the teacher made at least 440 false entries; and this implies a settled determination to commit fraud, which is by no means common among teachers."

Mr. Cumin states, also, that in the interests of the scholar there was much to be said in favour of this alteration. It had been found that when once a scholar's attendance had reached the prescribed limit of 250 attendances, he was apt to become less regular, whereas by the qualification of 22 weeks' enrolment, there was no such standard of sufficient attendance suggested. On the actual working of this provision we have received a large body of evidence, the consideration of which must be reserved for a later chapter of this report.

In addition to the foregoing fundamental alterations the following changes were made in the scheme of instruction by the Code of 1882. A Seventh Standard was added to the six already existing, which themselves underwent certain modifications. English, or literature, and physical geography, the latter of which had proved to be among the most popular of the specific subjects, disappeared from the list, and a portion of their matter was incorporated in the class subjects of English and geography. Meanwhile the schedule of specific subjects was enlarged and arranged under 12 heads, but instead of being accessible as before to a scholar in the Fourth Standard, specific subjects were henceforth limited to scholars who had passed the Fourth Standard. While the curriculum was graduated up to the Seventh Standard, scholars were permitted to devote a portion of the school time to class and specific subjects, an arrangement which gave scope for higher studies in the case of individual scholars, and still enabled the definition of an elementary school laid down in the Act of 1870 to be fulfilled, that the principal part of the education therein given should be elementary. Meanwhile the doctrine of examination according to a standard of age was abandoned in this Code.

Besides these changes in the method of assessing the grant, and in the subject-matter of examination, the Code of 1882 introduced a new form of grant, called the Merit


[page 41]

Grant, on the effects of which we have taken much evidence. No better description can be given of the objects with which the Merit Grant was instituted, and of the intended method of its application, than that which is to be found in section 29 of the Instructions to Her Majesty's Inspectors accompanying the Code of 1882, §29.*

"There is no graver or more difficult task imposed upon Her Majesty's Inspectors by the amended Code than that of assessing the merit grant. Your own experience must often have led you to conclude that the full value of a school's work is not accurately measured by the results of individual examination, as tabulated in a schedule; and that two schools, in which the ratio of "passes" attained is the same, often differ materially in the quality of those passes, and in general efficiency as places of education. It is in order that these differences may be duly recognised in calculating the grant that my Lords have caused the award of a substantial part of that sum to be dependent on the estimate you form of the merit of a school as a whole. Article 109b, specifies three particulars: (1) the organisation and discipline; (2) the intelligence employed in instruction; and (3) the general quality of the work, especially in the elementary subjects. Thus the award of the merit grant will be the result of several factors of judgment. The quality as well as the number of passes will necessarily rank as the most important of these factors; but inferences derived from them alone may be modified by taking into account the skill and spirit of the teaching, the neatness of the schoolroom and its appliances, the accuracy and trustworthiness of the registers, the fitness of the classification in regard to age and capacity, the behaviour of the children, especially in their honesty under examination, and the interest they evince in their work. The Code also instructs you to make reasonable allowance for "special circumstances". A shifting, scattered, very poor or ignorant population; any circumstance which makes regular attendance exceptionally difficult; failure of health, or unforeseen changes among the teaching staff, will necessarily and rightly affect your judgment. It is needful, however, in all such cases, to have regard not only to the existence of special difficulties, but also to the degree of success with which those difficulties have been overcome." From bad or unsatisfactory schools it is manifest that the merit grant should be withheld altogether. The cases which you dealt with under Article 32b of the former Code, and in which a deduction of one or more tenths was made for "faults of instruction or discipline", or in which you have not recommended the grant for "discipline and organisation", would of course fall under this head. Other cases will occur which are not serious enough to justify actual deduction, but in which you observe that there is a preponderance of indifferent passes, preventible disorder, dulness, or irregularity, or that the teacher is satisfied with a low standard of duty. To schools of this class no merit grant should be awarded. But a school of humble aims, which passes only a moderately successful examination, may properly be designated "Fair", if its work is conscientiously done, and is sound as far as it goes, and if the school is free from any conspicuous fault."

Succeeding codes have introduced few modifications into the Code of 1882, which is still substantially in possession of the field. One addition only may be noticed in the Code of 1884, because it bears directly on the subject of over-pressure, on which we have taken so much evidence. It occurs as an addition to the clause directing the attention of the inspector to the moral training of the school in awarding the grant for organisation and discipline, of which clause we have already traced the history, and it is intended to throw on the teacher the whole responsibility for the classification of the school, and for the presentation of the scholars for examination.† The following are the words of the new clause which is still in force: "The inspector will also satisfy himself that the teacher has neither withheld scholars improperly from examination nor unduly pressed those that are dull or delicate in preparation for it, at any time in the year; and that in classifying them for instruction, regard has been paid to their health, their age, and their mental capacity, as well as to their due progress in learning."‡ As a guide to the discharge of one branch of the responsibility thus laid on the teacher - that of properly selecting those who should be withdrawn from examination - a definition is subjoined of what will be accepted as a reasonable excuse, which, as it bears so closely on the important subjects already referred to, we also quote in full. "The following, among others, will be considered reasonable excuses for either withholding a scholar or not presenting him in a higher standard; delicate health or prolonged illness, obvious dullness or defective intellect, temporary deprivation, by accident or otherwise, of the use of the eye or hand. If a scholar has failed in two subjects, or twice in the same subject, he may generally be presented again in the same standard."‡

*See Appendix to this volume.

†New Code (1884), Art. 109 (b.)

‡New Code (1884), Art. 199 e (vi.)


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From this review of the history of the Codes it will be manifest that the two elements of which the grant from the first consisted have been throughout maintained - payment for attendance and payment on the results of examination. The proportions in which these two elements have entered into the calculation of the grant have varied but slightly, until the Code of 1882 gave an additional prominence to average attendance. Under that Code not only was a fixed grant made payable on the average attendance, but the latter became also a factor by which the amount of that part of the grant was determined, which depended on the results of individual examination. In 1882 a third element was introduced, by allotting a grant to the general excellence of the schools. The principle of payment by results, which has since 1862 so largely affected the distribution of the grant, appears now again to be called in question, and it will be our duty at a later stage of the Report to weigh the evidence which has been given before us on this subject.

Mention has already been made of the Instructions to Inspectors which are issued from time to time by the Department. They form practical commentaries on the application of the Code, and contain, a« their name implies, directions to the inspectors, as to the way in which their duties are to be discharged under the existing regulations. The following extract from the Instructions to Inspectors, issued in 1878,* will show how from time to time their attention has been directed to the higher aspects of education, and to the moral and social needs of the children in elementary schools.

"My Lords are anxious that you should lose no suitable opportunity of impressing upon both managers and teachers the great responsibility which rests upon them, over and above the intellectual teaching, in regard to the moral training of the children committed to their charge. You will express your special approbation of all schools where, from knowledge which you have gained by repeated visits, you observe that a high moral tone is maintained.

You will probably have observed that their Lordships' object throughout has been, over and above the acquisition by every child of the bare ordinary rudiments of education, to promote the development of the general intelligence of the scholars rather than to seek to burden their memories with subjects which, considering the early age at which the majority of children leave school, would not be likely to be of use to them; and also to encourage such training in school, in matters affecting their daily life, as may help to improve and raise the character of their homes. With respect to the ordinary rudiments, you will urge the teachers, as far as they are concerned, not to be satisfied with just enabling the children to pass the standard examinations which set them free from compulsory attendance, but to endeavour to provide that all children before they leave school shall at least have acquired the power of writing with facility, of using the simple rules of arithmetic without difficulty, and of reading without exertion and with pleasure to themselves. As regards history and geography, you will encourage, as far as you can, such teaching as is likely to awaken the sympathies of the children. Their attention should be specially directed to the interesting stories of history, to the lives of noble characters, and to incidents which tend to create a patriotic feeling of regard for their country and its position in the world; and while they should be made acquainted with the leading historical incidents that have taken place in their own neighbourhood, and with its special geographical features, an interest should be excited in the colonial and foreign possessions of the British Crown.

You will bear in mind, and will urge upon managers and teachers, that though certain subjects only are paid for under the Code, and certain subjects only are obligatory, it is in their power to give instruction to children in any other useful and suitable branches of knowledge for which the parents show a liking, or which the character and habits of the population seem specially to require. It cannot be too strongly impressed upon you that uniformity in the school course, as far as the non-essential subjects are concerned, is not the object their Lordships have in view in their administration, but that, on the contrary, they consider it advantageous to the country generally that there should be a variety in the teaching of the schools, so as to meet the varying and very different requirements of different localities and condition of life. It is with this view that a great variety of optional subjects, both in elementary science and literature, has recently been added by their Lordships to the Code. From no good school, however, or conscientious teacher, will you ever hear the plea urged that only "paying" subjects can be attended to. The schools which pass best in such subjects are not those which confine themselves solely to the work of the standards, which are necessarily fixed with an eye to the capacities of ordinary children, or even to the others enumerated in the Code."

*See Appendix to this volume.


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It would be wearisome to enter on a detailed account of the form which the Instructions to Inspectors have taken in successive editions. It may suffice to make a few extracts from the Revised Instructions adapted to the Code of 1886, for the purpose of illustrating the spirit in which Her Majesty's Inspectors are desired by the Department to discharge their arduous and delicate functions:

"My Lords would especially call your attention to the general principle, that all hurry or undue haste on the day of examination is incompatible with the proper discharge of your main duty - that of ascertaining, verifying, and reporting the facts on which the parliamentary grant is administered. An early attendance at the school is absolutely indispensable, not only on account of the greater length of time available for work, but in the interests of the children, who are far more capable of sustained exertion in the early part of the day. A hurried inspection probably necessitates some evils, which are much to be deprecated, - the attempt to do two things at once, e.g., to give out dictation or sums while hearing the reading of another class; keeping classes unemployed instead of dismissing them to play; retaining children in school in the dinner hour, and thereby not allowing sufficient time for the meal; prolonging the examination to a late hour in the afternoon; and embarrassing young scholars by want of clearness in dictation or in asking questions. As a rule, infants should not be detained beyond the ordinary hour for dismissal; and other children whom it is proposed to examine later, should be relieved by a short interval for recreation before that time."*

We have already quoted from the Instructions of 1882† the official statement of the principles which were to be kept in view by the inspectors in awarding the merit grant. The instructions now in force contain a description of schools deserving the mark "Excellent", to which we shall hereafter have occasion to refer.

"It is the intention of their Lordships that the mark 'Excellent' should be reserved for cases of distinguished merit. A thoroughly good school in favourable conditions is characterised by cheerful and yet exact discipline, maintained without harshness and without noisy demonstration of authority. Its premises are cleanly and well ordered; its time table provides a proper variety of mental employment and of physical exercise; its organisation is such as to distribute the teaching power judiciously, and to secure for every scholar, whether he is likely to bring credit to the school by examination or not, a fair share of instruction and of attention. The teaching is animated and interesting, and yet thorough and accurate. The reading is fluent, careful, and expressive, and the children are helped by questioning and explanation to follow the meaning of what they read. Arithmetic is so taught as to enable the scholars not only to obtain correct answers to sums, but also to understand the reason of the processes employed. If higher subjects are attempted, the lessons are not confined to memory work and to the learning of technical terms, but are designed to give a clear knowledge of facts and to train the learner in the practice of thinking and observing. Besides fulfilling these conditions, which are all expressed or implied in the Code, such a school seeks by other means to be of service to the children who attend it. It provides for the upper classes a regular system of home exercises, and arrangements for correcting them expeditiously and thoroughly. Where circumstances permit, it has also its lending library, its savings' bank, and an orderly collection of simple objects and apparatus adapted to illustrate the school lessons, and formed in part by the co-operation of the scholars themselves. Above all, its teaching and discipline are such as to exert a right influence on the manners, the conduct, and the character of the children, to awaken in them a love of reading and such an interest in their own mental improvement as may reasonably be expected to last beyond the period of school life."‡

The teachers called before us have been very generally questioned as to their practice in the matter of setting home lessons. It is instructive to learn from the following extract what advice Her Majesty's Inspectors are bidden to tender on this subject:

"Your advice will be occasionally asked respecting home lessons, although the subject is mainly one of internal discipline, and not necessarily within your purview. For delicate, or very young children, such lessons are plainly unsuitable, and the special circumstances of some schools render it inexpedient to require home tasks in any form. Of such circumstances the local managers are the best judges. But in the upper classes of good schools, in which the teachers exert a right influence and take an interest in their work, the practice of giving short exercises to be performed at home is attended with no difficulty, and is open to no practical objection. The best teachers

*Revised Instructions (1886), page 13.

†See Appendix to this volume.

‡Instructions (1886), §51.


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use such exercises rather to illustrate, and to fix in the memory, lessons which have already been explained in school, than to break new ground or to call for new mental effort. This purpose is served by lessons of a very simple and definite character - a sum, a verse of poetry, a list of names or dates, a letter, an outline map, a short parsing exercise, which may readily be prepared in half an hour, and which admits of very easy testing and correction on the following day. When these conditions are fulfilled the home task is found to have a very valuable effect, not only in helping the progress of the scholar, and in encouraging the habits of application, but also in awakening, on the part of the parents, an interest in the school work."*

Once more, since complaints have been laid before us that the exemptions from examination claimed by the managers have sometimes been disallowed by the inspector, it is well to set side by side with these complaints, which will hereafter be dealt with, the principles on which Her Majesty's Inspectors are instructed to act in this matter:

"Much care will be needed in dealing with cases in which the scholars, though present, are withheld from examination. Some recent experience seems to show that many of the school managers are hardly yet aware of the responsibility which lies upon them in connexion with the exception list, and that they sometimes sign the schedule before examining its details with sufficient care. Managers should be recommended to consider the cases of deficient or delicate children as they occur throughout the year, and to place on record in the log-book or minute book the names of scholars whom for any reason they intend to withhold. You will not in any case examine, for the purpose of recording the marks on the schedule, a child whose name is placed upon the exception list; but it will be your duty to inquire whether there is an adequate reason for withholding him. The Code enumerates the principal of such reasons. A mere general allegation of backwardness or incapacity should not be accepted unless, on seeing the child, you are satisfied that he ought not to be examined. Nor should any fixed proportion of exceptions be allowed as a matter of course in any case; since in a school in ordinary conditions such exceptions should be very few, and, in circumstances which are specially unfavourable, the number of legitimate excuses may sometimes be large. You will judge of each case on its own merits before entering the mark 'excused' (E) or 'not excused' (NE) on the examination schedule. And in determining cases of difficulty it is well to bear in mind that if the claim is made in the interests of the scholar, and because for any reason it is not good for him that he should be examined, it should be freely allowed. But in any cases in which it is clear that the exception is asked in the supposed interests of the managers, or because it is feared that the repute of the school or the amount of the grant might slightly suffer if the scholar failed to passed, the excuse must be regarded as insufficient."†

It might at first sight appear that under the form of Instructions to Inspectors, the Education Department could in fact modify the statutory regulations which govern the administration of the grant. But since the Code requires managers to furnish themselves with a copy of the Revised Instructions for each year, which are, moreover, presented to Parliament, the Department practically challenges the most jealous inquiry into the good faith with which it adheres to the letter and spirit of the Code in the directions it gives to its Inspectors.‡

*Instructions (1886) §57.

†Instructions (1886), §64.

‡New Code (1886), Art. 8.



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PART II

The existing State of Facts

We have been furnished by Mr. Cumin with returns, prepared by him from official records in the possession of the Education Department, containing full statistics of the progressive growth of elementary education in England and Wales, embracing up to 1885 a period of 25 years. These returns will be found printed in Appendix C of the first volume of our Report, together with a summary of their contents.* We have also had the advantage of examining Mr. Cumin on the most important points arising out of these figures. Before entering on the consideration of the details of these tables, which show the gradual advance made under the several heads of educational statistics, it may be convenient to present a summary of the most recent facts of the case, as they are represented in the returns of the Elementary Schools visited by Her Majesty's Inspectors in the year ending August 31, 1886.

From these we learn that -

1. The number of Her Majesty's Inspectors and Assistants was 302.
2. The estimated population of England and Wales was 27,870,586.
The estimated population of those belonging to the class frequenting elementary schools between 3 and 5, 1,432,739; 5 to 13, 5,216,788; 13 to 14, 587,819; total, 7,237,346.
3. The number of Day Schools visited by Her Majesty's Inspectors was 19,022 Institutions, containing 28,645 separate Departments.
4. There were 5,145,292 places in the schools inspected in that year, affording accommodation for 18.46 per cent of the estimated population.
5. There were on the registers of the schools inspected 4,505,825 scholars, and 4,553,751 on the registers of annual grant schools, being 16.34 per cent of the estimated population.
6. There were in average attendance 3,438,425 scholars, being 76.31 per cent of the number of the registers.
7. There were, acting as teachers in these schools, 42,212 certificated teachers, 17,439 assistant teachers, 27,804 pupil teachers, and 4,659 female assistants.
8. These schools were maintained at a total cost of £6,839,870, which was met by income derived from the following sources, viz., from school fees, £1,812,917; from Government grant, £2,866,700; from voluntary subscriptions, £742,597; from local rates in the case of Board Schools, £1,169,150; from endowment, £156,123; from miscellaneous receipts, £79,702.
In reviewing the progress of national education by the light of the tables prepared for the Commission by Mr. Cumin, it must be premised that the figures supplied by the Department refer only to schools in receipt of annual grants, and consequently leave out of account, at least in the earlier periods, a considerable amount of educational effort unconnected with Government. This, however, has been a quantity year by year diminishing, and more rapidly since the passing of the Education Act of 1870; the facilities given for granting certificates to acting teachers having, by this time, brought almost all efficient schools within the reach of annual grants. The figures, therefore, supplied by the Department in respect to the present time may, without serious error, be taken to represent the whole available resources of elementary education. But in estimating the progress which these statistics disclose, especially in the earlier periods, it must be borne in mind that it is not entirely attributable to a newly created provision for education, but that it includes also many schools which had previously been in existence, although not before connected with the Education Department.

In taking account of the buildings which have been erected with the aid of grants from the Department, the return of the money spent on the erection of training colleges up to the date (1863) at which building grants ceased,† is approximately exhaustive, and comprehends all that had been done up to that date in England and Wales in that direction. The total sum that had been expended on these fabrics is reported to have been £638,900, towards which the Department has contributed £118,627, leaving rather more than half a million, which was provided by voluntary contributions.

*Report, vol. I., page 517.

†Table I., Appendix, Report, vol. 1.


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We gather from the last report of the Committee of Council on Education the following additional facts. There are 30 training colleges connected with the Church of England, 6 are conducted on the British and Foreign school system, 1 is Congregational, 2 are Wesleyan, 3 Roman Catholic, and 4 other undenominational; making a total of 43 in England and Wales.* Of these, 17 are for masters, 25 for mistresses, and one for masters and mistresses combined. These colleges accommodate between them 1,369 male students, 1,822 females, together with 66 students resident in the same institution for masters and mistresses.

The total annual cost of maintenance for the year 1886 was, for the male colleges £82,719, for the female £78,024, for the mixed college £2,999. The average annual cost per head is about £60 for males and £43 for female students. Out of £167,643, the total annual cost of their maintenance, £121,822 is supplied by grants from the Education Department; the students contribute £27,441, while £15,971 consists of voluntary contributions. These institutions are nearly all full, and indeed there is great competition for admission into them.

Between the years 1839 and 1882 building grants have been made by the State towards the erection and improvement of 6,335 elementary schools, amounting in all to £1,767,035, to meet a sum of £4,866,273, voluntarily contributed by the promoters. The number of scholars thus provided for was 1,233,050, at a total cost of £6,633,308. It should be borne in mind that this represents only that part of voluntary school building towards which the Department has made a building grant. No fewer than 2,239,531 school seats have been provided in schools erected by unaided voluntary effort, the cost of which represents an outlay of more than £11,000,000. This does not include the value of those sites which have been given gratuitously.

The progress made in the quarter of a century between 1860 and 1885 in the number of schools, school places, and scholars brought annually under the view of the Department through the visits of H.M. Inspectors, is set forth in Table 2 of Mr. Cumin's Returns. The number of schools annually inspected rose from 5,141 to 19,063; and the school-places from 1,094,006 to 5,061,503. That progress has been continuous, but the great leap in the provision of school accommodation naturally took place after the Education Act of 1870 had made it incumbent on every school district to supply itself with sufficient and efficient education. In the five years following on 1870 the accommodation in inspected schools increased by 1,267,840 places, and in the succeeding five years by 1,094,329 more. Of the whole increase in accommodation from 1870 to 1886, amounting to 3,182,919 places, 1,542,032 were due to voluntary effort, whilst 1,640,887 were provided by school boards. The existing school accommodation, reckoned as 5,200,685 in 1886, is made up of 3,472,581 places in voluntary schools and 1,728,104 in board schools, the former being to the latter somewhat in excess of two to one.

Corresponding to the 5,200,685 school places in the 19,173 schools on the annual grant list, there were in 1886, 4,553,751 registered scholars. Since in 1860 there were only 957,936 on the registers of grant aided schools, and only 1,693,059 in 1870, this represents an increase in the last 16 years of 2,860,692 - 1,189,230 voluntary, and 1,671,412 board - and in the last 26 years an increase of 3,595,815 scholars on the school registers. In the meanwhile the population increased from 19,902,713 in 1860 to 22,090,163 in 1870, and to 27,870,586 in 1886.

A further test of the progress of education is given by the proportion which the number on the registers of efficient schools bears to the population. Taking account only of State-aided schools, this proportion in England and Wales was 4.81 in 1860, 7.66 in 1870, 11.46, in 1875, and in 1886 it stood at 16.34. If all other certified efficient schools were included, we learn from a note to these tables that the registered scholars would certainly not be less than 1 in 6 of the population. Again, taking the number of scholars of the ages of from 7 to 11 "on the registers of our annual grant schools, we find that they (2,093,910) are upwards of 95 per cent of the estimated population (2,202,291) of that age, and of the class usually to be found at elementary schools."† Such are the statistical proofs which Mr. Cumin is able to afford of the opinion which he expressed in evidence, that we have got nearly all the children of the country who ought to be there on the registers of our elementary schools, a result which, we venture to think, both the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, and the author of the first Education Act of 1870, would have regarded as no mean one, could they have foreseen its being realised in the intervals that have elapsed since their respective labours.

*Report of Committee of Council (1887), page 388.

†See Table Report, Vol. I., page 620.


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Passing from the registered scholars to those in average attendance, we find that the proportion of the latter to the former has been singularly fluctuating during the periods referred to. The percentage of registered scholars in attendance stood in 1860 as high as 74.35 in grant-aided schools, which were then, in the nature of the case, somewhat picked ones. But by 1870 that proportion had fallen heavily, standing then at 68.07, though the continually varying Regulations of the Department during that period render it difficult to institute a very valid comparison. By 1875 it had still further fallen to 66.95. But in the intermediate time the Education Act of 1870 had passed, which brought into account a large accession of feeble schools and of unwilling scholars throughout the country, while at the same time a considerable number of board schools newly established had not as yet got into working order. By 1880 a rebound of regularity of attendance had taken place, the average attendance having then risen to 70.61 per cent of the scholars on the register - 70.5 in voluntary schools and 70.8 in board schools. This improvement in the regularity of attendance took place during a period which included the important changes in the Code of 1875 to which we have already called attention. During the same period the Act of 1876 had come into operation, creating indirect, and at the same time extending direct, compulsion. Finally, in the interval between 1880 and 1886, the proportion of attendance to scholars on the registers rose to the figure at which it now stands, 76.31 - 76.27 in voluntary schools, 76.38 in board schools. During this period Mr. Mundella's Act came into force, requiring compulsory byelaws to be universally adopted, while later on the Code of 1882 was enacted, making the grant depend more largely upon the attendance. Board and voluntary schools seem to stand more nearly on an equality in this respect than in any other, the figure representing regularity of attendance showing in 1884 an advantage in favour of voluntary school attendance of 4 in a 1,000, whilst in 1886 the advantage was with board school attendance, but only of 1 in a 1,000.

The educational results, as tested by examination, have likewise shown evidence of continued advance, though with fluctuations in certain particulars. The year 1872, in which the effects first appear of the new Code of 1871 and of the creation of board schools, is the first in which the present tables give the percentage of scholars presented in Standards IV to VI, and of those above 10 years of age presented in Standards I to III. The first percentage, indicating the degree of advance in learning, shows every year evidence of increasingly good results. The percentage of these upper standard scholars, which was in 1872 only 17.96, and fell in 1873 to 17.43 of the whole, rose, with one or two trifling exceptions, progressively, till in 1886 it reached 34.68, or more than a third of the whole. In like manner the index of backwardness, supplied by the proportion of elder children presented for examination in the lower standards, had fallen from 63.71 per cent in 1872 to 36.33 per cent in 1886. The percentage of passes in reading, writing, and arithmetic has not made like progress. Beginning with a record of 83.57 per cent in 1864 - the first year in which Mr. Lowe's Revised Code took full effect - it rose progressively until 1870, when it reached the maximum of 85.87, after which it gradually fell off, beginning, however, to recover itself in 1878, and standing, in 1886, at 85.99. It must, however, be borne in mind that within these earlier periods elementary subjects more generally engrossed the attention of scholars to the exclusion of class subjects. In many cases specific subjects have been added to the programme of school studies, and more also is now demanded under the head of these rudiments. Compulsion, too, has in the meantime driven into school a residuum whose attendance and attainments are not likely to have been on a par with those of scholars previously attending school of their own free will.

The financial position of schools at selected periods beginning with 1860 is one of the most important facts of the case which is disclosed by Mr. Cumin's tables. The annual charges of education have from the first been divided between the Government and the local promoters. But previous to 1862, part of the Government grant was paid direct to members of the school staff, and so does not appear in the school accounts. Since Mr. Lowe's code, however, all payments from the Department have been made direct to the managers as part of the school funds, and to that extent have increased the apparent cost of each child's education. In 1860 the cost is set down as 18s 11½d, and in 1862 at 19s 11d; but in 1870, when the whole grant is included in the reckoning, it stands at 25s 5d, and each successive quinquennial return shows a further increment. Thus, it had risen in 1875 to 32s 5¼d, in 1880 to 36s 8¼d - 34s 7¾d in voluntary schools, and 41s 11¾d in board schools - and it stood in 1886 at 39s 5d - 36s 4¼d in voluntary schools, and 44s 11¾d in board schools. Meanwhile, the average grant earned by each scholar which stood in 1860 and in 1862 at


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10s 6d was temporarily reduced in 1870. But at each quinquennial period since the passing of the Education Act of 1870, the rate of Government grant per scholar shows continuous increase, being 12s 7¼d in 1875, 15s 5¾d in 1880, and 17s 2½d in 1886 for each scholar in average attendance.

Much less variation is apparent in the charge of each child's education on the local resources. Standing at 18s 11½d in 1860, it had risen to 20s 10d by 1875, and only reached 22s 1¼d in 1886. Out of this sum the parent has contributed in the form of school fees nearly one-half, leaving the remainder to be provided by subscriptions and endowments in voluntary schools, and by rates in board schools. In the case of Church of England schools, which are far the most numerous of the former class of schools, the demand made on voluntary contributions for each scholar's education was 7s 1¼d in 1885, being a smaller sum than at any previous period recorded in these tables.

The aggregate cost of education to the country, being the product of two increasing factors, viz., the cost of schooling per head, and the number of children under education. - has risen with great rapidity. In 1870 the aggregate expenditure on elementary schools was about 1½ millions, in 1875 it exceeded 3 millions, in 1880 it had risen to 5 millions, and in 1886 to more than 6¾ millions (£6,839,870.)

The Government grant rose from £562,611 in 1870, to £2,958,766 in 1886. Voluntary subscriptions which stood in 1870 at £418,839, rose to £742,597 in 1886, a point at which they have for some years been almost stationary, but with a tendency every now and then to decline.

The annual charge of board schools on the local rates had risen in 1885 to £1,169,150.

The number of certificated teachers in England and Wales rose from 6,393 in 1860, and 12,676 in 1870, to 42,212 in 1886. Of these, however, only 28,645 could be in charge of as many schools, leaving over 14,000 to act as assistants. The head teachers, if masters, enjoyed an average salary of £132, if mistresses of £80. No account, however, is here taken of the numerous residences provided in voluntary schools for the principal teacher, which must add from £10 to £20 to the value of the post. Certificated masters acting as assistants had in 1886 an average salary of £90, and assistant certificated mistresses of £63. Of uncertificated assistants (ex-pupil teachers) there were 17,439 at work in 1886, whereas in 1880 there were only 7,652. On the other hand the pupil teachers, who amounted in 1880 to 33,733, had fallen in 1886 to 27,804.

The evidence we have received shows the great importance attached both by managers and teachers to the mark of merit awarded to their schools by Her Majesty's inspector, whether excellent, good, fair, or nil. The Excellent merit grant, we learn from Table 5, was in 1884 awarded to 12.45 per cent of the infant schools examined, and to 14.49 per cent of the schools for older scholars. These latter only slightly improved their record in 1885, rising to 15.90 per cent rated as excellent, but in 1886 they again advanced to 16.10 per cent. The infant schools made much more progress, rising to 16.88 per cent rated as excellent in 1885, and to 18.71 in 1886. But a singular law is disclosed by these tables as governing the award of the merit grant, viz., that its grades vary on the average with the size of schools. The following table, extracted from Mr. Cumin's Returns, referring to 1885, will best illustrate this law of proportion between the numbers in school and the rate of merit grant when the calculation is extended over the whole area of annual grants.

AVERAGE NUMBER OF SCHOLARS IN EACH DEPARTMENT OR (INFANT) CLASS

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It will be observed that equally in infant and upper schools, and as well in voluntary as in board schools, each descending grade of merit corresponds with a reduction in the average size of the school obtaining it. And one reason is not far to seek, for not only are small schools relatively more expensive than large ones, and therefore apt to be less well equipped, but as numbers increase that division of labour which economizes force becomes more and more perfect.

PERCENTAGE OF DEPARTMENTS AND (INFANT) CLASSES

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This disparity in average size, followed by a corresponding disparity in merit grant, may be further illustrated from a return made by the Local Government Board, and printed in Appendix D. of Vol. I. of our Report. From this it will be seen that of the 14,916 parishes in England and Wales, corresponding approximately to a similar number of school districts, those which have a population under 500, and therefore presumably an average school attendance not much over 60, number 8,951. Of these small parishes the very large majority are supplied by voluntary schools; how large may be inferred from Table 13 in Mr. Cumin's returns. There it will be seen that out of 3,928 schools in England and Wales with less than 60 in average attendance, 3,286 are voluntary, and only 642 are supplied by boards. A similar conclusion may be drawn from Table 12, which shows that in a still smaller class of schools, 1,252 in number, where the accommodation is under 60, only 179 are board schools. It will help to throw light upon the educational problem if it be remembered that in England and Wales, as Mr. Cumin has told us in evidence, 30 per cent of all schools have an average attendance of leas than 60, and 52 per cent an average of less than 100. And it may further be inferred from the figures already quoted that nearly four-fifths of all the smaller schools are voluntary ones.

Mr. Cumin's returns include an elaborate comparison carried on for 10 years between the summaries of voluntary and board-school work, as shown in Table 6. Looking only to the figures of 1885, the number of voluntary schools inspected was 14,600, as compared with 4,295 board ones; their relative accommodation was 3,398,000 and 1,600,718 school places, their average attendance 2,183,870 and 1,187,455 respectively. In point of regularity of attendance they were practically on the same footing, as has been already remarked. Their percentage of scholars presented in higher standards was also almost identical, but the advantage was on the side of board schools in the percentage of passes, board schools having 87.07 per cent, as against 84.14 per cent in voluntary schools. Board schools also were receiving a larger average grant per head, earning 17s 7d as against 16s 8¼d in voluntary schools. On each child's schooling board schools spent 9s. 6½d in excess of the sum paid by voluntary ones: the amounts being 45s 4d and 35s 9½d respectively. Finally, each separate institution inspected had on an average 195 scholars on the register in voluntary schools as against 362 in board schools.

The following facts regarding the distribution in 1881 of the population of England and Wales between school boards and school attendance committees may be gathered from Table VII furnished by Mr. Cumin. In England alone the population under the former is 15,261,159; under the latter 9,352,767. Of the school board population 3,834,354 is in London, 6,824,540 in municipal boroughs, and 4,602,265 in parishes. The districts under school attendance committees comprise a population of 1,545,008 in municipal boroughs, 821,593 in urban sanitary districts, and 6,986,166 in unions.


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If we omit London, the boroughs, and the urban sanitary districts, only 2,478 parishes in England are within the school board area, whilst 9,684 parishes are outside of the school board area, a proportion of about one to four. In Wales the population under school boards is 995,766, whilst that under school attendance committees is 364,747; 449 parishes, excluding boroughs, being within, and 555 outside of the school board area. Taking England and Wales together, a population of 16,256,925 is under school boards, and of 9,717,514 under school attendance committees, the former being 63 and the latter 37 per cent of the whole population. The number of parishes, however, in England and Wales (excluding borough and urban sanitary districts) which are in school board and in non-school board districts respectively is 2,927 and 10,239, being 22 and 78 per cent of the whole number of these parishes.

We have received a considerable body of evidence, given principally by teachers in charge of schools, as to whether children now leave school at an earlier age than formerly, but such evidence has been founded largely on general impressions, and at the best covers a very limited area. One of the tables furnished by Mr. Cumin supplies materials from which an answer may be drawn at once more comprehensive and more exact. The table below is extracted from the fuller Table II, printed at page 522 of Vol. I of our Report, regarding the ages of scholars on the register. This abridged table is confined to the returns made for each period of five years, beginning with the year 1865 and terminating with that of 1885. It shows that in the course of that period of 20 years the centesimal proportion of scholars of 12 years old and over has increased by nearly 2 per cent, while the proportion of those of 11 years and over has increased by 4.23 per cent. On the other hand, taking account of the five epochs selected in this abridged table, the proportion of registered scholars who had turned 13 years of age will be seen to have fallen gradually from 1865 (4.41) till it reached a minimum (3.36) in 1875, to have attained a maximum in 1880 (5.00), and to stand now at 4.10, almost exactly where it did in 1870.

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The distribution of the population of England and Wales under standards of exemption determined by byelaws is given in Table VIII (B) of Mr. Cumin's returns. It appears that the fourth, fifth, and sixth Standards for total exemption are those in force among the following proportions of the population: viz., the Fourth Standard for 31.68 per cent, the Fifth for 48.12, and the Sixth for 19.95. But of school districts 9,372 have the Fourth Standard for total exemption, 3,967 have the Fifth, and 79 have the Sixth. For partial exemption the mass of the population may be grouped as having Standards II, III, or IV, and in the following proportions: 9.79 per cent have the Second; 58.80 per cent have the Third; and 24.13 per cent have the Fourth Standard for partial exemption. For this purpose the Second is the Standard in force in 1,546 school districts, the Third in 8,912, the Fourth in 2,001.

The duration of school life can only be approximately arrived at from these tables, and appears to be an inference drawn from insufficient data. No trustworthy figures illustrating this point have been collected by the Department, as Mr. Cumin tells us in a note to Table IX (C) . The limits of school life being taken to lie between the ages


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of 3 and 13, the average attendance, taken as about 70 per cent, is presumed to suggest that on an average each child's school life extends over a period of seven years. The age at which children enter school and leave is shown from the following Table:

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In Table XV we have reprinted a Parliamentary Paper furnished by the Education Department to the House of Commons on August 13th, 1885, on the motion of Mr. Molloy, showing the growth of voluntary schools from 1870 to 1885, under the several heads of (1) number of children in attendance; (2) expenditure; (3) school fees; (4) voluntary subscriptions; (5) Government grant; (6) income from other sources; and, (7) the number of new schools established. On reference to that Table it will be seen that during the period of 14 years included in the return, the number of children on the register of voluntary schools has increased from 1,693,059 in 1870 to 2,853,604 in 1884, whilst those in average attendance have steadily increased from 1,152,389 to 2,157,292. The total expenditure has risen continuously from £1,527,023 in 1870 to £3,812,149 in 1884. School fees which amounted in the former year to £502,023 amounted in the latter year to £1,205,440. Voluntary subscriptions rose, though with a certain amount of fluctuation, from £418,839 to £732,524. The Government Grant which was £562,611 in 1870 had risen to £1,768,140 in 1884; while additions to the income from other sources, which in 1870 stood at £76,509, had gradually increased to £192,975 in 1884. Meanwhile the number of new voluntary schools established had amounted in all to 6,735, the largest addition being made in 1872, when 1,056 new schools were built, from which number the annual additions gradually declined as the school supply became more adequate, the smallest number of new voluntary schools established in any one year being 51 in 1882; the number for the two succeeding years being 70, and 89 respectively.

In the same year Mr. Mundella moved for a Return for the years 1869 to 1884, showing for each child in average attendance at voluntary schools; (1) the average cost; (2) the average grant; (3) the average school fees; (4) the voluntary contributions. This return, which will be found printed in Table XVI, shows that for that period of 15 years, the average cost per child gradually rose from £1 5s 5d to £1 15s 2d; the average grant from 9s 7d to 16s 4d¾; the average school fees from 8s 4d to 11s 2d; while the voluntary contribution per child in average attendance fluctuated a good deal, beginning with 7s 3¼d in 1869, rising to a maximum of 8s 8¾d in 1877, and thenceforward declining regularly with the increasing numbers till it fell in 1884 to 6s 8½d.



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PART III

Machinery for Carrying on Public Elementary Education
Chapter I - Supply of Schools.
Chapter II - Structural suitability of the present School Supply.
Chapter III - School Management.
Chapter IV - Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools.
Chapter V - Teachers and Staff.
Chapter VI - Training Colleges.
Chapter VII - Attendance and Compulsion.

CHAPTER I

SUPPLY OF SCHOOLS

We now proceed to inquire how far a sufficient amount of school accommodation has been already provided, and to what extent the existing machinery of the Education Acts is effective for supplying such deficiencies as may from time to time arise. Section V of the Act of 1870 thus lays down the obligation which lies on each school district to provide sufficient school accommodation:

"There shall be provided for every school district a sufficient amount of accommodation in public elementary schools (as herein-after defined) available for all the children resident in such district for whose elementary education efficient and suitable provision is not otherwise made."

In the opinion of Mr. Cumin, the Secretary of the Education Department, the present supply of schools throughout the country is quite sufficient, except in places where the population is continually on the increase. He admits further that "in every county in England, excepting the London district, the accommodation is considerably, and in some cases very largely, in excess of one-sixth of the population ... the ideal number of those who might reasonably be expected to be at school every day." In Lancashire, for instance, one-sixth of the population in the year 1881, amounted to 575,000: the school accommodation in 1885-6 was 780,134, so that (putting aside any increase of population that may have taken place in the interval) according to this calculation there were in this county 205,000 places in excess. For this apparent excess Mr. Cumin suggested one explanation. It was, he believed, partly attributable to the number of large buildings which had been erected primarily for Sunday school purposes, and in which day schools were held without occupying to the full the space provided.|| "Thus", he said, "in the county of Lancaster, in the Church of England schools the average number of seats in each department is 149, the average attendance (on week days) is 98, and the percentage of seats occupied daily 65. In the Wesleyan schools the average number of seats in each department is 244, the average attendance is 154, and the percentage of seats occupied daily 63. In British schools there are 200 seats in each department on an average, the average attendance is 128, and the percentage of seats occupied daily is 64. In Roman Catholic schools there are 201 seats on an average in each department, the average attendance is 118, and the percentage of seats occupied daily is 58." On the other hand, in board schools, erected solely with a view to day school accommodation, "there are 206 seats on an average in each department, the average attendance is 151, and the percentage of seats occupied daily is 73." In addition to the reason thus given for any apparent superfluity of accommodation, the decrease in the rural population of many counties during the last few years must have thrown a certain number of school seats out of use. In some places, including several mining districts, this decrease of the population has been considerable.

Two further explanations of the apparent excess of accommodation were suggested to Mr. Cumin during his examination, and accepted by him. "In the first place", he


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says, "more attention has been paid to the organisation of infants' schools, and even of babies' departments"; and in the second place, there has been an increased provision of class rooms for the separate instruction of the different classes. It must, of course, always be borne in mind, that a superfluity of accommodation in one locality is not set off against a deficiency occurring in another; and, consequently, that an excess in the aggregate, over so large an area as a county, is not incompatible with the existence of a deficiency of accommodation in particular places.

The oral evidence given to us as to the basis on which the accommodation required in any district is calculated by the Education Department was not very explicit. But on this point we are able to refer to the instructions issued to the Inspectors of Returns in May 1871, for their guidance in conducting the first inquiry held, under section 71 of the Education Act of 1870, into the school supply of the country at large.

These instructions ran as follows:

Sufficiency

"For what proportion of the population of a district ought school accommodation to be provided?"

"To this question no answer can be given which will be universally applicable. Local circumstances vary so widely that what would be an ample supply of schools for one district would be insufficient for another of the similar population. A parish may be wholly, mainly, or only very partially occupied by the classes requiring public school accommodation for their children. The requirements of Bethnal Green cannot be measured, in this respect, by the same standard as those of Hastings or Leamington. Accordingly, in the official returns sent to the local authorities, they are asked to state what proportion of the population in their respective districts they estimate to be 'of the class whose children will attend public elementary schools'."

"The requirements of each district must be judged by the answer to this inquiry; but, in ordinary cases‡ (i.e., where the labouring classes are about six-sevenths of the population), it may be assumed that accommodation in elementary schools will be required for one sixth of the entire population. This has been the rule hitherto followed by the Committee of Council in making building grants, and it is probably sufficient for all practical purposes. But where the families who are able to make independent provision for the education of their children either exceed or fall short of their usual proportion (one seventh) to the whole of the community, it may be calculated that accommodation will be required in elementary schools for about one-fifth of the rest of the population."

"For example: in a parish of 1,400 souls, building grants have hitherto been made for as many as 233 children. If six sevenths of the population belong to the class for whom elementary schools are required, school room may have been provided with public aid, for 233 children out of 1,200 souls. Of these 1,200, about 216 will be between 5 and 13 (the compulsory age under the Act) and 277 between 3 and 13. Room for 233 scholars will, consequently, be somewhat in excess of the number of children from 5 to 13; but as many infants go to school before 5, a school of this size will be large enough to enable every child in the parish, who is likely to attend it, to have 8 4/10 years of schooling, out of its 10 years of school life (3-13)."

"This provision appears to be sufficient, but is not in excess of what will be required, especially having regard to the compulsory powers of the Act. You may fairly take it as a standard in judging how far, in respect of quantity of accommodation, the requirements of each district are met by the schools included in its returns."

The Report of the Department for 1886-7, (p. xiii), also lays it down that "to meet the wants of the children for whom our schools are provided, and who constitute one-fifth of the total population, the number of school places to be provided ought to to be equal to one-sixth of the population."

The first part of this formula, adopted in 1871, appears to have been based upon the Census Returns of 1861, (the last published at that date), which showed that 23.12 per cent of the whole population were between 3 and 13 years of age. Deducting 1/7th for the class of children not usually found in State-aided schools, the remainder, being mainly of the class contemplated by the Act of 1870, would amount to 19.82, or, for working purposes, 20 per cent of the total population. We may point out that owing to improved sanitary conditions, the proportion of children between 3 and 13 to the whole population, rose from 23.12 in 1861, to 24.04 in 1881.§

See Report of Committee of Council for 1869-70, p. xiv.

§Census Return, 1881.


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Under the present conditions of elementary education, we are, on the whole, disposed to agree with the Department, that, (in the case of populations containing the ordinary proportion of the upper classes), "after making due allowance for absence on account of sickness, weather, distance from school, and other reasonable excuses for irregular attendance, school seats should be provided for one-sixth of the total population, and these seats ought to be daily occupied."* A table which we give in our Third Report,† proves how nearly these requirements have been realised in several counties. It appears that while in 11 English counties and in Wales generally, more than 90 per cent of one-fifth of the population are found on the school registers, no less than 99 per cent of one-fifth are on the school registers in the county of Leicester, and 92 per cent of one-sixth are in average attendance. It must also be borne in mind that since the Circular of 1871 was issued, an increasing number of scholars of a wealthier class have been drawn into Public Elementary Schools; that increased outlay upon the staff and buildings, and notably the enlarged curriculum of education, have held out greater attractions to scholars; and that the Act of 1876 has imposed upon backward children the obligation to attend school up to the age of 14. Owing to these and other circumstances, a larger proportion of accommodation than suffices for one-sixth of the population has in fact been provided in certain localities, and especially in some of the manufacturing districts.

The question has arisen as to the amount of accommodation that ought to be provided for children between 3 and 5 years of age, the latter being the earliest age at which they can be compelled to attend school. The Rev. Prebendary Roe, a Diocesan Inspector, who is well known to have given great attention to elementary education, speaking of the rural schools in Somerset, is of opinion that all children, in the country districts at least, should be in school by four years of age; and as far as these districts are concerned, he would have provision made for all children over three years of age. Mr. Cumin informs us, in the following words, that the Education Department have no uniform rule in regard to the accommodation for these young children: "What we say is, generally, that you are to consider the children between the ages of three and five as capable of going to school, and capable of bringing a grant; but it does not at all imply that the accommodation in every case is to be supplied for every child between the ages of three and five." Mr. Sharpe, one of Her Majesty's chief inspectors, and other witnesses,|| have given it as their opinion that small baby rooms are absolutely necessary in very poor neighbourhoods where the mothers are obliged to work for their living; that the "babies" if they are suitably dealt with, reap great advantage from being in school; while the elder children are often thereby set free to attend school more regularly.

It has been contended that in some districts, notably in parts of London, the provision for infants is largely in excess of the requirements, in consequence of full accommodation having been provided for the children between 3 and 5 years of age, who do not attend as regularly as the older children. Mr. Cumin, however, gave it as his opinion that the supply of school accommodation in London is not more than is required, whatever may be said about its distribution. On this point we think it right to observe that the proportion of children of school age in London to the total population is considerably less than throughout the country at large. The Census Returns for 1881, being given for quinquennial periods, cannot be quoted in respect of children between 3, or 5, and 13. But they show with respect to children between 5 and 15, that while the proportion of the population of that age in 1881 was 22.90 per cent in England and Wales - 22.31 in the towns, and 23.15 in the rural districts - it was only 20.60 in London. Taking 2 1/3 per cent as the difference between the children of school age in the Metropolis and the country generally, it follows that London with its 3,816,413 inhabitants must, in 1881, have had nearly 89,000 fewer children than would have been found in a population of the same size elsewhere. The child population of London, between 3 and 13, was estimated by the Registrar-General, at the Census of 1881, to be 831,595, or 21.79 per cent of the whole population. Deducting one-seventh from this for children not using the elementary schools, and an eighth besides for all causes of absence, according to the rule of the Education Department set out above, the result gives 12,372 fewer school places than by the application of the previous estimate of one-sixth of the population. It must be borne in mind that the erection of school buildings in London in three storeys will often compel the provision of a definite amount of accommodation for infants, irrespective of what might otherwise be considered the best proportion.

*Report of the Committee of Council, 1886-7, p. xii.

†Report, Vol. III., p. 741.


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The ultimate responsibility of ascertaining the sufficiency or deficiency of accommodation in any given district rests with the Education Department, and they depend for their information on the inspector of the district. "The inspectors", Mr. Cumin says, "are continually bound to see that there is no deficiency of school accommodation in their districts"; and they would inform the Department of any such deficiency, either through their annual reports or by special representations.

But within their own districts the school boards appear to be the primary judges of the accommodation to be provided. The law officers of the Crown, Mr. Cumin states, have given it as their opinion that the 18th section of the Elementary Education Act of 1870 gives absolute discretion to school boards to supply such additional accommodation, as in their opinion, is necessary. In London the initiative is always taken by the school board. There, however, a provisional order being almost always required to obtain a site, the proposal to build is necessarily brought before the Education Department, and, on their behalf, a special local inquiry into the question is held by Her Majesty's inspector. If, as is customary, in London and elsewhere, the building is to be erected by means of a loan, the Department can refuse their consent to its issue, and, indeed, under the Act of 1873 (sec. 10) they are bound to do so if the proposed school is in excess of the requirements of the district. Again, the Department may refuse an annual grant to a board school, not provided by means of a loan, if they deem it unnecessary. Thus the Department can exercise a very practical control over the provision of additional school accommodation proposed to be provided by school boards.

In districts where there is no school board, and in which, therefore, no authority exists charged with the duty of providing school accommodation, the school attendance committee, frequently make representations to the Department respecting the school supply within their district. These representations receive full consideration, and are sent down to the inspector, who is directed to inquire into the facts, and if he reports a deficiency, the parish or district is called upon to supply it by voluntary effort, or, failing that, to elect a school board for the purpose.|| But in all cases in which the need of further supply is called in question, the Department is not wholly dependent on the information of its inspector. Local remonstrances are sure to be sent in; all sides are fully represented, and the Department are able to decide judicially with a full knowledge of the facts relied on by all parties to the dispute.

The question of whether a school board has a prior right to supply a deficiency of accommodation in its district has been keenly debated. As a consequence of the assertion of such a right, (founded upon the 18th section of the Act o6 1870 already referred to,) offers on the part of voluntary bodies to supply an existing deficiency have been in many cases refused by the Department, with the result that, if the schools had been built, they would have been excluded from the annual grant. Some of these schools were, however, ultimately recognised. A detailed list of these cases is to be found in the Appendix to our First Report. It is admitted that the school board is bound to reckon as a part of the available supply from time to time all voluntary efficient schools then existing. But Mr. Cumin's interpretation of the Act, on which, he states, the Education Department have always proceeded, is, that as the school board are bound by the 10th section of the Act of 1870 to supply the original deficiency, so under the 18th section they are afterwards entitled, if they insist on doing so, to supply whatever deficiency may from time to time arise. The Department, he says, do not, in estimating a deficiency subsequently arising, recognise as part of the school supply, schools which are only in contemplation, nor even those which are in course of erection, unless the boards acquiesce in divesting themselves of their right to supply the deficient accommodation.** Only with the consent of the Department can these be reckoned as public elementary schools, and such consent can, under the terms of the 98th section of the Act of 1870, be given only to the managers of a school already in existence.

Mr. Cumin stated that this interpretation of the 18th section of the Act†† has been endorsed by both political parties in Parliament. He was asked: "Supposing that there were a large influx of Roman Catholics into a population, and that there

††Act of 1870, sec. 18. The School board shall maintain and keep efficient every school provided by such board, and shall from time to time provide such additional school accommodation as is, in their opinion, necessary in order to supply a sufficient amount of public school accommodation for their district.

A school board may discontinue any school provided by them, or change the site of any such school, if they satisfy the Education Department that the school to be discontinued is unnecessary, or that such change of site is expedient.


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were an offer at the same time of a Roman Catholic inspected school to meet that need, would the board have an unconditional right to refuse the Roman Catholic school"? - "Last evening", he replied, "in the House of Commons, that very case was put; and the Ministers of more than one Government came to the conclusion that the board were entitled to supply this accommodation against an actual offer by Roman Catholic volunteers to supply the deficiency."

On the other hand, Mr. Cumin appears to assume the existence of a power in the school board to divest itself of this prior right and enabling it to accept the offer from a voluntary source to supply the deficiency. For in answer to (Q. 1886), "Then am I to understand that offered and projected voluntary schools are absolutely not to be taken into account by the boards?" - he replied, "They are absolutely not to be taken into account by the boards, unless the boards acquiesce in divesting themselves of the right to supply the deficient accommodation."

In practice, however, there have been important exceptions to the recognition by the Department of the power of a school board to waive its prior right. In the Willesden case, for example, the Department threatened to declare the Board in default if it allowed a clergyman to supply a deficiency which had been officially notified to exist. Mr. Cumin's account and justification of the action of the Department will be gathered from the evidence given by him in reference to this case. "The school board", said he, "was set up to supply a particular deficiency, and that supply the school board wished to put upon the clergyman, who was a volunteer. We said, 'You cannot do that, because it is your duty, as a school board under the statute, to supply the deficiency, which deficiency caused the election of a school board.' The board and various other persons disputed that, and we said, 'Well, inasmuch as this is a question of difficult legal interpretation, we are quite willing to abide by the law officers' opinion.' The law officers were consulted, and they supported the action of the Department."

Objection has been taken to the interpretation thus given of the powers conferred on school boards by the Act of 1870, on the ground that it is at variance with the language used by Mr. Forster, when he had charge of the Bill in the House of Commons. It is stated that he gave countenance to the idea that a door was in the future always to be left open to all comers to supply a deficiency, even when a school board had taken the matter in hand. But this point is now one of secondary importance, since the law officers of the Crown have not upheld such a construction of the words of the Act.

The present official interpretation of the law as to the right of supply, complicated as it is in practice with the administrative question of the power of the Department to refuse annual grants to unnecessary schools, has given rise to much controversy. It is alleged that in some cases, and especially in the case of Roman Catholic schools, it constitutes a serious grievance. And dissatisfaction is not unnaturally felt by several religious denominations at a construction of the Act which seems to bar their right to establish schools of their own religious faith, wherever the school board chooses to interpose and to refuse its assent to their admittance to a share in the annual grant. The first complaint is that the Department, instead of itself deciding whether the proposed voluntary school is unnecessary or not, hands the question over to the School Board for decision. The next complaint is that, in those instances in which the Department pronounces the school to be unnecessary, the Department refuses to exercise the discretion of giving or refusing grants to unnecessary schools, which the 98th section of the Act of 1870, in order to meet the equity of exceptional cases, puts into its hands. Further, it is contended that the interpretation thus given to the Act conflicts with the whole idea of religious liberty, which allows parents the right of deciding in what faith their children should be educated.

The practice of the Department on this point is well illustrated in the now famous Dan-y-craig case, which has been several times brought before Parliament, and of which the official correspondence has been printed as a parliamentary paper. The case originated in a resolution of the school board of Swansea to exercise their prior right of supplying the existing deficiency without recognizing a Roman Catholic school, which was in course of erection for the children of that body in Dan-y-craig, a suburb within their district. In the view of the Department, the proposed Roman Catholic school fell at once into the class of unnecessary schools, and as such was excluded from the annual grant. From that disability, however, it appears that the Department was ready to set it free, if the consent of the school board could have been obtained. The


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assent of the Board was persistently refused in answer to the repeated inquiries of the Department; and till quite recently (1888) the Dan-y-craig school continued to be excluded from the grant, solely in consequence of the objection raised by the Swansea School Board. It may be remarked, in passing, that the London School Board have never refused their consent to new voluntary schools being put upon the annual grant list, however well supplied with schools the district might already be.

It will be generally agreed, we think, that some check ought to be placed on the multiplication of schools claiming to be supported out of the education grant, and that check can hardly be placed in other hands than the Education Department, to which it has been committed by statute: but the promoters of voluntary schools seeking Government aid look upon it as an intolerable grievance that the decision should be placed in the hands of a local body who are likely to be prejudiced against them. The opinion of Sir Henry James and Mr. Stokes taken on behalf of the promoters of the Dan-y-craig school, was referred to in a question put to Mr. Cumin in his examination as follows:

"I will only read the last sentence of Sir Henry James. 'We think that in the case of a denominational school, the religion professed by its managers, and whether that religion is such as to cause the schools to be suitable or unsuitable for the children of the district, would be matters properly to be taken into consideration by the Department before arriving at a decision.' Here is a case in which there were 120 or more Roman Catholic children in that place, of whom 55 had been attending the board school under the compulsion of the byelaws; is that a case in which there should be no consideration?" Mr. Cumin replied, "I have only again to say that I have read Sir Henry James' opinion, and I agree with it; but I do not interpret it in the same way as your Eminence. I agree with the opinion of Sir Henry James and Mr. Stokes, and I see nothing contradictory in their opinion to anything that the Department has done. With respect to the word 'suitable', all that I would venture to add is this: that by section 74 of the Act of 1870, which refers to the byelaws, it is provided that 'every school board may from time to time, with the approval of the Education Department, make byelaws for all or any of the following purposes: Requiring the parents of children of such age, not less than 5 years nor more than 13 years, as may be fixed by the byelaws, to cause such children (unless there is some reasonable excuse) to attend school.' Now, one of the reasonable excuses is, that there is no public elementary school open which the children can attend within a distance not exceeding three miles. Therefore, under the Act of 1870, a child is bound to go to school unless he can show that there is no public elementary school within three miles, in which case he is excused; but if there is a public elementary school, whether it is a board school, or a denominational school, to that school the child must go if there is no other school; and therefore, that school must be considered suitable. That is the view taken by the Department, and this is re-affirmed in the Code of 1881, which provided that no grant is to be made for or in respect of any school which is not previously in receipt of an annual grant, if the Department think that the school is unnecessary. The principle laid down in this Minute was first inserted in the Code in 1878 Art. 7 (b); 'No grant is made for or in respect of any school which is not previously in receipt of an annual grant, if the Department think that the school is unnecessary'; and this article was repeated in successive Codes till 1882."

The following portion of Mr. Cumin's evidence will tend to elucidate the action of the Department in this important case.

"Q. 1919. In practice, when a school is offered to the Department and applies for annual grants, which seem to be in excess of the one-sixth limit, do you consult the school board before you answer the application? - Yes, always.

1920. And it rests with them to determine in the first instance, and to submit to the Department the considerations upon which they think that the school is necessary or not? - Yes.

1921. In some cases they admit different classes of schools, and do not insist upon making the supply.

1922. That I suppose is partly from the fear of increasing the rates? - Partly from that, and also from the difficulty of compelling the children to go to a school that they do not like.

1923. On the other hand, do not some school boards say, 'We decline to allow any addition to the school supply, because we will insist upon the children of every class going into board schools'? - That is so.


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1924. You are guided, therefore, in the first instance, largely by the opinion of the school board of the district? - What we say is, 'If you, the school board, are willing to perform your duty by supplying this accommodation, if you do supply the accommodation, and if the children are actually brought into these schools, any provision beyond that must be an unnecessary school, and therefore we are bound to refuse it under Article 98.' But, as I have stated before, we allow it to be a certified efficient school."

Assuming that by "Article 98", quoted in the foregoing answer, we are to understand the 98th section of the Act of 1870, the interpretation here put upon it by Mr. Cumin, seems to us somewhat strained. The clause runs thus: "The Education Department may refuse a grant, if they think the school unnecessary." The Act, if we rightly understand these words, throws upon the Department a double responsibility. They are to decide whether the school seeking a grant is unnecessary; and in the event of their so determining, they have then to decide whether they shall put in force the power entrusted to them of refusing a grant to such a school on the ground that it is unnecessary. But, the Department appear to us to escape their first duty, that of determining whether the school is unnecessary by resolving beforehand to accept the decision of the school board on that point; and the second duty devolving on them, that of deciding whether or not they will make an annual grant to unnecessary schools, so as to meet the equity of hard cases, seems to us to be wholly in abeyance. By the following Minute of August 1876 the Department practically relieved themselves of this latter duty.

"Resolved, that with a view to remove any doubt as to the discretion of the Education Department in administering the Parliamentary grant, so as to prevent the multiplication of unnecessary schools, and to secure uniformity, economy, and efficiency in the distribution of the grant, it is expedient to provide by the New Code that no annual grant shall be made for or in respect of any school to 'which such grants have not previously been made if the Education Department think that the school is unnecessary." The duty of deciding whether a school is unnecessary or not was, however, distinctly recognised by the Act as attaching the Department itself. The Code of 1882 dropped the reference to the decision of the Department, and stated that "the school must not be unnecessary", leaving it an open question who is to be the judge.

The remedy for the grievances complained of seems to us to lie in a more liberal interpretation of the word "suitability", and in a close adherence to the spirit of the provisions of the Act of 1870. The following contention of Mr. Allies, the Secretary of the Catholic Poor School Committee, seems to us worthy of serious consideration. Regarding the decision as to what schools are unnecessary, he said, "We should not rest with anything short of its being left still, as the Act leaves it, to the decision of the Education Department, and that the Education Department should not take the decision of the school board as if it were its own, or consider itself bound by the decision of the school board not to give a grant if it thinks proper. I wish to reserve to the Education Department the entire decision. We fully admit that if the Education Department, considering all the circumstances, determines that the school is unnecessary, it may, according to the Act, give its decision accordingly."

The far more serious proposal that has been made, to abolish all restrictions on grants to unnecessary schools, would prove, as Mr. Cumin clearly shows, injurious to the interests of the very schools which it is meant to uphold. "Unless this minute is maintained", he says, "there is no reason why a board should not build any number of schools it pleases, and in this way set up rival schools to all the voluntary schools in the kingdom. It is the only protection that exists for voluntary schools."

The question whether the religious denomination of a school ought not to be taken into account by the Department in the question of "suitability" under Section V of the Act of 1870, has been raised in connexion with the subject of "unnecessary" schools. Mr. Cumin interprets the word "suitable" in the Act as referring only to schools which are not public elementary schools: "There is a view", he said, "taken of Section V which I think requires a little elucidation. The Act says, 'that there shall be provided for every school district a sufficient amount of accommodation in public elementary schools available for all the children resident in such district for whose elementary education efficient and suitable provision is not otherwise made.' Now it is sometimes supposed that 'suitable' applies to a public elementary school. This is a mistake, as I understand it. Suitable provision means that the


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provision must be suitable where it is not a public elementary school. But supposing that there is a case of a parish with a school managed by a particular denomination, and that that school is a public elementary school, that is to say, that it is efficient, having a certified teacher, having a conscience clause, having a time table put up being open at all times to inspection, and being conducted in accordance with the Code; that school is ipso facto suitable, and it is ipso facto efficient, because it is a public elementary school." According to this interpretation, the Act of 1870 provides, that in any school district, if there be not already efficient and sufficient accommodation which is also "suitable" or "such as the parents could not reasonably object to on religious grounds", then the Law shall step in and see that a public elementary school is established, in which the question of suitability will not arise, because the school is ipso facto suitable. Mr. Cumin contended that, so far as the religious question is concerned, every public elementary school, whether established by a school board or by a particular religious denomination, is regarded by the Department as "suitable" to the children of parents of all religious opinions. For on being asked whether a public elementary school connected with any religious denomination is "suitable" for the children of every other denomination, he answered, "That is the view of the Legislature." This contention is borne out by the Official Circular defining "suitability", which we have already quoted at length.‡

Reference has been made in the course of the evidence given before us to the injury which is alleged to have been inflicted on denominational schools under the working of the 23rd section of the Education Act of 1870. Under that section power is given to the managers of denominational schools to transfer their school buildings to school boards even when the property is held on definite trusts on the following conditions:

1. That the resolutions to transfer must be adopted by a majority of two thirds of the managers present at a meeting specially summoned.
2. That the resolutions of the managers must be confirmed by a majority of two thirds of the annual subscribers present at a meeting specially summoned.
3. That the proposed transfer agreement must be sanctioned by the Education Department, which "shall consider and have due regard to any objections and representations respecting the proposed transfer which may be made by any person who has contributed to the establishment of such school."
The effect of these provisions, it has been stated in evidence, is to set aside almost entirely the influence of the trustees and founders of the school, and to place its fate at any given moment in the hands of the managers for the time being, who are an uncertain and changing body, and may never have contributed to the erection of the school. Managers, it is alleged, have even obtained election for the express purpose of securing the transfer of the school in whose maintenance they had previously taken no active interest. It has likewise been stated in evidence, that in many cases in which the transfer itself would not be opposed by those who founded and who have to a great extent maintained the school, an agreement with the school board has been sanctioned by the Education Department, containing provisions which have not been necessary for the purposes of the Education Act, and which have been unduly at variance with the original trusts. It has to be noted that under the present law neither the trustees nor the founders of the school have any power in relation to these transfers beyond the right of making a representation to the Education Department. In view of the friction caused by the working of the 23rd section and the grievances which it appears to have created, we recommend that, in any fresh educational legislation, it be enacted that no transfer of a school held under trust shall take place without the consent of a majority of the trustees, and that the Education Department be instructed to sanction only such terms of transfer, beyond what is required for the purposes of the Education Acts, as do not interfere with the original trust, in the event of a voluntary school being leased to a school board. Provision should also be made that no structural expenses involving a loan should be incurred without the consent of the trustees who lease the building.

The following considerations seem to us to point out the lines upon which any questions which may arise in the future as to the supply of deficient accommodation ought to be dealt with. The Act of 1870 was called for to keep pace with the growing requirements of the country in the supply of schools. Its leading provisions were based upon the necessity of filling up, without delay, the great deficiency existing at the time. The term originally proposed by the Bill for the extension of voluntary effort was reduced by the House of Commons, which also limited to four months the period

‡Report, Part I, Chapter 3, page 25.


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allowed for making application for building grants, and put a stop to all such grants for the future; a step which was not contemplated by the Bill. As soon as, working under these restrictions, volunteers had prepared for, or made such additions to the previous school supply as were within their powers, it became the duty of school boards to fill up any remaining deficiency. This duty, the duty, that is, of completing tho school supply of the country, so as to satisfy the wants of the population, we consider to have been imposed upon the school boards. We agree with Mr. Cumin in thinking that this duty could not, so far as the original deficiency was concerned, be delegated to others, as he held in explaining the action of the Department in the Willesden case already referred to.

Assuming, however, that the pressing deficiency of 1870 has been filled up by local effort, whether free or compulsory, the difficulty remains as to the future relations of these two agencies of school supply if the population of a district increases. No question has been raised as to the allowance of voluntary effort to keep pace with the growing requirements of a district in which no school board had to be set up, after the first general inquiry into the school supply of the country. On the contrary, the 13th section of the Act provides for a periodical "stock taking" of the schools of every district, and for the publication of notices of any discovered deficiency, with power to the district to supply that deficiency voluntarily before a school board is forced upon it. This, however, applies also to school board districts; and we think it to be a matter of regret that so long an interval has been allowed to elapse since the passing of the Act of 1870, without a renewal of the general inquiry which was held in 1871-2. These inquiries were meant to be periodical, and one of the objects which they were intended to serve, was evidently the discovery and recognition of any efficient elementary schools which might have come into existence since the board was created and ordered to fill up the void disclosed by the first inquiry. For, under the 18th section of the Act, which assumes that void to be filled up, it is no longer, as in section 10, the duty of the school board to supply deficiency. The duty is now only a right, and that right the board may plainly allow others to discharge, or they may forfeit it, if anticipated by the action of the friends of the voluntary system. In fact, it appears to us that, after the supply of the original deficiency, the two systems are regarded by the Act itself as starting again on equal terms; so that if volunteers (as in the Dan-y-craig case) take the field first, and provide a school which satisfies the requirements of the Department, we consider that such school has, under the Act, a claim to recognition as part of the school supply of the district, before such recognition is extended to a rival board school subsequently started. We may point out that the Scotch Education Act of 1872 contains a provision (section 67) under which voluntary effort is allowed to come into action after the supply of a district has been completed by the school board, and that grants may be made to an "unnecessary" voluntary school if it is called for by "the religious belief of the parents, or is otherwise specially required in the locality". It is somewhat significant that, while the Scotch Education Department is required to justify the recognition of every such school, the English Department has to justify its refusal of grants. A liberal interpretation, as we have recommended, of the term "suitable" may, perhaps, make the working of the Act of 1870 as little open to objection as that of the Scotch Act.

To sum up, we see no reason why voluntary effort should not be entitled to work pari passu with a school board in providing accommodation to meet any increase of population, subsequent to the determination of the necessary school supply arrived at by the Department after the first inquiry of 1871. If a similar inquiry were held periodically, say every five years, voluntary effort might be recognised, in the interval between two inquiries, as entitled to meet any deficiency not ordered to be filled up by the school board on the requisition of the Department. We do not think that the letter, much less the spirit, of the Act of 1870 would be violated by such an arrangement, or by its being distinctly understood that an efficient school, whether provided to meet a numerical deficiency or specially required by any part of the population, would be admitted by the Department as part of the supply of the district, and be entitled to claim a grant as soon as it was opened.

There remains but one further inquiry regarding the school accommodation provided under the Education Act of 1870; namely, who is entitled to use it? To this question the answer of Mr. Cumin is that the school places are open to all children, unless there is a reasonable excuse for refusing admission, of the grounds of which refusal the Department is the ultimate judge. If a boy, he says, starts from Richmond with twopence in his pocket, and presents himself at a twopenny school in London, the master would be bound to take him in, if there were room in the school, on pain of


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losing the grant. A voluntary school, indeed, he adds, can charge any fees it likes in order to discourage the attendance of children from another district. But the fees in a board school must be sanctioned by the Department, and without that sanction no such differential fees can be charged. If it be asked, who are the "children" thus entitled to make use of the school accommodation? the answer given, on behalf of the Department, is that there is no definition given in the Act, but that the word is held to include "all children, of whatever age, who can avail themselves of the seven standards in an elementary school." Even the children of wealthy parents cannot be refused admission into a public elementary school; such a refusal, Mr. Cumin declares, would entail forfeiture of the Government grant. This definition was acted upon by the Duke of Richmond, when Lord President, in the case of an appeal made to the Department by the managers of a voluntary school, which was so highly appreciated by a neighbouring mill-owner, that he insisted on sending in his carriage daily two of his children to attend it. It is alleged that this particular case is by no means an isolated one; and if the practice should become general, it is evident that the one-sixth rule as to accommodation will have to be reconsidered, since this rule relates, not to the exact accommodation, but to the proportion of children to be deducted from the total number of children of school age, as representing the class of children not likely to need the public elementary school provision. It is obvious, however, that an administrative decision of a department is not of equal authority with the language of an Act of Parliament or with the decision of a superior court of law. The legal right of any one to send his children to a State-aided or rate-supported school may be a necessary consequence of the legislation of 1870, but such a result does not seem to have been fully considered during the passing of Mr. Forster's Act. All difficulties arising from the interpretation of the Act would be practically removed if the country possessed a well-organized system of secondary education, to which children from elementary schools might have access by way of exhibitions.

CHAPTER II

STRUCTURAL SUITABILITY OF THE PRESENT SCHOOL SUPPLY

In our previous chapter we have shown that, roughly speaking, school provision is needed throughout England and Wales, for one-sixth of the population, though in certain districts, such as Lancashire or the West Riding, the requirements amount to nearly a fifth, and if we take the total school accommodation of the whole country, as it appears in the returns of the Education Department, this proportion of the population is adequately provided for. But in estimating the sufficiency of school accommodation, we have, as yet, taken no account of its quality or of the difference which exists in different classes of schools in the scale of allowance of space for each child in average attendance. The suitability, also, of the actual space provided for the purposes of elementary education must obviously affect the conclusion we have drawn that, on the whole, the demand for school accommodation has been fairly met. Since the provision of school buildings has been going on without intermission for half a century, great differences exist in the suitability of school premises for the purposes for which they have been erected. The standard of what is required in the way of buildings and appliances has during that period been very properly raised, though uniformity has of necessity not been insisted upon. And many groups of schools, which at the time they were built conformed to the requirements of the Education Department, or to the most advanced public opinion of the time, would now be deemed unsuited for educational purposes, were it not that from time to time they have been improved to meet the demands made by Her Majesty's Inspectors. These improvements have very frequently taken the form of the addition of class-rooms, which would seem to be going forward in many directions, and would, we are informed, be still more largely carried out but for the badness of the times, a limitation which specially affects agricultural districts. Some schools have been built primarily for purposes other than day school instruction, and have been subsequently adapted for the latter purpose. These, as will be seen in the answers to our Circular B, are in many cases over large, far too wide as regards the main room, while the class rooms are insufficient in number, and unsuitable owing to the want of proper height and width.


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One broad line of demarcation, however, exists between the accommodation provided by voluntary effort and that which has been created by school boards out of loans sanctioned by the Education Department. Whereas a minimum of 8 square feet is insisted on by the Department as a provision for each child in average attendance in the former class of schools, in the latter 10 square feet has been the established minimum for some years. There can be no doubt that the latter calculation more nearly represents the indispensable requirements that have to be met, and many of the Inspectors urge that there should be a review of the accommodation, so as to bring it up to the higher standard of capacity. In the earlier years after the passing of the Act of 1870, the deficiency to be supplied in the matter of school accommodation was so great that it was not expedient for the Education Department to examine too closely into the quality of the school provision then available. A very great strain was thrown on the resources of the populous and growing districts where school provision was mostly needed. But the time has now come when the chief stress of school provision is past, and when the State may well be more exacting in requiring for all children a proper amount of air and space, suitable premises, airiness and lightness of site, and reasonable extent of playground. We may note that in the Scotch Code it is stated that 10 square feet of area for each child in average attendance is to be considered as the normal scale in an efficient school. In his general report for the year 1886, Mr. Blakiston, Chief Inspector of the Northern Division, who has reported more fully on school buildings and equipment than any of his colleagues in the last Report of the Committee of Council (1886-7), while recognising the general improvement in regard to the state of school buildings and premises, and the greater attention paid to cleanliness, repairs, and the supply of apparatus, recommends, with the unanimous concurrence of his colleagues in the district, that the minimum of accommodation in all schools should be raised to 10 square feet for each child in average attendance.*

It must be borne in mind, however, that superficial area is but a rough approximation to the actual accommodation of a school, and that the truer criterion, especially in schools for older children, is to be found in the amount of seat-room provided. Measured by this standard, it may often be found that overcrowding may exist under the more liberal scale of measurement, equally as under the more restricted measurement of 8 square feet for each child. In all schools, indeed, there must be some elbow-room, some surplus accommodation, which is not vacant or unused in any reasonable sense of the term. The more elbow-room there is the better, so long as the children are not withdrawn thereby out of the reach of the eye and voice of their teacher. But we think that the demand for increased accommodation for each child in those buildings in which it has been hitherto calculated at 8 square feet per child should be measured rather by the need of more seat room than by the simple calculation of superficial area. The proper measure of a school's accommodation should be the seat supply, and that measure might well be acted on by the Department, in accordance with the ground plans of the school submitted to them in any review of the sufficiency of the accommodation.

It will not be inappropriate here to quote certain of the rules of the Education Department (11th January 1887) on planning and fitting up public elementary schools which show what are the arrangements for health and for education, on which they insist, when schools are erected by those on whom the duty of supplying school accommodation is cast.

"1. The accommodation of each room depends not merely on its area, but also on its shape (especially in relation to the kind of desk proposed), the position of the doors and fireplaces, and its proper lighting.

2. The proper width of a schoolroom is 18 to 20 ft. or 22 feet. Accommodation is calculated by the number of children seated at desks and benches. Wasted space cannot be considered.

4.(a) The walls of every schoolroom and classroom if ceiled at the level of the wall plate must be at least 12 ft. high from the level of the floor to the ceiling, and if the area contain more than 360 superficial square feet, 13 feet; if more than 600 ft., then 14 ft.

(b) The walls of every schoolroom and classroom if ceiled to the rafters and collar beam, must be at least 11 ft. high from the floor to the wall-plate, and at least 14 ft. to the ceiling across the collar beam

5. The principal entrance to a school should never be through the cloak room. The latter should be screened off or separated. Gangways should be at least 4 feet wide

*Report of Committee of Council (1886-7), p. 264.


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and amply lighted from the end. Hat pegs should be 12 inches apart and of two tiers. There should be a separate peg numbered for each child.

6. Class rooms are calculated at 10 ft. square if not providing accommodation for more than 60 children. The minimum size of class room is 18 ft. by 15 ft.

The class rooms should never be passage rooms from one part of the building to another, nor from the schoolrooms to the playground or yard, and should be on the same level as the schoolroom. Each should be easily cleared without disturbance to any other room.

Windows

8.(a) The light should, as far as possible, be admitted from the left side of the scholars. All other windows should be regarded as supplementary or for summer ventilation. In cases where left light is impossible, right light is next best. Where neither is possible, the light should be admitted from a high point.

(c) The sills of the main lighting windows should be placed about four feet above the floor, and the tops of some should always reach nearly to the ceiling.

9. Staircases. No triangular steps or "winders" should be used in staircases; each step should be about 13 inches broad, and not more than 6 inches high. The flights should be short, and the landings unbroken by stops.

12. Number of closets and privies required:

for girlsfor boys
Under 50 children32
Under 100 children53
Under 150 children63
Under 200 children74
Under 300 children85

13. Desks. Benches and desks graduated according to the ages of the children should be provided for all the scholars in actual attendance.

14.(a.) Every school should have a playground.

(b) In the case of a mixed school, playground must be separate for boys and girls.

15. Infant schools. Infants should not, except in very small schools, be taught in the same room with older children, as the noise and the training of the infants disturb and injuriously affect the discipline and instruction of the other children.

19. The width of an infant school should be in proportion to its size, and may be 24 feet.

20. The accommodation of an infant school room is calculated at 8 square feet for each child, after deducting wasted and useless space."

It would, indeed, be a hardship were any sudden demand for more space for each child to be made on the schools built by aid of a building grant from the Committee of Council, since they frequently owe their restricted area, not so much to the views of their promoters, as to the limits put by the Department on the dimensions of school buildings, especially in regard to breadth, in which direction it was strongly maintained for many years by the Department that any increase on a minimum, which would now be held to be insufficient, was money thrown away, and therefore was not to be encouraged by a grant. It is a matter of congratulation that a more liberal scale of estimating accommodation now prevails, and it is a most important rule of the Department that 10 square feet should be the minimum accommodation for each child in average attendance in all school buildings in future to be erected.

Some of the above observations as to area apply also to the cubical contents of school-rooms, which are required to be on a minimum scale of 80 cubic feet for each child in attendance, except in the case of board schools and of new voluntary schools, in which the present rules of the Department would exact a minimum of at least 100 cubic feet. Here, again, the amount of air secured by these regulations for each child in attendance is no criterion of the healthiness of such rooms, unless account be further taken of the means provided for changing the air as soon as it becomes vitiated, in other words, for good ventilation. Merely raising the scale of the cubical contents by no means of itself secures the sanitary ends in view; while a remedy for the closeness of those school buildings which have been constructed originally on a low scale of cubical contents may often be best applied by improving the system of ventilation rather than by any increase of space. Mr. Blakiston tells us that a gradual amelioration is going on in the sanitary condition of the schools in his district through the substitution of shafts and wall openings for roof ventilation,* which latter is found, in practice, to be attended with so much draught that it is rarely used by the teachers. The system of warming, we are told by the same authority, is now better under-

*Report of the Committee of Council (1886-7), pp. 264-5.


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stood, and fresh air is often admitted in the close neighbourhood of the stove, so as to secure that it shall be warmed before it circulates in the school.* We, draw attention, at the same time, to a practical suggestion of the same inspector, which is said largely to improve the attendance in bad weather, viz., the provision of arrangements for drying wet clothes, parents hesitating much less to send their children to school in doubtful weather, when they know that they will not have to sit all day in their wet things.*

We are of opinion that existing schools should gradually, but within reasonable limits of time, be brought up to the higher estimate of the space required for school accommodation. But we think that this would be more advantageously brought about, in cases where it is required, by pressure exerted on managers through Her Majesty's Inspectors at the time of their visits than by a hard and fast rule of the Department, which might have the effect of requiring a sudden increase of 25 per cent in the accommodation in a considerable number of schools throughout the country. The peremptory enforcement of such a requirement would, in our opinion, at the present moment press hardly upon many districts, whether it had to be met by voluntary contribution, or out of the rates, and would not, we believe, be consistent with the best interests of the public or the advancement of elementary education. Whilst recommending that 10 square feet should be provided for each child, it must be borne in mind that such accommodation is needed for the number of children in average attendance, and not for those whose names are on the school books. We find from the returns for 1886 that whilst there was room in the schools for 5,145,292 children, the average attendance was only 3,438,425, and the number present on the day of inspection was 4,064,463.* To require therefore, an addition to the accommodation to bring it up to a theoretical standard, would produce unnecessary hardship, and it should only be demanded when the average attendance shows that the existing schools are insufficient for the number of children that are being educated in them. In these cases a liberal allowance of time ought to be given to the managers to make the necessary alterations. If, therefore, 8 square feet were provided for all children on the rolls, it may be safely assumed that the cases would be comparatively few where the accommodation would not exceed 10 square feet for those actually present at any given moment.

The question of school furniture and materials falls partly under the head of school provision and partly under that of school management. The desks and benches, which are more permanent, and are part of the original equipment of the school, may more properly be touched upon here. We do not think it advisable that any absolute rule should be laid down as to the character of the desks to be used. But care should be taken that the school furniture should always be suited to children. It should always be the first consideration in the fittings of a school that they should be primarily adapted to the requirements of day school education, due regard being had to the age, size, and physical comfort of the scholars. In the last reports of the Committee of Council, several of Her Majesty's Inspectors complain of the unsatisfactory character of the school furniture in certain schools in their districts.†

It cannot be doubted that good playgrounds attached to schools have a perceptible influence on the inclination of children to go to school, especially in the case of boys. Those whose physical restlessness leads them to absent themselves from school, whenever they can do so, find their wants met by the games which take place in the playground in the intervals between lessons. Unfortunately the ease with which playgrounds are to be procured varies almost inversely with the need for them. They are, indeed, of great value even in the country, where most schools are provided with playgrounds, for they offer not only safety and exercise for the children when out of school, but also special opportunities for moral training, at a time when they are released from discipline But in towns playgrounds are even more important, where the alternative place of exercise is the street; and for town children, the exercise of games is much more needed than for those who, living at an appreciable distance from school, get daily exercise in walking. Where playgrounds can be had, there is no doubt that, as far as the Department have any voice in the planning of a new school, the provision of a playground should, as a rule, be recommended, and, if possible, separate ones for the two sexes. We may notice that the London School Board has in places where land is very costly provided playgrounds on the roof of the schools,

*Report of the Committee of Council (1886-7), pp. 264-5.

†Reports of the Committee of Council (1886-7), Vertue, quoted by Johnstone (1885-6), p. 2. Blackiston (1885-6), pp. 6, 11; lighting, pp. 11,12. Monro, quoted by Williams (1885-6), p. 3. Bancroft, quoted by Williams (1885-6), n. 3. Morgan Owen, quoted by Williams (1885-6), p. 4. Williams (1885-6), p. 26. Oakley, p. 19. Fitch, p. 62.


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and that this expedient has been found useful, and we think that it might with advantage be introduced elsewhere if a playground cannot otherwise be secured. Since each of the various improvements we have recommended may in many cases form a serious charge on the funds of the school, we would call attention to our recommendations on this matter, in the Chapter relating to the distribution of the Parliamentary grant.

CHAPTER III

SCHOOL MANAGEMENT

Before defining what we consider to be necessary for the successful management of a school, it is essential to have a clear idea of the end for which the school exists. If that were fulfilled when it has taught its scholars such rudiments of secular knowledge as will enable them to discharge the tasks which will probably fall to their lot in after life, little or nothing can be required from the managers beyond such oversight as will secure that the requisites for instruction are provided, and that the teachers do not neglect their duties. But if we regard the school as a place of education in which the character is to be formed, as well as the intelligence cultivated, and the success of which is to be estimated not so much by the scholars passing examinations or gaining prizes, or even by the amount of knowledge acquired, as by their conduct in after life, then much more than oversight is demanded, from the managers as well as the teachers, inasmuch as by their active sympathy with, and kindly influence over, individual scholars, they may do much to mould their character, and help to make them good and useful members of society.

School management, accordingly, divides itself into two branches, that which can be conducted at a distance, and that which implies personal intercourse with the school, the teachers, and the scholars. Much of the character of elementary education must obviously depend on the efficiency of these two branches of management, and especially of the latter. The first branch includes such duties as the appointment and removal of teachers, the proper equipment of the school, the regulation and remission of fees, and such other matters as are more or less capable of being settled in committee, and do not necessarily involve direct contact with the school itself; while the second involves the frequent visitation and personal superintendence of the schools to be managed, and demands special qualifications in the managers.

We gather from a considerable amount of evidence which has been laid before us, that in the case of voluntary schools and in school districts which contain only a few board schools, these two branches of management may easily be combined in the hands of one body of managers, whilst in some districts where a school board has many schools under its control, and notably in London, the school management committee is a distinct body, exercising functions distinct from those of the visiting managers of its schools. And as the duties to be discharged by each are distinct, so are the qualifications different which are demanded for their discharge. A general zeal for education being pre-supposed as a necessary condition for both branches of management, breadth of view, business habits, administrative ability, and the power of working harmoniously with others, are important qualifications for the work of the school management committee. For the personal oversight of schools, some amount of education, tact, interest in school work, a sympathy with the teachers and the scholars, to which may be added residence in reasonable proximity to the school, together with leisure time during school hours, are desirable qualifications; and it is hardly necessary to say that personal oversight of the religious and moral instruction implies religious character in those who are to exercise it.

For the management of those voluntary schools which have been built with aid from the Government Grant, the Education Department in very early days made definite provision, by inserting in the Trust Deeds of such schools Management Clauses differing in some respects according to the description of the school. These specified the qualifications and subsequent method of election of the managing body, the original body of managers having been nominated by the promoters of the school. To a body so constituted the whole direction of the school was committed by the clauses which were imposed by the Government as a condition of a building grant, and accepted by the founders of these schools; while in the case of Church of England schools the superintendence of the religious and moral instruction was assigned to the clergyman of the parish. A similar arrangement prevailed in the case of Roman Catholic schools.


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The returns made by the managers of voluntary schools throughout specimen districts of England, which we have received in answer to Circular A, and of which we publish a summary in our Statistical Report, show that such bodies of managers are almost universally in existence, whatever be their degree of vitality, and that they comprise persons in very various social positions. Nor do they exist merely on paper. The returns made annually to the Department from every school receiving a grant require the signature of three persons to authenticate the numerous particulars to be certified; though of these three persons only one need be a manager. Doubtless there are cases in which schools are virtually farmed by teachers, in disregard of the condition on which the grant is made, that the school shall not be carried on for private profit; and in these cases the management must, of course, be purely nominal. Any such system of management we emphatically condemn, and we are of opinion that effective measures ought to be taken to render its existence impossible. But there are a far larger number of schools, especially in thinly populated districts, in which the management practically falls into the hands of a single manager, most frequently the clergyman of the parish. We need not repeat the tribute paid by the Duke of Newcastle's Commission to the self-imposed sacrifices of the clergy in behalf of the education of their parishioners;† but we have no reason to think that these efforts have been diminished, or that the confidence reposed in their management in such cases has been lessened. However undesirable in theory the form of management just referred to may be, it has been practically inevitable in many instances; and Mr. Sharpe, one of Her Majesty's Chief Inspectors, gives it as his opinion that the payment of grants to schools which are in the hands of a single manager has for 30 years worked well. We would, however, insist upon the importance of voluntary schools being placed under a board of managers, wherever suitable persons can be obtained, and that the vitality of this board of managers, in all cases where it is practicable, should be ensured.

The financial management of all schools is the subject of careful scrutiny by the Department, as will be seen by the following description given by Mr. Sharpe of the checks exercised on the accounts of a voluntary school. Speaking for the inspectors, he says: "We claim no power of auditing, but we see that the accounts are audited and that they are in a state to be audited: that is to say, all bills are brought before us, all docketed in order; and we see that the auditor can verify each one." The items of expenditure which were not fairly chargeable to the school fund would be struck out in the Education Department. "The supervision", he adds, "is very strict". He thinks that in his experience he has "become acquainted with no abuses arising from the fact that the schools are under the management of individual persons, and without check". Several witnesses have contended for the necessity of a public audit of the accounts of voluntary schools. But it is doubtful whether the additional security against any mismanagement or misstatement would be worth the expense. Mr. Cumin relates a case in which an extravagant sum appeared in the expenditure of a board school as the salary of a monitor, who was the daughter of a member of the school board; and the auditor held that, however glaringly improper such an expenditure might be, he had no power to disallow the item in question. We think, however, that the accounts of all voluntary schools should be as open to public inspection as the accounts of board schools.

If for the technical duties which may be discharged by occasional attendance at a committee it is not always possible to secure the effective co-operation of the nominal managers, it is doubly difficult - increasingly difficult in towns, Mr. Sharpe thinks - to secure in all places the personal visitation of the schools by the managers. For this demands a fair amount of leisure in the busiest part of the day, in addition to the other personal qualifications already alluded to; and if we confine our attention to that branch of management which consists in the personal and sympathetic supervision of schools, much of the evidence before us is favourable to voluntary management. Mr. Sharpe, referring to the managers of board schools in London, says: "The managers of board schools have less power to manage, and, therefore, they have, as a rule, less interest in their school. Archdeacon Norris, many years one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools in various districts, is able to compare the present management of the board schools in Bristol with that of the voluntary schools that existed before 1870, and he thinks the comparison is much in favour of the latter. "I cannot help coming to the conclusion", he says, "that our board schools are indeed badly off as compared with those old voluntary schools or with the

†Report of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, pp. 77-78.


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existing voluntary schools in respect of management." Speaking of the managers of the Bristol board schools, he thought that it was impossible for them to give the time and attention to their schools that managers give in voluntary schools: and that this might be largely due to the wider field which the former would have to super- intend in comparison with the latter. In the opinion of Mr. Stewart, another of Her Majesty's Chief Inspectors of Schools, "the interest of the managers diminishes as the area of their field of work increases". The latter witness, speaking principally of the small voluntary country schools, says that each school has at least one good friend, who is really "the backbone of the whole thing". Canon Warburton, formerly one of Her Majesty's Chief Inspectors of Schools, finds that in rural districts the interest in voluntary schools has diminished of late years; but this evil, he thinks, would only be aggravated by the extension of the school board system throughout the country. In like manner the chairman of the school attendance committee of the Leek Union, a populous district of North Staffordshire, was of opinion that more interest was taken by the managers in the voluntary schools in his union, than by the managers of the board schools in the schools under their management. The late chairman of the Great Yarmouth School Board considered that the permanence of the voluntary school managers, as compared with those of board schools, is the chief cause of the greater influence which, in his opinion, the former exercised over teachers and scholars.

Several witnesses before us have suggested that representatives of the ratepayers should be associated with the persons who now manage voluntary schools, and others have attached special importance to giving a voice in the management to representatives of the parents. No objection on principle has been raised to the latter of these proposals by the managers of voluntary schools who appeared before us as witnesses. The master of St. Saviour's Everton church schools informed us that two parents of the scholars were already members of his committee. Our statistical returns, moreover, show that the parents of scholars attending voluntary schools are more frequently found on the managing committees of these schools than is generally supposed. The manager of a Wesleyan school informed us that formerly there were parents on his school committee, though "there are none now, but that, when they were there, it was not qua parents. It has been suggested that the presence in a school of the children of managers might be found to interfere with the discipline of the school and with the authority of the teachers. So long, however, as the parents are not a preponderating element, we should be glad to see them represented on the committee of management. But, while voluntary schools do not receive aid from the rates, there seems to be no sufficient reason why the management clauses of their trust deeds should be set aside, in order to introduce representatives of the ratepayers. Passing on to the management of board schools, we find that an elaborate system of dual management is at work under the London School Board. The functions of management are there divided between the school management committee, elected out of the members of the school board, and bodies of local managers appointed for each group of schools, who are nominated by the divisional members of the board. It is the opinion of the present Chairman of the London School Board that, but for the aid of local managers, the work of the board could not be done, and he adds that if the schools of the board are to be maintained in efficiency, the powers given by Parliament to appoint local managers should be used in no grudging spirit, and that in order to gain the assistance and help of responsible persons, local managers must be intrusted with responsible powers. They are already intrusted with large, and latterly with increased, responsibilities. In addition to the personal visitation of the schools under their charge, they practically nominate the teaching staff; they suggest what fees should be charged, and in what cases they should be remitted; a veto, however, on the appointment of teachers, and the responsible direction of affairs, are reserved to the school management committee of the board. The efficiency of this local machinery varies of necessity in different localities. The Fleet Road Board School seems fortunate in having twelve active managers, including the vicar, and, amongst others, a medical man, whose professional advice on questions of sanitation and over-pressure is specially valued.|||| But it is more common in voluntary than in board schools, especially in rural districts, to find managers taking part in the instruction given in the school, and coming into personal contact with individual children. Mr.


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Stewart complains of some confusion in the management of schools under the London School Board in his district, by which we understand him to mean that a conflict of authority such as may weaken the hands of the teacher is liable to arise between the school management committee of the board, the board's inspectors, and the local managers. It was recommended that more power should be put into the hands of the local managers; amongst other advantages, it was thought that this would lead to the simplification of the returns now made by the teachers to the school board. It is fair to add that other evidence before us is as strongly opposed to the delegation of greater power to local managers.

Recognising the principle that the delegation of large powers will alone secure the interest and co-operation of the best men, the Liverpool School Board have remitted, subject to the general rules of the board, the entire management of each school to a local board of managers, carefully selected in the first instance by the school board, and afterwards co-opted by the local managers themselves. The board find that men of business, who have had the conduct of large enterprises, are found to be generally efficient members of local boards of managers, as their acquired knowledge of mankind guides them in the selection of teachers, and in the exercise of effectual supervision, without encroaching upon the legitimate sphere of the teachers' duties and responsibilities. As evidence of the extent to which it is possible to interest various classes of a community in elementary education, we may add that the chairmen of the local bodies of managers connected with the Liverpool School Board include eight merchants, six ministers of religion, two medical men, a county court judge, a journalist, and two extensive clothiers. But before entrusting the charge of a new school to a body of managers, the Liverpool School Board organise it, appoint the staff, and retain it in their own hands for some months, and, when the managing body are appointed, the board elect in the first instance its chairman and secretary. Thus a body of managers is not called upon to exercise their most responsible powers until they have had time to become familiar with the working of their school, nor to elect a chairman or secretary before they have had opportunity of estimating the relative fitness of their colleagues for these important posts. The action of these local bodies is harmonised with that of the school management committee of the board through the aid of the board's inspector, who attends, as technical adviser, all meetings of the local bodies of managers at which head or assistant teachers are appointed. He is consequently in frequent intercourse with these bodies, and is consulted on other questions, and as he also attends the meetings of the school management committee of the board, he contributes materially to keep the two authorities responsible for a school in touch with one another.

The method adopted at Birmingham will be best understood from the following questions and answers, which we quote in full from the evidence of Dr. Crosskey, Chairman of the School Management Committee of the Birmingham School Board:

31,238. I think I heard you say, in answer to Canon Gregory, that your schools have no managers, I believe that was your expression. How do you get on without managers, if I may say so? - By a system of inspectors and by hard work on the part of the committee.

31,239. What do you mean by inspectors? - We have board inspectors constantly at work amongst the schools.

31,240. Are they paid officers? - Yes. Hard work is done by the committee.

31,241. Do you mean by the committee of the school board? - Yes.

31,242. In what sense do they do hard work? - The school management committee have to make themselves acquainted with the state of their schools.

31,243. Then they act as managers, do they not? - No, the system is different. We have inspectors who examine the schools child by child precisely on the lines of Her Majesty's inspectors; we have another inspector who goes through and sees the general condition of the school. Reports from these inspectors come regularly before the committee with a very perfect and systematic analysis of the work of the teachers and of the condition of the schools. In that way the school management committee have in their possession in the course of the year accurate reports on their schools twice over from two authorities, apart from the Government inspector; they form their opinion of what is going on in the schools; they take measures to appoint teachers or to add to the staff, or what not, as may be necessary, based upon these reports and upon personal examination of the schools.

31,244. Then do these authorities (I do not know what name to give them), these


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inspectors, take a personal interest in the children; do they know anything about them? - No, there is nothing of that kind of management; but personal interest, I believe, is being developed in another and, as I think, a better direction. The schools are becoming the centres of a larger amount of interest in the parents themselves, and our great object is to make the teachers come into such relationship with the parents and children that the parents and children group themselves round the school as their school; the personal interest of the head teacher and the staff goes into the homes of the children, and in that direction we are very anxious to extend the influence of the school.

31,245. I do not quite see how you secure such interest in the homes of the scholars as you desire? - They frequently have entertainments; the teachers will go to the homes of the children very often; they visit them if they are irregular, and we want to link the staff of the school with the parents. We think that if the children and the parents feel it to be their school, and take a pride and an interest in it, if you can get a personal interest between the staff and the parents, that is the best thing; we think that no committee of managers dropping in, or any work in visiting that they can do, will equal that. That is our theory; we try to carry it out, and I believe it has been carried out successfully in many cases. Then with regard to the actual scholastic work, we watch it through the inspector. That constitutes the hard work of the school management committee.

31,246. Then you trust, in fact, as I understand, to this co-operation between the parents and teachers? - We try to cherish it largely.

Other school boards such as those of Manchester, Leeds, Bradford, and Hull, do not delegate the management of their schools to local managers. At Salford a committee of the board undertake the whole management, and, as the Chairman thinks, with great success. At Stoke-upon-Trent the elected members of the board superintend the schools in the township which they represent.

In our opinion it would be very advantageous if school boards, and especially the larger boards, were in the supervision of their schools, always to associate with themselves local managers. When it is found by school boards necessary to appoint a staff of local inspectors, these officers can, in our opinion, only very imperfectly discharge the functions of managers. At the same time it might be desirable, as Mr. Sharpe suggests, to relieve the managers of board schools of some of that routine work which now, in his opinion, leaves them little time to spare for making acquaintance with individual children, or for the general supervision of the schools.

Sir Lovelace Stamer, now Bishop of Shrewsbury, who is both chairman of the school board and manager of the church schools at Stoke-upon-Trent, has summed up the differences which he has observed in the management of voluntary schools and of those school boards which do not delegate their powers, in respect especially to the exercise of personal influence on the school. In answer to the following question:

"Do you find that the management of the board schools by the board is as effective as the management of your own voluntary schools?" He replied, "If I may answer that question, I believe that for inducing heartiness and earnestness in the work, there is nothing like the management of a good voluntary school, where the clergy and others who are interested in the schools are continually there, and take a direct and personal interest in the whole thing. The difference I can see between the voluntary schools and the board schools is just the difference between a private firm and a limited liability company."

If it were needful to strike a balance between the efficiency of the management in board and voluntary schools, the evidence before us would lead us to divide the honours. If it be asked, under which system of management that branch of administration which can be transacted outside the school is most vigorously conducted, it would be impossible to deny the superiority of the management of the school board dispensing the money of the ratepayers. If, however, we look for the closest supervision of the school and the most effective sympathy between managers and teachers, or between managers and scholars, we should feel, on the whole, bound to pronounce in favour of the efficiency of voluntary management. It is in the combination of the advantages of both systems that we look for progress in the future.

In conclusion, we have to record a successful effort in Liverpool among the managers of voluntary and board schools to combine for the general welfare of the schools under their charge, so as to arrive at a uniform system of management, in such matters as the time for holidays, the hours of attendance, the reception of new


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scholars, the checks to their capricious migration from school to school, and other similar details. The rules adopted to check capricious migration provide that no elementary school in the School Managers' Conference shall receive from any other school in it a child except at specified times, unless, either the parents have changed their abode, or unless, on any other reasonable grounds, the removal to another school is sanctioned by the standing committee of the Conference. These measures seem to have been very effectual in securing the continuous attendance of children at the same school; a most valuable result, for, as the school years of different schools begin and end at different times, frequent migration from school to school must inevitably not only preclude the regular and systematic education of the migratory children, but also interfere with the general progress and discipline of a school. It is necessary, however, that these rules should be considerately enforced, else they would involve serious hardships on parents and children; and if in any district complaints of such hardships are made they would demand very careful investigation on the part of Her Majesty's Inspector. But, even in districts where measures to stop capricious removal may not be necessary or expedient, such an association as the Liverpool Conference of School Managers might further many arrangements of general utility and convenience. Moreover, the two bodies of managers, voluntary and board, would have much to learn from one another, and the natural rivalry existing between the two systems, so far as it was unwholesome, would be mitigated by common counsel and action, and the united force of both systems would be brought to bear on the problems of education, free from all heat of traditionary controversies.

Another institution, the benefits of which are common to the voluntary and board schools of Liverpool - the Liverpool Council of Education, founded by the efforts of the late Mr. Christopher Bushell, chairman of the first school board in that town - has been of invaluable service. In the first place, by the foundation of scholarships (each of the annual value of £20 and tenable for three years) which provide for the maintenance as well as the tuition of the holders, the council affords to the ablest scholars of either sex in the elementary schools an opportunity of continuing their education in the secondary schools of the city; while the examinations for these scholarships test the results of the whole course of instruction in the elementary schools, and have an important influence in raising its general quality. Moreover, by a graduated system of rewards, extending over several years, the council assists the school board in promoting regularity of attendance; while by limiting these rewards to schools in which the doors are closed against late comers, not more than a quarter of an hour after the commencement of school, the equally important habit of punctuality is encouraged both in the scholars and in their parents. In many other ways also the council contributes to the efficiency of elementary education in the city, as, for instance, by pecuniary grants in aid of the introduction of penny banks, of instruction in practical cookery, and, where needed, of penny dinners.

Besides the work done by the managers of each school in the way of personal and vigilant superintendence, we have had evidence to show that much additional benefit may be conferred on isolated schools by managers combining to effect what cannot be done by each school for itself. Some instances of such combination may here be given. The Diocese of Rochester, for example, employs an organising master who visits such church schools as desire it, with the object of improving both the quality of their educational work and the way in which they are managed. The organising master informed us that he found in South London a certain number of schools in a poor condition, the great bulk of which, since he began to visit them, have been greatly improved. Looking back over five years work, he was able to say that one great object for which he was appointed had been realised in the case of all schools where he had been called in, inasmuch as none of them had collapsed in the struggle for existence. In the opinion of this witness, a system of visitation of voluntary schools by an expert might well be extended over the whole of England, and he contended that a grant from Parliament towards the salary of such organising masters or visitors would be a profitable expenditure of public money. A similar agency has been employed, and with like success, by the Huddersfield Church Day School Association. A sum of £250 had formerly been annually distributed amongst Church schools, but it failed to secure the desired degree of efficiency. After the formation of the Association, however, this plan was changed, and the money was voted towards paying the salary of an inspector to visit church schools in the district. The inspector is an ex-schoolmaster, and the schools which he visits pay an annual fee towards his stipend.


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The chairman of the Association, who appeared before us, stated that in the schools which had been visited by the inspector of the Association, the annual grant had been raised as much as from 2s to 3s a head; and that the system continued to be a very valuable auxiliary to the efficiency of these schools. For the visits of the inspector appointed by the Bradford Church of England School Society no fee is paid by the schools. His labours have resulted, as the Secretary of the Association told us, in a very material improvement in the efficiency of the teaching. In addition to the inspector's visits, the Society offers grants, when they are needed, in aid of the funds of struggling schools.

We strongly recommend this form of voluntary combination among isolated schools, by which they may not only strengthen their position financially, but also improve the quality of the education given in them. It is to some similar combination among the managers of voluntary schools that we look most hopefully for the means of enabling them to obtain that instruction by experts in useful subjects, such as cookery and the rudiments of elementary science, which the larger school boards are able to command for their schools. In the case of cookery, for example, by co-operation among themselves, it would not be difficult to secure for any considerable group of voluntary schools a weekly visit from a teacher of cookery. This we find to be already done in connexion with the Northern Union of Cookery, so that instruction in that subject is brought within the reach of the smaller and poorer schools in that part of the country. In like manner Dr. Crosskey is of opinion that the plan pursued by the Birmingham School Board of employing an itinerant teacher of elementary science is capable of being adopted by a combination of rural schools. This experiment we think well worthy of trial, while the principle of combination between schools which it involves is capable of application to other similar educational requirements, which single schools might be unable to meet.

CHAPTER IV

H.M. INSPECTORS OF SCHOOLS

The inspectors working under the Education Department were originally all on one footing, each inspector having the charge of an independent district. The staff now consists of three grades. Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools, Sub-Inspectors, and Inspectors' Assistants. Of Her Majesty's Inspectors, 12 are Chief Inspectors, each of whom has a district of his own. Of these, 2 have charge of the Training Colleges, and 10 have the general supervision of as many school divisions of England and Wales, each division comprising some 10 or 12 districts. There are besides 120 inspectors, almost all of whom are in charge of independent districts, 30 sub-inspectors, and 152 inspectors' assistants. One inspector with one sub-inspector and two assistants would, in Mr. Cumin's opinion, be "a good ideal staff" for each district.

In addition, 21 Examiners, all high class University men, are occupied in the Education Department in examining the reports of the Inspectors, in assessing the grants to be paid on these reports, in the revision of papers, and in carrying on, under the supervision of the Secretaries, the enormous correspondence of the Department arising out of the administration of the Code and the Acts.

It has been suggested that it would be desirable to place in the Education Department one of Her Majesty's Inspectors as an Assistant Secretary, to advise the Department on questions arising out of the work of inspection. But the Secretary, wisely as we think, deprecated a measure which would practically tie the hands of the Office in dealing with the whole body of inspectors, and might easily stereotype the special views of a single expert, liable himself, by withdrawal from personal contact with schools, to lose touch with the varying conditions of education. Already according to present arrangements the political and permanent heads of the Department are free to seek the best advice they can command on educational matters from any member of their staff, whether in or out of the office. There is, possibly, however, no reason why a vacancy in the secretariat should not be filled by the appointment of an inspector.


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All the members of the inspecting staff, who at the date of their appointment must be between 25 and 35 years of age, are nominated by the Lord President of the Council. The inspectors are appointed direct to their office. Only one appointment, however, has been made for some years past. The sub-inspectors are recruited entirely out of the assistants, and the latter are selected out of the ranks of elementary teachers.

The only formal qualifications hitherto exacted for appointment as Inspector have been a University degree, and as a rule, a first or second class obtained in honours. It has been represented to us that by the latter requirement good men have often been lost to the work, but it may, on the other hand, have proved a useful check on unsuitable appointments. As a matter of fact, the staff comprises many men who have carried off the highest University distinctions.

Successive Lord Presidents seem to have very carefully observed the rules laid down by the Committee of Inquiry who in 1853 examined into the constitution of the Education Department, before it was formally separated from the Privy Council Office proper. The Committee, which consisted of Sir Charles Trevelyan (then Secretary of the Treasury), Lord Iddesleigh (then Sir Stafford Northcote), and Mr. Charles Greville, Clerk of the Privy Council, reported as follows:

"We think it desirable that future appointments to the office of inspector should be made from among young men, taken at their entrance into life; that they should at first receive moderate salaries; and that as they acquire experience and prove themselves useful, their remuneration should be gradually increased. The circumstances of these gentlemen differ from those of the Poor Law inspectors (to whom they bear a general analogy) in this respect, that the service they perform affords opportunities for training young men in their duties, which do not exist to an equal extent in the other case to which we have referred.

The same general rules should be observed in the selection of inspectors as in that of examiners. No one, however, unless a graduate high in honours at one of the universities, should be selected without passing an examination, which should be of a searching character."

With respect to the appointment of examiners, the Committee reported thus:

"More than ordinary care ought to be taken in the selection of examiners. One of their chief functions is that of superintending the examinations which are carried on throughout the country, and upon the result of which the application of two-thirds of the Parliamentary Grant depends. The whole of the papers connected with the examinations for pupil teacherships, Queen's scholarships, and certificates to masters and mistresses are sent to the examiners for their inspection. It is, of course, impossible for them to peruse them all; but it is necessary that they should revise them so far as to satisfy themselves that the examinations have been conducted on proper principles, and to some extent in harmony with one another. This task can only be satisfactorily performed by men who both are, and are known to be, of high attainments. We are happy to be able to record our opinions that this principle appears to have been fully maintained in the appointments hitherto made to the office of examiner; and we recommend that the standard which has been adopted should on no account be lowered."

We have inserted the foregoing extracts in reference to the rules regarding the appointment of inspectors and examiners, which have prevailed in the past. How far some modification should now be made in the rules governing the appointments in question will be a point herein-after to be considered.

The inspectors' assistants, out of whose ranks sub-inspectors are recruited, must be between the ages of 30 and 35 at the time of their appointment, must have taken a first class in the certificate examination, after a two years' course of training, and must have been head teachers of a public elementary school - a restriction objected to by many of the trained certificated masters now working as assistants - a preference being given to those who have taken a University degree. The post of sub-inspector has been instituted only within the last few years (1882), and there has hitherto been no instance of promotion from the rank of sub-inspector to that of inspector, so that the door of admission to the coveted post of inspector has as yet been virtually closed against elementary teachers.** Even the subordinate post of sub-inspector, it is complained, has been practically barred against the most able head teachers owing to the


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low salary at which Inspectors' assistants (from among whom the former are recruited) enter upon their office. Through this or some other avenue, it has been contended, the best of the masters ought to be able to find admission into the inspectorate. On this point, however, the teachers who have given evidence before us are not unanimous, a few expressing a strong preference for having their schools examined by those who have not themselves been members of the teaching body.

Among those witnesses who were not professionally interested in the question a similar diversity of opinion showed itself. Mr. Matthew Arnold declared himself to be favourable to the admission of elementary teachers to the office of Inspector, though this opinion was given subject to the condition that the present system of administration was retained, and he doubted whether in any case even the best teacher would be qualified to be Chief Inspector. In this latter opinion the Chairman of the London School Board concurred. The two inspectors of training colleges, Mr. Fitch and Mr. Oakeley, who have had considerable opportunities for forming a judgment on the propriety of admitting teachers to the inspectorate, took opposite views. Mr. Oakeley declared himself averse to the proposal to recruit the body of inspectors from the ranks of elementary teachers, founding his opinion on his experience as the head of a staff which included inspectors, sub-inspectors, and assistants. He said that, in dealing with difficulties that arose in his district, he always found that the inspector, "the man of higher culture and University training", possessed great advantage. And he added that University training was still more desirable for exercising influence over the district, and particularly in cases where the inspector was brought into contact with secondary education. This branch of an inspector's duties must not be lost sight of in deciding the question whether it is wise to forego the above condition of appointment to the inspectorate, the actual examination of schools being, as we are told on authority, only one part of an inspector's duties. On this disputed question Mr. Sharpe sides with Mr. Oakeley, and he would not be willing to waive the condition of residence at a University, followed by a degree, as a necessary qualification for admitting teachers to the Inspectorate.

The further question has been raised in evidence before us, whether, if inspectors continue to be drawn chiefly from University men, any greater security ought to be taken than at present exists, for their familiarity with school work. As a rule, they have not been put in charge of a district till they have acquired some knowledge of their duties, by being associated for some time with colleagues of older standing in their work.|| Several Inspectors expressed themselves in favour of a more extended preparation, before the full duties of their office were entered upon. Mr. Synge, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector for the Eastern Division, thinks that inspectors should undergo a still longer period of probation, and that it should more distinctly take the form of a course of training for their office.** On the other hand, Mr. Harrison, Her Majesty's Inspector of Schools for the Liverpool District, would prolong to three years the time of probation to be passed in the rank of assistant inspector. It is admitted that the public service requires inspectors to be men of wide and liberal training. Even if at the outset they have not the familiarity with the work of the elementary school which is possessed by an elementary schoolmaster, such men might acquire it in a sufficient degree. Their definitive appointment should be made to depend on proof of their having acquired competent knowledge of the details of school work. No doubt there are to be found in the ranks of elementary teachers men, who with this familiarity combine the other and higher qualifications required in a competent inspector, and against such men the highest grades of the inspectorate should not be closed. On the other hand it has been represented to us even as a disqualification for inspectors, who have to pass an impartial judgment on the various methods employed in schools, that they should have been long engaged as teachers, following some particular method of their own.

The duties of the inspectors are numerous and varied. Under the Code they are not merely charged with the examination of the scholars in the various subjects for which grants are made, but they have to examine pupil-teachers and candidates for certificates; to assist the inspectors of training colleges in testing the teaching power of the students; to report upon the practical skill of acting teachers who wish to be examined for certificates, and of those pupil-teachers who seek to be employed as assistants or in sole charge of small schools. They have each year to report upon the


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general efficiency of every school and teacher in their districts, and to pay visits without notice, for the purpose of observing and conferring with the managers and teachers on the general work and organisation of the schools, on the time tables, and on the methods of instruction. There are, besides, many delicate questions in regard to the work and life of a school, on which managers and teachers are glad to have the advice of an inspector, but which they would not be likely to discuss with him freely, unless they met as friends and equals. Under the Act, the inspectors are the eyes and ears of the Department. They have to keep a constant watch over the school supply of their districts, and to make careful inquiries respecting it; they have to advise the managers of schools, school boards, and school attendance committees, not merely on the accommodation required, but on particulars of procedure, of law, and of the working of the Education Acts, as well as on the numerous non-educational difficulties which necessarily arise in the management of schools. They have also, from time to time, to report to the Department on questions of policy and administration, and as to the general feeling of their districts in regard to these questions. Conclusion. We are, however, of opinion that it is neither fair nor wise to debar elementary teachers from rising to the rank of inspectors, and it may be expected that the opening to elementary teachers of the highest offices in connexion with elementary education would tend to elevate the tone and character of their important profession.

The importance attached by the heads of the Department to the general influence of the inspectors on the work of their districts, and the appreciation shown by these authorities of the many ways and channels through which that influence might be exerted, especially on the moral character of schools, are manifested by the long series of instructions which have appeared, from year to year, in the Reports of the Committee of Council. It is to be regretted that the attention of the inspectors seems no longer to be directed to these valuable papers, and that the instructions on the administration of the Code, for the year in which he is appointed, are now considered all that is necessary to place in the hands of a new inspector. Many of the instructions issued in early years, or in the period shortly preceding the revision of the Code, in 1882, may, in some respects, be no longer matters of more than historical interest; but they were of a somewhat different character from those now published, and contain many very important suggestions as to the duties of inspectors, and the spirit in which they should carry out these duties. If the volumes of reports which contain these circulars of instruction are no longer available for the guidance of the inspector on his first appointment, the circulars themselves might with advantage be collected and published, along with some of the earlier minutes of the Committee of Council on school organisation, the pupil-teacher system, and other points of practical interest. They contain much that would be of value to the general public, as well as to the inspectors.

We have received a considerable amount of evidence on the subject of the employment of specialists in the examination of schools, where subjects of which they have special knowledge are taught. While it is admitted that the inspectors generally possess the broad culture and the tact essential to the efficient discharge of their duties, it is manifestly as important that an inspector called on to examine in special subjects should himself possess a thorough knowledge of them, in order that he may be able to do full justice to the most intelligent teaching. It is obvious that examinations, if superficial or inappropriate, must tend to exercise an injurious influence upon the instruction in a school, inasmuch as teachers will prepare their scholars with more or less reference to the anticipated character of the examinations which their scholars have to undergo. We have received much evidence to show that in certain subjects the instruction is often mechanical and superficial, and though these evils may be attributable to various distinct causes, we believe that one of the most effectual remedies for them will be found in thorough and intelligent examination. Several witnesses have especially urged upon us the necessity of thorough knowledge of science in those who are to examine in science subjects. They hold that to test fairly the acquirements of the scholars the examinations must be partially, and in the earlier stages entirely, oral, and conducted with the apparatus used for the purposes of demonstration in the lessons; and it appears from the evidence that examinations under these conditions can only be conducted by qualified experts. Among these witnesses are Dr. Crosskey, Chairman of the School Management Committee of the Birmingham School Board, Mr. Hance, Clerk to the Liverpool School Board, and Mr. H. E. B. Harrison, Her Majesty's Inspector, who has for many years examined the


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Liverpool schools. Their evidence deserves the more careful consideration, since both the Birmingham and Liverpool School Boards employ a central staff, consisting of a trained science demonstrator and several assistant experts, to give instruction in their schools. Professor Forbes, late of the Glasgow University, who, on the advice of Professor Huxley, was employed by the Liverpool School Board to test the value of the science teaching in their schools, gives significant testimony in his report to the importance of oral examinations. He says, "I believe that one of the principal objects of the board in asking me to hold this examination was to test how far the present system is successful in developing the observing faculties and general intelligence of the scholars. This, I felt sure, could best be attained by means of oral examinations. In comparing the results of these with the written ones, I found great differences, thus showing conclusively that those who answered best on paper were by no means invariably the most intelligent or best informed."

We may here refer to the evidence of Mr. Cumin, who also holds that for the examination in certain subjects it may be needful to obtain the aid of special experts. He says, "Generally, taking the specific subjects, for instance, physiology, domestic economy, and even chemistry, it does not appear to me that you can expect that every one of the ordinary inspectors should be able to examine in those subjects thoroughly: and I have no doubt that in consequence there is a great deal more money spent in them than ought to be spent." It is obvious that in regard to science a knowledge of the subjects of the examination on the part of the examiners is indispensable, and that such a knowledge is not reasonably to be demanded of all the ordinary inspectors. We were informed that the inspectors of districts have in some instances made arrangements, by which certain of their colleagues possessing such knowledge might be specially deputed to conduct these examinations; but, where inspectors so qualified do not exist, other assistance should be obtained, such as that of the inspectors of the Science and Art Department.

In making future appointments to the inspectorate, it would be desirable that, in regard to a larger proportion of them, special weight should be given to the possession of an adequate knowledge of natural science. The greater attention which has been given in our universities of late years to natural science will make it easier to act on this recommendation. On the other hand, care should be taken when any special examiner is called to assist the permanent staff, that such examiner should possess some knowledge or experience of the conditions of elementary school education.

It has been suggested that female instead of male inspectors should be employed to visit infant schools, and generally to examine the lower standards, and, indeed, to inspect the whole work of those schools in which girls form the preponderating or the exclusive element. The experience of the London School Board throws light on such a suggestion, so far as it relates to towns, since female inspectors have been employed under the London School Board in the examination of needlework. One witness alleged that there had always been in this form of inspection a good deal of friction. And mistresses themselves are said to prefer to have their schools inspected by a man rather than by one of their own sex. We would observe, however, that the multiplication of inspectors for special subjects, such as needlework, cookery, domestic economy, drill, music, and the like, however desirable in the interests of these studies, is open to many objections, and is obviously possible only within very narrow limits. There are, moreover, serious practical difficulties in the employment of women on the staff of inspectors, where much travelling is required. We think, however, that the experiment might be tried in large towns of appointing a sub-inspectress to assist the head inspectors in the examination of infant schools and of the earlier standards in other schools. They should themselves have been teachers in elementary schools, or should have had experience as governesses in one or other of the training colleges. We have been much struck by the ability, earnestness, and good sense of several of the mistresses who have come before us to give evidence.

We have received complaints of the insufficient salary (£150) offered to Inspectors' Assistants on their first entry upon office, and the suggestion has been made to us that it should be raised to £200, the superior limit of age of admission being raised at the same time from 35 up to 40. We think that these assistants should be chosen from the pick of the elementary schoolmasters who have acquired adequate experience. We are, therefore, of opinion that the initial salary should be such as not to deter the best head masters generally from applying for the post, and we should be glad to see it raised to £200 a year.


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To meet objections to the power now lodged in the hands of the single inspector of a district, a scheme has been laid before us for considerably enlarging the area of each district, and for appointing over it a board of inspectors to be jointly responsible for the examination and reports of schools. Such a scheme, however, failed to commend itself as feasible to the official witnesses under whose notice it was brought, and we do not regard it as practicable. It has further been suggested that a more frequent change of district would mitigate what has been called the autocracy of the inspector in his own district. But the evidence of experts tends to show that long connexion with the same district is one of the most powerful agents in bringing about a good understanding between an inspector and the managers of schools under his supervision, while it greatly increases the influence he can exercise for the general advance of education. It is obvious also that an inspector who has been long in charge of a district has a great advantage over a new comer in watching the ever varying conditions which affect the regulation of school supply. Moreover, a frequent change of inspectors has been complained of by more than one witness as introducing an element of uncertainty into the annual examination, most harassing both to teachers and to managers. Such a system of interchange, moreover, would prove very costly either to the country or to the inspectors themselves.

With the increased number of schools to be annually inspected, and the payment of grants according to the results of a great variety of subjects, one of the most difficult of the questions that have arisen has been, how to attain any uniformity of standard amongst so large a body of inspectors. Official witnesses have informed us that no effort is spared to establish a common standard of judgment among the district inspectors, by conference among themselves and by comparison of results within each division; while by associating himself in turn with each inspector of his division the chief inspector is able in some degree personally to co-ordinate the several standards of examination adopted by his colleagues. The tabulated results of the inspection of each district are carefully examined in the office of the Department, and any considerable inequalities between these results are brought to the notice of the chief inspectors with a view to equalize the standard as far as possible between one district and another. It has been pointed out, indeed, that all which can be secured by these methods is uniformity of results rather than uniformity of tests. And complaints have been laid before us tending to show that in special localities reports of schools have been sent in to the Department indicating an appreciable variety of standard between one inspector and another, and producing an uncertainty full of anxiety to teachers and managers. But, on the whole, it is impossible not to be struck with the narrow limits within which such complaints are confined. And the direct evidence on the part of teachers who have come under several inspectors, as to the uniformity of the standards by which they have been judged, convinces us that a considerable approximation to a uniform standard of examination has already been attained, and that further progress is likely to be made in the same direction. We think that it would tend still further to secure uniformity of standard if the chief inspectors ceased to have charge of districts of their own in addition to the larger areas which they have to supervise, so that their whole time and attention might be given to the business of supervision. This would allow them ample time to review the work of the inspectors in their division whenever complaints were made to the Education Department; whilst it would enable them to undertake the occasional inspection of schools in the districts in their division, and so, by personal investigation, to test the work, and to compare the results of examinations, in the various districts, a branch of their duty which otherwise can only be very imperfectly accomplished. An impression appears to prevail in some quarters that a more lenient test is applied by inspectors to the examination of voluntary schools than is in use in board schools. But one and all of the inspectors examined on this point disclaimed any conscious variation in the test they applied to the various classes of schools which they visited, and we do not believe that there is any ground whatever for thus imputing to inspectors partiality in the discharge of their onerous duties.

A good deal of evidence has been given by Her Majesty's Inspectors as to the frequency and advantage of "surprise" visits, or as they are more appropriately desig-


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nated "visits without notice". They concur in thinking that, whatever other advantages these may possess, they cannot be utilized for determining the amount of the annual grant, which can only, they contend, be fairly assessed at a visit announced beforehand on a set day. The advantage of seeing a school in its ordinary working dress was, we were told, much diminished by the uncertainty whether on such an occasion the school would be found in its normal condition. But Mr. Sharpe tells us that observations made at a visit without notice might properly affect the inspector's apportionment of the merit grant, and that it is a part of his duty to pay such visits whenever he has time disposable for that purpose. Mr. Fitch gave it as his opinion that to the managers alone in the long run could the Department look for that effective supervision of the ordinary working of a school which is assumed to be promoted by the frequent visits of inspectors without notice. While the utility of such professional visits was not denied, some inspectors thought that their value might probably be exaggerated, and one inspector gave it as his opinion that such visits might easily be overdone. On this point Mr. Oakeley made a suggestion, that, without any announcement beforehand, the examination of schools that have earned the highest merit grant might sometimes be allowed to drop for a year, and the grant be paid on the scale of the previous year, provided that a visit without notice had been paid to the school, and that the staff had not been changed. "We think that some re-arrangement of work ought to be made, or the strength of the inspecting staff increased, so as to admit of more frequent "visits without notice" to schools than are now possible, and of more time being given to the annual examinations both of schools and of pupil-teachers. More frequent occasional visits are not suggested as a means of detecting abuses, but rather to enable the inspector, by the observation of a school under its normal conditions, to acquaint himself with the general tone of the school and with the method of instruction, and to offer friendly advice to the teachers on any points on which they may stand in need.

The publication of the reports of Inspectors of individual schools was the subject of numerous questions put to the official witnesses. In the earlier years of the Education Department they were published in full in the Blue Books; but, in addition to other reasons, the very great expense that would now be involved in printing the detailed reports on some 25,000 individual schools would of itself prevent the Department from resuming such a practice. The London School Board, we are informed, publish all the reports of H.M. Inspectors on their schools, and Mr. Fitch tells us that such publicity does not in the least limit the freedom with which he expresses himself in regard to the schools he examines. We had no evidence, however, as to how far the volumes containing these reports are known to, or ever pass into the hands of the ratepayers. At present the inspectors' reports on schools are communicated by the Department only to the managers in the case of voluntary schools, and only to the school boards concerned in the case of board schools. It has been contended, and we are of opinion rightly contended, that in the case of voluntary schools the same amount of publicity might with advantage be given to the annual reports as is now given in the case of board schools.

Numerous complaints have been made to us as to the manner in which inspection is practically carried out. Some of the replies to the questions which were addressed to the managers and teachers of schools in the nine typical counties, to which our Circulars A and D were sent out, are to the effect that the inspectors fail to show as much consideration for and sympathy with the managers, teachers, and children as might be expected from them. Many of these complaints, however, resolve themselves into a disagreement with the requirements of the Code, to which the methods of examination must necessarily conform. We would suggest that an inspector should always bear in mind the great difference between a competitive and a non-competitive examination, and we have had evidence to show that inspectors sometimes make the mistake of putting questions that are much too hard for the latter. In a competitive examination it is of use to set some difficult questions in order to eliminate those candidates who have no real chance, and to confine the examination to those who are really capable of competing; but in a non-competitive examination it is not an object to eliminate any, and the aim of the examiner should always be to find out what the scholars know, and how they know it, and not to find out what they do not know. We think further that there is justice in the complaints made by several


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teachers with respect to giving out sentences for dictation. They say that the children are unaccustomed to the inspector's voice, mistake his words, and are in consequence confused; whereas if the inspector selected the passage to be written down by the children, and then entrusted it to the teacher of the class to read out, these difficulties would not exist, whilst there could be no real difference in the examination.

Where injustice is alleged to have been done in the inspection of any school, on a representation to the Department, the matter is inquired into, and, if it is thought to be called for, a second inspection is ordered. One district of considerable size appears to have been re-inspected recently by two chief inspectors, in consequence of a certain number of persons representing that their schools had not been fairly dealt with. It is alleged that many complaints that would otherwise be made to the Department are not made, for fear lest, by offending the inspector, future grants might suffer. The Department, we think, should make it clear that they are willing and anxious to examine into any complaint that may be made to them, and, that, as far as lies in their power, the school shall not suffer in consequence of a complaint against an inspector having been made. But cases of this kind are not very frequent, the reason alleged by the teachers who appeared before us being, that they fear to challenge the action of the Department. The official witnesses, however, lead us to conclude that instances of injustice are comparatively rare.

It is alleged, further, though no direct evidence is forthcoming on the subject, that inspectors sometimes favour the use of particular books in the preparation of scholars for examination, and even books of which they are themselves the authors. The Instructions to inspectors, however, lay down distinctly that "it is no part of the duty of the officers of the Department to prescribe or to recommend particular books for use in schools", and no case has ever been established to the satisfaction of the Department of the systematic infringement of such a rule. Official intimation is also given that inspectors ought not to write school books, though it is difficult to prevent this being done, so long as the names of the authors do not appear.

In like manner, if the allegation be true that the examinations are often protracted without regard to the exhausted powers of the children, it is at least in disregard of instructions framed expressly to prevent such an abuse, and if brought to the attention of the authorities we cannot believe that such infringement of instructions would be upheld. It seems, however, that in some districts, the staff of inspectors is occasionally insufficient, and it is inevitable that in such cases not only the inspector, but the children also, must suffer through the consequent over-pressure.

Our opinion is that in the matter of inspection, though the present system may be susceptible of improvement in the directions we have indicated, the country has been on the whole well served, especially since the establishment of the present system of grading inspectors. A witness who was adverse to the present plan of selecting inspectors, and who objected to their being appointed without previous experience of elementary education, yet bore emphatic testimony, in which we concur, to the excellent manner in which the present inspectors discharge their duties. "All the inspectors", he said, "that I have come in contact with during the last five or six years are admirable men.

CHAPTER V

TEACHERS AND STAFF

From the earliest days of the administration of the parliamentary grant, the necessity of securing an adequate supply of good teachers has been recognised as of the first importance. Accordingly, not only did training colleges receive building and maintenance grants to assist them in their work of fitting men and women for the office of school-teachers, but existing teachers were encouraged to improve their own education and their school methods by the offer of certificates upon examination, carrying with them a money value in augmentation of their salaries, and varying in


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amount according to the grade of their certificates. Moreover, pupil-teachers were provided for the better schools, and were paid for by the Government grant, on condition of their being trained by the head teachers, and prepared for admission into the training colleges at the end of their apprenticeship. And although a large part of the system to which we have just referred, which was brought into existence by the Minutes of the Committee of Council on Education of August and December 1846, was swept away by the Code of 1862, enough was preserved to show that not only at the beginning, but also throughout the whole period of the last 40 years, the paramount necessity of keeping up an ample supply of duly qualified teachers has never been lost sight of.

From the Report of the Committee of Council on Education (1886-7), we learn* that in 1886 there were in actual employ in elementary schools in England and Wales, 16,766 certificated masters, and 25,152 certificated mistresses, besides 294 provisionally certificated teachers, 17,439 assistant teachers, and 4,659 female assistant teachers, (under Article 84 of the Code†) a total of 22,141 adult male teachers, and 42,169 adult female teachers. And from the same source we gather‡ that at Christmas 1886, there was an addition made to the staff of certificated teachers to the extent of 1,144 masters, and 2,005 mistresses; the total number of certificated teachers (including provisionally certificated teachers) at the end of 1886 being 45,361, as against 12,027 on 31st December 1869. To this large body of adult teachers must be further added 27,804 pupil-teachers who were serving in schools at the date of the Report referred to above; the corresponding number of pupil-teachers on 31st December 1869 being 12,842. It is needless to point to the rapidity of the growth of this army of teachers since the passing of the Education Act of 1870, the only question we have to determine being, the adequacy of the present supply both in number and in quality.

The evidence taken upon the point of the sufficiency of the present supply seems to prove, that whilst there is still a growing demand for fully qualified female teachers, the supply of trained male teachers is somewhat in excess of the present demand for them. "At present we have too many male teachers", says one teacher; there is undoubtedly a superabundance of male certificated teachers", says another, statements which appear to be borne out by the testimony of Canon Cromwell, late Principal of St. Mark's Training College for Masters, who says, "For the last two years we have found great difficulty in providing situations for the number of teachers whom we have trained, not in our own college only, but I know that it has been the case in many other colleges also." An independent proof of the same statements is afforded in the evidence of several witnesses who speak of the very small salaries which many young men, now leaving the training colleges, are willing to accept, as compared with those which they could command a few years ago; some, it is said, taking appointments as assistants at £50 or £60 a year, whereas, formerly such students might, as principal teachers, have obtained salaries of £110 or £120 a year. Two of the chief inspectors who appeared before us, while saying nothing about over supply, admit that there is a sufficient supply of male teachers, and other witnesses say that they have no difficulty in obtaining as many male teachers as they need. On the other hand, very many witnesses bore testimony to the inadequacy of the supply of female teachers, although there was some difference of opinion as to the extent of the deficiency. One witness, whilst allowing that there was some deficiency of well qualified teachers, stated that there was not "an absolute deficiency"; whilst another as emphatically declared, "I have not the least doubt myself that the supply of trained female teachers is quite inadequate. The general statement as to this inadequacy is confirmed by other witnesses, and one reason assigned for the much greater "waste" in the ranks of female teachers than in those of male teachers was that a good many of them leave the teaching profession to be married, especially in the first four or five years after becoming certificated.

In reference to the quality of the existing supply of teachers, we are glad to state our opinion, that, as a whole, the present body of teachers are a very honourable class,

*Report of the Committee of Council (1886-7), pages 226 and 227.

†New Code, 1887, Article 84: "In mixed, girls', and infant schools, a woman over 18 years of age, and approved by the Inspector, who is employed during the whole of the school hours in the general instruction of the scholars and in teaching needlework, is accepted as equivalent to a pupil teacher."

‡Page xxiv.


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and have a great sense of their duties to the children in regard to the formation of their character, and their moral guidance. It is, however, said that there is now less educational enthusiasm in the profession than formerly. It is also said that the teachers' associations are at the present time devoting less time and thought to professional improvement. It is further alleged that a number of young women take up teaching who are in no degree fitted for the work; and that, generally, whilst the supply now is sufficient in quantity, it is "scarcely so yet in quality". The last quoted witness goes on to state that the "sudden demand that was caused by the Act of 1870 necessitated, no doubt, some relaxation in the standard of qualifications required for a certificate, and without these untrained teachers the supply would still be altogether inadequate. But the necessity for this relaxation has now to a large extent passed away, the training colleges being able now to supply most of the annual waste; and I think," the witness goes on to say, " that the time has come in which improvements may be safely required, both in the quality of the students who enter the training colleges, and also more particularly by compelling acting teachers to pass exactly the same certificate examination as students who have gone through the training colleges." It should, however, be stated, in justice to the teachers, that the alleged decay of professional enthusiasm, and the fact that less time is now devoted by teachers' associations to educational questions, are attributed by the teachers themselves to the unfavourable conditions under which elementary education is stated by them to be at present carried on. We are told that nine-tenths of the supply of elementary teachers is made up of those who have formerly served as pupil-teachers, and who, therefore, have had the advantage of a long preliminary training.

It is admitted, and proved very conclusively by the remarkable results of the labours of members of religious communities in Roman Catholic schools, that the employment as teachers of women of superior social position and general culture has a refining and excellent effect upon the schools in which they teach, and an attempt is made at the Bishop Otter College, Chichester, to introduce this element into the body of trained and certificated teachers. Up to the present time, however, difficulties appear to have intervened to limit the success of the experiment, and the fact that, as a rule, the students in that college have not been pupil-teachers is said to prejudice them when they apply for posts as assistants in the larger schools. Another attempt was made in the Code of 1882 to encourage graduates of any university in the United Kingdom, and women over 18, who have passed university examinations recognised by the Department, to enter the profession of elementary teachers; such persons being made eligible by the Code to become assistant teachers in inspected schools, and in a year afterwards (if not under 20 years of age) to be examined for ordinary certificates. By the same regulation of the Code such persons on passing the admission examination to a training college are forthwith recognised by the Department as assistant teachers. Mr. Cumin's comment upon the importance of the change made in 1882 is worthy of consideration. "There are a great many persons', he says, "who have a liking for education, and a disposition towards being schoolmasters, and the better the class they come from, the better the teaching is likely to be, and the better the influence over the children; and therefore facilities were given for persons having a better education to go and teach in the elementary schools. In Scotland, where you have that connexion between the elementary schools and the Universities, you get a better class of teachers; and the intention was to elevate the condition of the teachers, and to improve education generally." But we find, on inquiry at the Department, that though this provision of the Code has existed for nearly six years, there has not been a single application for admission to the office of a teacher under it.

The case of the untrained teachers, who are now in such large numbers obtaining certificates without going through the discipline and the course of study of the training college, has come before us in many aspects. The following table taken from the Report of the Committee of Council (1886-7), shows the number of trained and untrained teachers respectively who held the Government certificate.


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The teachers themselves seem to be almost unanimous in condemning the present facilities for entering the teaching profession without previous training. They say that although there is not a sufficient supply of trained teachers, the general supply of teachers is excessive, owing to the large numbers of untrained teachers who are allowed to become certificated. They assert, although this is not admitted by the Department, that the standard of examination which these acting teachers have to reach has been so much lower than that adopted for the trained teachers, that many of the former class of teachers prove to be unsatisfactory. The result, according to these witnesses, is, that the less efficient teachers are preventing the more efficient ones from finding employment. The demand they make is that acting teachers' certificates should be abolished, and that for the future the supply of teachers should be limited to persons who have been through the training colleges, or who are university graduates. Other witnesses, to a great extent, agree in this view of the question. Canon Cromwell thinks that the number of untrained teachers who receive certificates should be diminished, and he would bring about this result by raising the age at which candidates are eligible to compete in the certificate examination, and by increasing the number of years they are required to serve in school before being examined. Others are of opinion that the standard of examination should be raised so as to reduce the number of this class of teachers. Mr. Oakeley, Her Majesty's inspector of training colleges, makes the definite proposal that no acting teacher should be admitted to the examination on second year's papers, till two years after passing in the first year's papers, and that the grade of certificate for a candidate who is placed in the third division on the second year's papers should be of the third class, and therefore not such as to qualify him to undertake the charge of pupil teachers. It may be noted that by the Code of 1882 teachers passing on the first year's papers were made ineligible for taking charge of pupil-teachers, and since that change, the great majority of acting teachers have obtained their certificate on the second year's papers. It may be well to state on the other side, that some of the ablest teachers who gave evidence before us had not been through a course of college training. We cannot, therefore, lose sight of the fact that there are some persons with a natural aptitude for teaching who have not entered training colleges, but who could not be excluded from the profession without a real loss to our schools, and in any regulations for fixing the qualifications required of teachers, it is desirable that this should be borne in mind.

In some small schools, where the average attendance is under 60 children, the teacher is not only, strictly speaking, untrained but also uncertificated, the only qualification possessed being that of a provisional certificate granted at the close of apprenticeship as a pupil teacher, on a favourable report from an inspector as to intellectual power and efficiency as a teacher. A provisional certificate, however, is revoked on the holder of it attaining the age of 25 years. We are informed by the Education Department that in 1885-86, out of 27,804 pupil teachers on their list, as many as 425 assistant teachers who had been passed by Her Majesty's inspectors at the end of their apprenticeship - 63 as provisionally certificated teachers, and the remainder as assistant teachers - nevertheless failed at the scholarship examination. Some witnesses would have these provisional certificates abolished. It may be pointed out, however, that this class of provisionally certificated teachers is diminishing year by year, having


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fallen off in the four years between 1882 and 1886, from 498 to 294.* It would seem, therefore, as if the system had served its purpose, and is now dying a natural death.

There has been a great rise in the salaries of school teachers in the past 20 or 30 years. In 1847, the salaries of 8,691 teachers in church schools averaged only £29 12s 10d. They were for masters £35 11s 4d, and for mistresses £23 14s 3d, independent of augmentations from Government.† The average salaries at the time of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, including these augmentations, are reported in evidence to have been £95 for masters, and £65 for mistresses, whereas at present the salaries are, on an average, £119 for men, and £72 for women, and much higher still in board schools such as those in London. We are informed that English trained male teachers on leaving college usually ask from £85 to £90 a year, females about £10 less; that an ex-pupil-teacher as an assistant mistress is worth from £35 to £50 a year, and an assistant master from £60 to £70 a year. It is stated that the scale of payment to Roman Catholic schoolmasters is below the average, and much below the board school scale, and that there is a feeling of dissatisfaction aroused among those teachers in consequence of this fact. It is also stated that salaries generally are no longer on the increase, a statement which receives confirmation from the reports of the Committee of Council for the past five years; for from those reports, it appears that, whilst the average salary of a certificated master rose from £94 2s 1d in 1870 to £119 15s 6d in 1882, its amount in 1885 was only £120 19s 2d, and it had fallen in 1886 to £120 17s 6d. Certificated mistresses, on the other hand, whose average salary in 1870 is reported to have been £57 11s 1d, are commanding somewhat higher salaries every year, the amount having risen from £72 0s 11d in 1882, to £74 4s 11d in 1886.

At one time the practice prevailed on the part of school managers of making a large part of their teachers' salary depend upon the grant. It is asserted that the result was to make the teacher "look upon the school as a money-producing machine", and very much to increase the teacher's anxiety in view of the annual examination. It is also said that where this practice obtains there is a tendency on the part of the teachers to get rid of unsatisfactory scholars before the day of inspection, and evidence to this effect was given by Mr. B. N. Buxton, for many years Chairman of the London School Board. Mr. Diggle, the present Chairman, informs us that all the salaries in the London board schools are now fixed, and that, whilst before the change was brought about, unsatisfactory results followed, since that time "there has not been the least departure from the old spirit which was in old teachers to do their best." Testimony of the importance of paying fixed salaries is also borne in the case of the Birmingham School Board. Out of the 3,496 replies we have received to the Circular D, addressed to head teachers in selected districts, 1,455, or 41.0 per cent, state that their salaries are fixed, 1,944, or 56.0 per cent, state that their salaries are dependent on fees and grants, and 97, or 3 per cent, do not answer the question as to whether their salaries are fixed or dependent on fees and grants. We are glad to learn that the system of variable salaries is giving way before that of fixed salaries in voluntary, as well as in board schools, and we are decidedly of opinion that teachers' salaries should be fixed, and should not fluctuate with the grant.

Some teachers complain of the restrictions under which they work as being a source of worry and anxiety to them, and they affirm that these restrictions serve to deter others from coming forward to join the ranks of school teachers. One teacher, claiming to speak for the body to which he belongs, asserted that the teachers feel the system under which they work almost intolerable; and he further testified that teachers' meetings, in which formerly the main subject of discussion was how best to advance the education of the children under their care, are now devoted to the consideration of their grievances in relation to the inspectors, the Department and the Code. Mr. Cumin, on the contrary, denies that teachers are unduly hampered by the Code, and Mr. Fitch maintains that under no foreign Government "is there so little authoritative restraint on the discretion and educational plans of teachers as in England under our present Code." It has been suggested by some witnesses that more frequent conferences between teachers, managers, and inspectors

*Reports of Committee of Council (1882-3), page 195; and (1886-7) page 226.

†Public Education by the late Sir James Kay Shuttleworth (1883), p. 125.


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would be productive of much good, and that they might, to some extent, supply the place of the periodical conferences which form a part of the educational system of some Continental States.

Ou the question of the endorsement by the inspector of the teachers' certificates on the occasion of his visit to their schools we need do no more than cite the opinion expressed by some of Her Majesty's inspectors. It is thought by Mr. Harrison that these endorsements are rather below the dignity of the teaching profession. In the case of assistant teachers, Mr. Fitch would continue the endorsements of certificates by inspectors, because they are of a personal kind, and are based on the qualifications of the individual, rather than on the character of the school in which he is employed. But in the case of head teachers he would prefer that these endorsements should to be discontinued, and that teachers should, as now, be entitled to claim from the managers a certified copy of the report of their schools. Mr. Synge takes the opposite view, and gives it as his opinion that the endorsement should go on as at present. Mr. Brodie, too, considers endorsements of value as being real testimonials, but, at the same time, he thinks that they should be most carefully divested of all personality.

The question of pensions we found to be somewhat complicated by the past treatment it has received from the Education Department. Lord Lingen, who was Secretary to the Education Department up to 1869, and afterwards for several years Secretary to the Treasury, in giving some account of the history of the offer of pensions under the Minutes of 1846, says, "The original Minute in 1846 was very general in its terms, and I believe I am correct in saying that the authors of that Minute did not contemplate a general system of pensions for teachers, but the system of annual grants for schools being then introduced, and a large number of teachers under the old system being employed in those schools, they thought to provide certain means of enabling these teachers to be retired on reasonably equitable and charitable terms. Very soon after that date (I forget the exact date of the next Minute), I think it was 1851, it was felt that this was a very dangerous offer to put out, being largely understood as the offer of a pension scheme for all time coming, rather than as one of the forms of aiding schools. The pension was meant to aid schools in the removal of inefficient teachers just as the augmentation grant was meant to aid them in obtaining better teachers. Then the Committee of that day, I think, limited the amount of pensions to £6,500 in any one year, and the conditions laid down at that time were exceedingly stringent. There were very few teachers who in 1861 had been pensioned under that scheme, and, rightly or wrongly, it was considered at that time one of the things that might be withdrawn from the Code. Probably if everything had to be done again, and the consequences had been foreseen, that Minute would not have been withdrawn." The subsequent history of the pension regulations is to be found in the Codes of 1876 and 1885, in the former of which the persons entitled to apply for a pension are specified to be teachers who were employed in that capacity on 9th May 1862, when the original Minute was cancelled; and in the latter it is stated that the limit of £6,500 is not to affect the claims of teachers who were employed before August 1851. But it is contended that many persons were induced to become pupil-teachers, and many others were in training at the training colleges on 9th May 1862, on the strength of the old Pension Minute, and that they are therefore entitled to share with others in this particular grant. Lord Lingen, whilst deprecating any reopening of the question, admitted that he did not know of the exclusion of these two classes of teachers from the benefit of the restored regulations. Mr. Fitch, whilst denying that these particular persons have any legal claim to participate in the old pension scheme, admits that probably some of them were induced by the prospect of a pension to come into the work, and adds that he would be glad if Parliament would consent to extend the present pension regulations so as to include their case. Other inspectors are strongly of opinion, either that the pension system originated in 1846 should be fully restored, or that some new system should be devised under Government supervision for the purpose of securing to all teachers who should come into the scheme a retiring allowance at the age when they are too old to continue to be efficient in their work. It is pointed out, too, that such a system of pensions is everywhere in existence on the Continent, and that if once established in England, teachers


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might be induced to contribute to the fund. Mr. Oakeley, on the other hand, suggested that 2 per cent deducted from all school grants would form a sufficient and easily collected fund for the purpose. Mr. Sharpe, whilst pleading that he had not fully considered the question, stated that he had known many hard cases of teachers of small rural schools reduced to indigence in old age, whom it would have been desirable to pension when unfit for further work; and he pointed out that the condition in the Code, requiring that the teachers at the time of applying for a pension should be actually engaged in teaching, pressed hardly on some who have broken down under their work and so have become disqualified. Most of the teachers who gave evidence, advocated the establishment of a system of pensions; one, however, stated that a feeling against a superannuation scheme exists amongst many young teachers. Out of the 3,496 answers to Circular D sent to head teachers, 2,937, or 84 per cent, were in favour of a superannuation scheme. They express great difference of opinion as to the sources whence it should be provided. Their answers may be summarised as follows: in 395 cases it is suggested that the funds should be contributed by teachers only; in 521 cases by teachers and Government; in 297 cases by teachers, Government, and managers; in 111 cases by teachers and managers; in 470 cases by Government only; in 270 cases by managers only; in 470 cases by Government and managers; in 403 cases no method is suggested.

On the whole, we should be glad to see a superannuation scheme established, and we have arrived at the conclusion that the compulsion upon existing teachers to contribute to such a scheme should be indirect rather than direct; and should be enforced by the action of the managers, rather than as a legal obligation upon the teachers themselves. The facilities afforded by the Post Office for the purchase of deferred annuities are great, and we think that this system affords the best method of placing teachers in such a position that when, after the attainment of a certain age, in the judgment of their managers they become less competent for teaching, they may be relieved of their duties without any sense of injury or injustice. We think that managers would act wisely in requiring that the teachers whom they employ should be possessed of a deferred annuity of not less than £30 a year for men, and £20 for women (which henceforth should be purchased from the Post Office), the annuity to come into operation at the age of 55. Existing teachers who have already assured themselves in other offices should have (equally with Post Office annuitants) the advantage of what we further recommend. On attaining the age of 55 the teacher would receive the annuity he had purchased; and we think that the Education Department should, at the time of his retiring from the profession, supplement this annuity (also through the medium of the Post Office), upon a scale regulated by the length of his service as a teacher, the maximum augmentation not to exceed £15 per annum. We are of opinion that this scheme of superannuation should be made compulsory upon all teachers certificated after a date to be decided upon by Parliament. We think that cases not capable of being covered by these simple provisions would not be large in number, and might be met by grants from the Department in augmentation of benevolent funds until the effect of the above scheme was fully developed. We recommend that the Department should provide for these grants, as well as for the augmentation of pensions, by a deduction of 1 per cent from the annual grant paid to every elementary school.

The first question that demands our attention in entering upon the consideration of what should be the amount of staff for the proper working of a school, is whether the minimum staff specified in the Code is sufficient. In the case of small schools the evidence before us seems to be unanimous in condemning the Code requirements as quite insufficient. The minimum staff is "not sufficient for a small school", says one witness, and "barely sufficient for an average school". Instances also have been brought before us of a single teacher without assistance teaching six standards and an infant class; of another teacher with two monitors, managing a school with six standards and 20 infants; and of still another with only one monitor, conducting the teaching of seven standards and of two infant classes in one room. These examples seem conclusively to show the impossibility of properly working such schools with the limited provision of staff specified in the Code. Mr. Harrison, is of opinion that the minimum staff of the Code ought to be raised; and a suggestion was made by another


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witness that where there are more than 40 scholars in average attendance, the employment of a pupil-teacher or of an assistant-teacher should be compulsory. The authors of the Minutes of 1846 evidently contemplated this. Thus Sir J. Kay Shuttleworth, in his work on Public Education gives one master and one pupil-teacher as the proper staff for any number of scholars between 30 and 60, an additional pupil-teacher being required for schools of about 80 scholars.* The Minutes of 1846 allowed one pupil-teacher for every 25 scholars. In his evidence before the Duke of Newcastle's Commission,† Sir James Kay Shuttleworth said as follows: "What will occur, I hope, with respect to the pupil-teacher grant will be that there will be a gradual substitution of assistant-teachers for pupil-teachers, and the assistant-teacher will cost the Government somewhat less than two pupil-teachers. He will stand in the place of two pupil-teachers." And at a somewhat later date Sir James Kay Shuttleworth, in a letter to the "Times" of January 2, 1871, on the supply of teachers for the new schools to be called into existence, said, "The proportion of the teaching staff ought not to be less than 1 for every 25 scholars, and that of the assistant-teachers ought to be much greater than it is. In a school of 150 scholars there ought to be one principal teacher, two assistant, and three pupil-teachers; for 100 scholars, one principal, one assistant, and two pupil-teachers." And even as early as 1853, in his book "Public Education as affected by the Minutes of the Privy Council from 1846 to 1852," page 130, he says, "Elementary schools cannot be deemed to have received a satisfactory development until every 60 scholars are in charge of a teacher or assistant of 18 years of age, who has passed through five years' apprenticeship, and is aided by a pupil-teacher." The teachers are practically unanimous on this point. One teacher discourages children remaining after the fourth standard, because of the excessive labour thrown upon him owing to the insufficient staff allowance of the Code. Another states that a half-time school cannot be properly worked with the Code minimum of staff. A third puts in a special plea for a stronger staff in a poor school, || and several affirm that the minimum staff is quite inadequate to secure the results required by the Code. This opinion is held, too, by some of the inspectors and by some school managers, one of the latter throwing out the suggestion that the relative size of the staff should be determined partly by the size of the standards, and not simply by the total number of children in the school. One inspector thinks the minimum should be reckoned as at present, on the average attendance; another points out that if this rule is rigidly followed, there may be staff enough in winter when the attendance of infants is small, while there is an insufficiency of teaching power in the summer, when many infants are present.

The Report of the Education Department for 1886-7 shows that 28,645 departments, with an average attendance of 3,438,425, had 28.645 head-teachers, 13,567 certificated assistant-teachers, 17,439 assistant (ex-pupil) teachers, 27,804 pupil-teachers, and 4,659 assistants under Article 84 of the Code, giving a total staff, according to the calculations of the Code, sufficient for 5,118,660 average, or a staff in excess of the present Code requirements by 49 per cent. If we take the various denominations of schools, we find that, on the basis of computation of the Code, the Church of England schools were overstaffed 45 per cent, the Roman Catholic 45 per cent, the Wesleyan 37 per cent, the British 44 per cent, the board schools 57 per cent. This shows that managers generally find the Code allowance totally insufficient; and it shows further that if the Code minimum, which is only used in self defence by managers who wish to justify their own insufficient staff, were materially raised, it would not practically affect the great mass of schools throughout the country. We think, therefore, that the staff required by the Code should be considerably increased, since we have already shown that the great mass of the schools would find their staff undisturbed, and that the change would only affect such schools as are understaffed, and so need the application of pressure to make good their short-comings.

In the case of large schools the question has been asked whether the head-teacher should be counted as part of the staff prescribed by the Code. We have been told by one of the London School Board Inspectors that, in his belief, the head masters very often do not take any part in actual teaching. "If I go", he says, "to a school, time after time, and find the head master sitting in his own room, doing it may be clerical work, or if I never find him with a class, my impression is that he does little or nothing in the way of teaching; but it would be difficult to prove a specific

*Public education by Sir J. K. Shuttleworth, p. 132.

†Evidence given before Duke of Newcastle's Commission, vol. 6, p. 323, Q. 2437.


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case perhaps." Mr. Airy, Her Majesty's Inspector of Schools in the Birmingham district, also expresses a similar opinion. In his Report to the Committee of Council, (1885-6, p. 324) he writes as follows: "The second point on which I find myself at issue with the practice of the teachers, of the board schools especially, and with the policy of the board that tacitly permits it, is that, as a rule, the head teachers do not teach. An assistant teacher makes his reputation by the success with which he teaches his class, usually the first class. Upon that success he is promoted to a vacant head mastership; and in many cases, from that moment, his genuine teaching days are over. It is supposed that he will 'supervise'; that he will ' impress his system ' upon his subordinates. One teacher said to me that he ' did not know he was supposed to give actual lessons after he had a school '; another, who has left the profession, has admitted that he never gave a lesson from the moment of his appointment; while another considered it 'beneath his dignity' to take a part in the regular teaching." Dr. Crosskey, the Chairman of the School Management Committee of the Birmingham School Board, in reference to the opinion of Mr. Airy stated: "We had a little discussion with Mr. Airy upon that point; it is a difference of theory. I am Chairman of the School Management Committee, and I am more or less acquainted with the work of that Committee and the opinions of that Committee. Of course, we believe that the head teachers should teach according to the rules of the board; the whole question is, whether they are to take a distinct and definite part of the work, and be responsible for it, or whether they may, as directing large schools, teach where they think weak places exist. The Inspector, I believe, has a very strong opinion in favour of their taking a definite and distinct part of the school work. If a head teacher teaches all through and gives his time where he thinks the school is weakest, I think he does his work as well as if he took a distinct and definite part. I do not think that our teachers fail in industry or in teaching; of course, in so large a body of teachers, you will find some who are more or less remiss, but, on the whole, I believe they do work. I have often inquired into it." Mr. Stewart thinks the principal teachers should be reckoned on the staff, and give an equal number of lessons to each of the classes of his school, besides superintending the work of the other teachers; but his experience is that the head teacher is generally occupied in supervising, not in teaching. Some of the teachers gave it as their opinion that in a large school the head teacher ought not to be held responsible for any particular class, nor to count on the staff. School managers appear to be divided in opinion upon this point, and Canon Daniel, Principal of St. John's Training College, Battersea, thinks that, in a large school of 300, the head teacher ought always to be free to go about the school supervising the work of others. The Rev. J. Gilmore, the Chairman of the Sheffield School Board, being asked whether he considered that the principal teacher should be reckoned in calculating the staff of large schools, said, "That depends upon the kind of school. We have large mixed schools under the Sheffield School Board, where we have 700 or 800 children; in such cases we do not count the head teacher, and we do not think that he should be counted; but in an ordinary boys' and girls' school of, say 300, I think he should be counted." The Rev. J. Diggle, Chairman of the London School Board, thought that the principal teacher should be reckoned in calculating the staff of a large school.

We are of opinion that, while it would be undesirable that a head-master should not be able to give general superintendence to the whole work of his school, it would be matter of regret if he were dissociated from the work of actual instruction. We think that if the general requirements of the Code as to staff be raised, it may well be left to the managers and head teacher to organise their school as they please, subject to the inspector being satisfied with the results of the teaching.

The proper size of a class is a matter of considerable consequence to be taken into account in estimating the true minimum of staff required. As a matter of fact classes are found sometimes to contain as many as 60 or 80 children, and an assistant, we are told, has been seen endeavouring single handed to teach a class of 100. But it is generally allowed that these numbers are much beyond what should be permitted; and the average maximum number assigned by the several witnesses may be set down as 40 for an ordinary class in a school, and 25 for the highest class.ft It is most important that the classes, especially in girls' schools, should be


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kept within a reasonable size: for when the classes are too large, we are told that the health of the teachers begins to suffer, as "they find the work very fagging".

The special value of female teachers is dwelt upon by several witnesses. Canon Warburton has a great belief in schoolmistresses, and thinks they do quite as well as schoolmasters for small or even middle-sized schools; and he is often astonished at their success in the maintenance of discipline by moral power, even among elder boys. By another witness the employment of female teachers is recommended for the lower standards of boys' schools, and although Mr. Sharpe thinks that the employment of young married female teachers is a thing to be discouraged, he admits that, cæteris paribus [other things being equal], women are the better teachers.

In regard to pupil-teachers a suggestion has been made that in their earlier years pupil- they should not count on the staff at all, and that the seniors should only be reckoned teachers, as sufficient for 30 scholars. Another reckoning regards an adult teacher as equal in value to two senior pupil-teachers, but it is also pointed out that a preponderance of assistant teachers, in lieu of pupil-teachers, would not improve efficiency or results, the ground that young people of 18 do not receive the instruction and advice of a young head teacher so readily as they would do at the age of 13 or 14. The instruction given by pupil-teachers at the present time, it is said, does not secure the confidence of the parents, nor is it as valuable as it was some years ago. Mr. Matthew Arnold who, when reporting on French education in 1859, gave it as his opinion that "pupil-teachers are the sinews of English primary instruction, whose institution is the grand merit of our English State system, and its chief title to public respect," said, when examined before us, that he looked forward to the pupil-teacher system being shortly superseded, believing that there would be a sufficient supply of adult teachers to meet the demand that then would arise. The following questions and answers show Mr. Sharpe's opinion on this point: "Supposing you were organising a school and had the money to spend, in what way would you spend it? If you had money just enough to support an assistant teacher, would you expend it upon an assistant teacher or upon a corresponding number of pupil-teachers? - I would spend it upon one assistant teacher. And you would organise a large school in the same way? - Yes, in preference to a large number of pupil-teachers."

There are those who represent the employment of pupil-teachers as the weakest part of our educational system, and as a positive injury to the work of teaching. The pupil-teacher's training, it is alleged by these witnesses, is certainly not the best preparation for a teacher's work; the time occupied in teaching destroys, it is said, his intellectual freshness and energy, so that both teaching and learning suffer. "It is at once", says Dr. Crosskey, "the cheapest, and the very worst possible system of supply", and "it should be abolished root and branch." Several teachers express a similar opinion in their evidence. On the other hand, many teachers not only cordially approve of the pupil-teacher system, but they also look upon it as having justified its institution by its results, and as being the best way of securing a supply of trained teachers. "This country", says Mr. Hance, clerk to the Liverpool School Board, "must always look to the pupil-teachers as being on the whole the best as well as the main source of the supply of certificated teachers"; and this opinion is endorsed by the principals of several training colleges. Thus Canon Daniel, Principal of Battersea Training College, who has had much practical experience, says that he attaches very great importance to the previous training received by teachers as pupil-teachers, for the "power which is acquired between the ages of 14 and 18 can scarcely ever be acquired to perfection afterwards. We notice the greatest difference between students who have been pupil-teachers and those who have not, in their ability to handle a class, in their power of discipline, and in their capacity to deal with all the little difficulties of school work." Canon Cromwell, Principal of St. Mark's, says, "I have a very strong opinion of the great advantage of the pupil-teacher course in preparing young people to be teachers." Mr. Mansford, Vice-Principal of the Wesleyan Training College, thinks that the candidates for admission who have been pupil teachers are better trained than those who have not been, though he


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fears that their training is deteriorating rather than improving. The inspectors, too, bear strong testimony to the value of the system. "It furnishes a very valuable portion of the supply", says Mr. Fitch; "it needs improvement", says Mr. Oakeley, but "the system affords the best means of keeping up the supply"; "it is the only possible arrangement at present", says Mr. Sharpe; and Canon Warburton looks upon the relations between the pupil-teachers and the head teachers as most valuable, and he considers that those who become teachers, without passing through the apprenticeship of pupil-teachers, lose great practical advantages.

There is apparently almost absolute unanimity as to the imperfection of a large portion of the instruction given to pupil-teachers. Canon Warburton notes a tendency on the part of head teachers to neglect the work of instructing their apprentices. At the same time the instruction is described by several as being unsatisfactory and insufficient in itself, and as showing signs of defective training and crude cramming. Almost the same opinions are expressed by teachers who appeared before us, who complained both of the methods used, and of the results produced, and Sir L. T. Stamer doubts if the instruction of pupil-teachers is at present in a satisfactory condition, except where it is in the hands of very conscientious teachers.

On the whole, we concur in the opinion of the inspectors, whose words we have just quoted, that, having regard to moral qualifications, there is no other available, or, as we prefer to say, equally trustworthy source from which an adequate supply of teachers is likely to be forthcoming; and with modifications, tending to the improvement of their education, the apprenticeship of pupil-teachers, we think, ought to be upheld.

It appears that in some parts considerable difficulty is experienced in finding suitable candidates, more particularly boys, to be trained as pupil-teachers. They cannot in some cases, it is said, be induced to remain at school till they have arrived at the age for apprenticeship, and it is thought to be becoming increasingly difficult to get the best boys for this purpose. Both in town and country the difficulty is reported to be about the same, and we are informed that in London it is less easy now than it was to obtain girls for the work. Other witnesses state that they find no difficulty except in the very poorest districts, and that the supply of female pupil-teachers exceeds the demand. So far as there is a falling off, it is said to arise from a popular idea that salaries are decreasing and that the teacher's position is not improving, and not from any efforts on the part of teachers to keep down the supply. Bearing in mind these difficulties, it appears to us that it would be advisable to recur to the system of allowing pupil-teachers, when the managers wish it, to be engaged for five years at the age of thirteen. This would meet the difficulty of retaining clever children in school from 13 to 14, and would in no way interfere with the practice of those who should still prefer a shorter term of apprenticeship commencing at a later age.

In regard to the sources from which pupil-teachers should be drawn, Mr. MacCarthy, Vice-Chairman of the Birmingham School Board, says: "Some think that the children from public elementary schools are preferable as pupil-teachers, because the knowledge that they possess of the routine of an elementary school renders their services more immediately available; and that, having the same kinds of homes as the children that they will have to teach, they have greater knowledge of such children's needs, and they are consequently more able to sympathise with them than teachers from superior homes. Other head teachers, however, hold that those advantages are more than counter-balanced in the long run by the superior qualifications already mentioned." In answer to another question, he further said, "I think that the mistresses, not being quite so highly educated as the masters, rather prefer to have a less educated set of pupil teachers than otherwise, and therefore there is, on their part, a bias towards those who have been educated in their own schools."

To meet the difficulty of the imperfect education of pupil-teachers, an attempt has been made in some large towns to introduce a collective system of instruction. Instead of each principal teacher taking charge of his own pupil-teachers and instructing them himself, the pupil-teachers, in many instances, are collected at some convenient centre.


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and there instructed by a special staff of teachers in the various subjects required for their annual examinations, and for the admission examination at the training college. In the year 1874 the attention of the School Board for London was for the first time specially directed to the conditions under which their pupil teachers were appointed and taught. In the following year the Board adopted a scheme which they hoped would remedy what, in their opinion, were the two main defects of the then existing system; namely, the instruction of children by pupil teachers who had not sufficient knowledge or experience, and the imperfection of the instruction and training of the pupil teachers themselves. A new scheme was started in January 1882, and remained in force for three years, which after some experience was held by the Board to be an improvement upon the old practice, but to be still unsatisfactory in one chief respect, inasmuch as the instruction of the pupil teachers had to be given out of school hours, in addition to the work upon which they were employed during school hours; and, in consequence, complaints of over-pressure were frequent. Accordingly, in 1884, the Board adopted the scheme which is at present in force, the details of which are as follows:

(vi) The pupil teachers and probationers are divided into two sections: (a.) junior, viz., first year probationers, second year probationers, and second year pupil teachers: (6.) the seniors, viz., third and fourth years pupil teachers. The juniors are not counted on the staff. The seniors are considered as responsible teachers, counting for 40 scholars.

(vii) (a) The juniors must attend the school in which they are apprenticed for one part of each day; and must further attend the pupil teachers' school, for their instruction, the other part of the day and on Saturday mornings.

(b) Head teachers must on no account detain their pupil teachers so as to prevent them from attending the pupil teachers' schools, owing to the absence of another teacher, or other cause, except on the days when Her Majesty's Inspector is actually examining the department in which they are engaged, unless they previously obtain the consent of the Board Inspector.

(viii) (a) While they are at school they must (subject to clause (ix)), in accordance with the terms of the pupil teachers' journal, be employed in learning school management, theoretical and practical, under the head teacher, in examining home lessons, and in preparing lessons on simple subjects, which they may occasionally give to a class under the superintendence of the head teacher, or one of the assistants.

(b) The head teacher of the school in which the pupil teacher is engaged will be held responsible for the examination of the entries made by pupil teachers in their report books at least once in each week, also for the production of the book at each managers' meeting for inspection by the Board Inspector at his visit to the school, and for making the necessary remarks on object and other practice lessons in school in the spaces provided for that purpose on the right-hand opening of the book.

(c) Managers are requested to examine the pupil teachers' report books, and see that the entries made show that the pupil teacher is giving the proper attention to his (or her) studies.

(ix) The seniors must attend classes for instruction on two half-days and on Saturday morning in each week, and must be engaged in teaching at the school during the remainder of the week. If necessary, junior pupil-teachers may take charge of classes in the school during the absence of the senior pupil-teachers at the classes.

In order to carry out this plan, the Board, according to the last return of the School Management Committee (Lady-day 1887), had, at that time, 11 centres for the instruction of pupil-teachers. There were then 1,108 departments, and the average number of pupil-teachers under instruction during the year ended at Lady-day 1887 may be taken to be 1,636. To each centre there was a responsible teacher, and there were in addition 41 permanent assistants (of whom 9 divided their time amongst more schools than one), and 36 occasional assistants, who were employed only on Saturday mornings. These teachers were, in most instances, certificated by the Education Department, but, in some few cases, "other qualified teachers" (Art. V of the memorandum of agreement) had been appointed, either women who had passed the recognised university examinations (New Code, Article V) or teachers of science or drawing, holding certificates of the Science and Art Department, or teachers of the special subjects of French and needlework.

Some estimate may be formed of the improvement of the instruction under the centre system in London by an examination of the subjoined table.


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Table showing results of Examination for Queen's Scholarships of Pupil-Teachers and Ex-Pupil-Teachers from London Board Schools, and from all England and Wales excluding London Board Schools

[click on the image for a larger version]

As regards the years 1885 and 1886, it is stated that a number of pupil-teachers had the option whether they would git at the scholarship examination in the former or the latter year. Many of the best pupil-teachers elected to sit at the former, and consequently some allowance must be made for this fact in comparing the figures for 1886 with those for 1885. A table in the Second Volume of our Report, page 1036, shows in detail the passes in the second and third classes.

In Birmingham every pupil-teacher is relieved of one half day's schoolwork in each week in order to attend the day classes. These day classes meet, each for a session of 2½ hours, at the school board offices. The females (candidates and pupil-teachers) of successive years come on successive mornings, and the males on successive afternoons. On Saturday mornings, also, all the males are under instruction for 3 hours at one board school, and all the females at another. In addition to these day classes, all the candidates and pupil-teachers are in attendance for 2¼ hours on each of two evenings in the week; the males and females being taught at different board school centres. Thus the total amount of instruction under the centre system is nearly 10 hours a week for each candidate and pupil-teacher. The staff of instructors at each centre consists of (1) an organising director and one assistant, who devote their whole time to the instruction of pupil-teachers and the superintendence of the classes; (2) a science demonstrator and assistants, who give one lesson a week to each class; (3) an art master for drawing; (4) head teachers and assistants under the board, selected by the board as having special aptitude for teaching special subjects, who take part, under the director, in the evening and Saturday morning classes. In the case of the pupil-teachers under the Birmingham School Board no statistics can be given to show their comparative success at the Queen's Scholarship Examination, before and after the adoption of the centre system. The scheme has been in operation since 1884, but attendance at the examinations was optional before 1887, at which time the board made it compulsory. Under the Birmingham School Board the pupil-teachers are required to sit for their scholarship in the July preceding the completion of their apprenticeship. It must be noted, that the half-time system for pupil-teachers has not been adopted by the Birmingham Board.

The centre system was introduced by the Liverpool School Board in 1876, only a few years after their first schools were opened. They were induced to adopt this


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course by the fact that the pupil-teachers from the Roman Catholic schools of Liverpool, who had the advantage of central class instruction, took very much higher positions in the Scholarship Examination than those from the Liverpool board schools; the latter being in no way distinguished from the average of the kingdom at large. In 1878, when stipendiary monitors were allowed by the Code to be substituted for the old first year pupil-teachers, the monitors engaged by the board were formed into half-time classes, and a special teacher was appointed for their instruction. This system has been continued up to the present time in respect of candidates for apprenticeship. In 1883, all the pupil-teachers in the board schools were allowed one half day in the week during school hours for private study, and in 1884 first year pupil-teachers were made half-timers, and a special class established for their instruction. The effect of these arrangements is shown by the following table, which compares the results attained in the Scholarship Examination by the pupil-teachers from the board schools of Liverpool; with the average of those secured by pupil-teachers from the kingdom at large.

[click on the image for a larger version]

Mr. Hance, the clerk to the Liverpool School Board, maintains that in the schools of this board the introduction of the central system has in no respect impaired the influence of the head teachers over their pupil-teachers. But the Liverpool School Board Lave always impressed upon their head teachers, that the central class system is intended to supplement, and not to supersede, either their instruction or their responsibility for the progress of their pupil-teachers, and this responsibility is accentuated by small special payments to them, conditional upon their pupil-teachers passing satisfactorily the annual examinations of Her Majesty's Inspector.

Mr. Sharpe thinks that the centre system of instruction is a good one for clever and industrious pupil-teachers, although not acting so well for the more backward and idle, but he points out that it is only practicable in large centres of population. Mr. Fitch pronounces the experiment to be a success, and other inspectors approve and recommend the system. Some of the teachers regard the new system as a great improvement, and they say they do not see that it interferes with the head teacher's influence. Mr. Diggle speaks highly of the results produced by the centre system in London, maintaining that it has turned out a much larger proportion of teachers qualified in respect of teaching as well as in respect of their attainments than the old system. Other managers testify to similar good results, both in Birmingham and in London. Other witnesses speak very strongly in disapproval of the centre system. One says that it weakens the link between teachers and apprentices; another considers it far inferior to the old system in dealing with pupil-teachers who require "whipping-up". A third says that there may be a danger of its becoming an apparatus for the higher instruction of youths who have no intention of ever becoming teachers at all. Mr. Sharpe reports that it is the opinion of some head teachers that the centre system creates greater independence in the pupil-teachers, so that they are not so amenable as before to discipline; but, he adds, that he does not attach much importance to this opinion. Some teachers, whilst acknowledging that the system has brought them great relief, point out the danger of the pupil-teachers becoming students rather than teachers, and they consider that the system of personal supervision on the part of the head teacher is superior to the centre system. Mr. Gilmore,


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the chairman of the Sheffield School Board, expressed his dissatisfaction with the centre system, as it exists in Sheffield. At Leeds the board being dissatisfied with the results of the individual teaching of the pupil-teachers, introduced a new system by which they farmed out the teaching of the pupil-teachers in numerous groups throughout the borough to some adult teachers, but they have not diminished the school work of the pupil-teachers. They are not satisfied with the results of their new method (which, however, cannot properly be called a centre system), and we are informed that probably the old system will have to be reverted to. Notwithstanding the evils which have been pointed out to us - among other things, the loss likely to be incurred by removing that element of the old system of apprenticeship which created very real bonds of affection, as well as responsibility and duty, between the head teachers and their young apprentices - we fully acknowledge that the intellectual advantages obtained are a very strong recommendation of the centre system, although it will require careful vigilance, and is not applicable to country districts.

We have received many suggestions, made with the view of improving the pupil-teacher system generally. Mr. Sharpe complains that the instruction given by pupil- teachers for the first two years is not satisfactory, and Canon Warburton says that it would be an excellent plan, if it could be carried out, not to allow pupil-teachers to be responsible for classes until the end of the second year. It is even suggested by some witnesses that pupil-teachers should be entirely released from teaching in their first year, and partially so during the rest of their apprenticeship, managers being compensated for the loss of their pupil-teachers' services by an increased Government grant. These suggestions seem to have arisen from complaints that are said to have been made that head teachers use the pupil-teachers rather as reliefs to their own school work, than as apprentices to be instructed in the art of teaching, and that the pupil-teachers ought, therefore, to be allowed more leisure for study. We must add that some school managers already allow their pupil-teacher's leisure during school hours for their own studies, under arrangements which ensure that the time given is profitably utilised. Another complaint is made that the opportunity of weeding out the unsatisfactory pupil-teachers during their apprenticeship is but little resorted to, with the consequence that many thoroughly unsuitable candidates are kept in the teaching profession, who ought to have turned their attention to some other occupation. The suggestions made with the view of removing this ground of complaint are many and various. One suggestion is that the annual examinations of pupil-teachers should be more strict, and that inspectors should have greater power to exclude from the list of pupil-teachers those who display little aptitude for self-improvement or teaching. Another suggestion is to delay the age of apprenticeship to 16, up to which age the young people should attend some higher grade elementary or secondary school, a plan said to have succeeded well in a school at Manchester. A suggestion, which we deem valuable, proposes that the apprenticeship shall be made to consist of two parts, and that all unsatisfactory pupil-teachers shall be got rid of at the end of the first period, when they are not too old to take up with some other occupation. One proposal in this direction would give the junior pupil-teacher a term of three years, and the senior pupil-teacher a further term of three years, the whole apprenticeship to end not later than at the apprentice's coming of age, and only approved juniors being allowed to become senior pupil-teachers. One advantage of this scheme is thus described: "It would reduce the number of teachers coming into the market, and, better still, it would help much towards putting an end to a plan which too often saddles a school with a useless pupil-teacher, the college with an unprofitable student, and the country with an unskilful teacher, who may go about from school to school always experimenting upon children, but never succeeding." Some witnesses complain of the annual examination of pupil-teachers as too lenient, and confined within too narrow limits of time,|||| and Mr. Synge is of opinion that the results of that examination should be announced earlier than they are.

As bearing on this part of our inquiry, we would call attention to the reports of the inspectors of training colleges, the general tenor of which is to the effect that the progress of the students in training (consisting, as they do, mainly of ex-pupil-teachers) is greatly retarded in their first year by imperfect preparation previous to

||||The Secretary, whilst admitting that many complaints have been made as to this delay, expresses it as his opinion that there is no practicable way in which the matter can be remedied; 59,623 (Cumin).


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their entrance into college. This is a strong confirmation of the opinion of those witnesses who consider that justice is not done to many of the pupil-teachers during their apprenticeship, and we think that more attention should be given by the inspectors to their annual examination. It would be well so to re-arrange the conditions of the apprenticeship, as to give every pupil-teacher at the age of 16 greater facilities for withdrawing from a work for which he may have but little liking, and to give also to the school managers an opportunity of ceasing to employ any pupil-teacher, who at that age is found to be unsuited for the office and for the work of teaching.

Inasmuch as the efficiency of the training received by pupil-teachers is a matter of importance, not only to the respective localities in which the pupil-teachers may be serving, but to the nation at large, the expense of exceptional local efforts to raise the standard of pupil-teachers' education should not, we think, fall exclusively upon the local managers or school board, but should be borne in part by the parliamentary grant.

In conclusion, we recommend -

(1) That pupil-teachers be allowed, especially in their first year of service, more time during school hours than is now given them for their own studies.

(2) That, without in any way superseding the responsibility of head teachers, the instruction should, wherever possible, be supplemented by central class teaching in respect of some of the compulsory, and of the additional subjects.

(3) That to encourage managers of voluntary schools as well as school boards to extend the advantages of central class teaching to their pupil-teachers, extra grants should be offered to those managers or boards who successfully adopt that course.

(4) That, in districts where central class instruction is obviously impossible, extra grants should be made to managers who successfully employ other special means to secure the thorough instruction of their pupil-teachers.


CHAPTER VI

TRAINING COLLEGES

The promotion of colleges for the training of teachers was undoubtedly the most important step taken by the Department to raise the quality of elementary education. St. John's College, Battersea, which was established in 1840, was the first institution of its kind. It has been already stated in the introductory chapters of this Report, that the training colleges now number 43, of which 17 are for males, 25 for females, and one in which the sexes are mixed. Of these, 30 belong to the Church of England, all with the exception of St. Katherine's College, Tottenham, in connexion with, or receiving grants from, the National Society, and 8 are undenominational, of which 6 are in connexion with the British and Foreign School Society. There are two Wesleyan colleges, and three Roman Catholic.

From a table published in the Report of the Committee of Council (1886-87) we learn that the original cost of those colleges towards which building Grants were made was £397,470. Of this sum, while £118,627 was granted by the Committee of Council, £278,842 was originally subscribed by the promoters, whose total outlay on sites and buildings up to 1881 amounted to £520,272. The aggregate annual expenditure of all the colleges for the year 1886 was £167,647, of which £115,275 consisted of grants from the Committee of Council, and £51,172 was provided from other sources.§ Of the latter sum, £6,546 came from the Department of Science and Art, £15,970 from subscriptions and donations, and £22,228 was contributed by the students themselves in the form of fees, and £5,212 for books. The number of students in training was 3,272, of whom 1,391 were males and 1,881 females.

In the 43 colleges there were only 96 vacant places altogether, so nearly was their whole capacity utilised: but had all candidates who passed the entrance examination obtained admission, the colleges would have been filled twice over.||

§Besides the amount of expenditure returned to the Government, and accounted for in the Annual Government Reports, considerable amounts have been paid in some of the colleges from time to time for improvements and enlargements, towards which the Department made no contribution.

||For the 1,682 vacancies there were in July 1886, 5,111 candidates, of whom 3,379 passed high enough to be eligible for admission. Of these many did not desire to enter college, but we have no means of ascertaining the exact number.


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We have had the advantage of examining both the past and present inspectors, who have been specially charged with the duty of examining and reporting on these institutions; Mr. Sharpe, who was formerly the inspector of the male training colleges, being now succeeded by Mr. Oakeley; and Canon Warburton, who formerly filled the same office for female training colleges, having given place to Mr. Fitch. Mr. Sharpe thinks, that the present system of training colleges is a very cheap bargain for the State. Canon Warburton, says, "I think that the present arrangement is an admirable bargain for the country. It is not only that the country saves 25 per cent of the cost of training, but it is also saved a very much larger total outlay which would be involved if the management was not private management, and looked after by people on the spot." To the religious, moral, and intellectual influence of these institutions the inspectors bear emphatic testimony. All the training colleges, Mr. Sharpe believes, are doing efficient work with a sufficient staff of teachers and with a carefully drawn syllabus of study. Their fittings and apparatus are brought up to the best modern level. All the London colleges have now chemical laboratories, and several of the provincial colleges also, but most of the laboratories in the country are small, and scarcely efficient for teaching chemistry beyond the rudiments. The moral tone of the colleges, he says, is excellent; and they thoroughly prepare a student for his future career as a teacher of the ordinary subjects of instruction in elementary schools. Canon Warburton considers that girls come into training colleges raw, self-conscious, and awkward, and that they go out capable and self-possessed women. Residence in a college, Mr. Oakeley says, has a very refining and elevating effect upon students. Mr. Fitch believes that the religious influence of the training college over the aims and character of the student is very valuable. The training college, he thinks, supplies the moral influences which may not always be found in the student's home life and surroundings.

Each of these witnesses has his own criticism to make, qualifying the general satisfaction expressed with the work of the training colleges. Mr. Sharpe after describing the improvements which have already removed the chief causes of complaint, admits that there is still room for further improvements, of which he specifies one - some curtailment in the number of hours devoted to study. The improvements to which he refers appear to have been made chiefly in the male colleges. Canon Warburton, summing up his impressions of the female training colleges, in his Report for 1885 (p. 442), says: "On taking a parting review of the whole subject of our voluntary State-aided system of training elementary schoolmistresses, my prominent feeling is one of admiration for the zeal and energy with which the work is being carried on, mingled with a certain sense of disappointment with the intellectual acquirements and technical skill obtained as the result of so much forethought, self-denial, watchfulness, and ungrudging labour on the part of all concerned in the work of the colleges." The main drawback, Canon Warburton thinks, to the success of the female training colleges is the inferior quality of the raw material sent to them. He also says that the students are not turned out so good at teaching as one would hope. He attributes this to the artificial conditions under which the students learn to teach in practising schools, but admits that the students improve rapidly when they come to be responsible for a school. And while he has found the lectures in general to be remarkably good, the pupils, he thinks, get too much help, and do not work out things sufficiently for themselves. He thinks it a great mistake to limit them to one practising school, and that they ought to teach in any school within a given area to which they may be able to gain admission, so that they may see schools of various types of excellence. Mr. Fitch signifies some dissatisfaction with the practising schools in several colleges. And though, as a rule, Mr. Oakeley finds that the premises of colleges and practising schools are very good, and the latter, as a whole, well equipped, there are not, he thinks, proper appliances in all colleges for teaching science. These, however, Mr. Sharpe tells us, are, under the pressure of the Department of Science and Art, in course of improvement. In the Edge Hill Training College near Liverpool, we find from Mr. Hance's evidence that an experiment has been tried of giving the students


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practice in teaching under new and more natural conditions. He tells us that, in the first place, the authorities of the college have made arrangements with the school board by which one of the largest of the neighbouring board schools has been constituted the practising school of the college, the head teachers of the school receiving from the college remuneration for their increased responsibilities. In the next place, the second year students are detailed to various neighbouring board and voluntary schools for two afternoons in each week throughout the greater portion of the year. In each school the students take some one or two definite subjects, which they continuously teach under the supervision of the head teacher, and for the results in these subjects at the Government examination they consequently feel some personal responsibility. We are informed that the head teachers not only welcome the aid of the students, but do much to assist them by advice and criticism.

Mr. Matthew Arnold compared the English trained elementary teachers with those of Germany, France, and Switzerland, much to the disadvantage of our own country, though he favoured us with but few details of the points of foreign superiority. Dr. Crosskey much prefers the German and the Scotch system of training to our own. Mr. MacCarthy criticises unfavourably the existing system of training colleges. Mrs. Fielden, of Todmorden, expressed a strong objection to teachers trained in the existing training colleges. On the other hand, Archdeacon Norris, who unites in his own person the traditions of an inspector in the earlier time with his later experience in the management of the Fishponds Training College for women, thinks that the colleges do wonders in two years with the raw material they have to handle, which is of a very poor quality. To us it appears that until the candidates for admission are better prepared it is vain to look for much substantial improvement in the rank and file of the students who leave our colleges after two years' training. The marvel is, not how far short of perfection are the teachers when they leave college, but, rather, with how few exceptions good results are produced from materials that are often very unpromising. It is a noticeable fact that out of 1,500 students in training in 1885, only two failed to pass the certificate examination. And the Principal of the Home and Colonial Training College makes bold to affirm that there is no body of young women in England so thoroughly educated as the 2,000 girls in Government training colleges; an opinion which derives some confirmation from their success at the examinations for certificates in papers which presume a high standard of attainments on the part of those for whom they are prepared.

Much criticism has been directed against the existing training colleges, not so much for their alleged inefficiency, as because of their inaccessibility to those students who do not belong to the religious denominations by which they have been severally established. Canon Warburton is of opinion that there is room for more colleges for females, and that there is a special need for undenominational accommodation. The number of undenominational colleges, counting those connected with the British and Foreign School Society, is quite insufficient, it is maintained, to meet the demand for training on the part of those nonconformist pupil teachers who have been apprenticed in board schools, and who may find the door of entrance to the training colleges of other denominations closed against them. One representative witness has strongly urged that it is wrong in principle that the State should contribute towards denominational training colleges - a contention which is obviously inadmissible so long as 69 per cent of our elementary schools, containing 56.37 per cent of our scholars, are themselves denominational. The contention, moreover, we think, comes too late in the day after the State has entered into binding engagements with these institutions; and it ought not, in our opinion, to have much practical weight given to it, so long as the State is as well served as it now is by the supply of trained teachers which the colleges send forth.

But others who do not go so far as the witness alluded to above have claimed that a conscience clause should be introduced into training colleges, or, if that be deemed unfair, at least that nonconformist students should be admitted into church training colleges, after the requirements of church candidates have been met. As to the claim for the compulsory introduction of a conscience clause into training colleges, it may be doubted whether many who have made, or echoed, such a demand have formed a distinct conception of what would be the actual effect of a conscience clause as applied to students residing in training colleges - a question, it will


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be observed, wholly distinct from that of the conscience clause as applied to day scholars. It would mean, in the first place, that no student resident in the college who, on the ground of conscience, made objection so to do, should be required to attend any lectures or pursue any course of study of a directly religious character, included in the college course, and that every student would have a right to object to any specifically religious instruction, which might be incidentally given in connexion with the teaching received from the college staff. But it would also mean that no student, who claimed exemption on the ground of conscience, should be required to be present at any common act of worship, public or collegiate, as, for example, at family prayers in the college, morning and evening. Such liberty of exemption, it is evident, would destroy all unity of Christian family life, whether in a denominational or an undenominational college, and would interfere fatally with the framework of ordinary domestic and moral discipline, which, more, perhaps, than anything else, by its gentle and continual influence, secures the easy maintenance of good order and Christian propriety in the college. Even more far-reaching would be the operation of a conscience clause, such as would satisfy the demand of the few representatives of extreme secularist principles, by securing, without respect of creed or religious opinion, free access for all candidates who seek training as teachers to the advantages of residence in all residential training colleges. A conscience clause, to meet this demand, would preclude, in the maintenance of college discipline, all appeal to Divine Revelation or to the law of God.

Inspectors who have devoted many years to visiting these colleges, and who speak with an authority such as belongs to no other witnesses, tell us that the proposal of a conscience clause in residential training colleges is inadmissible. They strongly hold that it would be a breach of faith to insist upon a conscience clause being applied to residential training colleges, which were founded originally with the concurrence of the State for the special religious purpose to which they are now applied. Canon Warburton believes that an obligatory conscience clause would close some colleges. One of the greatest authorities on the practical working of such institutions gives it as his opinion, that it is very undesirable to have persons of different religious faiths in the same college. And though the religious difficulty seems to be partially overcome in the case of the undenominational colleges, yet it is at the sacrifice of that denominational instruction which Mr. Sharpe regards as most valuable in producing a race of religious and moral teachers. Moreover, he thinks the introduction of a conscience clause would interfere materially with the discipline of a college. And Mr. Fitch, who commenced his career as the Principal of an undenominational college, declares himself to be entirely opposed to obliging denominational training colleges to receive persons irrespective of their religious belief. Mr. Bourne who represented the Borough Road Training College admitted that the religious instruction given, even in his own undenominational college, is not so free from anything like doctrinal colour or character as to satisfy the views of the secularist school of educational opinion. Miss Manley, too, of the Stockwell Training College, also an undenominational college, belonging to the British and Foreign School Society, made statements to a similar effect. The question, we think, is eminently one on which the opinion of those whose practical experience is widest and most profound, ought very carefully to be weighed, and we cannot doubt that the preponderance of testimony is decidedly adverse to any such fundamental change as that which the imposition of a conscience clause on residential training colleges would involve. The recommendations we shall presently make for giving enlarged facilities for training will be based on the supposition that the relations of the State and the denominational training collages will not be seriously disturbed. We see, however, no reason why grants should not be made to any residential training college which may hereafter be established by private liberality on an undenominational basis, and with a conscience clause in the trust deed.

Suggestions have been made to us from opposite quarters that, supposing the existing training colleges to remain, the grant made to them by the State should be reduced. Canon Warburton has always been in favour of increasing the entrance fees, as he thinks there is no trouble in getting the money, and the colleges would thereby be rendered more independent. But the State is said by more than one witness to get full value for its large contributions to the annual expenditure of the colleges. And


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since they are very cheaply managed, the present system, as has been already remarked, is a very good bargain for the State. Moreover, the advantages arising from the supply of trained teachers are by no means confined to the schools belonging to the denomination which educates them. In view, therefore, of the primary importance of a supply of well-trained teachers, and with the view of enabling young persons of humble origin to enter college, who cannot afford to pay high entrance fees, and who have in past years furnished so large a proportion of the most efficient of our teachers, we think it would be in every respect a doubtful economy for the State to attempt largely to reduce its maintenance grants to the present colleges.

It has been urged upon us that training should be extended to a third year, or even longer. This was originally provided for by the rules of the Education Department, but so few students were found able or willing to prolong their college life, for whom, nevertheless, an extra teaching staff had to be provided, that training was limited to two years. Canon Cromwell, the late Principal of Saint Mark's, Miss Manley, of the Stockwell Training College, and Miss Trevor, of Chichester, think that a third year of study would be of advantage to the more promising students; and Canon Daniel says that it would be the means of providing for the further education of students with special aptitudes, who might afterwards become lecturers in the colleges. But the last witness evidently is looking forward to students coming up better prepared than they are at present; and consequently to a more advanced course of study for students during their two years' residence, when the necessity for giving them so much elementary teaching ceases. Mr. Sharpe, however, sees no advantage in prolonging the course of training beyond the existing period of two years. It would certainly involve, he says, a serious additional cost, to require that students should be trained for three years instead of two. On the other hand, we think that there is much to be said for a more extended course of training. As is the master, such is the school, and our elementary teachers would be very different if their training were more thorough, and extended over a longer period, for it is not more knowledge that they need, but more penetration of their minds by that knowledge. In all good education, time is an essential element, and the same knowledge if learnt slowly is generally worth far more than if learnt quickly. Moreover, it would kindle a new spirit in the teacher if the history of education were more studied than it is; the teachers of the present day do not know enough of what has been done by the great teachers of past times, and they would learn much of the science of their profession by a study of its history.

It has been suggested that if students were allowed a third year of training, to be spent at Oxford or Cambridge, the benefit would be considerable in completing their equipment for the best class of service in their profession. To any such suggestion the objections seem to us, under existing circumstances, to be very great. To begin with, the additional expense involved would be large; but there are other objections oven more serious. The two years' work at the training college does not fit in with any of the ordinary courses of university studies. There would have to be provided at the university in such a case a separate and special course for one year, with a distinct examination and diploma. Such students would be unsettled and unfitted, rather than prepared for their work as public elementary teachers, and this proposal therefore seems to us to be inapplicable to those who are to become teachers in elementary schools. We are, on the whole, of opinion that an additional year of training would be a great advantage for some students, and only hesitate to recommend it from the doubt whether it is as yet feasible. But, at any rate, we think that picked students from training colleges might even now with advantage be grouped at convenient centres, for a third year's course of instruction.

Whilst the present training colleges well fulfil, as we have shown, the objects for which they were founded, viz., the provision of well qualified teachers for our elementary schools, it is contended, and, we think, established by evidence, that a large need exists for further facilities for training, either by development of the existing colleges or by the establishment of institutions of a new type. It is asserted by some witnesses that the undenominational colleges are too few, and Canon Warburton admits this to be the case with colleges for female students. Mr. Sharpe does not indeed think there would be any use in materially increasing the supply of trained teachers, so far as taking charge of schools is concerned, the wants of the country being already suffi-


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ciently met, since the small country schools, in their present straitened circumstances cannot afford a trained teacher. If certificates were granted only to those teachers who had gone through a course of training, the provision for training would require at least to be doubled, and the erection and maintenance of new residential colleges would involve an expenditure which the country would be reluctant to incur, so long as there were feasible schemes for accomplishing that object by any cheaper mode.

Several important schemes have been laid before us in considerable detail for supplying additional facilities for training. The first to be mentioned is one for day training colleges similar to the Normal School now in operation at Worcester, in the State of Massachusetts. The scheme was originally laid before the Education Department by the Birmingham School Board, and was fully explained to us in evidence by the Rev. E. M. MacCarthy, one of the members of that body, and head master of one of the schools on King Edward's foundation. The advocates of this plan propose to establish 10 or 12 colleges in as many large towns, accommodating 250 students each, and by preference in those towns in which colleges for higher education are to be found. To these would be admitted persons of both sexes, at the age of 16, to remain for five years' training, during the first two of which they would be full-time students at college, attending practising or model schools as required. The third year would be spent by them as half-time teachers (receiving half-pay) in some school approved by the training college authorities, within a two or three mile radius of the college. The half-time might be alternate months or quarters. The last two years would be spent in selected schools within the inspector's district, in which they would be probationary teachers on full pay, but still under some supervision from the college. There would be no religious test or instruction. It is further proposed to bridge over the period between 14, when school age ceases, and 10, the age of admission to such colleges, by payment to males of what they would otherwise earn from ordinary employments; a very small payment being supposed to be required in the case of females. During this period they would be under instruction in secondary schools, if satisfactory schools of that kind existed in the district; if not, special instruction would be provided for them by the school board or by the day training college authorities. The whole cost of this plan to the State is estimated at £60,200 for 10 colleges for the first three years of training, with an annual output of 1,200 probationary teachers. The expense is to be borne by the Consolidated Fund. Mr. MacCarthy contemplates the foundation of scholarships by which poor scholars may be maintained from 14 to 16 years of age in secondary schools, a plan which, if carried out, would entail a further cost upon the rates for preliminary education. On these proposals we remark, that, if carried out, they would at once lead to a claim from the existing colleges for largely increased grants; and they would also involve the superseding pro tanto of the pupil-teacher system. On these and on other grounds we think this plan is open to objections.

Another scheme for establishing day training colleges was laid before us by Mr. Cumin, which does not contemplate any interference with the present colleges, or with the pupil-teacher system. It proposes to utilise as day training colleges existing educational institutions, in which lectures may be delivered, covering to a considerable extent the ground of the present syllabus in force in training colleges, and to which practising schools may be hereafter attached. The training branches of these colleges would be under the management of a local committee. The financial arrangements suggested by Mr. Cumin for carrying out this proposal are as follows:

(1) A Queen's scholar who elects to be trained at a day training college will be awarded a scholarship of £25 for each year of his training. It is assumed that the course is for two years, but it would be better if it were for three years.

(2) The scholarship will be payable half-yearly to the Queen's scholar, through the local committee, upon the production of a certificate from the local committee that he has attended the prescribed classes and lectures during the preceding months.

(3) The Department will pay to the local committee in respect of each day Queen's scholar in training an additional sum of £10 in aid of the class and other expenses incurred by the committee. This grant will be paid at the end of the year upon the production of a statement, approved by the Department, and certified in such manner as the Department may require, showing the expenses incurred by the committee during the year.


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(4) Where the expenses incurred by the committee in any year do not equal or exceed £10 per day Queen's scholar, the grant offered by (3) will be proportionately reduced.

(5) The grants (that is to say, the £25 and the £10) may be withdrawn for such time as the Department determine, if in any year the local committee fail to satisfy the Department that a due proportion of the Queen's scholars trained under their direction are following the profession of a teacher in an elementary school.

"Thus, assuming", says Mr. Cumin, "that a student can board and lodge himself during the 40 weeks of training for £28, or 14s per week, he will have to pay £3 towards the cost of his maintenance. In English training colleges the fees now paid by men vary from £10 to £20 for the two years' training, and the average fee in 1886 was £8 2s. It may, therefore, be assumed that a day Queen's scholar would be able to pay about £8 a year towards his maintenance and education. Deducting the £3 required for his maintenance, he could pay the local committee £5 a year towards their expenses. This would enable the committee to spend £15 a year; that is to say, the £10 and the £5. I should suppose that, where a fair number of day Queen's scholars are trained, the above sums would meet the class fees and the other lecturer's salaries, for which the local committee would be responsible."

"I might just supplement that", Mr. Cumin goes on to say, "by a comparison with what is the actual state of things. In the training colleges for men the average annual cost is £61. This includes maintenance of buildings, taxes, and so on, which amount to £9; the cost of the Science and Art Department is £3; that makes £12. But the £9, of course, will not be incurred in the day colleges, and the £3 is repaid by the Science and Art Department. Therefore you may deduct those two amounts, and that brings the £61 down to £49, which is the net cost. This might be met by a grant of £25 for board and £10 for fees from the State; that is to say, £35, and then that would leave, even if the expenses could not be reduced, a sum to be paid by the student or by his friends of £14. That is taking a very liberal estimate, but I am only putting it in order to show that even at that liberal estimate it would not be outside the class of people who, I think, would be induced to become teachers by the superior education which they would get and the superior lectures they would attend."

This plan is recommended to us by Mr. Cumin as likely to introduce persons of superior education into the profession of elementary teachers, and at the same time to "improve very greatly the position of the teachers, and also their real merit and teaching power". He suggests that a committee, consisting of the professors whose lectures the students were attending, should become responsible to the Department for their moral supervision. No interference is contemplated with their religious views, but it is observable that in this scheme no provision for religious instruction is contemplated. This plan, if carried out, would, in his opinion, redress any grievance now alleged to arise from the great preponderance of denominational colleges. Mr. Cumin does not think that these day training colleges would come into any direct competition with residential colleges, since the close supervision which can alone be exercised in the former would naturally give their students a preference in the eyes of managers over those trained in the latter. The students of day colleges would, it is contemplated by Mr. Cumin, be the successors of the present acting, i.e., untrained teachers, rather than of those now trained in residential colleges. As these acting teachers, however, are largely employed in small schools with small salaries, it does not seem to us probable that the persons whom it is hoped to attract to such training institutions would be likely to refrain from seeking the highly-paid situations now offered in board and other large schools.

There is, indeed, a considerable concurrence of opinion among those who are engaged in the working of the present system that day training colleges can never be as effective as residential ones. Mr. Bourne, Secretary of the British and Foreign School Society, whilst wishing to see day training colleges established, thinks that their effect upon the moral character of the pupils would not be equal to that of the residential colleges. Canon Daniel, Principal of the Battersea Training College, thinks that day training colleges would be inferior both morally and intellectually. He says, "When I say they would be morally inferior, I mean that there would be no close personal relations between the teacher and the taught; there would be very little knowledge of the inner life of the students, nor would there be an opportunity


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for that friendly criticism which a master in a training college can give a student when he sees that things are going wrong. Intellectually, of course, there would be great disadvantages from much the same causes." Mr. Mansford, Vice-Principal of the Wesleyan Training College, Westminster, compares the day training colleges in Scotland with the residential colleges in England, and prefers the latter on account of the superior boarding and feeding of the students; and then, he adds, "there is another circumstance, the conditions under which a young man takes his daily meals, his conduct and associates at table, the arrangements of his bedroom, &c., have a very direct and important bearing upon his education and character. All that would be lost by attendance at day training colleges, where the students, through lack of funds, would be compelled to live under conditions which would go far to neutralise the benefits of their intellectual training." And the approval of Mr. Fitch to any system of non-residential training, to meet the requirements of another class of persons, would be conditional on its not diminishing the attractiveness and usefulness of the existing colleges and on its making provision for a strict moral control over its students. But, subject to these conditions, he is in favour of maintenance grants being made to non-resident students, who, owing to circumstances, could not use the existing training colleges, whether they are to be trained at day training colleges, or at colleges such as University College, Liverpool, Owens College, Manchester, or any other similar institution. Mr. Oakeley, who is of opinion that all teachers ought to be trained, sees no other way of effecting this except by day colleges, though he, too, prefers the existing boarding institutions, and would protect them from any injury that might arise from competition with day colleges. He believes also, that local university colleges are anxious to co-operate in some such scheme, and that a sphere of usefulness is open before it.

The witnesses who have expressed themselves favourable to this extension of training by means of day colleges do not generally look as high as the universities of Oxford and Cambridge for the educational institutions to which day training colleges may be affiliated. Canon Warburton, indeed, who speaks with the authority of an ex-inspector of female training colleges, thinks that female students would be much benefited if they could go up to Oxford and attend high-class lectures; and he believes that persons on the spot there might be induced to start arrangements to accommodate them in boarding houses, if assured of support from the Government. But Mr. Sharpe looks rather to such institutions as Owens College, The Yorkshire College, and Masons College, as likely to lend themselves most readily to the day training of elementary teachers. And in like manner Mr. Fitch does not look forward to any advantage from association with Oxford or Cambridge, but rather with colleges of the Scotch type. Canon Daniel does not approve of the suggestion to connect the training colleges with the old universities. It is rather to what are now called local university colleges that these schemes point as the nucleus of the day training college.

We have had the advantage of examining Professor Bodington on the details of a scheme for the formation of a department for training elementary teachers in connexion with the Yorkshire College at Leeds, which is not a residential college, but one only for teaching and examining. We do not, however, feel ourselves called upon to express an opinion here as to what places of higher education may ultimately co-operate with this particular scheme of day training colleges. At the Yorkshire College those general subjects which are required of candidates for certificates are already taught to ex-pupil teachers and acting teachers, and arrangements might easily, Mr. Bodington believes, be made for adding the professional subjects. He thinks that schools in the neighbourhood could be utilised, under a master of method, for practising the students in the art of teaching, and for this the school managers are willing to give facilities. Already 100 acting teachers attend the classes at the college in the evening, and on Saturdays. Arrangements could be made for from 30 to 40 pupils, who would be easily assimilated into the general body of students. The annual cost of tuition and maintenance Mr. Bodington reckons at about £55. The results for college subjects would be tested by the University, and for professional subjects by a Government examination. Though the college would give no religious teaching, Mr. Bodington has reason to believe that the various denominations in Leeds would gladly organise voluntary religious instruction for day students in training belonging to their


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own bodies. It is expected, however, that the majority of students would reside with friends or relatives. The certificate here obtained would count, and lead up to a degree in that university to which the local college was affiliated. It is estimated that the number of students to be thus instructed would not be large in proportion to the whole number in the college. But the value of an experiment of this kind, which may be undertaken at once, if the Government can encourage it with a promise of grants payable to the student for board, and to the college for teaching, he holds to be very great. The system resembles in some respects those in use in Ireland and in Scotland, and the success of the latter, Mr. Bodington thinks, promises well for the success of a similar undertaking in England. The scheme in connexion with the Yorkshire College has been favourably commended to us in memorials supported by the managers of voluntary schools in Leeds, and by the Church Day Schools Association as well as by the school board of that town. Mr. Fitch also expressed himself strongly in favour of utilising local university colleges, such as Owens College, Manchester, and University College, Liverpool, in the training of teachers, and proposed that certificates should be given to graduates of such colleges who, after attending for at least six months a course of instruction in the art and theory of teaching, and having practised for a similar period under supervision in a practising school, should pass the Education Department's examination in school management. He was likewise in favour of maintenance grants being made by the Department to non-resident students at such colleges, and also, under certain conditions, to non-resident students at day training colleges.

We have also strong evidence from Wales, where there is at present a serious deficiency in the means of training elementary teachers, in favour of utilizing for this purpose the colleges recently established at Aberystwyth, Cardiff, and Bangor. Mr. Lewis Williams, who is chairman of the School Board at Cardiff, and also a member of the Council of University College in that town, laid before us resolutions, on the one hand, from the Council of the College urging the importance of founding Queen's scholarships for elementary teachers at the Welsh university colleges, and, on the other hand, from the Cardiff School Board, pledging itself, in case such scholarships were founded, to give opportunity, in the schools of the town, for the acquisition of practical experience in teaching and in school management. The Council of the College is further prepared to supply all that would be necessary in the way of professional teaching.

Considering the demand that already exists for more ample or more generally available opportunities of training, and the importance of giving every facility for training to those who now obtain certificates without it; considering, further, that such schemes as those submitted to us would, in their nature, be tentative, that they would not involve a large outlay of capital, and would only be adopted when local circumstances seemed to invite the adaptation of some existing educational machinery to this purpose, we think it might be well that some such experiment should be made, subject to the condition, that only a limited number of students should receive Government assistance towards their training. It would be obviously impossible to limit the number of those who were desirous of being trained in such colleges at their own expense. But such a number only of students should be paid for by the Department as are found practically necessary to complete the supply of trained teachers, who, it has been already intimated, should be largely substituted for the present mass of untrained and uncertificated teachers.

In these proposals for day training the following important points, no doubt, will require the serious attention of Parliament.

1. The question of security for religious and moral instruction for those who are to be teachers.

2. The constitution of a governing body at each centre, corresponding to the managing committee of a training college, which, at some pecuniary risk, will be responsible for the professional, as distinguished from the general education of the students, and will provide model and practising schools under its own direct control and supervision.

3. The adjustment of the financial relations of the governing body with the Department, more especially in regard to the security to be given to the State that the students after being trained at the public cost will devote themselves to the work of elementary teachers.

4. The means of securing that the supply of trained day students shall not exceed the probable demands of the country.


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In reference to the question between boarding and day training colleges, we are of opinion that so long as many of the pupil-teachers are drawn from uneducated homes, and come to college imperfectly prepared, the undivided influence of a good residential college will be of advantage to them, and in any case, arrangements will be necessary for boarding some of the day students who attend colleges at a distance from their homes. But in proportion as the colleges are brought within reach of the homes of the students, and these are drawn from families of wider education, we consider that the preservation and extension of the home influence, side by side with that of the training college, may in many cases be a great advantage.

As to the government of the new day training colleges, we think, without defining too minutely how they should be administered, that their government should be both educational and of a local representative character. But whilst recommending that facilities should be afforded in one or other of the ways suggested for the establishment of such colleges, we are of opinion that no portion of the cost of establishing or maintaining them should fall upon the rates. If the great need for them exists which is asserted by some witnesses, we cannot doubt that the liberality of those who are anxious to see them provided, will furnish whatever funds may be needed.

A suggestion for the extension of the benefits of the existing residential training colleges was laid before us by Mr. Cumin; who proposed that the colleges should be permitted, though not compelled, to take day students. Such a suggestion appears to us to have very great recommendations. The children of parents of a different denomination from that of the college, if residing at home or with some family approved by their parents and the college authorities, might be received on terms similar to those of the Endowed Schools Act of 1869 (section 16), which provides for the education of day scholars at boarding schools, without their being required to join in the family worship of the school, or to receive any religions instruction to which the parents object. The increase of the number of students might enable the smaller colleges to strengthen their teaching staff. Such a plan would also supply to the day students that superintendence which we hold to be so important an element of training, the authorities of the college being bound to exercise a close supervision over those who mixed daily with their resident students; while the day students would have the great advantage of joining a body with well established traditions, and pervaded by a strong esprit de corps. The adoption of the plan of admitting day students, thus being left optional with the authorities of the college, this option would naturally be exercised only where there was room to spare, and where therefore no outlay on buildings would necessarily be called for. In the great centres of population those students of higher cultivation whom it is hoped to attract into the profession, might be led to take advantage of the facilities for training by this, and by the other plans which have been before described.

In conclusion, while unanimously recommending that the experiment of a system of day training for teachers and of day training colleges should be tried on a limited scale, we would strongly express our opinion that the existing system of residential colleges is the best both for the teachers and scholars of the elementary schools of the country, and the above recommendations are made chiefly with the view of meeting the cases of those teachers, to whom for various reasons a residence at a training college cannot at present be offered.

CHAPTER VII

ATTENDANCE AND COMPULSION

The tables furnished by the Education Department, to which we have referred in an earlier part of this report, strikingly exhibit the increase that has taken place in the number of children brought into school since the passing of the Education Act of 1870. Whereas in that year the numbers on the roll in elementary schools receiving annual grants amounted to 1,693,059, or 7.66 per cent of the estimated population of the year, this number had risen in 1886 to 4,465,000, amounting to 16.24 per cent of the estimated population for the latter year. A portion of this increase is, indeed, due to elementary schools of a quasi-public character already in existence


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which during that period came under the purview of the Department for the first time, through their admission to the annual grant. A further portion of the increase may be ascribed to the substitution of public elementary schools for private adventure schools of varying types and quality. But the larger proportion of this very remarkable increase is a genuine addition to the number of children under efficient instruction.

Mr. Cumin has given it as his opinion that at present almost every child goes to an efficient school for a certain time in its life. In like manner the belief is shared by the present and the former chairman of the London School Board that, speaking generally, the whole school population of London is now on the roll, though Mr. Diggle admits that there must always be a residuum, belonging to the neglected classes, which the machinery of the school board is unable to reach. Even these, he thinks, have at some time or other mostly attended a school. But the proportion of those not attending any school, Mr. Cumin believes, is being gradually reduced in England, and the migration of parents is, he thinks, accountable for a good many of these cases. Throughout England and Wales the Report of the Department for 1886-87 (page 242) shows that the number of scholars between 7 and 11 years of age on the registers of aided schools is equal to 95 per cent of the number of children of that age belonging to the class usually found in elementary schools. In some agricultural parishes every child of school age is known to be at school. That such a result should have been brought about in so short a time, and with so little friction, affords no small ground for satisfaction.

In like manner the regularity of attendance, as shown by the percentage of the number on the roll who are in actual average attendance, steadily, though much more slowly, increases. Almost everywhere, however, there is still room for improvement, and in some instances to a considerable extent. Throughout England and Wales the average attendance of the registered scholars has risen from 68.09 per cent, in 1870 to 76.27 in 1886. In London this figure rises to 78.9; in the counties of Bedford, Oxford, and Westmoreland to 80; and in Berks to 81 per cent. In Huddersfield, where special pains are taken to improve the attendance, it is as high as 84 per cent in the board schools, and 81 per cent in the voluntary schools; while in a large voluntary school at Liverpool it rises to 94 per cent, probably approaching the highest point to which regularity can be forced without a careful sifting of scholars, the ordinary absence from sickness and infection alone being supposed to approach 5 per cent, but it must be added that in Liverpool the names are removed from the registers more rapidly than in other districts. Any good school in a town which from its popularity is able to pick its scholars finds little trouble in getting regular attendance; and the same may be said in many a country school in which the clergyman, the teacher, and the leading residents, exert all their influence to get the children to attend. One condition, however, of a high percentage of attendance is that the school shall be thoroughly good, and another that the children shall like it. This is most likely to be the case where the buildings are warm and cheerful, and where the school is in charge of a teacher who does not think that his duties to his scholars begin and end with the school hours, and who lives in the midst of them.

Among the causes which have largely tended to promote regularity of attendance, we should do wrong to omit the value which parents who have themselves reaped the advantage of elementary education attach to a school for their children. A person wholly illiterate is probably sceptical as to the benefits of education; one who has been himself educated, even though imperfectly, is better able to comprehend the value to his children of the discipline and instruction to be gained by punctual attendance at school. The former will not exercise his personal influence to carry out school regulations, while the latter, being alive to the need of education and of intelligent training, will be more ready to co-operate with the school authorities. From the educational progress recorded since the date of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, it is manifest that this class of motives must have been for some years largely increasing in operation. Neither ought we to omit from consideration the improved homes and greater comfort at the present time enjoyed by the working classes, which tend lo increase their sense of the ill consequences attending upon ignorance.

It is, however, to compulsion, first partially introduced in 1870, widely extended in 1876, and fully and universally established in 1880, that the increase of the numbers on the roll is largely attributable. Among the witnesses before us, Mr. Stewart appears


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to stand alone in his opinion that, provided the required accommodation had been furnished, the result would have been much the same if attendance had not been obligatory. But to estimate fairly the influence which compulsion has had upon the great increase in the number of children attending school, to which we have already called attention, we must speak of it under the three heads into which its operation may be divided. There is, first the direct influence of compulsion. This is exerted over parents who are indifferent to the moral and intellectual welfare of their children, who are very eager to obtain what advantage they can from those children's earnings, but who never look beyond. The fear of punishment has, no doubt, affected this section of the population who send their children because they feel obliged; although in large towns, by frequent removals from one neighbourhood to another, they often elude the vigilance of the attendance officers. But, secondly, compulsion exercises an indirect influence. Many parents are apathetic, yield weakly to their children's wish not to go to school, or find it convenient to use their services at home, and so, if left to themselves, would make but little effort to insist upon their children's attendance at school. But they are keenly alive to the disgrace of being brought before a magistrate, the fear of which supplies a stimulus sufficient to make them do their duty in this respect. In addition, the existence of a compulsory law has considerably affected public opinion, and has done much to secure a larger school attendance by making people recognise that the State regards them as neglecting their duty if their children remain uneducated. It is probable that the law of compulsion has exercised greater influence on school attendance from these causes than any other. Lastly, the introduction of labour certificates by the Act of 1876, has exerted considerable power over the minds of many thrifty parents, who have been anxious for their children to obtain exemption from school attendance at as early an age as possible, that they may begin to earn money for the benefit of the family. But however adequate an instrument compulsion has proved for getting children on to the school register, it is confessedly much less effectual in increasing the regularity of attendance. The children who have been enrolled by its means come chiefly from the more ignorant and careless families, and are naturally the least likely to attend regularly. And, in addition, the latitude allowed in carrying out the law of compulsion is too great, to secure a satisfactory amount of regularity, seven attendances out of every ten most frequently satisfying the authorities.

As a means of enforcing compulsion on certain classes of children, the day industrial schools established in several large cities under the Act of 1876, have been found efficacious. Irregular children, and children of negligent parents, are detained in these schools, in which they are fed as well as taught; and orders are made by the magistrates on the parents for contributions towards the cost. A large number of the scholars who have been sent to these schools merely on the grounds of irregularity are discharged after only a few months' detention, on condition that they attend an ordinary elementary school with regularity; and their attendance while thus "on licence" is supervised by a special officer, attached to the staff of the day industrial school, instead of by the ordinary attendance officer. The results in many cases have been most satisfactory, the attendances of these children in Liverpool after leaving the day industrial school having reached 87 per cent of all possible attendances. Detention in these schools further provides a suitable substitute in many cases for commitments to ordinary boarding industrial schools, in which the public expenditure involved is very heavy. The average detention in a boarding industrial school is 5¾ years, and the average cost rather more than £20 a year. Each child, therefore, detained in such a school costs on an average about £115, of which about £85 falls upon the local authorities and Her Majesty's Treasury. A successful experiment made by the Rochester School Board, which has established a day industrial school of a special type, shows that it is possible for the smaller boards to deal at a very reasonable cost with the case of children now usually sent to boarding, industrial or truant schools. We have not taken special evidence upon the subject of industrial schools, as a Royal Commission has recently reported to Your Majesty respecting them.

Another aid to the enforcement of compulsion which has been found useful in some districts, has been the establishment of truant schools, in which children are detained for short periods under a discipline which, in its earlier stages at least, is of a punitive character.


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But beyond the point at which the efficacy of compulsion becomes exhausted, the influence and resources of managers and teachers often secure good results in the matter of regularity and of voluntary attendance beyond the obligatory standard; and we think a good deal more might be accomplished by the same means. It is generally admitted that, although compulsion may be necessary in certain cases, it is most desirable to minimize the resort to it as far as possible, by appealing to other and higher motives, and especially by efforts to interest parents in their children's progress. Among many other means by which this end might be secured, it has been suggested to us that, as has already been done with very good results in some schools, a report should, at the close of each school year, be sent home to the parent of each child, conveying information as to the child's punctuality, general conduct, and educational progress. Another means of attaining the desired end would be to encourage scholars to take home some of their most interesting reading books, and to read them to their parents, most of whom would be able to appreciate their progress in reading, and might also often be interested in the subject of the book. If manual training, moreover, be introduced into elementary schools, the parents' appreciation of its value will, it may be hoped, stimulate them to make increased efforts, not only to secure regular attendance, but also to prolong their children's stay at school beyond the period legally enforced. Prizes for regular attendance have been tried with good effect by the Liverpool Council of Education, a voluntary body under whose auspices a most efficient system of co-operation between board and voluntary schools has been established. In Manchester the school board gives rewards for good attendance, and is satisfied with the results.

The Selmeston plan, introduced by Rev. W. D. Parish, which has found many imitators among the managers of voluntary schools, deserves separate mention. In this small village in Sussex, where formerly, Mr. Parish states, the attendance was shocking, the school fee was raised in 1871 from 1d to 3d a week with the promise of a return of 2d a week at the end of the year to each child who had attended 240 times, together with a prize of 1s for each pass at the inspector's examination. The result is said to have been that the regularity of attendance is far in advance of any school in the neighbourhood, nor has any case of non-attendance ever been referred to the magistrates. This plan, however, involves so large an immediate expenditure per head out of voluntary sources that it is not likely to be generally adopted, unless the circumstances of a district are exceptional. But where no special expedient is resorted to, many witnesses concur in representing that a great deal of power may still be exerted by the personal influence both of managers and teachers to improve the attendance, even where compulsion has exhausted its powers.

Many questions have been put to the witnesses before us as to the efficacy of the law of compulsion, and its administration by the local authorities, the attendance officers, and the magistrates. Of the action, or rather the inaction, of the magistrates complaints are very general. In the replies we have received to Circular A, both the managers of voluntary schools and school boards complain that compulsion is not carried out efficiently. We are told that there is no uniform system; that the magistrates are lenient, and will not enforce the penalties; that the expense of prosecution is too great; and that the procedure is extremely dilatory and inefficient. It is also suggested that the costs should fall upon the parents; that the fines should be increased and a payment enforced: and that a mode of legal compulsion should be adopted which does not treat parents as criminals. In some cases managers complain that the local authorities are indifferent, and do not enforce attendance; and that when members of those bodies are interested in juvenile labour, the law is evaded, and employers are never summoned. Complaints are also made that the attendance officers are inefficient; that their districts are much too large; that many of them have other occupations, for instance, that some are relieving officers; and that the magistrates will not support them when they are energetic. A few witnesses suggest that the Department should undertake compulsion, and that the police should be employed as attendance officers. In the replies of the head teachers to Circular D, the same complaints are made, and with greater frequency. It is said that the compulsory clauses are inoperative; and that neither magistrates, local authorities, nor attendance officers are efficient. Complaints are made that the fines imposed are so trivial that the children when employed can earn many times the amount during their absence from school. Some suggest that school cases should be dealt with in a special court, or on separate days; others recommend that convic-


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tion should be prompt, fines heavy, and that employers of children under the legal age should be severely punished.

It is but fair to notice Mr. Cumin's remark, that the blame may sometimes lie with the local school authorities, who have not always been judicious in the selection of cases for prosecution. Canon Warburton, who thinks the bench does not now deal strictly enough with offenders, considers it fortunate that in the earlier stages of compulsion they took a lenient view of their duty. The London police magistrates have for some reasons so limited the number of summonses to be heard in any one day that the carrying out of the compulsory law is said to be seriously impeded in the case of school board prosecutions. But, apart from this, the ordinary police court has been represented to us as a specially unsuitable place for assembling the parents of irregular scholars, and it has been proposed to appoint special magistrates and special places for hearing school board cases. Mr. Buxton, the late chairman of the London School Board, complains that the attitude of the Metropolitan police magistrates has even tended to prejudice the public against the law, and to throw the burden of the costs on the school board instead of on the offenders. We invite attention to the list of cases referred to by Mr. Buxton in support of his complaint, which will be found in the Appendix (page 1021) of our Second Report. It has been contended that it would be of advantage to appoint a special magistrate for London to adjudicate on school attendances cases, who should hold sittings in the various districts of the metropolis at an hour and place when other police cases were not being heard; but we think such a plan objectionable on principle. We have also had some evidence to show that the dilatory process of recovering fines under the Summary Jurisdiction Act of 1879 has, in some cases, encouraged parents to defy the law, and that it has added greatly to the labour involved in carrying out compulsion.

The chief complaint with respect to attendance officers is that they are too few in number for the work to be done, that they have other duties to attend to, which engross too much of their time, and that they are too easily satisfied with an imperfect attendance. We are told of schools which are only visited two or three times a year by the attendance officer, who is satisfied with one out of every two attendances. Under these circumstances it is plain that such an agency is powerless to grapple effectively with the evil of irregularity. In country districts, however, the influence of the managers, and a little personal trouble on the part of the teachers out of school hours, are as effective for securing regularity as the action of the attendance officer. Meanwhile the managers can always appeal to the local authority in cases where that officer is unable or unwilling to discharge his duties efficiently. We are of opinion that periodical returns of absentees from each school should always be called for by the local authority, with whom, and not with their attendance officer, it rests to decide upon the number of attendances that will justify them in not enforcing compliance with the letter of their byelaws.

We think also that it is of great importance that local committees should be more generally appointed in each district by school attendance committees, under section 32 of the Act of 1876. The members of such a committee would themselves be likely to know the circumstances of each family, and, as they could deal with cases of irregularity on the spot, the parents would not be compelled to attend the meetings of the school attendance committee, often held at long distances from their homes. It is much to be desired that school attendance committees should hold meetings from time to time in various parts of their district accessible to the population.

Many complaints have been made against school attendance committees; but one of the witnesses who complained, when reminded of the fact that the average attendance in five at least of the rural counties, which are chiefly under school attendance committees, rose to nearly 82 per cent, whereas the average of England was only 76 per cent, admitted that, judged by results, these local authorities could not be so negligent of their duty as was sometimes assumed. This admission is confirmed by a table printed in the Appendix to our third Report (pages 740-1), which fully bears out the assertion of those who maintain that as far as regularity of attendance is concerned the efficacy of school attendance committees is at least as great as that of school boards. The conditions, however, of regular school attendance are so complex, and so essentially different for urban and rural districts, that we cannot make any certain comparison between the relative efficiency of compulsion, as enforced by school attendance


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committees and school boards, based simply on school attendance. In the country the element of distance and bad roads tells against attendance; on the other hand, the accommodation is generally sufficient in quantity, and the schools, having a settled constituency, do not suffer from the evil of migration. In the towns there is sometimes a deficiency of school supply; the poorest parents are less under the control of public opinion, and the low parts of large towns attract a population more difficult to deal with than any in the rural districts. It is admitted, that school attendance committees, which rest on the area of the union, are likely to be more effective in enforcing attendance than boards elected by parishes with a small population. In small areas, such as many of the rural parishes, many school boards appear to be peculiarly ineffective in carrying out compulsion, and some have occasionally to be declared in default. On the other hand, many of the larger school boards leave little to be desired in the vigour with which they look after the attendance. Huddersfield appears to be a good example of what may be done in a large population, where the board acts vigorously, employs sufficient officers, and is backed by a sympathising bench. The table inserted below, which appeared in the Report of the Committee of Council (1881-2) (p. xxxi), throws light upon the comparative activity at that date of the various classes of educational authorities:

[click on the image for a larger version]

The evidence before us generally tends to the conclusion that parents are becoming more and more reconciled to compulsion. But from Welwyn in Herts, Menai Bridge in Wales, and Dibden in Hampshire, we have been informed that it is very distasteful to parents in those places. These, however, are just the localities where it is said by the same witnesses that compulsion is not effectively carried out.

Unfortunately the desire to get the standard of exemption passed has not strengthened, but has rather superseded, that desire of parents for the improvement of their children, which was the only motive to be appealed to before attendance at school became compulsory. From every quarter we have been told that a very great majority of children now leave school as soon as they are legally exempted from attendance, and that the education of the majority of scholars is thus prematurely closed. We find it difficult, however, to reconcile some of the statements made to us, as to the withdrawal of children from school at an earlier age than formerly, with the figures in one of the returns furnished to us by the Education Department to be found in Appendix D of our First Report (page 522). These figures, for purposes of comparison, may be conveniently given for three years of special interest in our educational history, 1870, 1875, and 1880, and for 1886. They show the following percentage of scholars on the registers of schools inspected in each of these years:

[click on the image for a larger version]

The gross number of scholars, represented by these percentages, show a very considerable increase. The number of children above 12 on the registers was -

In 1870161,703
     1875264,700
     1880498,199
     1886536,616


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The remarkable increase between 1875 and 1880 may probably be attributed to the universal application of direct compulsion in 1880, although the improvements in the Code of 1875 do not appear to have been followed by a corresponding improvement in the attendance of the scholars. In parishes where there is much demand for children's labour, and where the standard of exemption is as low as the fourth, several witnesses have assured us that few children remain at school after 10 years of age. But the consequences of premature removal from school, on passing the standard prescribed as a condition of labour, are even more serious where the demand for juvenile labour is slack. An interval then occurs between the completion of school life and the entry on employment which, in the case of boys especially, is most injurious to character, and leads to the loss of what little of intellectual acquirements they had gained at school. At Stoke-upon-Trent, for instance, Sir Lovelace Stamer points out that while a total exemption from school can, under the byelaws, be easily reached at 11, under the Factory Acts full time work is not attainable till the age of 13, and we gather from his evidence that the interval between 11 and 13 is too often wasted in idleness with the worst effects on those who are condemned to it. In this respect, therefore, the forward child is left in a worse position than the wastrel, who must either go to work or continue at school till he is 14 years old.

Two classes of remedies have been proposed to us for the premature removal of children from school, immediately on their passing the minimum legal standard of exemption. The most obvious one is that of raising the standard, so as to make compulsory education cover a larger part of a child's life. We have heard much evidence tending to show that the fifth standard might be made the universal minimum standard of exemption, as is the case in Scotland, without inflicting any serious injury on parents or employers. Such is the opinion, for example, of Mr. Synge, H.M. Inspector in the eastern counties, with this proviso, however, that he would accept a pass in two subjects as a qualification for labour, if in the previous standard the pass had been a complete one; and he would give an additional qualification for labour, to be obtained by attendance only, so that dull children, whose school life is now prolonged to no good purpose after brighter children of their own age have been discharged, might be set free to go to work on an attendance qualification in default of one gained by attainments. Several other experts advocated the universal adoption of the fifth standard for exemption from school attendance.

Mr. Oakeley, whose experience as an inspector is long and varied, has a still bolder proposal to make, viz., that educational standards of exemption should be entirely abolished, and that an age standard should be substituted under the provisions he suggests. Half-time employment would, according to his proposal, not be accessible to a child till it was 10, or better still 11, and all children would be forced to remain at school till they were 13. It is obvious to remark that such a proposal would withdraw from the whole of school life the stimulus to attendance now afforded by the desire to obtain the prescribed educational qualification for employment. Nevertheless, Mr. Harrison, Her Majesty's Inspector for the Liverpool district, concurs in this recommendation. And it is a proof how grave must be the mischief for which so drastic a remedy is thought by experienced inspectors to be the only cure. We are bound, however, to record that we have received evidence from teachers and clergymen in the agricultural districts, to the effect that the compulsory retention of children at school to a greater age than at present is not feasible in those districts, chiefly owing to the poverty of their parents, but in some degree also to the requirements of agriculture, and these witnesses could not be brought to concur in the adoption of the fifth standard as a uniform one of exemption.

In the replies which have been made to Circulars A and D, Managers, School Boards, and Teachers allude frequently to the want of a uniform standard of exemption, and many request that the standard of age should be raised. They say that there is great want of uniformity in the byelaws of neighbouring school districts, and that the byelaws are often not in accord with the Factory Acts. Some say that a child may leave school after passing the exemption standards, or attend very irregularly for a year or more, before he can go to work under the Factory Acts. Parents, we are told, are prone to accept the minimum of school work fixed by the exemption


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laws as a maximum. Half-time is generally disliked by those teachers and managers from whom replies have been received; it is said to disorganise the school, and to be impossible except in purely half-time schools. The suggestions as to compelling attendance at school vary greatly in different districts; some would adopt a standard exemption, and others an age exemption only. The expression of opinion is very strongly in favour of a longer school life. Some think that managers and local authorities should have the right of exempting children in harvest and busy seasons, a power which the latter already possess, and also dull children; and many desire that the Education Department should fix a uniform age standard of exemption for the whole country. But it must be remembered that not only agricultural but many other employments require to be begun at an early age; and that industrial education is not always to be postponed for longer instruction at school. While we do not desire to see either the standard or range of elementary education unduly restricted, we must bear in mind that, in the case of children preparing for many employments, including agriculture, a prolonged school life is incompatible with the practical instruction of the field or workshop, which must necessarily commence at an early age.

We have received further evidence on the effects on the education of a child of the system of half time exemption, as it is provided for by the Education Acts. The principle of day half-time has not yet been widely or successfully adopted in rural districts, and the general opinion seems to be that it is not suited to the existing requirements of agriculture in this country. Its advantages as a means of increasing the slender incomes of large families in rural districts have to be considered, but, in our opinion, these would be sufficiently met by the arrangement already sanctioned by the 9th section of the Act of 1876, which provides that the children actually needed for farming operations may be absent from school during those times when there is a pressure of work suitable to them, requiring them to attend school regularly during the remainder of the year, and also during the busy months, unless they can show that they are bonâ fide employed in farm work. Subject to the recommendation which we have just made as to the rural districts, we are of opinion that the minimum age for half-time exemption from school attendance should be 11, and the minimum age of full-time exemption 13. We think that the case of those young persons who have failed to make due progress in the day school may be best considered when we deal with the question of evening and continuation schools. A further point in connexion with half-time attendance at school deserves attention. The Act of 1870 (sec. 74) provides for partial exemption in the case of any child, between 10 and 13, who passes a standard prescribed by the byelaws of its district. This privilege is limited by the byelaws generally, and also by the model byelaws of the Department, to children who are "shown to the satisfaction of the local authority to be beneficially and necessarily employed" when not at school. There is, moreover, a provision in the Code (Article 15) for securing to schools certain pecuniary advantages in respect of the attendance of half-time scholars, in compensation for the extra trouble and expense which they necessarily entail upon the managers and teachers. In the Instructions issued to the inspectors after the adoption of this Article (1882), the reasons for it were given in a circular dated 16th March 1883, in the following words:

"This article must be read in connexion with Article 11, in which a half-time scholar is defined as 'A scholar certified by the local authority to be employed in conformity with the byelaws'. The rule laid down in Article 15 was adopted with the view of encouraging a systematic alternative of work and instruction for children who are obliged to go to labour before par.sing the standard of proficiency fixed by the byelaws of the district for total exemption from the obligation to attend school. It was not meant to apply to cases of desultory school attendance, or to give any benefit to schools in respect of merely irregular scholars who have passed what is called the half-time standard, and are not habitually and necessarily at work when not at school." The system of half-time is firmly planted in the manufacturing districts under the Factory Acts, which, however, are not within the terms of our inquiry. The education of the children employed in workshops and factories is regulated by the Factory Act of 1878, and the beneficial result of that measure is shown by the fact that in the districts to which it mainly applies, a very large proportion of the scholars in the highest standards now consists of factory scholars. It is hoped that the article in question will secure to the children employed in other labour, not regulated by any Act, the benefit of similar educational advantages. In like manner in 1886 (Report of Committee of Council, 1885-6, page 166) the inspectors are told, "you should explain to the members of school boards that a child is bound to attend school full time whenever it is not beneficially and necessarily employed, and


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that a bonâ fide half-timer meant, a child who is legally at work when not at school." All this we are surprised to find is now omitted from the inspectors' annual instructions, with the result that the bearing of the article in question upon school attendance likely to be forgotten, and that half-timers, other than those working under the factory laws, may probably be taken as meaning nothing more than irregular scholars. The last Report of the Department (1886-7, page 223) shows that while no fewer than 1,437,113 children from 10 to 13 were in 1886 borne on the registers of aided schools, only 168,453 were returned as half-timers under the Code. This latter number probably represents but few scholars other than factory scholars. Unless the object of the article, as originally explained by the Department, is better understood, and the half-time requirements of the byelaws are more stringently enforced, we fear that the children will lose the discipline of school, without having the benefit of the discipline of work.

In connexion with school attendance some important evidence was given before us with respect to the employment in theatres of young children, usually selected for their brightness and intelligence, employment which naturally interferes with their education, and is said to be generally demoralizing, both at the time, and by unfitting them for ordinary work when they become too old to appear on the boards. Mrs. Fawcett, who has given great attention to this matter, states that children are apprenticed to the stage when under five years of age, sometimes at three, for a term of seven to nine years; that they are employed for a considerable period during the day, and till a late hour at night, having often to return home long distances alone. We agree with Mrs. Fawcett in thinking that it is the duty of the State to step in between these children and the employers, whether parents or others, whose cupidity seeks to make a profit out of their work, especially as we are told that it is not the poorest parents who send their children on the stage. Certain provisions in the Act of 1876 bear upon these cases, but they do not stop all employment between 5 and 14, and they do not apply to children under five years of age. We are informed that the London School Board has been most anxious to deal with this evil, but has found that its legal powers were insufficient. The law on this subject is stated to be defective, and we recommend that it be strengthened. We are of opinion, from considerations of health as well as of morality and education, that one remedy for a state of things which affects a large number of young children (about 1,000 in London alone) would be to bring theatrical employment under the Factory Acts.

We have thought it well here, in conclusion, to summarise the obstacles to school attendance, which are alleged to exist by those who are actively engaged in education, although many of these obstacles have already been incidentally mentioned. First in importance is the desire of parents to profit by their children's labour; a motive, however, which acts at the same time up to a certain point as the chief incentive to keep children steadily at school, in order that they may be free to work at the earliest moment. And so far as premature employment is an obstacle, the poverty of many of the parents, both in towns and in country districts, makes it one exceedingly difficult to remove, and demanding very considerate treatment. The indifference of parents to education for its own sake, must, we fear, be reckoned as an obstacle, which has perhaps been aggravated by compulsion, and has, possibly, not yet reached its worst; though we believe that it will tend to decrease in proportion to the improvement of schools. Again, truancy contrary to the wish of parents is answerable for a certain amount of absence from school. Home needs, such as sickness in the family, the absence of the mother at work and nursing babies, keep many girls away, sometimes for long periods. In towns the migration of families, in the country bad roads and bad weather, are said to be fruitful sources of irregularity. We feel bound to draw attention to the tabulated replies from the managers of voluntary schools, school boards, and teachers, to whom our printed inquiries were addressed, which bear witness to widely spread dissatisfaction with the administration of the compulsory clauses of the Education Acts, accompanied by a demand for a still more stringent system of compulsion. This expression of opinion, on the part of many of those conversant with the daily working of our educational system, respecting one of the most recent and most important provisions of the Education Acts, requires from us a special notice. On consideration, it will hardly be a matter of surprise that this opinion should so largely prevail amongst managers and teachers. The former are often making great personal


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sacrifices to provide the education offered by their schools; both are daily witnesses of the vast benefits of it; and they have painful evidence of the difficulty of securing satisfactory results without regular attendance: while their schools, under the present system of Government grants, have a considerable pecuniary interest in the regular attendance of all the children in their district. Hence they are impatient for the time when every child should be in its place whenever the school is open, and they are naturally intolerant of any delay or hesitation in the use of the powers of the law to attain at once this desirable end.

We are of opinion that, though there are undoubtedly very considerable local shortcomings calling for amendment, the vast increase in the school population receiving regular instruction, a result obtained in the short period of 17 years, may be considered most satisfactory, and that the absence of any serious opposition to compulsion on the part of the wage-earning classes, notwithstanding its grave interference with their homes, is largely owing to the gradual steps by which it has been introduced. We cannot therefore endorse any general condemnation of the manner in which "compulsion" has hitherto been administered. At the same time, we recommend that a constant vigilance should be exercised by the Department with regard to the efficient action of local authorities in securing the attendance of children at school, in conformity with section 27 of the Act, 1876, both through their inspectors and by means of periodical returns; and that the Department should report to Parliament at stated intervals upon the whole subject. There is a very general agreement among the managers, and still more among the teachers, that the age and standard for partial and for total exemption might be considerably raised. We have not recommended as great an increase in these requirements as is generally asked for, but we think that the consensus of opinion expressed will make it easier to carry out the alterations in the age of exemption which we have suggested.





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PART IV

Education and Instruction given in Public Elementary Schools
Chapter I - Religious and Moral Training.
Chapter II - Curriculum of Instruction.
Chapter III - Manual and Technical Instruction.
Chapter IV - Various Classes of Elementary Schools.
Chapter V - Elementary Schools and Higher Education.

CHAPTER I

RELIGIOUS AND MORAL TRAINING

Among the vital changes introduced by the Education Act of 1870, none was preceded by a more protracted controversy, or occasioned more anxiety to those who were solicitous for Religious Education than the altered attitude which the State then took up towards it. Religious education ceased henceforth to be a necessary condition of a grant. It was no longer examined into by H.M. inspectors. Moreover, the Act expressly affirmed the principle that the Government grant was in future to be paid solely in respect of secular instruction.* By this legislation, also, it should always be remembered, Private Adventure Schools, which necessarily adapted themselves to the various views and wishes of parents, have been almost destroyed, and the children of all the wage-earning classes, to speak generally, are compelled by law to spend all the week-day time available for their education, in the years before they begin to earn their own living, in schools for the teaching and training in which the State is largely responsible.

Having been commissioned by Your Majesty to inquire into the working of the Elementary Education Acts, we should fail in our duty did we not review the Religious and Moral effect of the present system, and of the provisions made by law for enabling and controlling religious as well as secular instruction. While the whole Commission is animated by one and the same desire to secure for the children in the Public Elementary Schools the best and most thorough instruction in Secular subjects, suitable to their years and in harmony with the requirements of their future life, it is also unanimously of opinion that their Religious and Moral Training is a matter of still higher importance alike to the children, the parents, and the nation, though the views of its members differ as to the method whereby this object of supreme moment should be attained.

Upon the importance of giving Religious as well as Moral Instruction, as part of the teaching in day public elementary schools, much evidence was brought before us.

*It was made necessary by the provisions of the Act of 1870, that a notice should be conspicuously put up in every school, Voluntary and Board alike, that it shall be no condition of the child's admission to the school -

that he attends or abstains from attending any Sunday school or place of worship; or
that he attends any Religious Observance or Instruction;
It was also provided -
that the times of Religious Instruction or Observance should be only either at the beginning or end of the school meetings;
that it shall be no part of the duty of Her Majesty's Inspectors to inquire into any Instruction given in Religious Subjects, or to examine any scholar in Religious Knowledge, or in any Religious Subject or Book;
that any scholar may be withdrawn from any Religious Teaching or Observances;
that in Board Schools no religious formulary, which is distinctive of any particular Religious Denomination, shall be taught;
that the Parliamentary Grant shall not be made in respect of any instruction in Religious Subjects, and that the condition of the grant shall not require that the school shall be in connexion with a Religious Denomination, or that Religious Instruction shall be given in the school.

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Amongst many other witnesses we select a few representative names of large experience. The Rev. J. Duncan, secretary of the National Society, thought it impossible to draw a distinction between religious and moral teaching, as moral teaching is of necessity the result of the religious teaching; in his view, moral teaching could not be given effectually without teaching the religious doctrines on which it is based. Mr. Matthew Arnold, H.M. Inspector, had seen no successful teaching yet in which the teaching of morals was separated from the usual religious sanctions; but such a way, he stated, might be invented. Canon Warburton, another of the most experienced of H.M. Inspectors, regarded moral instruction as a very wretched substitute for religion, but at the same time he thought that such teaching did good. The Rev. Dr. Richards, Roman Catholic Diocesan Inspector of Schools, regards religion as the only real basis for moral training, and he stated that he is always afraid, when it is not made so, that there will be sooner or later an outbreak of immorality. Many other witnesses have offered us much evidence as to the importance attached to giving religious and moral teaching in our Day Schools.

With respect to the opinion of the country generally upon the subject of Religious and Moral training in the day schools, there can be no doubt. If we refer to the Voluntary Schools, in most of which the whole basis of education is religious, we find that there has been a vast increase since 1870 of such schools, erected and maintained at great pecuniary sacrifice on the part of their supporters, and held in much favour by large masses of the population. And if we ask what is the testimony of School Boards, we find that out of 2,225 School Boards representing the judgment of more than 16 millions of our population, only seven in England and 50 in Wales, according to the Parliamentary Returns of 1879, 1884, and 1886, have dispensed entirely with Religious Teaching or Observances. Most of the School Boards of large towns, following the example of London, have adopted careful schemes for Religious Instruction. Of the large School Boards, one alone dispenses with reading the Bible, and one other alone dispenses with prayers and hymns, while those small boards which shut out direct religious teaching from their day schools are, in the most part, in Wales, where the Sunday school system powerfully affects the whole population. Thus both Voluntary Schools and School Boards bear unmistakeable testimony to the determination of the people that their children's education should be Religious and Moral. If further evidence is needed, we have only to refer to the admissions of every witness we have examined on this subject, whether favourable or hostile to teaching religion in the day schools, which we shall set forth in greater detail later in this chapter, as well as to the replies furnished to the printed questions we addressed to all the teachers, the managers, and school boards in certain Typical Counties and Districts which are enumerated below.* Thus all the evidence is practically unanimous as to the desire of the parents for the religious and moral training of their children.

Before reviewing the effects of the religious and moral teaching and training given under the present system, and before proposing such improvements as may seem to us desirable, we deem it to be our duty to state briefly the object at which we think we ought to aim, and the principles which should govern the action of the nation with respect to it. The object clearly should be the elevation of those classes of the community for whom the education is designed. The character of Englishmen has stood high for integrity, honour, perseverance, and industry, and has not lagged behind that of other people for patriotism and the social virtues. Our object is to preserve what has been good in the past from being tarnished in the future, and to improve and elevate our fellow countrymen so far as possible. Whilst differing widely in our views concerning religious truth, we are persuaded that the only safe foundation on which to construct a theory of morals, or to secure high moral conduct, is the religion which our Lord Jesus Christ has taught the world. As we look to the Bible for instruction concerning morals, and take its words for the declaration of what is morality, so we look to the same inspired source for the sanctions by which men may

*Circular A was addressed to the managers of all Voluntary Schools and to all School Boards in the following counties:

Berkshire. Durham. Lancashire. Lincolnshire. Devonshire. Gloucestershire. Leicestershire. Staffordshire. Dorsetshire. Kent.
Circular D was addressed to the head teachers in the following districts:
West Riding of York. Bedfordshire. Sussex. Birkenhead. Chelsea. Two Mining Unions in Glamorganshire. Wiltshire. West Ham, Essex. Greenwich. Merionethshire. Warwickshire. Southwark.

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be led to practise what is there taught, and for instruction concerning the help by which they may be enabled to do what they have learned to be right.

Such then being the views of the Commission and of the Country as to the Religious and Moral Training in the Education of all children, we think it right to begin this part of our Report with stating the evidence we have received, and the conclusions we have arrived at, on this all-important subject. We therefore proceed to state the facts as to Religious teaching and Observances which are given in the replies to our circulars above-mentioned as forming a valuable portion of the evidence upon which our Report is based. They came from so large a percentage of the schools in important Typical and varied Counties and Districts, of which the names were given in the former page, that we may consider them to represent approximately the general practice of the whole Country. In the return A from managers of Voluntary Schools* and from School Boards in 10 counties,† the Managers of the Voluntary Schools state respecting these Voluntary Schools that:

1. In 102 schools no religious instruction is given.‡
2. In 1,261 schools (35 per cent of all the answers) religious teaching is encroached upon before the Government inspection, in most cases slightly.
3. In 3,618 schools the religious teaching is given by the teacher, in only 2,079 of which (55 per cent of all the answers) it is also given by other persons (clergy or ladies).
4. In 286 schools (8 per cent) the registers of attendance are marked before religious teaching and observances.
In 2,925 schools the registers of attendance are marked after religious teaching and observances.
In 443 schools the registers of attendance are marked both before and after.
The returns from the School Boards in the same counties show that:
1. Thirty-three boards give no religious teaching in their schools.§
2. In the schools of 103 boards (or 30 per cent of boards which make returns) religious teaching is encroached upon before the Government inspection, in most cases slightly.
3. In the schools of 358 boards the teachers give the religious teaching, and in the schools of 43 of the above boards some other persons also give it.
4. In the schools of 11 boards the registers are marked before the Religious Teaching and Observances.
In the schools of 318 boards, after.
In the schools of 37 boards, both before and after.
In the Return D from the Head Teachers of all schools, both Voluntary and Board, in 12 counties or populous urban districts it is stated that:
1. In 320 departments (under a head teacher), or 9 per cent of all that sent in replies, no religious teaching is given.
2. In 1,013, or 32 per cent, religious teaching is encroached upon to a slight extent (except in York West Riding, where it is reported that "one-half the time is encroached upon in many cases") before the Government inspection.
3. In 3,220 departments the teachers give the religious teaching, and in 1,062 of these other persons (chiefly clergy or ladies) also give it.
4. In 281 departments the registers are marked before the Religious Teaching or Observances.
In 2,344 after; and in 741 both before and after.
We would call attention to two serious dangers arising from the system largely prevailing (as will have been seen from the above Returns) both in Voluntary and Board Schools, of marking the Attendance Registers of the children only after the morning religious teaching, prayers, &c. One danger is that children, parents, and teachers may be thereby encouraged to consider religious matters as of less importance than

*It must be remembered that Voluntary Schools include those belonging to the Church of England, Wesleyan Methodists, Roman Catholics, British and Foreign School Society, and some secularists.

†See list already given.

‡Principally British schools.

§See last Return to Parliament, ordered May 1888, which will enumerate the school boards giving no religious teaching, and will contain the plans adopted by all the other school boards respecting religious teaching, reading of the Bible, and religious observances under the provisions of the Act of 1870. The figures given elsewhere in this Report are taken from the Parliamentary Returns from 1879-1885. The Return ordered by the House of Lords in May 1888, has not yet been presented to Parliament, but will form Vol. [number missing] of Report.


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the secular teaching, the other that the most idle, ill-disposed children, and those of negligent or dissolute parents, for whom such instruction is of special value, will naturally only attend after the religious teaching is over. We recommend, therefore, in order to avoid those dangers, and for the purpose of securing punctuality of attendance, that the rule should be laid down that all registers should be marked before the Religious Teaching and Observances, the most scrupulous care being taken in accordance with the letter and spirit of the Education Acts to provide for the case of children whose parents object to such teaching. We believe that there can be no difficulty in working such a rule as this, since it has been practically adopted and practised for some time by the Liverpool School Board, in combination with the managers of the Voluntary Schools, for purposes of discipline.

We now proceed to consider what is the nature and value of the Religious Instruction actually given in all Public Elementary Schools. First, as regards Voluntary Schools, a comprehensive answer, drawn from official records, can be given only in the case of those Church of England schools which are visited annually by the diocesan inspectors. From the volume issued by the National Society, in which their reports are collected, a very favourable opinion would be gathered on the whole of the quality of that instruction in the majority of Church of England schools reported on. Several witnesses of wide experience have likewise been examined by us as to the nature of the religious teaching given in these schools. They entirely repudiate the idea which has been sometimes put forward that it consisted commonly of committing to memory church formularies without explanation. It is usual, it appears, for the diocesan inspector at his visit to suggest a syllabus of instruction for the ensuing year, on which the next examination of the next year will be held, the parts of Scripture selected for study or committal to memory being such as seem best to lend themselves to the instruction of children in their faith and duty. In a large proportion of schools, too. Prebendary Roe (a diocesan inspector with wide educational experience) tells us that religious teaching is something much better and beyond mere head knowledge. Archdeacon Barber, who has had long experience of the same kind in the diocese of Oxford, gave it as his opinion that religious and moral training in church schools is as good as it was before 1870, in spite of the tendency to crowd it out. Out of the 3,759 voluntary schools, the managers of which sent replies to our Circular A3, 3,622 gave religious instruction daily, and 2,976 were examined in religious teaching, in most cases by a diocesan inspector. The general inference we draw from the various sources of information open to us is that in the class of schools in which religious instruction is obligatory under their trust deeds, the religious instruction is quite as good now as it was before the passing of the Education Act of 1870, if not a good deal better; and that it is effective, intelligent, and practical. The systems of diocesan inspection which have been instituted, both for Church of England and Roman Catholic schools since the passing of Mr. Forster's Act, appear to have resulted in more attention being given to religious teaching than before. From the first, the Wesleyan Conference, through its Connexional Education Committee, and its locally responsible Circuit Quarterly Meetings and Day School Committees, has made religious instruction and training the indispensable basis of education in its day schools. We have warnings from the teachers in our evidence that there is some danger lest the system of special and separate religious inspection may lead to a mechanical treatment of sacred subjects, while the religious training which influences and elevates life and character may become subordinate to formal and technical instruction. But in the face of much evidence given both by managers and teachers to the value and acceptability of these annual examinations, we do not attach much weight to this theoretical. objection. We note that in one or more dioceses a central system of instruction of the pupil-teachers in religious knowledge has been introduced.

Secondly, as to Board Schools, the returns made to the Parliamentary inquiry form the only authoritative record of the nature of the Religious Instruction given throughout the country in Board Schools. Mr. Sharpe stated that he knew of no school in his district where the teaching was wholly secular, and among the many witnesses we examined one only spoke of a voluntary school (British) in which, though opened with prayer, there was not even Bible reading without comment. Even in this school, however, it was claimed that great pains was taken with the moral and religious training. Under the Huddersfield Board we were also informed that there is no religious instruction, though the religious observances on opening and closing school are said to be of a solemn character. There are neither Religious Observances or Religious


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instruction in the Board Schools of Birmingham, but we are informed that the Bible is read daily without note or comment for 15 minutes. In the large school boards of Liverpool, Manchester, Bradford, Hull, and Sheffield, witnesses have testified that oral religious and moral instruction of a systematic kind is given in addition, to and in direct, connexion with Bible readings.† Under the London School Board a very full syllabus of Bible instruction,* which is given for from half-an-hour to three-quarters

†See Appendix

*See Syllabus of School Board for London:

REGULATIONS AS TO RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION

Bible Instruction and Religious Observances

81. In the schools provided by the Board, the Bible shall be read, and there shall be given such explanations and such instruction therefrom in the principles of morality and religion as are suited to the capacities of children, in accordance with the terms of the resolution of the Board passed 8th March 1871: provided always -

(i) That in such explanations and instruction the provisions of the Act in sections VII and XIV be strictly observed, both in letter and spirit, and that no attempt be made in any such schools to attach children to any particular denomination.

(ii) That, in regard of any particular school, the Board shall consider and determine upon any application by managers, parents, or ratepayers of the district who may show special cause for exception of the school from the operation of this resolution, in whole or in part.

Such explanations and instruction as are recognised by the foregoing regulation shall be given by the responsible teachers of the school. In this article the term "responsible teachers" does not include pupil teachers.

In all schools provision may be made for giving effect to the following resolutions of the Board, passed on July 26, 1871:

(i) That, in accordance with the general practice of existing elementary schools, provision may be made for offering prayer and using hymns in schools provided by the Board at the "time or times" when according to section VII, subsection 2, of the Elementary Education Act, "religious observances" may be "practised":

(ii) That the arrangements for such "religious observances" be left to the discretion of the teacher and managers of each school, with the right of appeal to the Board by teacher, managers, parents, or ratepayers of the district:

Provided always -

That in the offering of any prayers, and in the use of any hymns, the provisions of the Act in sections VII and XIV be strictly observed, both in letter and spirit, and that no attempt be made to attach children to any particular denomination.

During the time of religious teaching or religious observance, any children withdrawn from such teaching or observance shall receive separate instruction in secular subjects.

Sections VII and XIV of Education Act (1870) - Conscience Clause

82. A copy of sections VII and XIV* of the Elementary Education Act (1870), and also of the preceding regulations, must be hung up in a conspicuous part of the schoolroom.

Syllabus of Bible Instruction

83. The Bible instruction must be given in accordance with the syllabus adopted by the Board. (See Appendix III.)

Managers to see that Regulations respecting Bible Instruction are carried out

84. It is the duty of managers to see that the regulations of the Board for Bible instruction are carried out and it will be well for them to visit the schools during the time set apart for such instruction.

Bible Instruction of Pupil Teachers and Candidates

85. The Bible instruction of pupil teachers is given at the pupil teachers' schools, where also the same regulations are in force as to religious observances at the opening of the classes that are laid down for the ordinary day schools. It is the duty of managers of the pupil teachers' schools to see that the regulations of the Board on this point are complied with. [For Syllabus, see Appendix III.]

C. SYLLABUS OF BIBLE INSTRUCTION FOR SCHOLARS FOR THE YEAR TO BE COMMENCED ON THE 1ST JANUARY 1887

In the schools provided by the Board the Bible shall be read, and there shall be given such explanations and such instructions therefrom in the principles of morality and Religion as are suited to the capacities of the children. - Article 81 of this Code.

GENERAL INSTRUCTION. - The teachers are desired to make the lessons as practicable as possible, and not to give attention to unnecessary details.

Head teachers of infant schools must draw up a syllabus of lessons for children below Standard I, and submit it to the Board Inspector when he visits the school.

*"VII. Every elementary school which is conducted in accordance with the following regulations shall be a public elementary school within the meaning of this Act; and every public elementary school shall be conducted in accordance with the following regulations (a copy of which regulations shall be conspicuously put up in every such school), namely:

(1) It shall not be required, as a condition of any child being admitted into or continuing in the school, that he shall attend or abstain from attending any Sunday school, or any place of religious worship, or that he shall attend any religious observance or any instruction in religious subjects in the school or elsewhere, from which observance or instruction he may be withdrawn by his parent, or that he shall, if withdrawn by his parent, attend the school on any day exclusively set apart for religious observance by the religious body to which his parent belongs:

(2) The time or times during which any religious observance is practised, or instruction in religious subjects is given, at any meeting of the school shall be either at the beginning or at the end of such meeting, and shall be inserted in a time table to be approved by the Education Department, and to be kept permanently and conspicuously affixed in every schoolroom; and any scholar may be withdrawn by his parent from such observance or instruction without forfeiting any of the other benefits of the school:

(3) The school shall be open at all times to the inspection of any of Her Majesty's Inspectors, so, however, that it shall be no part of the duties of such inspector to inquire into any instruction in religious subjects given at such school, or to examine any scholar therein in religious knowledge or in any religious subject or book:


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of an hour daily is followed in all schools, and the Chairman of the Board (Mr. Diggle) tells us that both teachers and parents desire that it should be made effective.

The answers we have received to Circular A3 testify that out of 385 school boards, 348 give daily Religious Instruction, and 123 have Religious Examinations; and out of 3,496 teachers of departments, who have sent in replies to Circular D, 3,161 say that they give daily religious instruction, and 2,372 say that examinations in religious knowledge are held annually. We are bound, however, to state that the Parliamentary returns show that in not a few board schools, which are returned as giving Religious Instruction, or as having Religious Observances, the religious teaching is confined to reading the Bible for a few minutes at the opening of the school, without note or comment, to reciting the Lord's Prayer, or to other very meagre provisions for the board religious influence over, or training of, the children.

We proceed to summarise the oral evidence given to us as to the effect of the religious and moral instruction imparted in Board Schools under the Cowper-Temple clause. The Rev. J. Gilmore, Chairman of the Sheffield School Board, says: "I think that the present system has a tendency to lower the importance of religion and morality in the estimation of the children, because, in many cases, religion and morality are entirely neglected." But he goes on to describe the system of religious instruction adopted in Sheffield, and adds that the parents of the children in Sheffield value the religious instruction given in the board schools very highly. The Rev. Dr. Aston, member of the Bradford School Board, thinks there is a tendency, in the present system, to lower the importance of religion and morality in the estimation of managers, teachers, and scholars. The late Rev. R. B. Burges, a member of the Birmingham School Board, said: "I consider that in the board schools the whole religious and moral teaching is worthless. There is no foundation for morals or religion." On the other hand, it should be stated that the teachers in some board schools strongly defend the religious and moral training they give. Thus, Mr. A. C. Rogers, an assistant master of a London board school, says: "I should not wish the public to infer that the religious teaching and the moral training in board schools is inferior to that in the voluntary schools. I do not think it is inferior; I think I do the work of religious teaching under the London School Board as well as I should have done in a voluntary school." Mr. Adams, headmaster of another board school, thinks that the moral tone has distinctly improved. Mr. Birley, Chairman of the Salford School Board, and late Chairman of the Manchester School Board, speaking of the effect of the present system upon the religious and moral teaching of the child, says as follows: "We have no direct evidence, but I have a letter here from the rector of one of the parishes in Manchester, who has recently had a board school placed in his parish, about a year and a half ago. He says: 'Probably nowhere could the influence of the religious and moral teaching upon the character of children be so readily tested as in a parish like ours, because the school here is the only civilising influence. Their parents are very poor, and generally very ignorant. There are no well-to-do residents to set good examples, and children are often left to follow their own sweet will, so that any change in their habits must be due in a great measure to the influence of the school. Since the opening of our schools in 1885, I have noticed a remarkable change; children whom I had noticed previously as dirty and disobedient we now find, as a rule, clean, obedient, and respectful. Our Sunday school is far more orderly, and does its work with a great deal less friction than formerly. The change is most remarkable, and I have no doubt extends in other moral directions. My opinion is that the influence of a well-conducted day school is very great. Notwithstanding the large increase of population, there is a diminution of almost all classes of offences.'" Mr. Stewart, Her Majesty's inspector, thinks that the schools are to some extent lower in moral tone than they were before 1870. Mr. Sharpe, Her Majesty's inspector, on the other hand, thinks the moral tone as good as under the old system. Canon Warburton has attended lessons given during the hours set apart for religious instruction in board schools, and is much struck by their usefulness. Sir Lovelace Stamer, rector of Stoke-upon-Trent, and Chairman of the School Board, states that the examination in religious instruction in the board schools of Stoke works very satisfactorily. Mr. Palgrave, Chairman of the Great Yarmouth School Board, considers that in the board schools of Yarmouth the religious instruction is carried on as reverentially and as efficiently as in the voluntary schools with which he is acquainted. Mr. J. Powell, an elementary teacher, has "not the slightest notion how the inspector finds out the moral tone of


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the school, but he has sometimes thought that it was what in algebra we call inspection; it is so in the Code, but he has never been able to ascertain how he found out the thing at all." Canon McNeile, Chairman of the Liverpool School Managers' Conference, would be inclined to attribute the considerable development of socialism to the teaching in the board schools. Mr. J . Nickal, inspector under the London School Board, thinks that the present effect of our public system of education on the religious and moral training of the children is to consecrate the idea of success. "That it is not altogether bad; if it leads to industry and conscientious effort, I think it is good; but if the element of unscrupulousness enters into it, of course it is bad." Mr. R. Balchin, another elementary board school teacher, is not very anxious to say anything upon the religious teaching in the schools, but he would say this, that so far as the present system is concerned, it seems to have nothing whatever to do with turning out children well principled or conscientious; it simply has to do with getting them to pass a particular examination. "Still", he adds, "boys are turned out well principled and conscientious." Archdeacon Norris, formerly Her Majesty's inspector for Staffordshire and Cheshire, doubts whether distinctly religious men and distinctly religious women are so desirous to become teachers as they were under the old system. Such as the teacher is, such is the school; and the religious influences brought to bear upon the children depend, in his judgment, infinitely more upon the character of the teacher than upon what he teaches. But he adds that the schools under the Manchester School Board are trustworthy places for training the character of children, and that the board schools with which he is most acquainted are distinctly religious, both in Manchester and Bristol.

On the whole, we are of opinion that greatly as the estimate of the value of the Religious Instruction given in Board Schools varies with the standpoint from which it is regarded by various witnesses, there is good ground for concluding that where care is bestowed on its organisation, and sufficient time is allowed for imparting it, it is of a nature to affect the conscience and influence the conduct of the children of whose daily training it forms a part. In many of the board schools the teachers accompany systematic Bible-reading with appropriate comments and explanations; in others, the scriptural instruction is restricted by limitations not imposed by the Act itself, such as that the Bible be read without note or comment, which we think must greatly lessen its value. We must add that though we highly value the influence of Sunday schools, it is admitted that many scholars in elementary schools do not either attend them or any place of worship, and that their parents are often either too ignorant or too indifferent to give their children any religious instruction. Such children, therefore, are entirely dependent upon instruction in the day schools for any knowledge of the scriptural truths which ought to be the common heritage of all the people in a Christian country. We hope that the religious and moral training in all Board Schools may be raised to the high standard which has been attained already in many of them, and that it will be made clear that the State, while scrupulously maintaining its provisions for safeguarding the rights of conscience, does not wish to discourage any of the managers, teachers, and members of school boards, connected with any of the public elementary schools of the country who are endeavouring to bring up the children in love and obedience to God.

The need for Annual Inspection of Religious Instruction in Board Schools corresponding to that made by the Diocesan Inspectors in Church Schools, in presence especially of the strong competition to which religious instruction is exposed by the restriction of the Government examination to secular subjects, has been recognised in evidence before us by the representatives of many important school boards; and we gather that a movement is extending itself for securing that an annual examination should be held with a view to test the efficiency of the scriptural instruction. In the case of such important school boards as those of Leeds, Liverpool, Salford, and Bristol, the witnesses who spoke for them informed us that an annual examination was already held in their schools in the subject of religious instruction prescribed by their respective boards, and was generally conducted by the board's inspectors. In London we learn from the chairman (Mr. Diggle) that the school board, not satisfied with the examination of representative scholars for the Peek prizes, have recently instructed their inspectors to examine throughout all the schools they visit in Scripture Knowledge; and we were informed that the report to the board on the state of Scripture Knowledge in any school would affect the future prospects of a teacher. It does not appear that the terms of section 76 of the Education Act of 1870, which limits the


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right to set apart two days in each year for a religious inspection to those schools which are not supported by rates, is found to prevent a similar inspection in board schools. We think that the same facilities for Inspection should be given by law to School Boards as are allowed under the Act of 1870 to the managers of Voluntary voluntary Schools.

The chief Regulations as to Religious Teaching contained in the Education Acts are to be found in the provisions which allow a parent to withdraw his child from instruction in religious subjects of which he disapproves, in voluntary and board schools alike, and in what is known as the Cowper-Temple clause, which prohibits the use of distinctive religious formularies in a rate-supported school.

It does not appear by what other means short of prohibiting all religious instruction in public elementary schools, - a proposal which will be dealt with presently - Parliament could have carried out its undoubted intention to ^dissociate the State from all connexion with distinctive religious teaching. We cannot, therefore, concur in the view that the State may be constructively regarded as endowing religious education when, under these conditions, it pay annual grants for secular instruction in aid of voluntary local effort to schools in which religious instruction forms part of the programme. The contention of those who regard the State and the Act of 1870 as constructively endowing religious education would exclude from the schools of England the religion of nature. But the 14th section of the Act, which forbids any denominational catechism or formulary to be taught in board schools, merely provides for perfect neutrality among Christian denominations. It does not exclude from public elementary schools instruction in the religion of nature, that is the existence of God, and of natural morality, which, apart from belief in the existence of God, cannot be intelligibly taught.

Before entering upon the examination of the effect of the conscience clause as embodied in section 7 of the Act of 1870 we wish to call attention to, and to correct, what seems to be a very prevalent misconception of its meaning. This misconception was, we believe, first shown to exist when objections were taken to the singing of the National Anthem during secular hours. It was more rationally and explicitly brought before us by the master of a Wesleyan school in the north, who said, "I sometimes feel sorry that my mouth is shut, except at certain hours, from giving the highest sanction I can think of to morality." He added, that if he met with a case during the secular hours which required attention, a case of lying, or any offence of that kind, he would be "precluded from bringing the sanctions of religion to bear", meaning "Christian, and not denominational sanctions". He said, "Of course I could tell the child that it was a crime against society and against social law, and I could show him the social mischief of lying, but I should not feel justified in appealing to Scripture." Another witness would apparently, during the hours of compulsory attendance at school (i.e., during the secular hours), forbid the name of God to be mentioned, because the children, even of wicked and immoral parents, would very often "believe religion to be too sacred a thing to be mixed up with ordinary task work". Now, without referring to the family education and training which such children are likely to receive, we agree with this witness, that " constantly to bring in "the name of the Deity would be a mistake in teaching in school". But we cannot for a moment admit that he either correctly understands the intentions of the framers of the Act of 1870, or puts a legitimate construction upon the wording of the Act. Mr. Forster advocated for our children "a good Christian training, a training, that is, of a Christian type" - he asserted it to be the opinion of the "enormous majority of the Country" that the "standard of right and wrong is based on religion"; and, when challenged to say whether "any child might rebel against his teacher whenever religious instruction was imparted during the ordinary course of teaching", he replied, "that he had carefully worded the conscience clause to prevent its having such an effect", declining to allow any alteration in that clause which would prevent the "possibility of any allusion to religious subjects during the ordinary hours of instruction". To have done so would, moreover, as stated by the secular teachers quoted by Mr. Mundella in the House of Commons, have excluded from our schools the works of the greatest English writers, and would have called for the invention of a new language and a new literature. We desire to point out that, under the seventh section of the Act of 1870, what a parent may claim for his child is exemption from "instruction in religious subjects". So under the Endowed Schools Act of 1869 (also passed by Mr. Forster) he may claim (section 15) exemption from "any lesson, or series of lessons, on a religious subject"; and the teacher is further forbidden "in the course of other lessons" to teach "systematically arid persistently any particular religious doctrine from the teaching of which exemption has been claimed."


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We proceed to consider the Working of the Conscience Clause. Our Returns may be held to show its operation throughout the whole Country, as the counties and districts to which our questions were sent are sufficiently numerous and Typical to enable us to argue fairly from them as to the country at large. The managers of Voluntary Schools in the under-mentioned counties report as follows:

And the teachers of all schools to which our circulars were addressed report as follows:

These figures apply, first, to the number of schools in which children are daily withdrawn by their parents from Religious Teaching, and secondly, to the same or other schools in which there being an annual Examination into the results of Religious Teaching the children are withdrawn from such examination by their parents; and they clearly prove that the Conscience Clause is practically operative all over the country in the most different classes and districts of the population.

We now come to consider how far the principle of the Conscience Clause has been loyally carried out by managers and teachers, a matter which has been referred to in our evidence. It is agreed that the number of children withdrawn by their parents from religious instruction is comparatively small. To what cause this is to be attributed has been the question in dispute before us. One class of witnesses tells us that parents, so long as education is religious, are not too nice as to the complexion which it assumes in the hands of the teacher; and that the absence of withdrawals from religious instruction indicates that the parents generally are fairly satisfied with the spirit in which religious instruction is given, even in schools carried on by denominations to which they do not belong. A different interpretation is put upon the same facts by witnesses representing some Nonconformist views. They believe that the fear of unpleasant consequences to children often induces parents to acquiesce in their receiving religious instruction to which they themselves conscientiously object. For the existence of any just grounds for this fear, however, we have failed to find proof. Cases have been cited before us by witnesses who had heard of them from others, and who were evidently convinced themselves, that undue pressure had been put upon certain children to induce them to conform to the religious teaching of the


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school. But no persons were produced before us, in answer to our challenge, willing to depose to any act of tyranny or intimidation exercised towards themselves or their children, to induce them to forego the right of withdrawal from the religious instruction of a school. Of this reluctance to give evidence the same explanation was offered to us as had been given for the absence of withdrawals from religious instruction, viz., that the persons aggrieved were afraid to make their complaints known. A single exception, indeed, occurred in the case of a working man, who complained that whereas he would have preferred that his children attending a London board school should have had no religious instruction at all, he had been induced to let them take part in it with the rest, rather than make martyrs of them. He contended that a child attending a voluntary school in Pimlico, and claiming the conscience clause, would be made a martyr of. The grievance, however, on which he founded his contention occurred in a board school in Chelsea, and not in a Pimlico voluntary school. It is possible indeed that among teachers the love of uniformity may perhaps now and then get the better of that tender consideration for the wishes of parents which we should desire to see cultivated to the uttermost. We welcome, therefore, the evidence laid before us which shows that, even where the children of Nonconformists are not withdrawn under the conscience clause, many teachers, when they have any means of distinguishing such children, are studiously careful, in giving the religious instruction of their own denomination, not to put to them questions which would require answers at variance with the fact or with the religious persuasion of their parents. But the absence of any substantiated case of complaint, and the general drift of the evidence, convinces us that the conscience clause is carefully observed both by teachers and managers. This is at least the view taken by those of Her Majesty's Inspectors who have appeared before us, to whom any complaint of its infringement would be known. We recognise, however, the importance of removing, if possible, such impressions from the minds of those who entertain any suspicion of unfair play or undue influence in the administration of the conscience clause. And any further precautions which might tend in that direction without compromising still higher interests are deserving of the most careful consideration. The suggestion was made to us with this view, that compulsory attendance at school should not extend to the hours of religious instruction. But Mr. Fitch, Her Majesty's Inspector, thinks this is inadmissible, since it would inflict an injury on school discipline out of all proportion to the object sought to be secured. "It would be used as a pretext", he said, "by a great many indifferent and careless parents for sending their children to school at 10 instead of 9 o'clock, and I should be sorry to see that interference with the ordinary discipline of school. It would be a very strong remedy, a large remedy for what I hope is comparatively a very small evil." It is not, in our judgment, to any alteration in the law, which after all must be carried out by the same persona whose faithful adherence to the spirit of the conscience clause has sometimes been called in question, that we must look for the redress of such grievances as may be suffered under the present system. It is rather to the spread of that spirit of tender consideration for the rights and consciences of others, of the prevalence of which we have happily received so much evidence.

But while we are most anxious that the Conscientious Objections of Parents to Religious Teaching and Observances in the case of their children should be most strictly respected, and that no child should, under any circumstances, receive any such training contrary to a parent's wishes, we feel bound to state that a parent's conscientious feeling may be equally injured, and should equally be respected and provided for, in the case where he is compelled by law to send his child for all his school time to a school where he can receive no religious teaching.

This grave injury to conscience may easily now arise in the case where a single Board or Voluntary school suffices for the whole school supply of a district, or where only one school is within a reasonable distance of a man's home. In that school, as we have seen is at this moment the case with a certain number of voluntary and board schools, the Bible may not be read or taught, and there may be no religious teaching. While careful and, we believe, ample securities are taken by law to provide for the case of a parent who objects to religious teaching for his child, no parent is able to claim for his child that instruction in the Bible, which is the basis of the Christianity of the nation. This grievance, we are of opinion, must be met.


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We think it right to call attention to the great care which has been taken both by Parliament and by the Education Department to prevent any breach in letter or spirit of the conscience clause. Under the Act of 1876 (sec. 7) special additional provisions were made to secure the efficacy of the conscience clause of Mr. Forster's Act of 1870, "It shall be the duty of such local authority (being a school board or school attendance committee) to report to the Education Department any infraction of the provisions of section 7 (conscience clause) of the Elementary Education Act, 1870, in any public elementary school within their district which may come to their knowledge, and also to forward to the Education Department any complaint which they may receive of the infraction of those provisions"; and we find that in the instructions issued to Her Majesty's inspectors in 1878,* which we have printed in our Appendix, special care was taken by the Department to secure that the conscience clause should be strictly observed. The directions given were as follows, and they remain in force:

"If any cases are brought before you, or come to your knowledge of an infraction of the 7th section of the Act of 1870, i.e., the time table conscience clause, you will not fail, acting in the spirit of the Act of 1876 (section 7), forthwith to communicate with their Lordships on the subject, and you will take special care to point out to school managers and teachers the importance of the strictest adherence, in letter and spirit, to the provisions of that conscience clause, and to remind them, where necessary, of the total forfeiture of grant which their Lordships would at once inflict should those provisions be persistently evaded or neglected. It should never be forgotten that a child withdrawn from the whole or part of the religious teaching or observances of a school, should in no way be subjected to disparaging treatment on account of his parent having thought fit to avail himself of his statutory right in this matter."

The views of those who would Remove from day elementary schools all Religious Teaching and Observance have received our attentive consideration. The Rev. C. Williams, Chairman of the Baptist Union, is personally in favour of the establishment of secular schools, and thinks that they are perfectly consistent with the religious education of the children of the Country, if the churches would do their duty, but he thinks that the majority in almost every district would be found opposed to a purely secular system. Mr. Snape, Governor of the Ministerial Training College of the United Methodist Free Churches, desires that in all State-aided schools the State should be responsible for secular instruction, and the Church should be responsible for the religious teaching. Rev. Dr. Bruce, a Congregationalist minister and Chairman of the School Management Committee of the Huddersfield School Board, said, "Our principle is this: that if you have a State system according to our Nonconformist views, it must in the main be either secular or unsectarian." The Rev. J. Atkinson, President of the Free Churches of the Primitive Methodist Society, would have no distinctive religious teaching, that is to say, no distinctive sectarian teaching; if religious teaching could be given without this, he would not object; but as he does not think this possible, he does not suppose that he would object perhaps to reading the Scriptures, but he sees difficulties in the way even of admitting that. Dr. Crosskey, of the Birmingham School Board, thinks it very undesirable, for the sake of religion, that religion should be taught in public elementary schools.

Those who hold this view in favour of purely Secular Schools did not shrink from urging before us, through the witnesses who represented them, that the State should take the extreme step of prohibiting religious instruction in public elementary schools. These witnesses, however, while affirming as a matter of principle the purely secular character of national public education, stated that they were willing to acquiesce in the compromise of 1870, by which, in board schools, unsectarian biblical teaching was left to the discretion of local representative authorities. Even those witnesses, however, who strenuously advocated the secularisation of public elementary education, most emphatically declared that they regarded religion as the true basis of education, and only contended for its exclusion from the day school in the belief that it could be provided in some other and better way.

In questions of this character, it is impossible to have negative provisions which have not also a positive side. Thus, for children to attend day schools in which no

*See Parliamentary Return, January 16, 1878, "Instructions issued by Lord Sandon (Lord Harrowby), Vice-President of Education Department," in Appendix.


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religious teaching was given, would, in the opinion of those who think that the daily lessons should be accompanied with religious teaching, be practically leading them to undervalue the importance of religion. They would hold that the impression left upon the children's minds would be that religion was a matter of inferior moment, at all events to that secular teaching which they were acquiring day by day.

In support of the contention that religious instruction should be excluded from the day school, it was further urged by Dr. Crosskey that it makes an undesirable tax on the teachers' energies. But, on the other hand, we have had brought before us trustworthy testimony, some of it from teachers themselves, that, as a body, they would consider it a great loss if they were debarred from giving Bible lessons to their scholars. Nor can that be matter of surprise if it be remembered that they would thereby be precluded from exercising their trained powers of oral teaching on a subject which they regard as one of the most interesting and profitable to their scholars. Moreover, the religious instruction given by teachers, we have been told by the Rev. J. Duncan, greatly increases the moral influence of the teacher. The moral character of teachers themselves. Archdeacon Norris, formerly Her Majesty's Inspector of Schools in various populous counties, thinks would suffer if they were forbidden to impart religious instruction. And, finally, against the attempt, on this or any other ground, to prohibit teachers from giving moral and religious instruction in their schools, Mr. Cumin, Secretary of the Committee of Council on Education, emphatically protests. He believes that many excellent teachers would absolutely refuse to be restricted in their teaching to secular subjects.

Dr. Crosskey advanced as an additional ground in favour of this restriction that religious instruction ought only to be given by religious people. But without denying that religious teaching is liable sometimes to fall into unfit hands, all such instruction is more or less liable to the same objection, and we see no ground for admitting the inference which seems to underlie this objection that elementary teachers as a class have no special fitness for the task for which, nevertheless, a very large proportion of them have been specially trained. Objection was also raised by the same witness to the Bible being used as a school book, lest it should thereby suffer in the estimation of the scholars, and it was urged that religion was dishonoured by being included in a programme consisting chiefly of secular subjects. But we have no evidence tending to show that these results actually occur, and it can hardly be supposed that if such were found to be practically the result, religious bodies and school boards would still continue to make such great efforts as we find they now do in order to maintain an efficient system of religious instruction in the schools for which they are responsible. On the other hand, we have positive evidence that children who have received religious teaching in the day school are better prepared to profit by Sunday school teaching, and to become themselves teachers in Sunday schools.

But were there more weight due than we have been able to attach to these and other like reasons for prohibiting elementary teachers from giving religious instruction in the day school, there are positive arguments of great value in favour of the principle of religious instruction being given by the teachers. We have spoken of the evidence tending to show that teachers, as a body, would strongly oppose its removal out of their hands. Even more to be considered, in our judgment, are the wishes of the Parents. A large body of witnesses, consisting among others of Her Majesty's Inspectors, teachers, and managers, speaking both for Board and Voluntary schools, deposed before us to the great value which the parents generally set on the Religious Instruction given to their children in the day school. Similar evidence is supplied by the answers to Question 8 in the Circulars A3 and D2. Out of 3,759 replies from voluntary managers, 3,438 state that parents desire religious training. Of 385 boards, 299 make the same statement, and out of 3,496 head teachers, 2,959 say parents desire religious training. To the question do the parents desire moral training? 3,486 managers, 303 school boards, 3,084 head teachers answer, Yes. If it be asked why, with this alleged preponderance of feeling in favour of a religious education among the most numerous section of the constituency, school boards are at times elected


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which do not give effect to these views, the reasons given by two members of the Birmingham School Board and by a member of the Bradford School Board seem sufficient to account for it, viz., that School Board Elections are frequently fought through Political Organisations. We are convinced that if the State were to secularise elementary education it would be in violation of the wishes of the parents, whose views in such a matter are, we think, entitled to the first consideration.

Many children would have no other opportunity of being taught the elementary doctrines of Christianity, as they do not attend Sunday schools, and their parents, in the opinion of a number of witnesses, are quite unable to teach them. The Rev. R. B. Surges, a clergyman of Birmingham, stated that a recent census of children attending Sunday schools in that town showed that there were 26,000 whose names were on the roll of some day school who attended no Sunday school. It is possible that some of these children may be taught religion elsewhere; it is probable that many of them would not be, in which case they would grow up without knowledge of God and His law.

But those who contemplate this change and advocate the exclusion of religious teaching from all Public Elementary Schools state that they look to supply the void thus created by other and, as they think, by better means. It is not asserted by them with much confidence that the duty of educating children religiously can be wholly left to their parents. Abundant evidence from all classes of witnesses is before us, tending to show that many parents are unable to undertake this branch of their children's education, even if they were willing, and that if it were left to them it would be omitted. Dr. Crosskey, of Birmingham, admits that in the case of the worst kind of parents (presumably those whose children stand most in need of such teaching), it would be hopeless to expect them to undertake the duty. But he relies on parents, if they know that it will not be given in the day school, being sufficiently anxious for the welfare of their children to secure their attendance on voluntary religious instruction if given at other times by religious bodies, a confidence, however, in which we do not share. At the same time he is ready to trust to the religious bodies to organise everywhere adequate machinery to give such instruction.

Two alternative plans have been laid before us by the limited number of witnesses who have proposed to remove religious instruction from the recognised programme of school teaching. The plan of religious teaching which they appear to favour most is simply to leave the matter to the zeal of the various denominations acting through Sunday schools and other voluntary agencies. The other proposal is to organise a system of religious instruction on the school premises, to be given daily by volunteers, either before or after school hours. Both proposals, it will be seen, rest on the assumption that the children now compelled by law to attend the school for a certain number of hours daily would be induced by persuasion voluntarily to attend at other times for the sake of this supplementary instruction. Dr. Crosskey, the chief advocate of these views, was closely pressed as to the probability of this assumption being realised, but he failed to satisfy us that there was reasonable ground for believing that out of school hours the voluntary attendance of children could be counted on to receive the religious teaching which is on all hands admitted to be necessary for them. This scheme is beset by a further difficulty, that of providing a staff of volunteers able and willing to maintain discipline and give efficient instruction during these week-day hours proposed to be set apart for religious teaching. Here again the evidence adduced failed in our opinion to show from what sources such a body of teachers was to be drawn and kept continuously at work. We concur with those witnesses who gave it as their opinion that without the ordinary school staff it would be impossible to give efficient religious instruction on any large scale to large bodies of children. The clerk of the school board of Liverpool expressed his conviction that the ministers of all denominations would be quite inadequate to deal with the instruction of that vast and growing population, and that to forbid religious instruction during the regular hours of school would be most disastrous.

It must be borne in mind that a somewhat similar experiment on a larger scale was tried at Birmingham by the Religious Education Society, at a time when a wholly secular system prevailed in the schools under that board, and that it failed, though


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the causes of that failure are still in dispute. But, after hearing all that could be said for it, we cannot recommend the plan thus suggested of religious instruction to be given by voluntary teachers on the school premises out of school hours, for the success of which even those most anxious to try the experiment will not be answerable. It would, in our opinion, be no efficient substitute for the existing system of utilising the school staff and the hours of school attendance for this purpose, a system which has taken deep root in the country, and appears to give general satisfaction to the parents.

But failing the acceptance of the above plan, the advocates for secularising elementary schools fall back on the alternative of Sunday school instruction and of such other efforts which religious bodies, they believe, will be roused to make to meet the demand, if it be created by excluding religious instruction from the day school. Evidence, however, has been laid before us showing that, at least in large towns, many day scholars are not in regular attendance at any Sunday school, and among the absentees a large proportion will naturally belong to the neglected classes. On these it is especially desirable that religious influences should be brought to bear, and yet, if no other provision be made for their religious instruction during the week, they will practically go without it. In support of this branch of his scheme. Dr. Crosskey could only express his belief that 75 per cent of the children in Birmingham board schools attended some Sunday school, leaving one quarter of the whole unprovided with religious instruction from this source.^ According to the evidence of another member of that board, four years ago there were as many as 25,000 day scholars in Birmingham alone not attending Sunday school, though many of these may have been infants too young to attend. It is less necessary to enter on any comparison between the efficiency of the instruction given at the day and Sunday school respectively, for in our judgment this proposal would fail equally with the other to secure that those children who now under compulsion attend the day school, and who, as the law stands, may daily receive religious instruction from their teachers in school hours, would attend in anything like the same numbers or with the same regularity at purely voluntary classes, whether held on Sunday or week day.

The vast importance of religious instruction and training for children being generally admitted in principle by our witnesses of all views, though they differ widely as to the means by which it should be given, we think it right to point out, in greater detail, what must be the results to certain classes of those who frequent our elementary schools of a purely secular system of education such as that which prevails at the present time in the comparatively few cases where either voluntary or board schools shut out all religious teaching, if it was to be adopted hereafter in the day schools as some of our witnesses desire. We give two typical cases of large classes of our population: the first case (and no unfrequent one) is where both parents, being poor, are engrossed from morning to night by daily work, and having had themselves but little instruction, and not possessing a very strong sense of religion, are neither physically nor morally able to give their children religious teaching out of school hours or on Sunday; they are anxious, as our evidence tells is often found to be the case with such parents, that their children should be religiously educated; the only day school near them is by the hypothesis Secular; there is no Sunday school, or it belongs to a Church they dislike, or it only supplies room for a small portion of the children of the district, so their children must grow up, against the parents' wishes, with no religious instruction. Worse still is the plight of the second case we will describe: that of the children of the dissolute, criminal, drunken, or grossly negligent parent; they have still less chance of hearing of religion at home. Even if there be room in the Sunday school, and their parents allow them to attend it, their very condition will make their admittance difficult. Our Education Law has closed to a great extent the Ragged Schools, which would have sought them out and given them the most suitable religious teaching. Their only opportunity, therefore, except in special cases, of having a knowledge of God and of Christianity would be in the day school, where the State obliges them to spend all their school life; but from this a Secular System, if adopted, or a Secular school board in the cases where it now exists amongst us, shuts out the Bible, Prayer, Hymns, and all Religious Training. Therefore these children also must in all probability grow up knowing nothing of religion. These two Typical cases represent vast numbers, especially in our large cities, and all oar evidence has gone to show that the present staff of ministers of all churches and denominations, as well as the many various existing religious associations and


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societies, are much too few in number, in proportion to the population, to supply the religious training for these children. For the mass, therefore, of the children above described, we must put on record our opinion that if they do not receive Religious Instruction and Training from the teachers in the Public Elementary Schools they will receive none, and that this is a matter of the gravest concern to the State.

Of the Moral Training at present given in Public Elementary Schools, we may here record that of those who have observed this training in action, one witness before us spoke of the moral influence exercised in schools as being enormous. Canon Warburton, though he thinks the tendency of the Act of 1870 was to diminish the attention given to Moral Training, yet expressed himself as much struck with the usefulness of the moral lessons given in board schools. Several of the inspectors attribute this influence almost more to the personal character and example of the teacher than to any direct moral teaching. And though Mr. Stewart spoke of the moral tone in large town schools as deteriorated, in smaller schools, and especially in those in the country, he saw no such falling off. As regards the returns we have received to question 8 in Circulars A3, D2, "Do parents desire moral training?" 93 per cent of voluntary managers, 79 per cent of school boards, 98 per cent of teachers answer, Yes.

We have already commented on a misconception of the seventh section of the Act of 1870 in its bearing on Religion. It is yet more difficult to understand the strange misconstruction which has been sometimes put upon it in respect of Moral Training, However unacceptable the conscience clause may be to many earnest friends of education, it cannot be held to have placed the moral instruction of our schools on a level with that of the primary municipal schools of Paris, in which, as Mr. Cunynghame, in his evidence, tells us, "not only is no word of religion taught, but the very name of God is in strictness forbidden to be uttered", with the result, as he was assured by all the schoolmistresses, that "by far the greater number of the poor children in Paris receive no religious instruction whatever", either at school or at home; while the master of one of the schools, himself a professed materialist, told him that "in ten years he believed that few of the boys in the school would even know the name of Christ otherwise than as a matter of history, and that he himself even viewed with apprehension the consequences of such a change, for, although a materialist, he felt by no means certain that materialism would be capable of supplying the wants of a nation." In the Circular D, which was sent to the head teachers of all Public Elementary Schools in West Riding of Yorkshire, Chelsea, Greenwich, Southwark, Bedfordshire, the Unions of Pontypridd and Merthyr Tydvil (Glamorganshire), Sussex, Wilts, Merionethshire, Birkenhead, West Ham, Warwickshire, in which the question was asked whether they were satisfied with the encouragement given by the State to moral training. This question was answered by 2,111 teachers, 60 per cent, in the affirmative, and by 1,139, 33 per cent, in the negative, some of them expressing the opinion that the State gave no encouragement to such training. A similar question addressed to the managers of voluntary schools in Berks, Devonshire, Dorset, Durham, Gloucestershire, Kent, Lancashire, Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, and Staffordshire was answered by 1,611, 46 per cent, in the affirmative, and by 1,723, 48 per cent, in the negative, and by school boards in the same counties by 245, 64 per cent, in the affirmative, and by 86, 22 per cent, in the negative.

As to the Moral Training given in the schools, the opportunities permitted to Her Majesty's inspectors of inquiring into the efficiency of Moral Training have been under the existing arrangements necessarily limited. But under the head of discipline they are required, as we have explained more fully elsewhere, by a paragraph in the Code to ascertain that reasonable care is taken by the managers and teachers to bring up the children in habits of punctuality, of good manners and language, of cleanliness and neatness, and also to impress upon the children the importance of cheerful obedience to duty, of consideration and respect for others, of honour and truthfulness in word and act.|| The fortunes of this justly valued clause have been various as we have before explained; and we have made inquiry from many witnesses as to the steps taken by inspectors to carry out the duties thus laid upon them; and we do not find that they are in the habit of doing more than observe and record any indications of the moral tone of the school that may present themselves during their examina-

||Art, 109 (6), first introduced in 1876.


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tion, which must necessarily be but an imperfect test of the pains taken at other times with the moral training. We agree with Mr. Sharpe, that it would make a material difference in the working of schools if this clause were abolished, since it serves to remind those who conduct schools of the importance attached by the State to that Moral Instruction and Training which cannot be effectively gauged by examination, and might otherwise be neglected for branches of teaching which affects the grant. The opportunity given by visits without notice, is utilised by many inspectors, though less frequently than is desirable, for the purpose of assuring themselves that the Moral Tone of the schools so far as it is reflected in habits of personal cleanliness, propriety of language, and a decent use of the school premises, is satisfactory. The article, therefore, is not to be regarded as a dead letter.

We are strongly of opinion that much greater support should be given by the State to the Moral element of Training in our schools, almost the only reference to such matters, as far as the State is concerned, being that under the head of Discipline in the Code to which we have already alluded, and which, being only introduced in 1876, has already, as we have shown, been once withdrawn by the Department in 1882, and may be removed in any year. We recommend, therefore, that general fundamental and fixed instructions should be laid down as to moral training, making it an essential condition of the efficiency of a public elementary school, that it should be held to comprise such matters as instruction in duty and reverence to parents, honour and truthfulness in word and act, honesty, purity, temperance, consideration and respect for others, obedience, cleanliness, good maimers, duty to country, the discouragement of bad language, and the like.

And as we have found with regret that in recent years this branch of the inspector's duty has not received the attention it deserved, we therefore think it necessary to make it a distinct recommendation that it should be considered the first duty of Her Majesty's inspectors to inquire into and report upon the Moral Training and condition of the schools under the various heads set forth above, and to impress upon the managers, teachers, and children the primary importance of this essential element of all education.

We append to this chapter the replies (sent through the Foreign Office and the Colonial Office) to our circular of inquiries as to the systems of education now in force in the leading Countries of Europe, in our principal Colonies, and in the United States of America, as regards Religious and Moral training in elementary schools.

After hearing the arguments for a wholly secular education, we have come to the following conclusions: (1) That it is of the highest importance that all children should receive religious and moral training;

(2) That the evidence does not warrant the conclusion that such religious and moral training can be amply provided otherwise than through the medium of elementary schools;

(3) That in schools of a denominational character to which parents are compelled to send their children the parents have a right to require an operative conscience clause, so that care be taken that the children shall not suffer in any way in consequence of their taking advantage of the conscience clause.

(4) That inasmuch as parents are compelled to send their children to school, it is just and desirable that, as far as possible, they should be enabled to send them to a school suitable to their religious convictions or preferences.

(5) We are also of opinion that it is of the highest importance that the teachers who are charged with the moral training of the scholars should continue to take part in the religious instruction. We should regard any separation of the teacher from the religious teaching of the school as injurious to the morals and secular training of the scholars.


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EXTRACTS from the Foreign Returns made to the Commission, showing what is done in Elementary Schools in the matter of Religious Instruction and Moral Training in some of the leading Countries of Europe, and in certain British Colonies and States of America. Drawn up by the Rev. T. D. C. Morse, LL.D.

[Note In the original, the following section (to the end of page 132) was printed in small type, two columns to a page.]

QUESTION 16 - Do the schools of the State give religious as well as secular instruction? and, if so, of what nature? By whom is it given?

QUESTION 17. - If not, are the schoolhouses used out of school hours for religious instruction?

QUESTION 18. - Is any provision made for the moral training of the children in the schools by the ordinary teachers in the ordinary school hour? If so, state what means are taken to secure it?

QUESTION 19. - Is the religious instruction obligatory on all the scholars? If not, what provision is made for the religious instruction of the minority?

QUESTION 20. - Are the teachers in the schools exclusively lay?

AUSTRIA:

16. They do, and the religious instruction is under the supervision of the church authorities of the various confessions. In places where no clergyman is available to give regular religious instruction, the secular teacher can be charged (with the consent of the church authority) with the instruction in religion of the scholars of his own creed according to the directions of the school inspector. If any church or religious body fails to provide for the instruction of its members the provincial school authority takes whatever steps are necessary.

17. -

18. The primary schools provide ''moral and religious", as well as secular, instruction.

19. Yes. As to the religious instruction of the minority, its own church authorities must provide for it. The parents must also secure domestic religious instruction.

20. Any Austrian subject may become teacher, consequently non-laymen are not excluded.

BAVARIA:

16. Religious education forms part of the curriculum, and is given by the parish priest.

17. No.

18. Yes, the teachers are bound to look after the moral training as well as the education of pupils, and the teachers must support the parents in the bringing up of their children.

19. Yes.

20. As a general rule all are lay. Exception: Convent schools. Small parishes, where the parish priest is also teacher.

BELGIUM:

16. The communes can inscribe religious and moral instruction at the head of the curriculum of all, or of some, of their elementary schools. This instruction is given at the commencement or at the end of the school hours; children at the request of their parents are exempted from attending such instruction. In many schools the (Catholic) catechism is taught, and sacred history. Generally speaking the teachers give the instruction in religion under the control of the clergy.

17. No.

18. Generally speaking moral training is united to the religious teaching. At the same time in various subjects, such as reading, mother-tongue, history, the teacher does not lose sight of moral education, nor does he do so during the play hours.

19. Religious instruction is not obligatory; the following guarantees are provided by the law for the rights of the minority:

(a) In the case of a commune in which 20 heads of families having children of school age ask that their children should be exempted from assisting at religious instruction, the King can, at the request of the parents, oblige such commune to organise for the use of these children one or more special classes.
(b) If in spite of the request of 20 heads of families having children of school age, the commune refuse to inscribe the teaching of their religion in the school curriculum, or hinder such instruction being given by the ministers of their religion, or by persons approved of by these latter, the Government can, at the request of the parents, adopt one or more private schools, as may be requisite, provided they meet the conditions prescribed for adoption by the commune.
20. The law and the regulations make no difference between laymen and the members of religious orders. In the communal schools the vast majority of the male and female teachers are lay; in the adopted schools there are a great number of monks and nuns. FRANCE:

16. No religious instruction is given in the public schools; but Thursday must be a whole holiday in order to enable parents to have their children taught in the religion to which they belong, outside of the precincts of the school. During the week preceding their confirmation (1st communion) the teacher will allow children to be absent from school, even during regular school hours, in order to enable them to perform their religious duties and attend church, if necessary (decree of July 18, 1882, Art. 5).

17. No.

16. Yes. Art. 1 of the law of March 28, 1882, declares moral and civic instruction as a part of the regular curriculum of compulsory subjects to be taught by the ordinary teachers in the ordinary school hours. Special directions with regard to the way of teaching these subjects are included in the "Programmes de I'enseignement des écoles primaires". Annexe F. des Règlements organiques, p. 369.

19. See answer to question 16.

20. Yes, in principle. (Loi du 30 Octôbre, 1886. Arts. 17 and 18.) There are still some teachers in the public schools (of both sexes) belonging to religious corporations, but after five years from date of above-mentioned law none but lay teachers are to be employed in boys' schools; as to girls' schools, no limit has been fixed as yet.

MORAL DUTIES

The programme of instruction in moral duties prescribed for use in the French elementary schools is a very remarkable one. The following is a translation of its principal portions. (See Règlements Organiques, pages 362-3, 1887):

OBJECT OF THE INSTRUCTION

Masters and mistresses shall teach the children during the whole duration of their school life their duties towards their family, their country, their fellow creatures, towards themselves, and towards God. (Rapport par M. Paul Janet, page 293.)

METHOD OF THE INSTRUCTION

The method shall be simple and familiar. Morality shall be combined with every part of their instruction; with the games and recreations of children, and their whole conduct. The aim should be at one and the same time to form the mind, the heart, and the character.

DIVISION OF THE CLASSES

Infant Department, from 5 to 7 years

1. Very simple conversations interspersed in all the work of the class and during recreation.

2. Short pieces of poetry explained and learnt by heart. Moral tales related to the class, followed by questions adapted to bring out their meaning, and to ascertain whether they have been understood by the children. Short songs.


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3. Special attention by the mistress to children in whom she has observed any signs of vice or other faults.

Elementary Classes, from 7 to 9 years of age

1. Familiar conversations. Readings with explanations (narratives, examples, precepts, parables, and fables). Appeals to the heart.

2. Practical exorcises tending to set moral principles in action among the class -

1. By observation of individual character, noting the tendencies of the children in order gently to correct their failings, or bring out their good qualities.
2. By the intelligent application of school discipline as a means of education, distinguishing carefully the failure in duty from the simple infraction of a regulation, pointing out the relation between faults and punishment, &c., &c.
3. By an incessant appeal to the child's own moral sense, making children frequently judge of their own conduct, leaving them free to speak and to act with the certainty that they will soon find out for themselves the consequences of their own faults and errors.

4. By the correction of gross vulgar notions, popular superstitions, belief in wizards, ghosts, or in the influence of certain numbers.

6. By deducing from the facts observed by the children themselves the consequences of the vices of which at times they have the example before their eyes.

Intermediate Classes, from 9 to 11

1. The child in the family. - Duties towards parents and grandparents. Obedience, respect, love, gratitude. To help his parents in their labour, to comfort them in their sickness, to succour them in their old age.

2. Duties of brothers and sisters. - To love one another. Protection due from the elder to the younger - effect of example.

3. Duties towards servants. - To treat them with courtesy and kindness.

2. The child at school. - Diligence, docility, work, decorum. Duties towards his teacher and towards his schoolfellows.

3. Country. - France, its greatness and its misfortunes. Duties towards country and towards society.

Duties which the child owes to himself as to the body. Cleanliness, soberness, danger of drunkenness, gymnastics.

Outward goods. Economy, avoidance of debt, baneful effects of the passion of gambling, not to be overfond of money, prodigality, avarice.

Labour: obligatory on all men. Nobility of manual labour.

The mind. Truthfulness and sincerity, avoidance of falsehood, personal dignity, and self-respect. Modesty; not to be blind to one's own faults. Avoidance of pride, vanity, coquetry, frivolity; to be ashamed of ignorance and idleness. Courage in danger and in misfortune; patience, readiness, and promptitude. Dangers of anger.

Kindness to animals: not to cause them suffering for no purpose.

Duties which he owes to other men. Justice and charity; to do to others what you would wish them to do to you; to do no injury either to the life, the person, the goods, or the reputation of another. Kindness, fraternity. Tolerance. Respect for the belief of others. - Throughout this course of teaching the teacher shall take as a starting point the existence of conscience, of the moral law, and of the principle of obligation. He is to appeal to the sentiment and to the idea of duty, to the sentiment and to the idea of responsibility; he is to make no attempt to demonstrate their existence by speculative reasoning.

Duties towards God. - The teacher is not called upon to deliver a course of academical lectures upon the nature and attributes of God. The teaching he has to give to all, without distinction, is limited to two points:

First he teaches his scholars not to pronounce the name of God lightly. He is strictly to associate in their minds with the idea of the First Cause, and of the perfect Being, a sentiment of respect and veneration; and in the next place he shall aim at making the child understand that the chief homage which he owes to the Deity is obedience to His laws as they are revealed to him by conscience and by reason.

Higher Classes, from 11 to 13 years of age

Conversations, readings, practical exercises as in the foregoing classes. This higher course embraces, in addition, in a regular series of lessons, the number and order of which may vary, elementary instruction in morality generally, and more especially of social morality, in accordance with the following programme:

1. The family. - Duties of parents and children; reciprocal duties of masters and servants; family spirit.

2. Society.- Necessity and advantages of society; justice, a condition of every society; mutual dependence and relationships; fraternity amongst men.

Application and developments of the idea of justice; respect for human life and liberty; respect for property, for one's word, and one's own honour, and also for the reputation of others. Probity, equity, loyalty, delicacy; respect for the opinions and belief of others.

Application and developments of the idea of charity or fraternity; its different degrees. Duties of benevolence, of gratitude, of toleration, clemency, &c. Self-surrender, the highest form of charity; show that it may find some place in everyday life.

3. Country. - What we owe to our country - obedience to its laws, military service, discipline, self-surrender, military fidelity. Taxes - condemnation of every kind of fraud upon the State. Of the vote; it is a moral obligation; it ought to be free, conscientious, disinterested, enlightened. Rights which correspond with these duties - individual liberty, freedom of conscience, of labour, of association. Guarantee for the security of the life and property of all. Sovereignty of the nation. Explanation of the republican device - liberty, equality, fraternity.

In each of these chapters on social morality, the attention of the scholar shall be called, without entering into metaphysical discussions, to -

1. The difference between duty and interest, even when they seem to be blended together; that is to say, the imperative and disinterested character of duty.

2. The distinction between the written law and the moral law, the first fixes a maximum of requirements which society imposes upon all its members under fear of certain prescribed punishments; the second imposes upon every man in the secret of his own conscience, a duty which no outward authority constrains him to fulfil, but which he cannot omit without feeling himself culpable towards himself and towards God.

HOLLAND:

16. No. As regards this subject, see Arts. 22 and 33 of the law.

17. For that object, in the year 1885, in 298 communes, 620 school premises were used by teachers of religion.

18. The answer to this question is contained in Arts. 22 and 33 of the law.

19. No.

20. Yes, that is to say, they must not wear the distinctive garb of their order; but ecclesiastics are not excluded, as they are in France, for example.

HUNGARY:

16.Yes, according to the denomination, the members of the latter providing for it.

17. It forms part of the regular curriculum, combined with religious instruction; both being given during school hours, but separately, according to religious persuasion.

18. Yes.

19. Not those who instruct in religion.

20. Practically not.

ITALY:

16. Religious instruction is only given in cases where it is specially requested, and then out of school hours.

17. -

18. One of the courses of instruction is that of "rights and duties", and in this the teachers are chiefly taken up with moral education, although moral education is not forgotten


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in other branches, as especially those of language and history.

19. It is obligatory for no one beyond the limits of the Catechism and Holy Scripture (see answer to Question No. 16).

20. Of 40,000 teachers only 4,000 belong to the regular or secular clergy. The remainder are all laymen.

PRUSSIA:

16. In all elementary schools the religious instruction is compulsory as well as the other branches of instruction. The religious instruction is given according to the ss. 14-21 of the "General Disposition" (vide above) by the teacher, exceptionally by clergymen, and by special teachers of religion.

17. The schoolhouses are sometimes used out of school hours for religious instruction, but that is of no consequence at all, nor is it in an interior connexion with the elementary schools.

18. Here we can only point out that the Prussian elementary school, in principle, not only aims at instruction, but as much also at the moral training of the children. The plan and the practice of instruction are regulated from this point of view. The ordinary teachers take care of the moral training of the children at all hours.

19. Yes. Also for the religions instruction of the minority provisions are made, partially at the expense of the State; for this purpose means are regularly granted by the Government.

20. Yes.

SAXONY:

16. Religious is given. In Protestant schools by the master; in Catholic schools by priest.

17. -

18. Falls under "religious" instruction as "theory of morals and duty."

19. Yes. But a minority of Catholic scholars would be taught by a local Catholic priest if such is available.

20. Protestants. Yes.

BERNE:

16. Yes. The religious instruction is given by the teacher or by a minister of religion; but in the Catholic schools the Protestant children, and in the Protestant schools the Catholics, are exempted from attendance. There are also exceptions for the Jews.

17. By permission of the school board the buildings may be used out of school hours for religions instruction or other purposes.

18. By the School Law of 1870 the ordinary teachers are bound to provide for the moral training of the children by all ordinary means.

19. See No. 16. It is left to the parents.

20. No; but persons belonging to "religious orders" are excluded.

GENEVA:

16. No.

17. No.

18. They are brought up to believe in republicanism as the only true form of government; other moral training is left to the parents.

19. There is no religious instruction in the schools. The State gives a certain sum yearly to the corporation of "Pasteurs" called the "Consistoire", who give religious instruction to children sent them by their parents. The sum given by the State is 6,000f. (£240.)

20. Yes.

NEUCHÂTEL:

16. No.

17. Yes. Vide Art. 20, "Loi sur l'Instruction Publique Primaire".

18. There is no special moral training, but the teachers are supposed, in their lessons of history and civic instruction, to form the child's moral character (verbatim).

19. No. It is left entirely to the discretion of the parents.

20. Yes.

TESSIN:

16. Religious instruction is not compulsory. However, in all the schools of the canton the priest of the parish teaches the catechism of the Roman Catholic Church in the ordinary school hours.

17. -

18. There is no special moral training, it being comprised in the religious instruction.

19. (See 16.)

20. The majority, i.e., 486 out of 495 are lay; 9 are clerical, or sisters.

VAUD:

16. Yes. From a historical point of view. By the teacher who gives secular instruction.

17. -

18. Yes.

19. I cannot get satisfactory details.

20. No (Art. 20 of law).* Only if the parents are willing.

ZURICH:

16. Yes. State religion (Reformed Church). By the schoolmaster or clergyman of the parish (State Church).

17. -

18. Yes, by stimulating their moral feelings, the teachers reading and explaining moral tales to the children, more especially during the lessons of German and history.

19. No, but attendance nearly general. No provision; this is left to the discretion of parents or guardians.

20. Yes.

WURTEMBERG:

16. Yes; the third part of the whole school time is devoted to religious instruction, that consists in learning by heart religious matters, in reading the Bible with a view of requiring knowledge of the sacred history and of the foundation of the doctrines of the church. The greater part of the religious instruction is given by the teacher, the clergyman teaching the confessional doctrines chiefly.

17. No.

18. No special provision is made. All the branches of the curriculum, not only those dealing with religious instruction, must keep in view the moral training of the children. Twice a week the Protestant children must attend public divine service; once a week they are catechised by the clergyman. The Catholic children attend mass before going to school every morning.

19. No; the minority may take part in the religious instruction of the majority; but if the parents prefer that their children should not do so, they may be excused and seek their religious instruction elsewhere. For confessional schools, see No. 13.

20. In the Protestant schools there are only lay teachers, either male or female; in the catholic schools female teachers of certain religious orders may be admitted.

NORWAY:

16. They do. The evangelic Lutheran religion. With regard to the extent of the instruction, there is no statutory provision for the elementary schools; but, on the other hand, for the grammar schools there is (Law, 1869, section 14, No. 1). The instruction is given by the teachers of the schools.

17. Falls to the ground.

18. In that respect no special provision has been made, except what has been stated as the object of the school (Law, 1860, section 1; Law, 1848, section 1; and Law, 1869, section 2).

19. It is, except for the children of Dissenters.

(See No. 5, lit. d.)

20. They are.

*This reference is incorrect.


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SWEDEN:

16. They do; but the children of parents who confess a foreign faith may be exempted from religions instruction. They are instructed by the teachers of the schools, under the inspection of the clergy, in Bible history, and the shorter catechism by Luther, with short explanations.

17. -

18. According to the school law it is the duty of the teachers carefully to watch over the morals and conduct of their pupils, not only during the lessons, but also out of school hours.

19. It is, with the exception mentioned at question 16.

20. They are, with the exception only of about 30 in the whole kingdom.

BRITISH COLUMBIA:

16. No.

17. In some cases.

18. The highest morality shall be inculcated, but no religious dogma or creed shall be taught. The Lord's Prayer may be used in opening and closing school upon the permission of the board of trustees.

19. -

20. Yes.

NEW ZEALAND:

16. No.

17. They may be so used by permission of the school committee in each case.

18. The only provision and the only security lie in the care with which teachers are selected.

19. There is none.

20. Very few teachers are clergymen, but orders are not a bar to appointment.

NOVA SCOTIA:

16. Schools strictly confined to secular instruction.

17. Trustees may legally grant such use, but the power is practically never called into exercise.

18. Every teacher is by law required to instil in the pupils' minds the fundamental principles of morality. This, however, is done incidentally, and not by formal teaching.

19. Religious instruction is relegated to the family, the Sunday school, and the various churches.

20. Clergymen and members of religious orders can (and in very small number) teach in the public schools, but only as holders of valid provincial licenses.

QUEBEC:

16. Yes. In the Roman Catholic schools the catechism of that church is taught as a regular school subject. In Protestant schools scripture history and the Gospels are taught, and the schools are opened with Bible reading and prayer. The religious instruction is given by the regular teachers.

17. No.

18. Teachers are required to give lessons upon the subject of good morals as a regular part of the course of study.

19. The great majority of the schools of the Province are distinctly Roman Catholic or Protestant. In the case of mixed schools religious instruction is given in accordance with the views of the majority, and the minority are exempt from attendance at that hour.

20. No.

ONTARIO: 16. The law provides that pupils shall be allowed to receive such religious instructions as their parents or guardians desire, according to any general regulations provided for the organisation, government, and discipline of public schools.*

17. -

18. The following are the departmental regulations on this subject:

Moral and Religious Instruction. - No course of moral instruction is prescribed. The teacher is expected, however, by his personal example, as well as by the exercise of his authority and by instruction, to imbue every pupil with respect for those moral obligations which underlie a well-formed character. Respect for those in authority, and for the aged, courtesy, true manliness, reverence, truthfulness, honesty, &c. can best be inculcated as the occasion arises for referring to them. The religious exercises of the school should be conducted without haste and with the utmost reverence and decorum.

19. The law enacts that no person shall require any pupil in any public school to read or study in or from any religious book, or to join any exercise of devotion or religion objected to by his pr her parents or guardians.

20. Yes; but not necessarily so.

PRINCE EDWARD ISLAND:

16. Only secular.

17. No.

18. No special provision.

19. No provision is made for religious instruction.

20. Yes.

MANITOBA:

16. Schools under the management of the Protestant section of the Board of Education are required to have Bible reading daily, and are opened and closed with prayer; the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer are also taught, but there is no denominational religious teaching. Schools under the management of the Catholic section of the board have a full system of religious teaching by the teachers under direction of the church authorities.

17. No; except that in rural school districts school-houses are frequently used on Sunday for church and Sunday school purposes.

18. Moral teaching is prescribed as a subject of instruction by oral lessons in Protestant schools, and is included in the religious instruction given in Catholic schools. The means taken to secure it are (1) in strict requirements as to character from persons applying for a licence to teach, and (2) by efficient inspection.

19. All primary schools in the province being Protestant and Catholic, the requirements stated in Question 16 are found practicable and do not require the provision of special rules for a minority.

20. In the Protestant schools, yes; in the Catholic, no.

QUEENSLAND:

16. No.

17. "Applications from ministers of religion or other persons desirous of giving religious instruction to the children in the school buildings out of school hours must be made to the minister," and are favourably entertained by him. This permission is not very generally availed of.

18. No special provision is made for the moral training of children in the schools by the ordinary teachers in the ordinary school hours; but the moral training of the children is regarded as part of the ordinary duties of every teacher.

19. No religious instruction is obligatory on any scholar.

20. "Ministers of religion and persons acting as local preachers or Bible readers cannot hold appointments as teachers."

SOUTH AUSTRALIA:

16. No.

17. Very seldom.

18. The relations require every teacher to "train his pupils in habits of cleanliness, industry, punctuality, obedience, truthfulness, honesty, and consideration for others."

*It appears that religious exercises are a part of the ordinary routine of the school.


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19. Special moral lessons are given weekly.

20. In the Government schools they are so; but not in private establishments.

TASMANIA:

16. Ministers of religion are allowed to instruct children of their several denominations during stated periods, half-an-hour in morning and half-an-hour in afternoon.

17. School houses may, with the permission of the board of advice, be used for Sunday school teaching.

18. Bible history is taught, and the readers in use inculcate morality.

19. Children are not obliged to attend while ministers of religion of other denominations than their own are engaged in teaching. The system in vogue does not provide for dogmatic teaching of any; it is secular.

20. Yes.

THE STATE OF COLORADO, U.S.A.:

16. No. No sectarian tenets or doctrines are allowed to be ever taught in public schools.

17. The use of school houses out of school hours for any other purpose rests with the Board of Directors and the voters.

18. No. All publications of an immoral or pernicious tendency are by law excluded. Instruction in hygiene, with special reference to the effects of alcoholic stimulants and narcotics upon the human body, is included by statute law of 1887 in the branches of study in all public schools.

19. No. None.

20. Yes.

CONNECTICUT, U.S.A.

16. No.

17. No.

18. No provision made by law.

19. No.

20. No. There is occasionally a clergyman; the hiring is in the hands of local committees.

STATE OF ILLINOIS, U.S.A.:

16. No. Any appropriation or grant of any school fund whatever in aid of any church or sectarian purpose is prohibited under penalty of double the amount and imprisonment of not less than one month or more than 12 months in county jail.

17. The board of directors have power to grant the use of school buildings, when not occupied by schools, for religious meetings and Sunday schools, for evening schools and for literary societies, or for such other purposes as they may deem proper.

18. None mentioned.

19. No.

20. Yes.

STATE OF IOWA, U.S.A.:

16. No.

17. They can be if so voted by the electors of the school district.

18. None stated. Teachers can report children of vicious or immoral habits for the purpose of their removal to institutions specially adopted for that purpose both for boys and girls.

19. No. None

20. Yes.

STATE OF KANSAS, U.S.A.:

16. No.

17. The district boards are authorised to open the school-houses for the use of religious, political, literary, scientific, mechanical, or agricultural societies of the district under such regulations as the school board may adopt.

18. None mentioned. Provision must be made by law for instruction in all public schools in the elements of hygiene, with special reference to the effects of alcoholic stimulants and narcotics upon the human system.

19. No sectarian or religious doctrine is allowed to be taught or inculcated in any public school; but nothing in the law is to be construed to prohibit the reading of the Holy Scriptures without note or comment.

20. Yes.

STATE OF MINNESOTA, U.S.A.:

16. No.

17. -

18. None specified. Except that instruction in hygiene with special reference to the effects of stimulants and alcohol upon the human system is compulsory.

19. No.

None.

20. Yes.

STATE OF MISSOURI, U.S.A.:

16. No religious instruction.

17. The care and keeping of the schoolhouse is left to the board of directors, but there is nothing to prevent the use of any schoolhouse for religious or other purpose when demanded by majority of voters.

18. Any student can be suspended or expelled by the faculty for contumacy, insubordination, or immoral conduct, and the decision of the board of directors is final.

19. Neither the general assembly of the State, nor any county, city, town, township, school district, or other municipal corporation can ever make an appropriation, or pay from any public fund whatever, anything in aid of any religious creed, church, or sectarian purpose.

20. Yes.

STATE OF NEBRASKA, U.S.A.:

16. No.

17. No information.

18. No.

19. No.

20. Yes.

TERRITORY OF MONTANA, U.S.A.:

16. No.

All sectarian publications are prohibited, and if any sectarian or denominational doctrine be taught, the school forfeits right to any portion of county school moneys.

17. -

18. Instruction is given during the entire school course in manners, morals, and the laws of health; and, according to territorial law, it is the duty of all teachers to impress on pupils the principles of morality, truth, justice, and patriotism.

19. No. None.

20. Yes.

TERRITORY OF WYOMING, U.S.A.

16. No.

17. Not specified.

18. No.

19. No. None.

20. Yes.

TERRITORY OF DAKOTA, U.S.A.:

16. No. The Bible may be read for 10 minutes without comment.

17. A majority of voters may permit the schoolhouse to be used for any proper purpose (but the seats must not be removed or furniture interfered with), giving equal rights to all religious or political parties, but the schoolhouse must be open at any time for literary or educational purposes.

18. No; by law. Except the effects of stimulants and narcotics upon the human system. Must by law be taught,

19. None.

20. Yes.


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CHAPTER II

CURRICULUM OF INSTRUCTION

In this large branch of our inquiry we have endeavoured to ascertain, not only what inquiry, are the results obtained under the established curriculum as set forth in the Education Code, but also, and more particularly, how far this curriculum is adapted to the several kinds of elementary schools upon which it is imposed, and to the varying ages and conditions of the scholars who have to be taught in accordance with its provisions. In carrying out this investigation, we have not failed to consider the possibility of the existing scheme of Standard Subjects, Class Subjects, and Specific Subjects being fundamentally imperfect. Accordingly, we have put questions to the witnesses with the view of learning whether the present standards are right in themselves or too exacting, or whether, indeed, any standards are absolutely necessary. We have inquired, too, whether the class subjects are suitable, reasonably to be called elementary, easily adapted to the needs of particular localities, and within the reach of the very numerous small schools in rural districts. We have further endeavoured to ascertain whether the specific subjects are the best that could be selected, and whether the refusal to make grants for them in any standard below the fifth is to be defended; also whether the encouragement given to the teaching of drawing, of elementary science, and of the subjects which, with better definition, might be understood to be embraced under the general head of "technical instruction", including cookery, is such as to secure that these branches of instruction shall receive the attention which their importance demands.

We are bound, however, before entering upon the consideration of the curriculum, to call attention to the fact that witnesses of all classes testify to the imperfect hold of knowledge gained in elementary schools. It is obvious that to teach a child to observe and think by proper training of the mind will more effectually develop its capacity and faculties than premature initiation into matters beyond its intellectual habits. We regard this as one of the most important matters which we have to investigate in connexion with elementary instruction, and we do not hesitate to affirm that a thorough grounding in the rudiments of knowledge is an essential condition of any national system, which is to secure permanent educational results. If these permanent results fail to be attained in the case of reading, writing, and arithmetic, which all children on leaving school must, to some extent, keep in practice, it may be feared that knowledge of other subjects, not engaging their attention after they quit school, will evaporate, and thus much time devoted to such subjects will be practically wasted.

Beginning with the standard subjects, and dealing first with the preliminary question as to the need and advisability of retaining any system of standards, we have it in evidence that formerly schools were examined without any prescribed standards, each inspector carrying a kind of mental standard with him to his work, which had been gradually formed by what he found children able to accomplish, and arriving at his judgment on the results by comparing them with that mental standard. We were also told that no system of standards strictly corresponding to ours is in use in continental elementary schools; but that a progressive system is adopted in them, under which children as a rule pass through a class each year, with the result that whilst more time is spent upon the course, the teaching is much sounder than under our system. Many continental plans of study for elementary schools are far more minute in apportioning the details of yearly work than the English Code. It is alleged that there are evils attending the use of standards which are neither few nor unimportant. It is said that the subjects in the standards must necessarily be arranged for an average school and for an average child, and so must be detrimental more or less to that which is above or below the average.^ It is said that a child of quick and superior abilities is hindered from rising through the classes as quickly as is desirable, and that oftentimes this operates more powerfully in inducing him to get away from school than would any amount of success in his passing rapidly through his standards, for in the one case he chafes under a sense of being unfairly treated, while in the other his very success acts as a spur to urge him on towards the highest point of


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excellence to be gained in his school. The duller child, on the other hand, it is said, has to be pressed in order to be made to keep up with the rest in his class, and this all the more, if through his own irregular attendance, or in consequence of an inefficient teaching staff, his subjects get much in arrear towards the end of the school year. The teachers in many instances complain of the bad classification produced under the standards. One computes the error in classification to be from 40 to 50 per cent, 20 per cent of the children in a given standard being too low for their abilities, and 20 to 30 per cent one or two standards too high. Another claims for teachers a free hand in the classification, even desiring to see all standards, except a "leaving" standard, abolished. A third affirmed that if he had the liberty he desired, he should transform his school from end to end. On the contrary. Mr. Matthew Arnold expressed considerable doubt about the advisability of entertaining any proposal to classify according to ability, and he much preferred the continental system of a class devoting a whole year to its prescribed curriculum. He would indeed have been willing to sweep away altogether the existing standards, and in lieu of the whole system he would have had the work for each class prescribed, the number of hours to be devoted to each subject carefully specified, the books to be used in the classes approved, and the teachers better trained; the one aim of the teaching being to secure that the principles of each subject of instruction are clearly set forth and thoroughly understood by the scholars.

It is also urged that the combination of labour passes with the results of inspection presents another difficulty in the present system, for an inspector is tempted to keep his examination down to the minimum, lest hardship should be inflicted upon the parents from their children failing to obtain exemption from attendance at school. It is maintained by Mr. Sharpe, on the other hand, that the system of standards is, on the whole, good for large schools, although wanting in elasticity in the case of smaller schools. The employment of the system in large schools, he says, has been helpful in retarding a scholar's too rapid progress from year to year; a scholar who has proved himself to be weak in any particular standard being allowed to go over the same ground for another year: and everywhere, from the lowest standard to the highest, the use of the system has done much to secure thoroughness of results. Without the standards, he thinks that our educational system would relapse into chaos, and that it would be impossible to compare school with school or district with district. He contends that, although the standard principle may tend to make teachers and managers aim only after average or even minimum results, it is difficult to see how any uniform minimum of attainments can be insisted on without the use of standards. It is alleged, indeed, that in the early days of the administration of the Parliamentary grant for education, the course of instruction pursued in a given school did, to a great extent, influence the character of its annual examination. But now, on the contrary, we are told, it is the knowledge of the kind of examination to be expected which practically rules and fixes the scheme of instruction. If, however, on the whole, as is alleged, greater thoroughness is the result of the change, the balance of advantage seems to us to rest on the side of retaining, instead of abolishing, the standards. Mr. Fitch tells us that the present system has been worked for so long a period of time that parents are thoroughly familiar with it, and in his opinion the knowledge that their child has or has not passed a particular standard awakens the parents' interest in his progress, and is very valuable.

In small schools, it is true, the difficulties of carrying on instruction in six or seven different standards, besides the infant class, when possibly the whole staff is represented by one teacher, are said to be very great; and for such schools some system of grouping appears to be almost a necessity. Mr. Sharpe would run two standards into one and allow two years for a child to pass through his group, and he would permit those in charge of the school to frame any scheme for the grouping of standards which he contemplates, subject to the two conditions that there are not less than three groups provided for in the school, and that the scheme is approved beforehand by the inspector. Mr. Fitch proposes a plan, with some parts of which other witnesses are substantially agreed, for getting over some of the inherent difficulties of the present system, and at the same time somewhat lightening the work of the inspector. He would have recourse to the regulations in the Scotch Code and


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abolish individual examination, with a record of each child's passes and failures, in Standards I and II. In Standards III, IV, V, or VI he would examine individually every child whose name has been half a year on the school registers, allowing no exceptions; but he would give the full grant where the percentage of passes in this part of the school is 75, and he would leave absolute liberty of classification to the teachers, insisting on no rule as to a child being examined again in the same standard, grant for and trusting to the loyalty of the teachers and to the watchfulness of the parents to guard so large a concession against abuse. In Standard VII. and possibly also in Standard VI he would dispense with the three elementary subjects and allow the scholars to be presented in not more than four subjects arranged under the heads of language, mathematics, and science, some form of payment for individual results being adopted in this part of the school.

On the whole, the evidence which we have received leads us to consider that the standards should be carefully revised with a view to some modifications in the method of examination, and in the grouping of standards, especially in small schools. Standards, in our opinion, have been shown to be of too much value for the purpose of examination to make it prudent to dispense with them. We are further of opinion that the system of standards should be so applied as to give perfect freedom to teachers to classify their scholars according to their attainments and abilities.

To come next to the Elementary Subjects, reading, writing, and arithmetic, we find in the first place much complaint as to the quality of the reading. Reading, we are told, does not receive sufficient attention in the matter of fluency and intonation; its chief fault is that it is too mechanical and unintelligent. Many of the reading books are said to be dry and too instructive. It is alleged that too few books are ordinarily in use, the children who read best being those who have read a large number of books, and that teachers introduce too much collateral matter, so abridging the time spent on reading. Where the teachers themselves are good readers and practise reading aloud to their scholars, improvement is said to be easily discernible. Mechanical repetition, it is said, does not produce good reading, it only leads the children to learn their books by heart instead of reading them; and it is alleged that the system at present in use fails to inspire the children with any real interest in reading. One of the chief difficulties connected with reading is said to be that the language of the reading books is not the language of the children's home and , out-of-door life, and is "an unknown tongue to the children of the illiterate, especially in remote situations." Many of the teachers complain that the three books are too much to be got up in the year. The evidence, however, shows that this complaint of the teachers arises from the fact that the spelling and grammatical tests may be taken from any part of the books prescribed, and not from any objection to the number and variety of books for the purposes of teaching reading. The statement that the children know their reading lessons by heart, which has been made before us, has also been denied. It is said that there is not time to teach them to read with intelligence the amount required by the Code, so that they get to hate their books. Children, we are told, are kept too long at mere mechanical unintelligent reading. Mr. Oakeley would like to see a list of approved books set forth by authority; and he would also limit the requirements for dictation. The reading lesson, it is said, is too much hampered with the spelling; if the examination in spelling was restricted to dictation, taken from one of the three books used, the other two would probably be read with more interest. Mr. Graves, one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of schools, would separate spelling altogether from reading, and he would award a separate grant to the subject; he thinks three reading books too much to be done in the year. Mr. Fitch, on the contrary, is of opinion that the latter requirement is reasonable. He does not think that explanations are very skilfully managed in schools; teachers, he says, interrupt the reading too much for the discussion of particular words, instead of reading as a whole, and attending to expression.

Looked at from all sides, it is plain that there is room for much improvement in reading. We are of opinion that it would be of advantage to increase, rather than to


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diminish, the number of books to be read in each standard, but that the spelling requirements should be diminished, and we think that unless the scholars are taught to read with ease, and acquire a taste for reading, their school learning will not be followed up in after life. It must be remembered that a child who has thoroughly acquired the art of reading with ease has within its reach the key of all knowledge, and it will rest with itself alone to determine the limit of its progress. Good reading is, however, at the present time often sacrificed to instruction in spelling. In a reading lesson the whole of the teacher's attention should be concentrated on securing fluency and expression, and on interesting the scholars in the subject-matter of the book. The art of reading aloud is acquired largely by the ear, and would be better taught by the teachers reading to their scholars. It is manifest that if children only hear each other read they will retain their own bad habits. We think it would be well for the Department to consider whether the words in Schedule I of the Code, referring to the reading of Shakespeare's historical plays in Standard VI and those referring to the reading of Shakespeare and Milton in Standard VII, should not be omitted. We strongly recommend the establishment of school libraries as a material encouragement to the habit of reading at home, and as forming important aids to the school course of teaching in securing a taste for reading.

The subject of writing in the Code includes spelling also, and the two subjects are considered jointly. But little evidence was given on the matter of handwriting, although much was said about the spelling. The fact appears to be that whilst the teaching of handwriting is assumed to be a comparatively easy matter, the teaching of spelling is known to be most difficult. We are disposed to think that too much importance is attached to spelling as a separate subject in the course of an elementary school, and we believe that the art of spelling accurately is learnt most certainly, and often unconsciously, by the practice of reading. If drawing were universally taught, as we shall afterwards recommend, probably handwriting would receive more attention than it does, with the result of its becoming both belter in form and more legible. The teaching of drawing has a marked effect in improving the character of the writing in elementary schools.

In arithmetic, as well as in the other two elementary subjects, Mr. Stewart considers that the work in the higher standards is heavy as compared with that in Standards I and II; and whilst he is not prepared to admit that the transition from Standard III to Standard IV is in many cases too great a step in advance, he thinks that there are some cases in which the tables of weights and measures in the Fourth Standard prove to be a heavy tax upon the child, who is required to commit them to memory. In small schools the requirements of the Code in arithmetic are unnecessarily intricate. Canon Warburton thinks the standards of arithmetic are not satisfactorily arranged, and that fractions should be introduced at an earlier stage than the Code at present requires. Mr. Wild, an elementary teacher, complains that children in the First and Second Standards are required to deal with numbers too large for their comprehension, and urges that the first lessons in arithmetic should be confined to numbers within the actual purview of the children themselves, instead of numbers of which they can form no right conception; and the same witness specially points out, as an instance of the faulty graduation of arithmetic in the Code, that in the Fourth Standard a child may be required to reduce square inches to acres, which involves teaching division by a fraction, 30¼, whereas to divide a number by a fraction is not prescribed until a child has reached the Sixth Standard. The problems set in the examination cards are looked upon as too difficult, and the tests themselves as very unequal; and although girls may pass in the subject of arithmetic, yet they are often unable to apply their knowledge to the simplest practical use, such as making out little accounts for their parents, or calculating the interest on small sums in a Post Office Savings Bank book. Much time is said to be occupied with mechanical and practically useless arithmetic, and with unravelling arithmetical puzzles. The "central preparation of arithmetic cards" is not altogether liked by the teachers, and some say they would prefer the inspector to test the scholars in the principles of the processes they use. The tables of area and capacity are stated to be too hard for girls. "It is a big jump from Standard III to Standard IV", says one witness. Mr. Arnold strongly advocated the teaching of principles instead of adhering to the hard-and-fast requirement for a pass in arithmetic, though he thought


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that a certain proportion out of a given number of sums ought to show a correct result. In answer to part of these statements, taken from the evidence of the teachers, Mr. Oakeley thinks that arithmetical principles and intelligence in arithmetical knowledge are best tested by the present method; he affirms that the arithmetic taught is connected with matters of everyday life; and so far from the questions on the present examination cards being harder than formerly, he says they are actually easier, and deal with smaller numbers. He admits that the division by 30¼ is an unfair test for the Fourth Standard, and proposes to abolish the pole and adopt the chain instead, the chain being 22 yards long, and a square chain just a tenth of an acre; he would also strike out fractions from Standard V and compound proportion from Standard VII, substituting in the latter case mensuration of rectangles in place of the rule struck out.

We are of opinion that in this subject the standards of the Code require to be carefully reconsidered, bearing in mind the importance of arranging them on sound educational principles; of graduating them so as to be well within the compass of the scholars of both sexes; and, in the higher classes, of giving some choice of rules that may be taught, so as to meet the varying industrial requirements of different districts. The exercises should be thoroughly practical, and of a kind likely to be met with in everyday life. The Inspectors should be instructed at their annual visits to see that the children have been taught, as far as their years permit, the principles of the rules, as well as their working. This cannot well be done on paper, but evidently requires to be attended to carefully. The evidence we have listened to shows how many teachers fail to understand that, looking at the matter from the lowest point of view, the best results are likely to be attained, and in the shortest time, by the employment of intelligent methods. We recommend that it should be distinctly recognised that, as the time of girls is largely taken up by needlework, the time they can give to arithmetic is less than that which can be given by boys. We think that this recommendation will best be carried out, not by exceptional leniency in the annual examination, but by modifying the arithmetical requirements of the Code in the case of girls.

Before we refer to the subjects which are now known technically as "class" and "specific" subjects, we have some general suggestions to make as to the Code syllabus, on the supposition that the present scheme of syllabuses is to continue. In framing the syllabus, the Education Department has evidently been anxious to extend to teachers great freedom, and some of the Code definitions of the knowledge which may be imparted are very broad and comprehensive. For instance, we may refer to the prescribed course in geography for Standard VII, namely, "The ocean. Currents and tides. General arrangement of the planetary system. The phases of the moon." It is evident that the knowledge of several of these branches of geography imparted in the time available, however thorough as far as it goes, can be but elementary, and that these definitions may be interpreted very differently in determining the suitable limitations of this knowledge. The expediency of allowing great freedom to teachers we fully appreciate; but, on the other hand, if they are not assured as to the limitations of the knowledge which will be required from their scholars in the official examinations, they are tempted to ramble superficially over too wide a field, in order to prepare for any possible questions which they anticipate may be put by Her Majesty's Inspector.

As respects the class subjects, a provision in the present Code meets this difficulty, namely, that which permits the managers of a school, with the approval of the local inspector, to substitute, for the scheme of instruction in the Code syllabus, a different and clearly defined scheme of lessons, and thus to secure a perfect understanding between the teachers and the inspector. This provision is especially suitable when a large number of schools in the same district adopt a common scheme, and we are of opinion that many managers and teachers would do wisely to avail themselves of this provision, and that the Department and the Inspectors should encourage them to do so. Additional provisions are, we think, required to secure these desired ends, and we suggest that the arrangement now adopted in the Code for "Mechanics" might advantageously be adopted for other subjects, namely, the provision of alternative courses, precisely defined, of which the managers of a school may select the one preferred by the teachers, and most suitable to the capacities of their scholars.


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We should not be justified in omitting all reference to another suggestion we have received from some of Her Majesty's inspectors, namely, that suitable text books should be recommended in the Code, their use in schools, however, not to be obligatory; and that these books, if adopted, should define the knowledge required in the official examinations. But we are altogether opposed to the introduction of an officially recognized set of Government text books. We think, however, that with the view of indicating to managers and teachers the range of study intended to be covered by the requirements of the Code, a more or less extended programme should be published for each subject, similar to those adopted in the Science and Art Directory, with a view of showing within what limits the official examinations would be confined. Teachers as well as inspectors might often value this guidance. The Education Department can obtain the aid of the most competent advisers in each separate subject, an advantage not always within the reach of the local authorities; and as the subjects taught are varied in elementary schools to meet their respective circumstances, it is hardly to be expected that either teachers or inspectors can have thoroughly thought out for themselves the course of instruction most suitable to all the subjects in which they may be called upon to instruct or to examine scholars. Such a programme would also obviously be valuable in assisting teachers to decide whether a subject is adapted to the capacities and circumstances of their scholars, and whether justice can be done to it in the time available. If teachers knew precisely the extent of the instruction contemplated by the syllabus, we think a valuable safeguard would be provided against the danger of overloading the curriculum of a school. Lastly, we find that much of the knowledge acquired in the elementary schools is very soon forgotten. Increased efforts to make the instruction more interesting would doubtless tend to diminish this evil; but we also think that every syllabus should be so framed as to refresh in later standards the knowledge acquired in earlier standards, and thus to impress it on the mind. In several subjects this end could be attained without deviating from a continuous and progressive course of lessons, as the earlier and more advanced stages have a close relation to one another. We must add that in the syllabuses for pupil-teachers, definitions or programmes of studies, which leave no doubt as to their interpretation, are specially required; since in the examinations for Queen's scholarships no communication is possible between the teachers and examiners, and the latter have no guidance in framing appropriate questions, except that to be derived from the Code syllabus.

The Class Subjects come next in order in considering the school curriculum. And here, on the threshold, we are met with the fact that some schools, more especially small schools, consider themselves unable to take up any of these subjects - a state of things which seems to us to be very undesirable. As already pointed out, however, liberty is given under the Code for managers to frame a course of study in the Class Subjects suitable for children in these small schools, on the condition, however, that provision in such a scheme shall be made for at least three groups of scholars. We should desire that, as far as practicable, children should be grounded in all the four Class Subjects, English, Geography, History, and Elementary Science, and that, when some only of these are taken, the selection should be left to the school authorities. The requirement, that in all cases English should be the first Class Subject taken up, much limits the selection permitted to teachers and managers, and complaints of the amount of grammar required under the head of English are not infrequent, the analysis particularly being stated to be beyond the capacity of the average child. That portion of the subject which consists of recitation is looked upon by some as very valuable, but the objection to continuing English compulsorily as the first Class Subject is very general. It is against technical grammar, such as word-building, Latin prefixes, and the mere accidence, that the main force of the objection is directed; and, inasmuch as the present supremacy of the subject has ousted history and elementary science from the vast majority of schools, and has even made it generally impossible in some schools to take up geography at all, the time is alleged to have come when this supremacy of grammar should be relaxed, if not taken away altogether, and full liberty of choice in Class Subjects given to the managers. The general effect of the evidence of the witnesses before us is that while they value the literary side of the English Class Subject, they think the technical


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grammar too dry and too much in excess of the powers of the scholars to make it the best instrument of education. By some, however, the contrary opinion is held, that English grammar and analysis are most useful exercises for intellectual training, and that they are too important to be left out where two Class Subjects are taken. A suggestion too has been made that "advanced reading", by which we understand intelligent reading in some standard authors, might be allowed to take the place of grammar in the Class Subject of English.

We are of opinion that the provision of the Code which requires that, if only one Class Subject is taken, it must be English, should be repealed. We think that the Department might well consider whether it will not be wise in the regulations of the Code relating to Class Subjects, to leave out a reference to any special authors. We are also strongly in favour of providing that children should have the advantage of learning by heart suitable passages of English poetry, but that allowance should be made for the different capacities of children; and we recommend the retention, under the head of grammar, of parsing and analysis; but that exercises in word-building and Latin prefixes should be left entirely to the discretion of the teacher.

We remark that geography and history are not placed on the same footing in the present Code, and, as a consequence, the attention which they respectively receive as subjects of instruction is very unequal. While geography as a Class Subject is taught in the majority of our elementary schools with increased skill, and by methods which interest as well as inform the mind of the learners, history has dropped out of the time- table of all but a few schools. The restriction of the latter subject to the Fifth and higher standards has greatly discouraged its systematic teaching, and checks the diffusion of a branch of instruction which not only properly forms part of the curriculum of the elementary school, but in other countries is regarded as obligatory. If the Inspectors were authorised to ascertain whether the children retain the facts of history related in the historical reading books, as well as whether they understand their meaning, this would probably lead up to the study of history in the upper standards.

Geography is one of the subjects in which, as it seems to us, alternative syllabuses might advantageously be set forth in the Code, since some teachers can do justice to a more comprehensive course than others. The course prescribed for Standard VI is "Geography of the world generally, and especially of the British colonies and dependencies; interchange of productions, and circumstances which determine climate": and these terms, taken in connexion with the definitions in earlier standards, include a geographical compendium of all the principal countries of the world, which, in the short period of a child's school career, must of necessity be dry and bald; whereas a more thorough and interesting knowledge of fewer countries, and of the most marked geographical distinctions between different parts of the earth, would be of more permanent value. Moreover, it is generally admitted that after scholars have been grounded in the elementary stages of a comprehensive subject, the specialising of some particular branch of it is valuable as a means of mental training. We, therefore, suggest that in Standard VII the whole time allotted to geography might advantageously be devoted to specialising some particular branch of the subject, as, for instance, the causes which contribute to vary the distribution of animal and vegetable life in the world, or the influence of the physical features of a few countries on the density, habits, pursuits, and character of the population, and, in the case of our own land, on its past history.

The Code does not contain any syllabus of instruction in History for elementary schools, and, if taught, the managers or teachers have to frame a scheme of lessons which must be approved by Her Majesty's Inspector. While this latitude may be desirable for managers or teachers who have given special attention to the subject, it would be well that the Code should provide a syllabus for those who may wish to avail themselves of its guidance. In the earlier standards it may be expedient not to attempt more than the general outline of English history, and in fuller detail a few of its most interesting epochs, or the lives of its most eminent men; but in the higher standards the Code might provide that scholars acquainted with the outlines of English history should devote all the time allotted to that subject in Standard VI or VII to acquiring a knowledge of our constitution and of some of our national institutions, such, for instance, as parliamentary and municipal government, the poor law, trial by jury, and the constitution and powers of the principal courts by which the laws are adminis-


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tered; and further, that when an interest has thus been awakened in these institutions, their development from earlier times might be traced through a few of its most important stages. In such a course the patriotic efforts and sacrifices made by our forefathers to secure the rights we now enjoy would find their appropriate place.

As to the specific subjects of the Code, the Department is of opinion that the curriculum of an elementary school may be considered as complete without the addition of any specific subjects,* and it is abundantly proved that, whilst they are quite suitable for some schools, they are incapable of universal application. With regard to the subject of domestic economy, it may evidently be made a very practical one, and ought to receive considerable attention, but we have not received from witnesses so favourable a report of physiology as a subject of instruction. We are, however, of opinion, that though the prescribed course in physiology as a separate specific subject may be more comprehensive than is needed to prepare the girls for their subsequent household duties, simple instruction in its elementary principles might be given with advantage, which would enable girls to apply intelligently and to appreciate in after-life, the practical maxims which secure health in a household. More than one teacher, having introduced French, gave it up because it was seen that enough could not be learnt to make the subject useful in after-life. If, however, the subject can be carried on through all the three stages set forth in Schedule IV of the Code, that objection is said to lose its force, and we are told that, generally, the teaching of the specific subjects in a school has the double effect of stimulating the scholars' intelligence and inducing them to continue longer at school. It is confessed, however, that these subjects have often been taken up rather in order to add something to the grant earned, than with the view to secure the improvement of the children's minds. Accordingly there was formerly a tendency to select the easiest subject rather than that which would be most profitable to the scholars. The proper course, we consider, would be to let the children's aptitude for particular subjects, and the teacher's qualification for teaching them, determine what "specifics" shall be taken up. In Scotland there is an almost universal demand for the teaching of these higher subjects; in England the demand is apparently very limited. But in Scotland the old parochial schools were expected to prepare scholars to go direct to the universities; and the Scotch Education Act of 1872, requires every public or board school to maintain, as far as possible, as high a standard of education as formerly prevailed in the parish school. Children of all classes are found on the registers of these schools, so that a large proportion of older scholars attend them, more especially in the rural districts, where there is little or no special provision for secondary education. We propose to discuss the question of Technical Instruction in a separate chapter, but we cannot, in this chapter on the Curriculum of Instruction, wholly leave out all reference to some of the matters which we shall deal with at length hereafter.

*Instructions to Her Majesty's Inspectors, Report (1886-7).

SPECIFIC SUBJECTS

45. You will observe that specific subjects cannot be taken up before a scholar has passed the Fourth Standard; and that English, geography, including physical geography, history, and elementary science are recognised as class subjects. If these subjects are simply and thoroughly taught, the scholars will form those habits of observation, reasoning, and exact statement which are needed for the intelligent conduct of life. In ordinary circumstances the; scheme of elementary education as now laid down by the Code may be considered complete without the addition of specific subjects. It is not desirable, as a general rule, that specific subjects should be attempted where the staff of the school is small, or the scholars in Standard V-VII do not form a class large enough to justify the withdrawal of the principal teacher from the teaching of the rest of the school; in this latter case they would derive more benefit by being grouped with the fourth standard for class subjects. The pecuniary loss entailed by the exclusion of a few boys from the study of specific subjects will be abundantly compensated by the greater success in other subjects, and especially by the higher merit grant reserved for more thorough teaching generally.

46. In large schools, however, and those which are in favourable circumstances, the scholars of Standard V and upwards may be encouraged to attempt one or more specific subjects, which the managers may deem most appropriate to the industrial and other needs of the district. It is not the intention of my Lords to encourage a pretentious or unreal pursuit of higher studies, or to encroach in any way on the province of secondary education. The course suited to an elementary school is practically determined by the limit of 14 years of age; and may properly include whatever subjects can be effectively taught within that limit. It may be hoped that, year by year, a larger proportion of the children will remain in the elementary schools until the age of 14; and a scholar who has attended regularly and possesses fair ability may reasonably be expected to acquire in that time, not only a good knowledge of reading, writing, and arithmetic, of English, and of geography, but also enough of the rudiments of two higher subjects to furnish a stable foundation for further improvement either by his own exertion, or in a secondary school.


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The change made in 1886, which brought Drawing into the Code, resulted, owing to the 17s 6d limit, which was then in force, in its ceasing to be taught in many schools. This step was retraced in the Code of 1887, and it is to be hoped that the teaching of this subject will spread and improve in all directions. But complaints are still to be heard of the drawing schedule being too difficult in the upper standards, and it is represented that as a result, there is no time to teach the subject in a village school, notwithstanding the benefit a knowledge of it would be to boys who are about to become carpenters and mechanics. Mr. Buxton describes the subject as "the best kind of technical education at present available", and "the foundation of all technical training for boys". And, if evening schools should revive, the introduction of drawing into their curriculum would supply the scholars attending them with instruction in a subject of great practical utility. It has been recommended to make the subject compulsory. Sir Henry Roscoe regards drawing as a link between science and art; he looks upon it as the foundation of all industrial pursuits, and suggests that it should be incorporated with writing. He deprecates spending too long a time in merely copying from the flat, urges devoting time to drawing from the round and drawing simple objects, and he specially pleads for the subject to be taught in childhood. He states also that in many foreign countries it is a workman's own fault if he cannot draw, and that in England it is almost exactly the other way.

We are of opinion that drawing is a most valuable part of elementary education, and that we are in England at present deficient, as compared with foreign countries, in respect to the teaching of the subject. At no time in a child's life can it be so easily taught as during the period of schooling. The command of the hand given by instruction in drawing would also improve the writing, and thus effect a saving in the time required for learning writing. We therefore recommend that, as far as practicable, drawing should be made compulsory for boys. It has been recommended to make it compulsory for girls, as well as for boys, but such a proposal is surrounded with difficulties, especially as regards some of the present teachers. Possibly, however, itinerant teachers, duly qualified, might be able to conduct the teaching in a group of schools, especially in rural districts, and so produce satisfactory results; and although we refrain from making the same definite recommendation in the case of girls, we think it right to point out that for many of the employments which girls of the class ordinarily attending our elementary schools may be expected to follow, an elementary knowledge of drawing would be of great practical utility. We recognise the difficulty which will attend the application of compulsion to this subject; but we are nevertheless of opinion that, if it is applied with due consideration for the existing state of things, the advantage to be gained outweighs the inconveniences which might be expected to arise in particular cases.

The teaching of elementary science in our elementary schools, whether as a class subject or as one of the specific subjects, is yet in its infancy. We propose to treat of it in detail in the ensuing chapter on Technical Instruction. One witness says that we have retrograded in this department of school work. Sir Henry Roscoe also thinks that the teaching of this subject is falling off. He would make the subject compulsory, since in his opinion the present system of elementary instruction tends to manufacture clerks and not artisans.

We believe that it would tend very much to facilitate the teaching of the upper standards if object lessons were continued in the lower standards, in succession to the teaching of a similar kind which has been given in the infant school. Geography, indeed, if properly taught, is a branch of Elementary Science, which should not be separated from the other branches, and which might well be taught along with other object lessons; and this the Royal Commission on Technical Instruction have recommended. The particular curriculum of elementary scientific subjects would probably vary according to the special requirements of each locality. In agricultural districts, for instance, arrangements might be made for giving practical and experimental instruction of the very simplest character in the principles of agriculture, the growth and food of plants, their diseases, and the most important conditions to which plant life is subject. The late Professor Henslow went far beyond this.


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Similar experimental instruction in dairy work of the very simplest character might in certain districts be given with great advantage to girls, instruction which would be of great importance to some of them in after life.

Much interesting and useful information on matters which are the proper subjects of science may no doubt be obtained from books alone, and the reading of such books ought not to be discouraged. But the true learning of science cannot be said to begin till the learners are taught to use their own senses in the study, and to rest their acceptance of scientific truth, even the most elementary, not on what they are told, but on the evidence supplied by their own observation of facts. Knowledge based on any other kind of evidence, though often very valuable, is not in strictness scientific knowledge, and the learners do not gain any touch of the scientific spirit from the acquisition of it. In all such matters it must be laid down as a rule that instruction in science, however elementary or however advanced, cannot be given through books, but must be imparted by means of experiments.

And here in fact this branch of our inquiry glides into the one which is better known under the head of technical instruction, with which we propose to deal more fully in the next chapter. We believe that technical instruction would exert a decided influence in the direction of preventing too large a proportion of boys becoming clerks and shopmen, and that those who were naturally fitted for work with their fingers would exert themselves and would feel that there was an outlet for their talent in this branch of instruction, and that thus we should promote the growth of really skilled artisans which our present system of public elementary education tends, it is commonly said, to discourage. The curriculum in the ordinary elementary schools might well include not only instruction in the elementary principles of science, but also elementary manual instruction in the use of tools; and in higher schools and in evening schools this work might be carried still further.

Needlework is in some sense a "technical" subject, and it is satisfactory to find how large a number of schools secure "good" as their report upon this part of their work. We trust that every endeavour will continue to be made to ensure that this essential branch of a girl's education shall be thoroughly practical and efficient.

Cookery, again, in some sense may be considered a "technical" subject, and its value in the estimation of parents is very high. In fact, mothers in some cases, it is said, are willing to pay an extra fee for instruction in this subject. The 17s 6d limit, however, has prevented managers of voluntary schools from forming cookery classes. One effect of the introduction of this subject is said to be to keep girls longer at school. We are informed that the recognised teachers of cookery are mainly educated persons, and are more efficient in consequence; and it must be remembered that every qualified teacher can obtain a certificate of competency for teaching the subject. Under the London School Board no less than 16,000 girls are now receiving instruction in cookery, and after two courses of lessons they are said to possess considerable practical ability in cooking. A system of lessons adapted to cottage cookery would be of the very greatest value to the girls in most elementary schools; and as the present system, which is quite new and tentative, is making real progress,ft we recommend that it be left to time and experience to suggest any changes that may have to be made. We wish to place on record our opinion that it should be the ultimate aim of the Department to secure that the girls who are educated in public elementary schools, and who will in most cases have hereafter to prepare the food of their families, should receive instruction in practical cooking, which they cannot for the most part obtain elsewhere. We hope that the difficulties of expense and organisation, which, especially in small and in poor schools, now prevent its general adoption, may be overcome within a reasonable period, by suitable encouragement being given by the Department to itinerant teachers, combinations for a cookery teacher, and the like. We believe it is difficult to over-estimate the far- reaching effect upon the homes of our labouring classes of a knowledge on the part of the mother of the family of good and economical cookery. Meanwhile we gladly note some of the results which have been already attained. It is said, among other things, that girls who attend the cookery lessons acquire a taste for domestic employments, and are both more useful at home and more intelligent in their general studies. The lessons are said to be a relief to over-pressure, and to tend to make the girls


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thrifty and careful housewives. Already, we are told, some of the children's homes have been benefited by the cookery instruction, the girls carrying their lessons into practice by cooking the family dinner.! In our judgment, the value of the cookery instruction lies not so much in any training it may give to girls who subsequently go out to service, as in the knowledge it imparts to those who will apply their information to that all-important matter, the benefit of their homes.

We have received no oral evidence on the subject of teaching music in elementary schools, and but little has been suggested to us on this subject in memorials or in other written communications. The reports of the late Dr. John Hullah, who was for many years H.M. inspector of music in elementary schools, and those of his successor. Dr. Stainer, indicate, however, that a very substantial progress has been made since 1870 in the extent and character of musical training in the public elementary schools of the country. The first attempt to secure general attention to the subject was made in 1871, and took the form of a reduction of grant in the event of its being neglected. In consequence of the objections raised to this arrangement, the Code of 1874 provided that the capitation grant on average attendance should be reduced from 6s to 5s, and 1s be added if singing were taught satisfactorily. It may therefore be said that the first encouragement of the teaching of singing by the payment of a direct grant took place in 1874. The conditions of the grant for singing appear to have remained constant from 1874 to 1882. During that period the attention given to musical training steadily increased, and included, not only the cultivation of the voice, but also that of taste in rendering with expression the sentiments of the songs and pieces which were practised in the schools. The development and extension of the tonic sol-fa system of teaching singing formed a distinguishing mark of the same period, and the encouragement given to this system by many of the larger school boards formed no inconsiderable factor in the improvement which then took place. The following extract from the report of Dr. Hullah for the year 1878 may be quoted as an indication of the progress which had been made in the training colleges up to that date:

"The year by year improvement in practical musical skill and theoretical knowledge of the students in training colleges has shown itself none the less clearly in the examinations of the past than of any preceding year. This improvement is attributable to a variety of causes. Fewer students now enter the colleges without any musical preparation; closer acquaintance with it has engendered increased love for it. To these must be added the all but universal substitution of good methods of teaching for bad; the changes, almost always for the better, among the teachers themselves; and the increased skill, naturally resulting from increased experience, even among the most skilful of these; and to these again the growing conviction among college authorities that music is an educational subject, one in which every student can, with fair opportunities, attain a fair amount of proficiency, and in the attainment of which proficiency it will be found that his judgment, his memory, his quickness of perception have been largely benefited."

In 1882 the grant of 1s per head on the average attendance was made conditional on "singing" being taught "by note", while a reduced grant of 6d per head was given if it were taught satisfactorily "by ear". The result of this change has been to secure greater attention to singing by note. In the year ending August 1882 there were 22,352 departments in which singing was taught by ear, while singing by note was taught in 4,329 only. In the year ending August 1886 the number were 17,020 departments in which singing was taught by ear, and 11,552 departments in which it was taught by note. These figures show a distinct progress, and we are of opinion that a few more years experience of the teaching of singing under the conditions now laid down by the Department will show a similar result. We note also with satisfaction the encouraging nature of Dr. Stainer's report on the training colleges for the year 1885, in which he says, "There can be no doubt that the examination in practical skill shows, year by year, better results"; and again, "It gives me great pleasure to report a vast improvement in the character and style of the songs sung by students to the inspector". Again in his report for 1886-7, he says, "I am glad to be able to report once more a steady progress in the musical work. ... Among the proofs of the good musical work being done, I may mention that in one college the whole of the students obtained full marks. In many others a very high average of marks is noticeable." And in reference to the teaching of music in elementary


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schools, the same inspector says, "It is highly gratifying to find that the rapid increase in the number of schools taking the shilling grant for singing by note is arousing the attention of English musicians generally."

The only suggestion made to the Commission for a change in the existing conditions was that the grant for the teaching of singing by ear should be withdrawn. We are, however, of opinion that the payment of the grant of 6d per head for singing by ear tends to secure attention to the cultivation of the voice and ear, and to the proper rendering of the pieces practised by the scholars, an advantage of no mean kind. We fear that, if this encouragement were withdrawn, the attempt to give any musical training would be abandoned in many schools. We are further of opinion that it would be impossible to enforce singing by note in every school in the country, since some teachers can never acquire the necessary qualifications for teaching it. Our opinion on this point is fortified by that of Dr. Stainer, as expressed in his last official report to the Education Department, from which we extract the following:*

"Some demand that the sixpenny grant for singing by ear should be at once stopped. I cannot recommend your Lordships to take such a step, for several reasons; two are most important. Ear-singing cultivates the musical taste, gives a love for the art, and constitutes one of the most pleasant of school lessons, almost a wholesome relaxation in the midst of other work. It is now chiefly confined to small schools where the want of ability in the children, or of skill in the (sometimes poorly paid) masters renders it impossible to attempt to reach the higher grade. Large flourishing schools take the shilling grant without difficulty, frequently reaching a point of musical excellence far above the requirements of the Code. To stop the grant for ear-singing would, therefore, be giving discouragement to small struggling schools without offering further encouragement to those more flourishing. It is then urged that the sixpenny grant, if taken away for ear-singing, might be added to the shilling as a merit grant for specially good singing by note. This would merely be adding 50 per cent to the grant obtained by the largest and best schools."

We have dealt with the question of Welsh schools and the bilingual difficulty. Many of these schools labour under this difficulty, which arises from the fact that although the native language of the children is Welsh, they are practically treated by the Code as if they always spoke English. It has been stated in evidence that fully two-thirds of the people in Wales habitually speak Welsh, and although a considerable proportion of the adults also speak English with ease, the bulk of the children, we are told, come to school wholly ignorant of that language, and yet English is the vehicle through which they have to learn everything, and in which they will have to be examined. The knowledge also of English which they acquire while at school is said to be so meagre and superficial that, according to the evidence, in Welsh-speaking districts, English is lost in a great measure soon after the child leaves school. The only provision in the Code which at all attempts to meet the difficulty, is one in which it is laid down that the intelligence of the children in the ordinary reading examination may be tested by Her Majesty's Inspector allowing them to explain the meaning of passages read. There has been no desire expressed before us that the use of the English language in the schools should be at all diminished. But it is felt that to enable these schools to overcome the special difficulties with which they have to contend, they should be allowed, at the discretion of the managers, to teach the reading and writing of the vernacular concurrently with that of English. As the Welsh language is almost purely phonetic in character, and does not present the difficulties which are experienced in mastering English, the permission to use bi-lingual reading books would meet the objection of the teachers, who complain that the amount of reading matter to be got up in Welsh schools is too great.** But it is felt that they should be allowed to take up Welsh as a specific subject recognised in the Code; to adopt an optional scheme for English, as a class subject suitable to the special needs of Welsh districts, such scheme being founded on the principle of substituting a graduated system of translation from Welsh to English for the present requirements in English grammar; to teach Welsh along with English as a class subject; and to include Welsh among the languages in which candidates for Queen's scholarships and for certificates of merit may be examined. All these points are advanced in the answers we have received to Circular D. from the head teachers in the counties of Glamorgan and Merioneth. Since concessions somewhat similar to those now demanded in Wales have already been granted

*Report of Committee of the Council (1886-7), page 482.

**Memorial of Society for Utilising the Welsh Language, pp. 6, 7, Appendix.


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in the Scotch Code to the Gaelic-speaking population of Scotland, there appears good reason why they should be conceded in the English Code for the relief of our Welsh-speaking population.

Evidence has been brought before us on the subject of physical training both from those engaged in its application to elementary schools, and from the military authorities charged with the selection of recruits and with their subsequent military drill. The statistics of rejection of candidates for the army, furnished to us by the War Office, point to so alarming an inferiority in the physical development of youths from urban, as compared with rural districts, as to call for the most serious consideration whether any remedy for it can be found in the practice of physical exercises in elementary schools, especially in towns where playgrounds are few and of limited area. The Inspector of Gymnasia, in his report to the War Office on this subject, recommends the general introduction into elementary schools of a system of exercises, similar to those practised at Aldershot with officers' children, consisting chiefly of extension motions, musical drill with wooden dumb-bells and wands, marching, running, hopping, and jumping, a large part of which could be carried on in schoolrooms and in all weathers. We do not recommend, with the evidence before us, the introduction into playgrounds of elaborate gymnastic apparatus, much of which is declared to be unsafe for children, except under the most careful supervision, and even then to be often detrimental. And in rural districts, where open spaces give the opportunity for spontaneous exercise in children's games, the necessity for systematic physical instruction of the kind referred to is not so great. But in towns, where playgrounds are scarce and their area limited, we should expect the best results, both physical and moral, from the introduction of some such system of instruction as that recommended from the War Office, something similar to which is already in operation at Birmingham with the best results, where physical exercises of the kind alluded to are daily practised under the superintendence of a professional instructor, who is responsible for familiarising elementary teachers with the system, by giving model lessons in their schools. Care, however, must always be taken in applying such training to delicate or underfed children, since such children have been known to suffer from compulsory participation in exercises, which are highly beneficial to their more robust schoolfellows. We refer to Mrs. Bergmann Osterberg's evidence for an interesting account of the Swedish system of exercises for girls, based on the study of physiology, which has been introduced by the School Board for London into its schools. One at least of the training colleges, and probably more, already qualify their students by a special course of training to superintend this kind of physical instruction. To these training institutions we look principally in the future for the gradual introduction into elementary schools of a safe and scientific system of physical training; and we recommend that provision be made for conferring, through experts appointed by the Department, special certificates on teachers duly qualified to conduct it, and possessing the requisite elementary knowledge of physiology.

In dealing with the subject of the elementary curriculum, we cannot fail to point out that the evidence laid before the Commission proves that the meaning and limits of the word elementary have not been defined in the Acts of 1870, 1873, 1876, nor by any judicial or authoritative interpretations, but that the meaning and limits of the word depend only upon the discretion of the Committees of Council, of successive Ministries, and upon the various Codes published by them, since the year 1870 the practice of the Department has continually raised and extended the meaning and limits of elementary education, so as to include gradually a range of subjects proper to schools of higher education. It was given in evidence that languages, classical and modern, and advanced science, might be taught in elementary schools, and that parents of all classes, from the lowest to the highest, had the right, and were at liberty, to send their children to them. Not a few children of the wealthier class are already attending board schools. It does not anywhere appear that in the year 1870 this result was contemplated, and it has become a matter of serious complaint, especially to those of the poorer classes who are compelled to pay the school board rates. The Act of 1870 enables the Department to frame and impose Codes which, after lying for a month on the table of the Houses of Parliament, become law. Hitherto no limit has been imposed upon the power of framing such Codes. It would appear, therefore, of absolute necessity that the instruction to be paid for out of the rates and taxes should be fixed


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by the Legislature. Until this is done the limits of primary and secondary education cannot be defined. We shall deal with the question of higher elementary schools in a future chapter.

We have examined the present provisions of the Code which distinguish between Standard, Class, and Specific Subjects, and we have suggested some amendments which might be made, on the supposition that this distribution of the subjects of instruction will still be maintained. But we believe that the quality of the education given in elementary schools would be greatly improved, if the Code contained several schemes of instruction, so as to provide for various classes of schools a curriculum varying in breadth and completeness with the number of scholars in attendance, and with the character and requirements of the population. Each scheme, however, should encourage the extension of the teaching of the necessary subjects beyond the prescribed limits. We recognise that in sparsely peopled rural districts the number of subjects taught must often be fewer than in schools situated in towns; but we are of opinion that even in small rural schools a larger measure of instruction might well be secured than that which includes only the three elementary subjects now required by the law; and we are of opinion that facilities should be given to managers to introduce other than the necessary subjects, in accordance with the varying circumstances of the localities. In making these recommendations we are well aware that it is possible to purchase an extension of the subjects of instruction at the cost of sacrificing that thorough grounding of the scholars in the rudiments of knowledge, without which all teaching is superficial in character and transitory in result. And we desire to emphasise in the strongest manner our sense of the necessity of looking to the quality of elementary instruction, at least as much as to its extent. The following are the subjects of elementary instruction which we regard as essential, subject to the various qualifications which we have already made:

Reading.
Writing.
Arithmetic.
Needlework for girls.
Linear drawing for boys.
Singing.
English, so as to give the children an adequate knowledge of their mother tongue.
English history, taught by means of reading books.
Geography, especially of the British Empire.
Lessons on common objects in the lower standards, leading up to a knowledge of Elementary Science in the higher standards.

CHAPTER III

MANUAL AND TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION

In considering the question of technical instruction, it is desirable to begin by defining clearly what is understood by that term. By technical instruction we understand instruction in those scientific or artistic principles which underlie the industrial occupations of the people (including especially handicrafts, manufactures, mining and agricultural labour), as well as instruction in the manual practice involved in the application of these principles. And our object in dealing with the subject will be, to discover and to specify, what parts of such technical instruction can be properly and efficiently given in our elementary schools, as well as to detail the special preparations that are required for this purpose.

Instruction in drawing and in elementary science is frequently and very properly regarded as part of technical education; and on this account, although we have alluded to both subjects before, we think it desirable further to consider them in this chapter.

For many years drawing was taught in elementary schools in connexion with the Science and Art Department, South Kensington; and no inconsiderable proportion of the teachers in these schools have become qualified to teach it by gaining the necessary certificate of efficiency. Up to 1886 the number of schools in which drawing was


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taught was not only large, but was at the same time steadily increasing. A change, however, was then made,* and the control of the instruction in drawing was, as we have already observed, transferred from South Kensington to Whitehall, with the result that the grant for drawing became subject to the 17s 6d limit, from which hitherto it had been exempt. The immediate effect of this change was seriously to diminish the number of schools in which drawing, was taught, more especially in the poorer districts. The Code of 1887, however, restored the former state of things†; and since we entertain strongly the opinion that it is most desirable that instruction in drawing should be extended as widely as possible, especially in boys' schools, both in town and country, we trust that, under the regulations thus recently adopted, a new impetus may be given to the teaching of drawing in elementary schools in general.

We have before observed that difficulties have to be met and overcome in teaching drawing to girls, which do not exist in the case of boys. We are, moreover, of opinion that it is of more use to girls to be able to sew well, and to possess such a knowledge of plain cooking as will enable them to turn to profitable' account the food they may have to prepare, than to know how to draw. Whilst, therefore, we think it is desirable that girls should be taught drawing, and whilst, too, we should be glad that under suitable conditions such instruction should be encouraged, we could not propose that the teaching of drawing to girls should be compulsory. With boys the case is different. Drawing, as a training, both of the eye and the hand, is useful to them in a variety of ways. The village carpenter and blacksmith, no less than the artisan in the town, would be benefited by being able to draw; whilst children who in the occupations of their after life may have no occasion to use drawing, would gain from its practice such a facility in the use of their fingers, and such a training for the eye, as they could not otherwise possess. We would therefore recommend (as we have already stated in the previous chapter on the curriculum of instruction) that drawing should, so far as practicable, be made a compulsory subject of instruction in all boys' schools.

The teaching of elementary science, which we regard as another part of technical instruction, is yet in its infancy. The Code provides for it in two ways, by making it both a class and a specific subject. But as a specific subject it cannot be taken up by any child below Standard V, and as a class subject its progress is hindered in a way which requires to be carefully explained. It is pointed out in the Report of the Royal Commission, on Technical Instruction, that the importance of "science" teaching has already been so far acknowledged that in all infant schools simple object lessons, and lessons upon the more commonly occurring phenomena of nature, have been made obligatory.§ But, when the child is promoted from the infant school to the school for older scholars, it finds its new school broken up into two divisions, the upper division consisting of the higher standards, and the lower division of the standards below the Fifth or the Fourth, as the case may be. It finds, also, that its instruction in "science" practically at an end until it reaches the upper division. For science is not generally included in the two class subjects taught, of which "English" must be one, and of the permissive subjects geography is almost always preferred to elementary science. The relative value of the two subjects, elementary science and "English", is very pointedly set forth by one witness - himself a practical teacher. "At present", he says, "English is a compulsory subject, and English includes grammar and recitation of poetry. I do not think that English is the most useful subject among the class subjects for our boys. I think that if any subject is to be made compulsory it certainly should be elementary science, and not English. I would keep the grammar in the English subject, because I think that is most useful to boys, but the poetry might be dispensed with, and the choice of subjects should be left entirely with the master." This witness further produced before us the syllabus he uses, drawn up for the various standards, on the principle of "eyes and no eyes". It will be found to be well worthy of perusal.¶ The evidence of another teacher also is very much in favour of science teaching. We quote it here in its entirety: "Q. 19,699. Have you found the elementary science a valuable means of awakening the interest and intelligence of your children? - Certainly. Q. 19,700. You think that, among the various subjects that you choose, that is the one that most enlivens the teaching of the school, and most awakens the intelligence of the children? - Yes, if the teacher will take an interest in it, and do it. Q. 19,701. I suppose you would agree that no subject would be interestingly taught unless the teacher took an interest in it? - Yes. I have parents who will put off their washing day so that their children shall not lose

*Education Code 1886, articles 16 and 109 f. xii. to xvii.

†See Appendix to the Education Code, 1887.

§Report of the Royal Commission on Technical Education.

¶See Appendix to Vol. III of the Report.


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their elementary science. Q. 19,702. If the teacher is willing and able, you see no reason why elementary science should not be largely used in schools for developing the intelligence of the younger children? - I think it should be."

The unsatisfactory character of the present condition of "science" instruction in our elementary schools is commented upon by several witnesses. One witness goes so far as to say that we have retrograded in this department of school work, maintaining that elementary science was far better taught 40 years ago than it is now; and fixing the date 1845-7 (when Professor Moseley was an inspector under the Education Department) as that during which the best results were produced. Sir Henry Roscoe agrees in the statement that the teaching of this subject is falling off. He would make the subject compulsory, being of opinion that we have no right, as a nation, to expect to retain supremacy in the manufacturing industries, unless our present system of primary instruction, which, he says, tends to manufacture clerks and not artisans, is exchanged for one of such a character as to lead up to that higher technical training which is necessary, both for the workmen engaged in our industries, and for the superior workman and foreman. Further evidence given by Sir Henry Roscoe, still more unsparingly condemns the existing educational system of this country. He says: "It seems to me that the English system of education, from top to bottom, has been hitherto almost entirely of a literary character, and that science has been practically ignored. Our school system seems to me to have been handed down from the middle ages, and to be founded on authority and on books rather than on a direct appeal to nature and to experiment. On the Continent, on the other hand, the scientific spirit seems to pervade life to a much greater extent than is the case with us, and therefore more attention is given to science teaching." "There is no doubt", he goes on to say " that the scientific instruction which is given on the Continent has very considerably influenced the great progress which has been made in the manufacturing industries of the continent." To much the same effect is the evidence of Mr. Balchin, head master of the Nunhead Passage School. "As a matter " of fact", he says, "the vast majority of our London Board School boys will become artisans or journeymen, mechanics or labourers. This being so, let the friends of elementary education ask themselves this question: Do the instruction and training of the boys in our elementary schools, during the last year or two of their school life, aim in the direction of the workshops and factory, or in that of the office and counter? From a most careful consideration of this question, I have not the least hesitation in saying, that so far as the work of Standards V, VI, VII, indicate any aim at all, it is in the direction of the office rather than in that of the shop; and, I maintain, that that is a wrong direction for the vast majority of boys in our schools ... I have not the least intention of recommending that boys, while at school, should he taught the trade of carpenter, builder, cabinet-maker, stonemason, or engineer. I am perfectly certain that nothing which we can attempt at school will take the place of an apprenticeship of four or five years in a shop or factory. All I want is to incline the boys' minds and energies in that direction."

If it be true, as we believe it is, that the object of elementary education is to give such instruction to the scholars in general as will best fit them to fulfil the ordinary duties of the life to which they are most likely to be called, and to enable those who may be endowed with special gifts to rise to still higher callings, then elementary instruction in science - and we lay special stress upon the word "elementary" - is only second in importance to elementary instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic. But the fact has impressed itself upon our minds that technical training does not exist for boys, even to the extent that instruction in needlework and cookery supplies it for girls. We have had, however, a great deal of evidence showing the educative effect of science teaching in our elementary schools for both boys and girls; and we think that science, especially mathematical, mechanical, and physical science, is not only the foundation, but an essential part, of thorough technical instruction.

There are, however, certain broad principles to be laid down as necessary conditions of introducing science teaching into elementary schools. In the first place care must be taken that it be not introduced too early in school life, lest it should interfere with the scholars' general instruction. In the second place we are of opinion that, as a rule, the ordinary elementary master cannot be expected to be a good science teacher. Even


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in the case of an elementary teacher who, whilst at the training college, has made good progress in science studies, we consider that he has so much else to do in the usual school routine, and that his attention is so much distracted from science, that he cannot be relied on, either for clear, vivid, and simple lectures, or for neatness and certainty in the performance of experiments. But to possess the power successfully to achieve these results is an essential qualification in a science teacher, and especially so in one who has to expound experimental science to boys of the class who attend our elementary schools. To meet this difficulty, the practice has sprung up under some of the larger school boards, especially in London, Liverpool, and Birmingham, of engaging the services of a skilled lecturer or science demonstrator to undertake the science instruction in each of a specified group of schools. The plan pursued by this visiting or circulating teacher, is to go round from school to school, conveying with him the necessary materials for his experiments. He teaches his subject in the presence of the class master, who, having heard the lesson, is able to recapitulate it, and so to secure that the boys thoroughly understand what they have been taught.

A good deal of evidence has been laid before us tending to show how the plan of employing these circulating science teachers actually works. In the board schools in Liverpool, where, as long ago as in 1876, the system was adopted under the advice of General Donnelly of the Science and Art Department, as well as of Professor Huxley, the results, as tested by the inspectors, are found to be less satisfactory in the lower than in the higher standards. The following are the percentages of passes in elementary science in Liverpool for the last two years:

Mr. Hance, the clerk to the board, accounts for the comparative want of success among the junior scholars by the circumstance of the examination being conducted upon paper instead of orally; the younger children having but imperfectly acquired the power of expressing their thoughts in writing. The subject of mechanics is taught in the board schools at Liverpool, even in Standard IV, in which, under the Education Code, no grants can be earned for specific subjects; and Mr. Hance supported his claim to have Standard IV admitted to a share in the grants for these subjects, by quoting the opinion of the board he represents, to the effect that if the examinations were conducted orally, science instruction could with advantage be introduced into that standard. He further testified that after an examination in science conducted by Professor George Forbes, of Glasgow, the examiner reported, "as to the good progress that had been made by such comparatively young children". Some of the scholars from these schools have been examined by Dr. Oliver Lodge, Professor of Physics in the Liverpool University College, as candidates for the science scholarships granted by the Liverpool Council of Education; and one paragraph of the examiner's report, quoted by Mr. Hance, was as follows: "On the examination as a whole, I do not feel called upon to make any general remark, except to say that the standard of attainment reached, is, for boys of 12 and 13, a remarkably high one, and reflects great credit on the system of instruction."

The same system of teaching science by means of an itinerating lecturer has been at work since 1880 under the school board of Birmingham, and Mr. Poynting, Professor of Physics in Mason College, reports very favourably of the efficiency of this description of teaching in that town. The plan on which the system is carried out in Birmingham is very fully described by Dr. Crosskey. The demonstrator, he says, or one of his assistants, visits each boy's and girl's department once a fortnight. He takes four departments a day, two in the morning, and two in the afternoon. The


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class teacher is present, and in the interval between the demonstrator's visits he repeats and enforces, with further illustration, the subjects taught, requires written answers to the examination questions, and submits the papers to the demonstrator. Two and a half hours a fortnight are given in the school to science, the demonstrator's lesson taking three quarters of an hour. The boys are taught mechanics or elementary natural philosophy, and the girls, domestic economy, considered as the application of chemistry and physiology to the explanation of matters of home life. In a few departments a second specific subject is taken; with the boys, electricity and magnetism, and with the girls, animal physiology; but in all the board schools of Birmingham, science instruction is given to all the scholars, both boys and girls, who are above the Fourth Standard; the total cost of the staff of demonstrators and assistants, including travelling expenses, being £1,030 per annum. The number of children receiving this teaching is stated to be 2,700 boys learning mechanics, and 550 learning magnetism and electricity; 2,200 girls learning domestic economy, and 100 animal physiology. The results are said to be eminently satisfactory, for not only is the percentage of passes as high as 88.5, but the school attendance is said to be very considerably improved on the "science" days, and the effect of the science teaching is seen in the very great degree to which it has aided to develop the general intelligence of the scholars. Professor Poynting, after mentioning that he has examined for four years, and after giving detailed comments on the kind of work done, ends his report in these words, "My experience, I think, fully justifies the opinion that the science teaching is most valuable, the training of the boys giving results which I should never have supposed possible before I began to examine." Dr. Crosskey further gives it as his opinion that the science teaching in the elementary schools prepares the way for the advanced work done at the Midland Institute.

The School Board for London has more recently adopted a similar plan of circulating demonstrators of science; although, having regard to the number of children in their schools, the scale of operation is not so large as in Liverpool or Birmingham. A demonstrator was appointed about three years ago to work in the East End of London. He had upwards of 2,000 boys under instruction in mechanics, and the work has proved so successful, that the board has appointed three additional demonstrators. The Chairman of the London School Board gave evidence before us strongly in favour of the plan; and Mr. Wilks, for several years Chairman of the School Management Committee of the Board, emphatically supported this opinion, making, however, the one reservation, that he considers this scientific instruction to be incomplete, so long as it is given only in the upper standards, as lacking continuousness, and not growing sufficiently out of what has gone before.

The question remains, what is the permanent value of this science teaching in elementary schools. It might easily happen that those who simply saw the scholars when they were at work, and those who examined the children in the subjects they had learnt, might be satisfied with the results, whilst those who had the opportunity of observing the effect upon the children's minds a few years later, might be convinced that the results were less satisfactory than was at first supposed. So far, however, as the evidence before us helps to decide this question, it is strongly in favour of continuing and extending instruction in science in elementary schools.

Among the witnesses from Liverpool, Birmingham, and London, there is a general consensus of opinion that it is desirable that examinations in science should be conducted orally, and not on paper. We have already referred to the evidence on this point given by Mr. Hance, clerk to the Liverpool School Board. Dr. Crosskey, speaking for the Birmingham School Board, maintains that in science subjects a written examination is an inadequate test of the general intelligence of children; and, although he has no objection to make, either to the fairness of the examiner, or to the suitability of his questions, he contends that questions which are set on paper in no way bring out the actual knowledge of the scholars. Other witnesses insisted on the need of thorough competence on the part of the examiner. Mr. Grieve, science demonstrator to the School Board for London, takes a similar view as to the need of making the examination oral. In his last report, published in the Annual Report of the School Management Committee for the year ending March 1887 (page 31), he draws attention to the


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following questions, set on paper in the Fifth Standard; to boys ranging, as a rule, between 11 and 12:

Question 1. Impenetrability and elasticity do not apply to atoms. Explain this, and give illustrations.
Question 2. In what bodies may you say that molecular attraction is balanced by the repulsive force of heat?
Question 3. There is a force which keeps solid bodies from falling to powder, and another force which is the cause of their breaking into particles. What are these forces?
Question 4. A nail driven into a piece of wood is not a case of penetrability. Explain this.
Question 5. Compressibility is due to the approach of the molecules. It is a proof of porosity. Explain the words in italics.
Question 6. What do you understand by (1) molecular attraction; (2) chemical affinity?
Question 7. There are two kinds of forces to be found. Explain this, and give examples.
Mr. Grieve, after commenting on the disappointment which such a style of examination on paper causes to boys of the ages mentioned, makes the suggestion that Standard V should be examined orally. In support of his suggestion, he quotes these words from the Code: "That instruction in the science subjects shall be given mainly by experiment and illustration. If these subjects are taught to children by definition and verbal description, instead of making them exercise their own powers of observation, they will be worthless as means of education." To secure that the teaching is conducted upon the right method, an oral examination with experiments is, he thinks, essential: the introduction of experimental teaching being the direct antidote to cram. His words are as follows: "I have, therefore, felt it my duty to call attention to this matter, lest, after all, the teaching of the subject might, in the end, develop into a cram."

Mr. Grieve mentions one or two encouraging features of his own immediate work. He states that in March 1887, there were 2,201 boys under instruction in 20 schools in which he was demonstrator; 1,168 from the Tower Hamlets division, and 1,033 from the Hackney division. Pieces of apparatus, similar to that used in the experiments, are made by the boys attending the classes. At Teesdale Street, Hackney, one of the managers has shown great interest in the subject, by offering money prizes to the boys who should make the best model of portions of the apparatus used in the demonstrations; and a great desire has been expressed in several other schools for the establishment of workshops where boys showing an aptitude for the use of tools might have an opportunity of constructing apparatus for themselves. One suggestion made by Dr. Crosskey is deserving of mention. He would stimulate the teaching of science by payments, not so much for results, as towards the salary of the special demonstrator.

The question, whether it is desirable to give manual instruction in elementary schools, is one of the gravest importance. Whether our existing school system, including the ordinary curriculum of the Code, is the wisest that could be devised, is a separate consideration; on one point, however, we are fully agreed, that whatever ought to be the ordinary course of instruction in elementary schools, it should be carried far enough to secure the thorough grounding of the scholar in the essential rudiments of learning, before he is encouraged to take up a more special course, which might otherwise encroach upon the time needed for his general education. It is, however, urged by many persons that, without giving anything like technical instruction, as the term is generally understood, to the classes of a school, we might early in life accustom boys to the use of their hands, and introduce some description of manual work for them, corresponding to the needlework and cookery provided for girls. Much has been done in infant schools by means of the Kindergarten occupations, to educate the hand and the eye, and to develop the physical nature of the child; and it is the subject of very general regret that boys from seven years old should lose all the benefit of this training, and be limited to the end of their school life to a merely literary education. But to this subject we shall have occasion to refer again hereafter.

There is, undoubtedly, a wish among many that, in addition to drawing and elementary science, some practical instruction in industries and in the use of tools should enter into the school curriculum. In the case of the ten counties to which our Circular


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A was sent, out of 3,759 voluntary school managers who returned answers, 770 expressed a desire that there should be some training in industry, or the use of tools; and of 385 school boards in the same counties, 122 were of the same opinion. But it would not, of course, be fair to conclude that those school authorities who failed to express themselves as favourable, were necessarily hostile to such a training, more especially as many school managers might be unwilling to commit themselves on a subject which they had not fully considered. In like manner, in answer to the circulars sent to the head teachers of elementary schools, out of 2,529 replies, 711, or 28 per cent, approved of teaching industries or the use of tools. From these returns it appears to be evident that, if it were thought desirable to recognise or encourage this kind of teaching, many among those actively engaged in managing and teaching our elementary schools would be favourable to it.

But whilst the great majority of the witnesses we examined appeared to be strongly in favour of introducing into elementary schools for boys some manual and technical instruction, so far at least as to include drawing and elementary science, we have had, no doubt, some evidence of an opposite kind. One head teacher indeed, thought that it would be most desirable to teach, where it was possible, the elder children the use of some kind of tools; but another in his evidence, said, "I think that the place for the teaching of handicrafts is in a technical or apprenticeship school to which boys might go after having passed, say, the sixth standard. We should allow them to devote the short time which they can remain at an ordinary day school to general culture, and not try to force them into the routine of their future work." On the other hand, Canon Warburton, gave it as his opinion, that in certain localities it would be very useful to introduce technical instruction. "I think", he added, "that something of navigation, for instance, ought to be learnt in seaport towns. There ought to be permission to teach it, and it should be paid for as a class subject under certain local conditions." Another inspector, the Rev T. W. Sharpe, on the contrary, gave this evidence, "The children in our schools, as a rule, are too young to profit much by manual work. In the carpenter's trade they cannot handle a plane; in the shoemaker's trade they could not pull the wax-ends through. I have ascertained by visiting industrial schools, how difficult it is for children of 11 or 12 years of age to acquire the use of tools, without very great waste of material. If they were 13 or 14, I could understand the manual labour being very useful." The Rev. J. R. Diggle, Chairman of the London School Board, made the following statements: "We are very anxious to be able to give some sort of manual training in the schools ... An effort has been made to establish a class for carpentering in a school in Chelsea; but the auditor of the Local Government Board has surcharged us with the cost of the wood ... We want more power." The Rev. J. Gilmore, Chairman of the Sheffield School Board, expressed himself as emphatically on the opposite side: "As regards technical instruction in the ordinary elementary schools, I do not think it could be taught. We could not afford to teach it. Our teachers are not properly qualified for teaching it, and we should have to get special teachers; and with the subjects as at present in the Code, I do not think that there would be time to teach it. We have in Sheffield what is called a higher central school, where we have technical education to a certain extent. This is a school where we have a competitive examination for entrance from all the voluntary and board schools of the town, in fact, from all the elementary schools of the town. We admit those who acquit, themselves best in this examination, after they have passed the fifth standard. Then they stop in the central school for the sixth and seventh standards; and, after that, we have established, in connexion with the Science and Art Department, a school for the ex-standards, which is doing, I think, very good work; and in that we teach chemistry, machine drawing and construction, mechanics, magnetism, electricity, light and heat, and drawing."

The consideration of the whole of the evidence laid before us has led us to the conclusion that there are several difficulties in the way of the introduction of manual and technical instruction into our elementary schools. The question first arises as to the person who is to give this instruction. Is this person to be a school teacher, or a mechanic? In most cases, we are afraid, the teachers are not competent to undertake this duty, as they are altogether ignorant, as a practical matter, how to handle the tools. On the other hand, a mechanic would probably fail of success from not knowing how to manage^children. In Sweden, the system of "Slöjd", which is being largely


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introduced into schools, and aims at developing handiness and accuracy through the use of tools, is taught by the school-teachers outside of the regular school hours as a voluntary subject. For this work they are paid extra money; and they acquire their knowledge at a special training college. In France the manual instruction is given by a mechanic

A second difficulty which has already been glanced at has to do with the age at which manual instruction should begin. Whatever instruction of this kind is to be given in our schools, it would not be applicable to boys under 10 years of age. From the age of seven, therefore, when they leave the infant school, with its Kindergarten and other various employments, to the age of 10, there would be three years during which any manual employment resorted to by way of varying their instruction, and of relaxing the mental strain, would have to be sought in some direction other than the use of tools. The evidence, however, to which we have listened has convinced us that this difficulty may be met by judicious systematised science teaching, in which the children should bear their part by collecting and preparing specimens, helping to make models in the geography lessons, and other similar acts calculated to exercise the hand and eye. On this point we refer with pleasure to the testimony of two of our witnesses. Mr. Balchin's evidence, and the specimens of flowers neatly fastened on paper by boys working in Standard III, produced to the Commission, show how easily the subjects of the Code can be adapted to such instruction in handiness and dexterity. And the value of awakening the interest, and of enlisting the activity, of boys in association with the work of their teacher is illustrated by the instance, quoted by Mr. Mark Wilks, of a master who, having to deal with some of the roughest and most neglected boys in London, successfully taught them modelling, and showed them in clay and plaster how rivers carved out valleys.

The case of small mixed schools in rural districts presents another difficulty. The teaching power in such schools is at once so limited in amount, and often so humble in quality, that we must obviously be contented with a more restricted range of studies. The complete realisation of our aims with respect to manual and technical instruction must, in these places especially, be a work of time, for it must be the result of improved qualifications in teachers and of improved methods of instruction. In this connexion we would remark that, without again discussing the question of teaching girls needlework and cookery, it seems to us that both these subjects are of the highest value, and deserve the greatest encouragement.

We shall have occasion, in treating of elementary evening or continuation classes and schools, to recur to the subject of elementary technical instruction after leaving school. In the meantime, it is proper that we should call attention to the evidence of numerous witnesses who appeared before us, as well as to that given before the Technical Commission, as to the much greater benefit which would accrue to our national industries from the widespread organisation of Science, Art, and other technical classes in connexion with the "Science and Art Department", and the "City and Guilds of London Technical Institute", if a greater number of the young people who leave our elementary schools were better prepared to take advantage of them. This, therefore, is another difficulty which must be met; for, as things are at present, these young people are, in too many cases, absolutely unfitted to profit by the opportunities for technical instruction which would otherwise be abundantly at their disposal. We may remark, in passing, that we have here an additional argument, if indeed any such were required, for the more general introduction into our elementary schools of drawing, and of a sound, thorough, and practical instruction in elementary science, as recognised essentials of the usual school curriculum.

It is obviously impossible satisfactorily to consider the subject of technical instruction in elementary schools apart from the question as to how the extra cost necessarily involved in it is to be defrayed, more especially in the case of voluntary schools, which still supply the greater part of the national provision for elementary education. When Mr. Forster's Act was passed in 1870, and voluntary effort was encouraged to co-operate further in providing the necessary machinery for the elementary instruction of the nation, the adoption of a system of technical education was in no way contemplated. The managers of voluntary schools, therefore, may fairly expect to receive liberal public aid in order that they may be enabled to supply this form of instruction on a footing of equality with board schools. We do not, however, lose sight of the danger which might arise in case the assistance thus rendered should be provided solely from Imperial sources; the temptation under such circumstances being almost


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overwhelming to take up particular branches of the subject, not with any special reference to the wants of the locality, but merely as a means of obtaining additional grants. To safeguard the State against such a danger it is our opinion that some proportion of the cost of supplying suitable technical instruction in elementary schools should be thrown upon the local rates. Imperial grants should be awarded to all public elementary schools for efficient instruction in any subject which can fairly be classed under the head of elementary technical instruction; but these grants in the case of voluntary public elementary schools should be supplemented by contributions from the rates of the district in which the schools are situated. We are further of opinion that it should be the duty of the Education Department to define the subjects permissible in each standard, and the maximum number of subjects that may be taught to the scholars in each; and that grants to voluntary schools from the local rates of any district shall in no case be made, except for subjects which the school board of the district has introduced into one or more of the board schools, or which the rating authority of the district has declared to be needed to meet the educational requirements of its inhabitants. In submitting these proposals we draw special attention to the circumstance that the contributions to voluntary schools from the rates, which we contemplate, would only be given for definite branches of elementary technical instruction; the question, therefore, of concurrent endowment of special forms of religious teaching would not arise. We are well aware that in introducing manual or technical instruction into our elementary schools there is a danger lest the new subject should interfere with the general curriculum of the schools, or in any way hinder the scholars from acquiring a complete mastery of the necessary subjects of a sound primary education. But, bearing this in mind, the following evidence of Sir Philip Magnus seems to us fairly to indicate what should be our aim in the matter. "I have suggested that drawing should be taught generally in our public elementary schools; that more attention should be devoted to the teaching of science than at present is given to it; that handicraft instruction should be introduced after a certain standard. ... Lastly, I think that further encouragement should be given to instruction in evening schools, in order that the children may not forget the knowledge and the skill which they have acquired in the elementary schools, and which they will need to apply when they come to take advantage of the excellent science, art, and technical classes which are now organised in different parts of the country."

If it should be thought that children ought to receive some instruction in manual employment, other than that which the elementary schools available for their use can give, we are of opinion that the best way of meeting the need would be through the establishment of a workshop in connexion with some higher institution, which might be willing to receive into the workshop boys of exceptional ability, or others to whom it was considered desirable to give this instruction. One such central institution could do its work better and cheaper than a number of scattered institutions, whilst nothing could be easier than to make arrangements for attendance at this central workshop being substituted on one or two afternoons in the week for attendance at the elementary school. In this way the boys would have a better chance of being efficiently instructed, and the result would be attained at a much more reasonable cost than in elementary schools. If a workshop of the kind just described, established in connexion with a higher institute, or in any other way, were thought desirable by the local authority for the purpose of affording practical instruction in manual employments to the children of its district, it might, in our opinion, be established, maintained, and supported in the same way as if it were a technical school.

Before proceeding, in the last place, to examine into the question of advanced technical instruction in its relation to elementary schools, it is desirable to call to mind what has already been done and is being done in this direction, lest by proposing some new scheme or system, out of harmony with existing efforts, we should be recommending what would prove injurious to the interests we are most anxious to assist. Hitherto our manufacturing superiority has been secured by the practical training of the workshop, by voluntary zeal, and by the energy of employers and employed. The Royal Commission on Technical Instruction in its Report says, "Great as has been the progress of foreign countries, and keen as is their rivalry with us in many important branches, we have no hesitation in stating our conviction, which we believe to be shared by continental manufacturers themselves, that, taking the state of the arts of construction and the staple manufactures as a whole, our people still


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maintain their position at the head of the industrial world."* Foreigners have been seeking to surpass us by the widespread establishment of technical schools, erected, and in some cases entirely supported, out of public funds, in which instruction is given in the theory as well as in the practice of the various industrial arts. To this cause mainly is to be attributed the growth of the opinion, which is now held by many friends of education and by some employers of labour, that, in addition to the training supplied in the workshops, there should be provided, with the aid of public funds, a general system of instruction in the scientific or artistic principles which lie at the foundation of industrial progress.

A good instance of what is already being done to supply the need which has just been alluded to is to be met with at "Birmingham in the institution which is called the Seventh Standard school. This is to a certain extent a technical school, and no scholar is admitted into it till he has passed the Sixth Standard. The teaching in it is laid out for a three years' course, one year in the Seventh Standard, and two years in connexion with South Kensington. The subjects taught are reading, writing, and arithmetic, according to the Code, and, in addition, mathematics, plane geometry and projection, machine construction and drawing, magnetism and electricity, theoretical and practical chemistry, freehand drawing, and the manipulation of wood-working tools. These subjects are not universally taught to all the scholars. The subjects are arranged in three divisions, machine construction, chemistry, and electricity; and the hours of work during the week, which are thirty in all, are distributed as follows:

In the machine construction division, mathematics twelve hours, projection five hours, machine construction four hours, electricity five hours, freehand drawing two hours, and workshop two hours;
In the chemistry division, mathematics twelve hours, projection four hours, theoretical chemistry six hours, practical chemistry four hours, freehand drawing two hours, and workshop two hours;
In the electricity division, mathematics twelve hours, projection four hours, theoretical chemistry five hours, electricity five hours, freehand drawing two hours, and workshop two hours.
In the second year, the scholars spend three hours in the workshop, one hour and a half during the school time, and one hour and a half in the evening. The object of the workshop instruction is, says Dr. Crosskey, "to teach the meaning, the nature, and the use of workshop tools, and to give manipulative skill in their employment together with information regarding the principles of tools, and the properties of the materials used. The schoolroom is connected with the workshop, and a practical mechanic is employed who is engaged to give workshop instruction, and who supplies the head master with specimens of work which are explained by the latter in the drawing room. The head master explains the connexion of the parts with one another, teaches the scholars to make a drawing to scale, and shows the required views of the model under examination. The scholar goes to the workshop and makes an article from the drawing to scale. This completed, he measures it, and makes a second drawing of it, still working to scale." It should be noted that the time-table given applies only to scholars who have passed the Seventh Standard. Boys working in that standard are required by the Education Department to give two hours each half-day, or twenty hours a week, to reading, writing, and arithmetic. This latter restriction is said to hamper somewhat the free and efficient working of the school.

There are elsewhere other elementary schools of a higher grade where more advanced science is taught, and in which a certain number of children stay on beyond the Seventh Standard. These may be regarded as continuation schools. The principal ones brought under our notice were the Deansgate school at Manchester, St. Thomas' Charterhouse Church of England school, and the Sheffield central school. An interesting account of the Deansgate school which is under the Manchester school board, is given in the evidence of the headmaster; and further particulars will be found with respect to the school in the evidence of Mr. Nunn, the present, and of Mr. Herbert Birley, the late Chairman of the Manchester school board. The headmaster of St. Thomas' school, Charterhouse, has given us a full description of his work

*Report of Royal Commission on Technical Instruction, page 516.


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in that school; and the Rev. J. Gilmore, Chairman of the Sheffield school board, refers to the Sheffield central school in his evidence. These and other similar schools keep their scholars after they have passed the Seventh Standard, and instruct them in science, receiving grants on their behalf from the Science and Art Department.

If, indeed, the system of which we have given examples were developed, we foresee that there would be a temptation to enlarge the curriculum of education, and so practically to convert primary schools into secondary schools, in which a portion of the cost of the education of the children of wealthier persons would be defrayed out of the rates. One instance of an attempt to provide technical (but not workshop) instruction, which is not open to the objection just stated, may here be referred to. Classes have been started in many places in which this instruction has to a large extent been given in certain subjects prescribed by the Science and Art Department; and their funds have been aided by grants from the same source. The munificence of the "City and Guilds of London Institute" for the advancement of technical education, of some of the Livery companies, as well as of individuals and public bodies in London and elsewhere, has already established some valuable and costly schools of the kind, which appear to be working successfully.

But while much good work in this direction has been done in London and in some manufacturing towns, it can only be considered as fragmentary and partial. For there are, no doubt, places in which those engaged in carrying on skilled industries have been unable to obtain the funds required to establish technical schools suited to the locality, which, as practical business men, they deem essential for the prosperity of their trade. The question has, therefore, arisen, whether the time has not arrived when some further help should be furnished from public sources, and whether some local public body should be empowered, under proper conditions, to provide for, or to contribute towards, the maintenance of technical schools adapted to the wants of the locality. We are strongly of opinion that nothing should be done which might discourage existing voluntary effort on the part of manufacturers and employers of labour, or which might lead an artizan population to trust more to the artificial teaching of a school than to the practical and diversified training of the workshop. Every precaution, therefore, should be taken that technical schools should only be established where the judgment and practical experience of a locality, as evidenced by its willingness to make adequate local contributions for the purpose, demonstrate their necessity.

We think that the general management of technical instruction should be entrusted to the Education Department, and not to the Science and Art Department. At the same time, the central authority in London should interfere as little as possible with the various methods of promoting technical instruction, which may be designed to meet the varying circumstances of different localities, provided that they appear to attain the object in view. Whore there are municipalities, we are of opinion that the local control of technical education should be lodged in their hands; in other places it should be exercised by the rating authorities. The national and imperial character of London, the conditions of its organisation and industry, and the absence at present of any central municipal authority, will require exceptional treatment.

It is obvious that if technical schools are to answer the end expected by those who are anxious to found them, they will require very skilful oversight on the part of the persons responsible for their management. It would, therefore, seem to us to be necessary that the immediate direction of these schools should, either by delegation or otherwise, be placed in the hands of a body which would be mainly composed of persons interested in the trades of the locality, and experienced in its industries Such a body, it may be hoped, would arouse real enthusiasm and munificence in establishing and supporting technical schools, whilst no danger would arise of institutions being set on foot which did not command the support of the practical men of the district.

We think that when sufficient local interest is proved to exist, either by voluntary subscription being forthcoming or by the levy of a rate, a contribution from the Parliamentary grant might properly be made to reinforce local resources. But though technical schools might be aided by scholarships, to be provided out of public funds to assist the cleverer children of the wage-earning classes, we recommend that they should, as far as possible, be made self-supporting by their fees.


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CHAPTER IV

VARIOUS CLASSES OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS

In proceeding to discuss the character and condition of the various classes of elementary schools, it is well to recall the fact that, up to the passing of the Education Act of 1870, all our elementary schools were voluntary ones, the majority of them receiving aid out of the Parliamentary grant, but many of them supported wholly by fees and subscriptions. The Act of 1870 introduced schools under the management of a new body, the School Board; and since that time the number of board schools has grown to 4,402, of which, however, 792 Church schools, 15 Wesleyan, 223 British, and 94 schools of other denominations have been transferred by voluntary managers to school boards.*

The sources of income open to voluntary schools consist, mainly, of school fees, subscriptions. Government grant, and in some cases endowment. Board schools, in lieu of subscriptions, can draw upon the local rates to meet the balance of their expenditure. Some managers and supporters of voluntary schools complain that as these local rates are paid by many individuals who are making large sacrifices of money and time for the support of voluntary schools, in which their own distinct religious teaching is inculcated, they have also to contribute in the form of rates to the maintenance of board schools, whose religious teaching, of whatever description it may be, they may regard as imperfect. Several memorials to this effect have been addressed to us, one of which, said to be signed by 250,000 persons, we print in the appendix to our Report. Some witnesses have expressed a fear that in time the school board system may drive the voluntary system out of the field altogether. On the other hand, we have the fact stated in the Report of the Committee of Council for 1886-7 (p. xii), that voluntary schools transferred annually to school boards are at the present moment very few, 18 only having been so transferred in the year referred to. It has been stated to us that the managers of voluntary and board schools are working harmoniously in several large towns, such as Liverpool, Manchester, and Salford, and it is said that whatever competition exists between them proves to be of advantage to both.

Opinions are divided as to the relative efficiency of voluntary schools and board schools, some contending that voluntary schools are quite as efficient as board schools, and others maintaining precisely the opposite view. Probably in this matter the truth may be best expressed in the language of one of the witnesses, who says: "The results are higher, taking them all round, in board schools; but many of the best schools are not board schools." One important advantage is certainly possessed by board schools. They have a larger purse to draw from. Hence they generally have better buildings and furniture, more and larger playgrounds, and a more numerous staff. But still further, board schools for the most part are found in populous districts, and so far as this is the case the average board school has all that can be gained from an attendance much larger than the average of voluntary schools, many of which are carried on amongst a sparse population, the average attendance in Church of England schools being 92, and in board schools 159. The regularity of attendance in board schools is very slightly better than in voluntary schools: out of every 100 children whose names are on the school registers there is an average attendance of 76.38 in board schools and of 76.27 in voluntary schools. Voluntary schools, however, have an advantage in the personal interest taken by private individuals in their management and visitation.

It has, however, been contended before us that the time has come when this twofold system of schools should cease. One set of witnesses advocates the abolition of all voluntary schools, and the setting up of board schools universally throughout the country; and it is suggested that the proper method by which voluntary schools should be extinguished would be by withholding from them all share in the Parliamentary grant. It is contended by these witnesses, that insufficient support prevents

*Report, Committee of Council, 1886-7, pp. xii. and 222.


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voluntary schools from being thoroughly efficient, while board schools are free from this disadvantage. It is further urged that it is wrong in principle for any public elementary school to be managed by persons responsible to no one but to themselves and to the supporters of the school; that the working classes prefer the board schools, and that they are a necessity to protect the religious liberty of the people. On the other hand, it is replied that there are no advantages, educational or otherwise, to be gained by the universal establishment of board schools; but that there will rather be a loss, resulting from getting rid of the healthy rivalry between the two classes of schools. It is contended that education must necessarily become secularised thereby: that the local rates would have to be largely increased; and that any attempt to hand over the secular instruction of all the children to the management of school boards, leaving it to the various denominations to provide religious instruction, must result in failure.

Some advocates of voluntary schools in opposing the suggestion to establish universal school boards, maintain that they have a grievance in the existing order of things which would be greatly aggravated if the suggested change was brought about, for in their view it is a violation of religious liberty to compel people to pay school board rates for a system of which they do not approve. Some few accordingly claim for voluntary schools, if efficient, an equal share with board schools in the local rates devoted to education, the provinces of Quebec and Manitoba being pointed to in illustration of a method by which this result may be obtained. And the friends of voluntary schools affirm that any measure which would have the effect of abolishing voluntary schools would be a distinct breach of faith with the managers of those institutions. It should not be left out of sight that the establishment of universal board schools would entail upon the ratepayers the large burden, from which they are now freed by the personal liberality of those who maintain voluntary schools. Weighing all the evidence that has been put before us, we have come to the conclusion that the State should continue to recognise voluntary and board schools as together forming the national provision for elementary education; and that both ought to continue to participate on equal conditions in the Parliamentary Grant.

There is one class of schools into whose difficulties we have been at great pains to inquire; these are schools chiefly in small rural districts. We shall hereafter make recommendations in favour of schools of this class which are in small rural parishes or in the outlying districts of large ones. The case of these schools was specially dealt with in the Code of 1875, which empowered the Education Department to make a special grant of £10 or £15 to a school which was the only one available for a population not exceeding 300 or 200 souls respectively. The grant was intended not to encourage the needless multiplication of small schools, but to meet the necessary extra cost per head of such schools, and thereby to make more efficient the education given in thinly populated districts. A somewhat similar provision was embodied in the Act of 1876. We find that, in the year 1886, 946 schools claimed the £15 grant, and 1,569 the £10 grant, 355 of the whole number being board schools.§§ Canon Warburton is of opinion that this additional grant generally goes to the improvement of the staff, and not to the relief of the subscriber's pocket, and as it is paid only "on the recommendation of the inspector", the opportunity is given to the inspector to refuse the grant where the staff is not satisfactory, and so to protect the public purse. The difficulties of these small rural schools arise from their necessarily large relative expenditure, if compared with schools educating more children. The consequence of this is not infrequently that undue economy is exercised in their management, and an insufficient staff of teachers is employed. An instance was brought before us of a school with an average attendance just under 60 children, all to be taught by a single head mistress. Reckoning the various standards to be taught in arithmetic, and the separate groups formed for teaching reading, writing, needlework, and two class subjects, and the infant's class, it was shown that in order to go once through with the various subjects taken up in the school, one mistress had to teach no less than 31 separate classes or groups.

§§Report of Committee of Council. 1886-7, p. 237.


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In the case we quote we believe that the difficulties were overcome by the exceptional ability of the mistress, one of the witnesses who appeared before us; but there are many such schools throughout the country. While no fewer than 6,398 parishes in England and Wales contain a population not exceeding 300, a return given in the Appendix to our First Report (pp. 534-535) shows that, in the year 1885, there were 5,180 aided schools, with an average attendance of less than 60 scholars. The accommodation in 1,252 of these schools did not exceed 60; but, over the whole number, only 41 children were, on an average, present daily throughout the year. Nor is the evil confined to voluntary schools, for in the above total of 5,180 are included the schools of no less than 516 school boards in parishes with from 100 to 500 people in each.* Some of these, with a population below 300, have the advantage of the special grant of £10 or £15, and yet in three out of every seven parishes of the whole number tabulated as having a population under 300, amounts to or exceeds 6d in the pound, 15½d, at Barnardiston (Suffolk), being the highest. Again in populations between 300 and 500, where the special grant cannot be claimed, in 175 parishes out of a total of 337, the rates ranged from 6d to 20d in the pound, all except 33 being not less than 9d, and 13 exceeding 1s. These statistics suffice to show how heavy a burden board schools are upon the ratepayers in small rural parishes.

The Rev. Prebendary Roe, a diocesan inspector, who is well known to have given great attention to education, and specially to the financial questions connected therewith, has given us detailed and very carefully prepared evidence of the circumstances of schools in rural parishes in the county of Somerset, with populations ranging from 90 to 550, which we think it desirable here to summarise. The expenditure per head on average attendance for this whole group of schools last year was £1 19s 7d, whilst in all church schools throughout England, the corresponding sum was £1 16s 5½d. This shows the cost of education in these schools to be 3s 1½d per head above the average. But limiting ourselves to the parishes with populations below 200, we find that the expenditure in these schools amounts to £2 15s 3d a head; in some of them it rises as high as £3, £4, and in one case £5 a head. Towards meeting this expenditure, the school fees average 6s 1d a head against 10s 7½d a head in all Church schools, still leaving to be made up locally, a further sum of 4s 6½d a head in excess of the average. In confirmation of the accuracy of these calculations of Prebendary Roe, we may mention that the returns furnished to us from 30 poor law unions show that the cost per head in all the voluntary schools having less than 100 scholars in average attendance, amounted to £1 19s 11¾d, and in board schools of the same class to £1 19s. In the group of small schools in Somerset above referred to, the average Government grant, (neglecting at present the sums awarded as special grants), comes to 15s 10d a head, 16s 5½d being the corresponding sum for all Church schools in England and Wales. A further sum in excess of 7½d a head above the average would, therefore, have to be made up locally on account of this difference in the amount of the Government grant. Combining together all these items, and still omitting to take account of the special grants awarded to about half of the schools, we find that their local supporters would have to provide 8s 3½d a head in excess of what has to be provided by the supporters of Church schools generally throughout the country. But in the case of 79 of these small rural schools a special grant of £10 or £15 was awarded, the total sum so received (and, for statistical purposes only, supposed to be spread over the whole 151 schools) thus amounting to 2s 7½d a head. The final result shows that, even with the benefit of the special grant, each child in all the 151 schools reported on, requires from the local resources a sum of 5s 8d a year, in excess of the corresponding average cost in all Church of England schools. This special grant, however, is only awarded to schools in the parishes below 300 in population; and it appears that, after taking this grant into account, the subscribers in the parishes with less than 200 people have to provide an average of 16s a head as voluntary contributions in order to keep their schools afloat, the average in all Church schools being 7s 2d, and in all voluntary schools 4s 7d. A considerable number of the schools, 39 in all, although disqualified for the special grant, receive some little benefit from Article 108 of the Code, under which infants are credited with the same amount of grant as that which is awarded to older scholars; but even in these schools the average subscriptions amount to 14s 10d a head. The conclusion, therefore, is forced upon us that in all these small rural schools the local supporters are much

*3rd Report, p. 742. Appendix XI.


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overburdened by the circumstances under which they have to meet the requirements of the Education Code.

We find, moreover, that there is little hope of increasing the gross amount of the Government grant by any improvement in the average attendance, for the evidence before us shows that already throughout these 151 small schools the average attendance is equal to 1 in 6.52 of the whole population against one in 8 for all England, whilst for the group of parishes below 200 in population the average attendance is one in 5.57.

An analysis of the items of grant actually received reveals the reasons why, in this whole group of schools, the grant on results is below the average attained in Church of England schools throughout the country. It appears that in 34 of the schools, with an aggregate attendance of 1,424 scholars (being one in five of all those in attendance at the 151 schools) no class subject whatever is taken, the corresponding proportion for all England being one in twenty schools.§ Again, whilst in all England of every 100 schools 31 take the shilling grant for singing, in these Somersetshire small schools only 11 obtain it. Prebendary Rowe urges that it is for teaching such subjects as these that something more than the bare minimum of staff is required; and to the lack of this additional staff is to be attributed the comparative meagreness of the grant earned in these schools. There are no less than 25 of these schools with only a single head teacher, without a monitor; of the 207 adult teachers employed in all these schools, 117 are untrained, whilst the remainder of the staff amounts only to 27 pupil teachers, and 108 monitors. Prebendary Roe was of opinion that the special grant has encouraged managers to improve the staff of their schools, and he stated that all but 17 of the managers with whom he had corresponded had expressed their willingness and desire to improve the staff, if the conditions of the grant were eased a little by giving more on the average attendance, and he thought it would be only fair, if the conditions of the payment of the grant were eased, that additional conditions of stringency as to the staff should be imposed by the Code. We are strongly of opinion that a larger and, in many cases, a better staff ought to be provided for these small schools, and that in schools which, from the peculiarities of the neighbourhood, are necessarily exceptionally small, the difficulties of providing competent teachers should be met by grants as already proposed. By the increased grant which we shall hereafter propose should be given to these small schools, we not only desire to provide for the extra expense of a superior teaching staff, but also partially to meet the higher rate of expenditure which they necessarily incur.

Another class of schools about which we have made a full inquiry is that of half-time schools. The system of alternating lessons and work under the Factory Acts has been a long time in operation, and a corresponding system has been in use under the provisions of the Code in other employments. But the yearly statistics of the Reports of the Committee of Council show that half-time employment is not on the increase, and the number of purely half-time schools, as far as the evidence before us helps us to a conclusion, cannot be very large. The total number of half-timers on the school register in 1886 was 168,543, out of a total of 4,505,825,†† whereas in 1876 the number was 201,284, out of a total of 2,943,777. Some teachers are altogether opposed to the half-time system, and try to persuade the parents not to use it. They complain of the difficulty of making half-timers keep pace with whole-timers, and some witnesses say that half-timers usually pass 12 per cent worse than other children, and it is also alleged that the results are not satisfactory from a moral point of view. We are informed that there are very few half-timers and no half-time schools in London, Manchester, or Sheffield; and but few half-timers in Newcastle. On the other hand, there are 2,000 half-timers in Stockport, 700 in Huddersfield, and over 7,000 in Bradford, where also there are four schools specially set apart for their use. There was almost an unanimous opinion among the school managers who appeared before us that the requirements of the Code are excessive for half-timers. The Code regards half-timers as if they were at little or no disadvantage, although they spend half their time at work; and it not only requires them to make the same amount of progress in the

§Report of the Committee of Council, 1886-7, p. 235.

††Report of the Committee of Council, 1876-7, p. 361.


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standards, but to take up also the same class subjects as the whole-timers, where both classes of scholars are attending the same school. This, it is contended, is unfair; for, inasmuch as the percentage of passes for half-timers is sometimes 24 per cent, and on the average is 12 per cent below that of whole-timers, the effect of having many half-timers in a school must be seriously to depress its rate of grant. Where the number of half-timers is sufficient to warrant the opening of an exclusively half-time school, there, to a great extent the difficulty just pointed out vanishes; but in other cases it has been recommended to us that the half-timers should be treated as a subordinate department of a school, and dealt with separately from the rest of the scholars. Further evidence has been laid before us tending to show that there is not much ground for objecting to the half-time system on moral considerations, and that the half-timer's physical condition does not much unfit him for study. The system does not appear to work well in London, or to be suitable for rural parishes. We desire here to record a suggestion thrown out by Sir Lovelace Stamer, that it would be a great thing if half-timers could be somehow required to attend a night school. The answers to our Circulars A and D show that half-time is greatly disapproved of both by managers and teachers, especially in rural districts. The returns from Lancashire and Yorkshire endorse the complaints of our witnesses against the standard of examination being the same as that for full-timers. There are also many statements to the effect that the admixture of half-timers with the whole-time scholars injures the organisation and working of the school.

The education of children in our workhouses does not fall directly within the province of our inquiry, but it has been incidentally brought to our attention; and, although few witnesses gave evidence upon the subject, we have been enabled to form some opinion as to the good and bad points of the existing system. Formerly, there were schools within the walls of the workhouse in the majority of the 647 poor law unions; but at the present time such schools exist only in 231 instances, or in a little more than a third of those unions. In the case of the rest of them, district schools and schools entirely separate from the workhouses, provide for the children's education in 111 unions, and in no less than 284 of them the children are sent to neighbouring public elementary schools outside. The theory is that the workhouse school combines elementary industrial and physical, together with moral and religious training. In practice, however, this theory fails to be entirely realised. The salaries offered to the teachers are not high enough to attract the best of their class; although, comparing the present teachers with their predecessors of 30 or 40 years ago, the improvement in the staff is said to be very considerable. The results show weakness just where the confinement of the children within the four walls of the house and the somewhat lower qualifications of the teachers would have led us to look for it, viz., in the want of intelligence in the children's knowledge of their subjects. The industrial training, too, is hardly what it ought to be. The introduction of cookery, however, into some of these schools has been attempted, we are told, with good results. The district poor law schools are generally somewhat better staffed, although not so well as they would have to be if they were under the Education Department. The results obtained in these are better than in the ordinary workhouse schools, although even here intelligence is said to be deficient, and the curriculum is ordinarily restricted to the three elementary subjects. We hear that physical training is beginning to receive a good deal of attention in these district schools, and kindergarten is finding a place among the occupations of the infants; the chief difficulty, however, seems to be to get good infant teachers. We are glad to find that in the case of the pauper children attending public elementary schools, the results, so far at least as their intellectual education goes, appear to be very satisfactory. A difficulty, however, arises in the management of the children out of school hours, and with their industrial training. An officer called an industrial trainer has to be engaged to undertake this work, but the time available for the industrial training is said to be so limited that this part of the children's preparation for their future life is but partially carried out. Notwithstanding this drawback, Mr. Holgate, an Inspector of Schools under the Local Govern-


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ment Board, in his evidence before us expressed an opinion that in a very short time we shall "see the last workhouse school, pure and simple, abolished, unless it happens that there is no public elementary school within ordinary reach." We think that the recommendation of the Industrial Schools Commission† in respect of reformatory, industrial, day industrial, and truant schools, namely, that their educational inspection should be transferred to the Education Department, might well be applied to workhouse schools.

The subject of evening schools, and of the importance of fostering a great extension of their number and usefulness, has been pressed upon us by a very large number of witnesses. It has been represented to us that many children who pass satisfactorily through the standards in the day school very soon forget much of what they have learnt when they go out to work. The same general conclusion is strongly confirmed by the returns published by the Registrar-General, which show what proportion of the population, when married, are found unable to sign their names. The necessity, therefore, for having some form of evening school for the purpose of fixing and making permanent the day school instruction is almost self-evident; and we agree with a witness who says, that it would be worth the while of the State to spend more money on evening schools, in order "to keep up the cultivation of the intellectual faculty, and to carry it forward till it bears a fruitful result." We have a great array of witnesses testifying to the usefulness of these institutions, some of them ranking their importance as high as that of the day school. But again and again the evidence before us testifies to the decay, rather than to the advance, of the evening school system. We are told that they are a failure in Birmingham, as no scholars can be induced to attend them; that very few evening schools exist in Salford or Bradford, or in the Norwich division, and not one in Norwich itself. And the Report of the Committee of Council on Education for 1886-7 shows that, whilst in 1870 the average attendance of evening scholars was 73,375, in 1886 that number had fallen to 26,009, though in 1887 it had risen again to 30,584.‡‡ In London the evidence shows that in the winter of 1886-7 there were 10,000 names on the evening school registers, with an average attendance of 7,000. We have endeavoured to find out the causes of this comparative failure, and we learn that, in the opinion of many witnesses, a chief cause is to be found in the insufficient encouragement of evening schools by the Education Department, and one of Her Majesty's Inspectors agreed in the view that if Government encouraged such schools with more liberal grants they would increase in number. We are told in particular that evening schools need more freedom in respect both of classification and of subjects of instruction. The Code makes it obligatory on evening scholars earning a grant that they must be examined in the three elementary subjects. In like manner a girl cannot join the evening cookery class without making 24 attendances at the evening school, and without being presented for examination in the standard subjects. This requirement is said to deter many girls from attending the cookery classes. "We tried", said Mr. Burges, "very hard inside the Birmingham Board, when I was on it, to get the Education Department to give grants to night schools without obliging us to go into elementary subjects; and when they refused it (and through the action of the other Education Acts) our old night schools were knocked on the head. We had an average of 250 lads from 12 to 20 years of age, and 130 girls."

The weight of evidence is strongly in favour of a special curriculum for evening schools. Boys desire to learn what will be of use to them. Give them, it is said, drawing, modelling, shorthand, bookkeeping, and the like, and they will attend the evening school. It is made a ground of complaint against the provisions of the Code that an evening scholar is expected in the short evening school session to master the same standard in the three elementary subjects which is required of a day scholar attending school all the year. If, therefore, standards are to be used in these schools, it is contended that they should be special standards, adapted to the circumstances and

†Report of the Reformatories and Industrial Schools Commission, paras. 51, 19, and 20.

‡‡Report of the Committee of Council (1886-7, page ix).


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the possibilities of the case. In the country, it is said, evening schools are chiefly needed for the purpose of repeating the work of the day school, and with this object in view it is most desirable that scholars should be classed in the standard, however low it might be, in which they really need further or repeated instruction. Evening schools of this type, it is said, would also meet the wants of town children under 13 or 14 years of age who are exempt from the obligation to attend the day school. But in towns, evening schools of a higher class are also said to be required for young people over 14 years of age. These, we are told by a large number of witnesses, ought to be a kind of continuation schools, meant to take up the work where the day school left it, and to carry it on until the scholars are fitted to attend institute classes, science and art classes, or university extension lectures. In these schools the formal teaching of the three elementary subjects, it is contended, should be left out, as enough of those matters might be taught through the various class or specific subjects which the scholars may desire to learn.

Several of the witnesses have directed our attention to the good moral effects produced by night schools, when properly organised and taught. The Rev. Dr. Paton, the representative of the Recreative Evening Schools Association, places a very high value on their moral influence which he attributes to the discipline and bright tone of a good night school, and to the carrying on of the training begun in the day school to a period when it becomes effective in the character of the scholar. He was further of opinion that the night schools exercise "a most important social civilising influence", and that much of this influence had been lost since the year 1870. Another witness urged the importance of including suitable physical training as a recognised part of the night school curriculum, and thought this would not require "expensive apparatus". The same witness gave evidence as to the existence of certain vicious practices among youths of the age when they should be attending night schools, and gave his opinion that, according to the facts he had stated, the introduction of physical training would have an important moral result. We fully agree that the retention of some educative and controlling influence over the scholars after they leave the day school, and the removal of them from the contamination of the streets, would have an excellent moral effect. The mere fact that the leisure time of young people is usefully occupied under good influences and guidance during a dangerous period of life, would, in our opinion, be in itself an important educational result, worth some public expenditure to attain. We attach the highest importance to the development and training of the physical powers of the youth of both sexes, and we therefore, think that, in the re-organisation of evening and continuation schools, moral and physical training should have as prominent a place as ordinary instruction and intellectual training.

Opinions are much divided as to the advisability of making attendance at an evening school compulsory, some contending that it would be a very good thing; others maintaining exactly the opposite view.§§ We have endeavoured to gather opinions on another question, whether upon moral grounds, it is wise to open the evening school to girls. But very generally the suggestion was looked upon with more or less disfavour. This must, however, be a question of locality, for there are many places in which respectable girls habitually frequent the streets in the evening for the purposes of exercise and pleasure, or for going on errands. A minor difficulty was pointed out to us in connexion with the annual examination of a night school. An evening school cannot claim this examination at the end of its winter session, unless at least 20 candidates are presented to the Inspector. Where it is impossible, by grouping or otherwise, to make up this number, the evening scholars have to be examined with the day scholars on the day of their annual inspection; and this may take place several months after the evening school has been closed, and at a time when the evening scholars are too busy at their work to be able to attend in the day time. There ought, we think, to be but little difficulty in rectifying this manifest hindrance to the success of rural evening schools.


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We find it more difficult to indicate the source whence teachers for evening schools are to be obtained. .It would be hard to impose the additional work compulsorily upon the day school teacher, and we are strongly advised against such a course. We have also been informed that great success has attended voluntary teaching by ladies, in the case of lads who have proved very difficult of control by teachers of their own sex. We cannot lose sight of the diverse conditions affecting evening schools in town and in the country. It is not probable that any highly organised system can be generally applied in rural districts, and to a large extent, evening schools in such places must depend upon voluntary work. We desire to bear our grateful testimony to the voluntary services of those who have already effected so much for evening schools without pay or reward, and we trust that their labours may not be relaxed. In towns, however, we think that the trained experience of some of those teachers, who may have married and quitted the ranks of the teaching profession, might supply at moderate cost, what is much to be desired, an organised staff of trained teachers for evening schools.

Upon the whole we are decidedly of opinion that the evening school system should be thoroughly revised; that special schedules of standards and subjects should be allowed, suited to the needs of the locality; that the local managers should be encouraged to submit such schedules to the Department for approval; that any such provision as that embodied in the present Code, which requires all scholars to pass in the three elementary subjects, as a condition for taking up additional subjects, should cease to be enforced, and that no superior limit of age should be imposed on the scholars. While we believe that the success of evening schools will largely depend upon great freedom being given to the managers and teachers of such schools, the Department should take ample security for their educational efficiency. If this were done, a larger proportion of the grant might be fixed, and less made to depend on the results of individual examination. In our opinion, the evening schools of the future should be regarded and organised chiefly as schools for maintaining and continuing the education already received in the day school, but, for some years to come, it will be necessary in many places, to repeat in the evening school, in greater or less proportion, the course of instruction previously given in the day-school.

We must not omit all reference to some other classes of schools which, to a certain extent, provide elementary education. There are a certain number of certified efficient schools for which provision is made in the Act of 1876. These schools receive no Government aid, being supported entirely from voluntary sources. The standard of efficiency required in these schools will be found in the Circular of the Department of 1877. Private adventure schools have been largely destroyed by the Education Acts. Some, however, still remain both in town and country, and may be useful as meeting the cases of children unsuited, on account of health and other reasons, for large schools. Where they are inspected carefully, as is done by the Liverpool School Board, they may still be of considerable value.

CHAPTER V

ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS AND HIGHER EDUCATION

The organisation of our elementary schools with a view to bring them into one complete system, and the relations that actually subsist between one description of school and another, are matters which have received our most attentive consideration. It is hardly possible, perhaps, to conceive a state of things in which all great differences arising from inequalities of population, area, and condition of the people, should cease to exist. Any one uniform description of educational machinery, therefore, cannot by itself be made to meet the varying needs of different localities which have to be provided for under any scheme of national education; variety of school being an absolute necessity in any successful attempt to cope with almost unlimited diversity of local circumstances.

Reference has already been made to the difficulties of small rural schools; but the question into which we have inquired, as to the possibility of reducing their number by some practicable system or grouping, must here be briefly dealt with. We have received no evidence to show us to what extent the grouping of two or more parishes


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together into a single school district has already been attempted, although there is reason to believe this practice has not, in the past, been uncommon. On one point, several witnesses agree, that there are rural parishes so small that it is difficult to find

the proper people in them to form an efficient school board. A system of grouping, with the object of securing improved school boards, has accordingly been strongly recommended to us. But, when it was asked whether it would be desirable to merge two or more small schools into one, the evidence we obtained was certainly not very favourable to such a suggestion. It was admitted, indeed, that in a small town with several parishes, the system might possibly be made to work well; but, even there, any sudden change of the existing state of things was deprecated by the witnesses; and doubt was thrown on the assumption that large schools are in themselves the best form of school organisation. A practice exists in some neighbourhoods of the elder boys from several small parishes attending a kind of central school, formed for a group of parishes in some adjoining parish. A further suggestion was thrown out that children might be conveyed, at the cost of the public funds, from their homes to some central school. In the case of 151 small schools in Somerset, the circumstances of which were detailed to us by the Rev. Prebendary Roe, and to which we have referred in a previous chapter, it is said that there was only one school whose managers reported that the school was unnecessary, and there were only seven instances where the managers expressed the opinion that, if their school were closed, there was sufficient school accommodation in adjacent parishes for the children that would thus be deprived of their own schools. That there would be some advantages attending a system of grouping is not denied; but Canon Warburton's opinion, on the whole, does not seem to be favourable to its extension. After allowing that the teaching under such a system might be more effectual, he adds, "But let me qualify that by saying that I think you would lose a great deal in the way of the personal interest and supervision, which are given in small schools. I do not think it would be all clear gain. The schools would be better as machines, but for the individual child, I doubt whether there would not be a balance of disadvantage." There is also the practical difficulty of little children, especially girls, under seven or eight years of age having to walk long distances, with the further drawbacks of wet days and bad roads. The proper solution of the question of grouping small schools is further complicated by the large area of some parishes containing few inhabitants. And in such instances the difficulties we have referred to are enhanced. Making full allowance for all these considerations, we cannot recommend any general system of grouping schools, though there are, no doubt, cases in which such grouping may be advisable.

We have much more evidence on the somewhat larger question of the grading of schools. In theory, every elementary school is looked upon by the Education Department as conforming more or less to one well-defined type. If it is not an infant school, then it is one in which, so far as the Department is concerned, the children may be presented for examination in the fullest possible curriculum of the Code. Each such school may theoretically have its complete set of seven standards, with, indeed, under certain circumstances, children who have passed the Seventh Standard as well; it may take up its two class subjects over and above needlework, singing, and drawing: and it may send in all its scholars above Standard IV to be examined in specific subjects. It is obvious, however, that local and other circumstances may interfere (as in most instances is found to be the case) materially to curtail the extent to which this full and complete programme is adopted. In a large number of schools, for example, the bulk of the scholars are to be found in the four lower standards, leaving but a few, if any, to represent the three higher standards, while in some other localities the number of children whose parents wish them to take advantage of the more advanced subjects in the Code may be abnormally large. A system of grading according to the size of a school, and the number of its classes is well known to exist on the Continent, and Canon Warburton would be well content to have the adoption of some such organisation tried as an experiment in England. But this does not meet the case now under consideration. The question is expressed in the following terms, in our Syllabus of points of Inquiry, "Is it desirable, and if so,


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under what circumstances, to grade the schools in large places, and to have pro motions from one to another?"

We observe, at the outset, that some of the witnesses object almost in toto to any such scheme. Mr. Matthew Arnold took this view, being desirous to see the establishment of a system of State-aided secondary education, as being more likely to serve the purpose required. Other witnesses also oppose grading our elementary schools on various grounds, such as the inconvenience of the younger children of the same family going to one school and the elder ones to another; the possible increase in expense of the plan;t the danger of the higher grade schools being monopolised by children from the higher grades of society; and the injury which would be done to both teachers and children of the lower school from which the best scholars would be drafted into the higher one. Some, whilst accepting the principle of a so-called high class elementary school so far as it applies to children in Standard VII, deprecate taking any other steps in the direction of grading. The Clerk to the Liverpool School Board states his objections to the proposal in the following words: "I am inclined to think that, theoretically, the practice would be likely to be injurious to education generally if largely adopted, because it would, I think, in many cases lead to the employment of inferior teachers in the ordinary schools, and deprive the ordinary teachers of the stimulus afforded by higher teaching. Also, if you require children for the purposes of their higher standards to go to a different school from that in which they have been hitherto educated, a good many children, I fear, will leave school earlier than otherwise they would." His opinion is summed up in the statement that, "In seeking to promote the higher education of the few, there is a great danger that the general education of the mass would be deteriorated."

The advocates for the adoption of some system of grading or classification of schools are, on the other hand, a very numerous body, including both teachers and school managers. Mr. MacCarthy would classify schools mainly on the basis of the machinery provided, and with reference chiefly to the rate of grant to be made. If the buildings were perfectly satisfactory, the staff large and highly qualified, and the apparatus and other appliances complete, such a school might be placed in the first class. If, however, in any given case more or less of this machinery was wanting, or a school, otherwise excellently provided for, failed to attain satisfactory results, then such school would have to fall into the second or the third class; a board of inspectors being entrusted with the duty of determining in which class each school in the first instance is to be placed, the rate of payment of the grant being made to vary with the grade of the school. Another witness proposes that a lower grade of schools should be recognised for very poor children in poor districts, in which the curriculum should be limited to the three elementary subjects, in addition to singing, drawing, and drill, a higher scale of grant being offered for doing good work under special difficulties - such schools being much of the same type as those known to the London School Board as "Schools of special difficulty". A school taking up the ordinary course of an average elementary school without the specific subjects would fall into the middle grade; whilst one exclusively for standards above the fourth would be placed in the highest grade. Under this scheme it is proposed that the Education Department, jointly with the local authorities, should fix the grade of each particular school, and that in some way or other the more promising scholars in the lower grade schools should be passed on to a higher grade school. Another scheme, as we are informed, is being gradually introduced at Salford. The plan is that there should be a lower school for Standards I, II and III; a middle school for Standards IV, V and VI, and a higher school for Standards V, VI and VII. Under this method it is contended that, as its tendency must be to bring together large numbers of children in the same standard, it would be easy to sub-divide the class, putting the duller children into a section by themselves, where they would be taught with direct reference to their capacities and attainments, and putting the rest into a higher section, where they would not be kept back by the presence of their duller companions. We have


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little doubt that, if due precautions are taken to secure that all who would be likely to profit by the teaching in the higher schools should have an opportunity of being promoted to them, some system of grading might be of real advantage to the progress of elementary education in the great centres of population.

But this opens up the question as to what should be the character and constitution of the most advanced grade of our primary schools, those generally known as "higher elementary schools". Some of the witnesses, whilst much desiring to see a sound system of secondary education established in this country, look coldly upon this class of schools. They think that the ground they assume to occupy would be better assigned to secondary schools, to which children might be promoted by exhibitions. Even among those who think well of "higher elementary schools", there are some who would not advocate their establishment, if thereby an increased charge would come on the rates; and they would seek to make up the needed amount of income by charging a higher fee, so as to make the schools independent of all sources of income except grant and fees. Another objection urged in evidence was, that the effect of withdrawing from the ordinary elementary schools all the children in the higher standards, would be to injure those schools educationally, by destroying a source of interest for the teachers, and of ambition for the children. It has been stated also that existing "higher elementary schools", by a process of under-selling, are starving secondary schools, and that they are thus making it difficult to find suitable candidates for scholarships which have been founded in grammar schools and are often specially limited to scholars in public elementary schools. On the other hand, it is urged that, in view of the difficulty of finding sufficient teaching power in the ordinary elementary school to deal effectually with the very few scholars attending in the higher standards, a system of collecting these higher standard children from all the schools in the same town into one department, and working them there in a full course of higher subjects will secure far better classification, and will prove to be a wise division of labour. It is contended that whatever harm is done to lower schools by depriving them of their more forward scholars is more than outweighed by the superior educational advantages enjoyed by children in the "higher elementary schools", in the form of laboratory, scientific apparatus, models for drawing, and of machinery not generally provided in the lower schools. It is also stated that these "higher elementary schools" are useful in providing well-prepared candidates to fill the office of pupil-teachers, in localities in which it would otherwise be difficult to procure them.

We find that there is great diversity in the actual constitution of these higher elementary schools. In Huddersfield, for instance, the parents are recommended, as soon as their children have passed the Sixth Standard, to send them to the higher school, removing them from the lower school they have hitherto attended. Standard VII in all the lower schools is abolished; and the fee charged in the Seventh Standard school is the same as in the lower schools, although it is observed as a fact that the children attending it are chiefly those of the better working class. In Sheffield admission to the higher elementary school is treated as a prize; admission to it being by competition among the children who have passed Standard V in any of the elementary schools of the town. The fee is 9d a week; but in the case of children whose parents, on account of poverty, are unable to pay so much, this payment is remitted. Children from private schools may compete for admission; but out of 273 admitted at the last examination, only six were from schools other than public elementary ones. In Bradford, where there are four higher elementary schools, two for boys and two for girls, the system adopted is very different. There, no attempt is made simply to gather together the clever boys and girls of the upper standards from the other schools, but the object is rather to supply in them for all standards a type of education higher than can be obtained in the ordinary elementary school, and to charge such a fee (9d) as can be paid by a somewhat higher grade of the wage-earning classes. As a matter of fact, very few children attend these schools in the lower standards; and, in order to meet the case of the deserving poor, certain exhibitions are offered to meet the amount of the fees and the cost of the books. In Birmingham, where at present there is only one higher elementary school, the scholars are


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exclusively of Standards VII and ex-VII; the fee is 3d a week; almost all the children are from the working class: and the condition of admission is that a child shall have passed the Sixth Standard and shall engage to remain in the higher school a whole year, and to present himself at the May examination of the Science and Art Department. At Manchester there appear to be four of these higher schools. One of them, the Central School, has admitted, since its opening, 1,450 children, of whom 250 came from schools higher than the ordinary elementary ones; and it is practically self-supporting, in the sense that its maintenance is not a burden on the rates, on account of the large grants from the Science and Art Department. The scholars are limited to Standard V and upwards, and the class of parents making use of the school for their children consists chiefly of skilled artisans, small shopkeepers, and persons in similar positions.

In most instances the curriculum of these "higher elementary schools" is controlled by the requirements of the Code up to Standard VII, and for all above that standard largely by the syllabus of the Science and Art Department: the dividing line being fixed by the fact that, as a rule, the Education Department will not make any grant for a child who has passed the Seventh Standard. This regulation of the Education Department, we may remark in passing, is complained of by one witness, who says that whilst in some cases a scholar passes Standard VII before he is 12 years old, the Code makes no provision for his further education. As long, however, as a child has not passed the highest standard of the Code he is treated in the higher elementary school in Manchester as an elementary scholar: he takes up the work of the standards, two class subjects, and two specific subjects, with one of the courses given in the Science and Art Directory; and in this way he may earn for his school, from the Education Department, as much as £1 2s 6d in grants. Children who have passed the Seventh Standard are usually formed into an organized science school under the Science and Art Department; and as that Department makes a grant of 10s a head for all pupils who, having made 250 attendances in the year, pass in one science subject; and since, further, all such pupils may compete in the various grant-earning subjects at the May examinations, the gross amount of grant a school may receive in this way is far more than could be obtained from the Education Department, and is estimated at the Manchester Central School to amount to £3 14s a head. The higher subjects usually taken up by the ex-VIIth children include mathematics, plane geometry and projections, freehand drawing, in addition to one of the following, namely, machine construction and drawing, theoretical and practical chemistry, or electricity. In Birmingham is added practice in the use of wood-working tools; and in Manchester French is taught to all; and the knowledge of commercial arithmetic and of English composition is carefully kept up. It will be seen that in many instances these schools are maintained at little or no cost to the ratepayers; but it has to be remembered that where the buildings have not been otherwise provided, the interest of the money spent in erecting them ought to be reckoned as a burden upon the rate; and in Birmingham, where the fee charged is very small, each scholar costs the rates about 19s per annum.

Similar schools promoted by voluntary managers were not unknown previous to the passing of the Education Act of 1870, and, as we have reason to believe, still exist. We have had before us as a witness the Master of St. Thomas' Charterhouse Church School, one of the best known of those voluntary schools which have supplemented the elementary course by higher branches of education. He tells us that the fees vary from 3d to 1s 9d a week: that the scholars belong chiefly to the lower middle class, but that 60 or 70 boys are sent in free by the Endowed Schools Commissioners. Many of them, he says, come from long distances. In the Seventh Standard, boys take up one or more of the following subjects: chemistry, mechanics, mathematics, botany, electricity, acoustics, and some other subjects, with the result that the boys acquire such a taste for science that they nearly always continue to study it after they go to work, and resort largely to evening classes where they may keep up their knowledge.


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Whilst the evidence before us is abundant for the purpose of showing how popular, and for the most part successful, these higher elementary schools are in the various places where they have been founded, still opinions are much divided as to the policy of extending, or even continuing, them. Several of the inspectors are opposed to the movement, avowedly because they think some system of secondary education ought to take up the work attempted by higher elementary schools. Mr. Matthew Arnold maintained that secondary schools should have their buildings, and also some portion of the teachers' salaries, provided by the State, and Canon Warburton recommends that the State should provide exhibitions to such secondary schools for the more promising scholars from elementary schools. Dr. Crosskey, however, takes the view that whilst the higher elementary school is intended for children from 12 years old up to 14 or 15, the secondary schools, which should be entered when a child is 10, or at most 11, years old, is designed to carry on the work much beyond 15, and is for picked scholars rather than for the average of the children found in higher elementary schools. Mr. Fitch is of opinion that, with the higher education now given in some elementary schools, the third grade schools, as laid down by the Schools Inquiry Commission, are practically no longer a necessity of an educational system. But higher elementary schools are said to be meeting the actual wants of more people than are secondary schools, more especially because the former schools are cheaper.

However desirable these higher elementary schools may be, the principle involved in their addition to our educational system should, if approved, be avowedly adopted. Their indirect inclusion is injurious to both primary and secondary instruction. If, therefore, the curriculum of higher elementary schools is restricted within due limits, avoiding all attempts to invade the ground properly belonging to secondary education, and if due precautions are taken to secure that promising children of poor parents are not excluded from the privileges to be enjoyed in them, then we are of opinion that such schools may prove to be a useful addition to our school machinery for primary education. In certain cases the object of such schools might be secured by attaching to an ordinary elementary school a class or section in which higher instruction was provided for scholars who had passed the Seventh Standard. In Scotland liberal grants are now made to the managers of elementary schools for advanced instruction to scholars who have passed the highest standard, and we see no reason why English children should not be afforded like assistance for continuing their education. This arrangement would facilitate the provision of such higher instruction in the smaller and less populous school districts, and, for reasons already suggested, might be preferred, by the authorities of some even of the larger districts, to the establishment of separate schools. We cannot therefore regard as completely satisfactory the present position of the class of schools to which we have referred. On the one hand they are obliged to adapt their curriculum in such a way as to bring them within the requirements of the Education Acts and of the Code in order that they may obtain Government grants; whilst, on the other hand, their object is to provide a much higher education than is ordinarily understood by the word "elementary". There is beside a tendency to provide schools for children whose parents are in a position to pay fees sufficiently high to cover the expense of their education, and so to benefit persons in comfortable circumstances at the cost of the ratepayers and taxpayers; thus relieving parents of their proper responsibility for the education of their own children. Under these circumstances we think it is desirable that the State should recognise the distinction between elementary and secondary education to an extent not yet attempted. It is to be regretted that no practicable suggestion was made for extending any such higher education to rural districts, or, indeed, to places with populations below 10,000 or 15,000. A knowledge, for instance, of the principles of agriculture, which might be taught in a higher elementary school, if such existed in country places, might be of very great value to those children, who were hereafter to be engaged in agricultural labour.

We find a very general feeling obtaining among the witnesses in favour of the adoption of some system of exhibitions or scholarships to secondary and higher schools. But it is maintained that boys or girls should be singled out for such promotion at a somewhat early age. It is a mistake, we are told, to assume that a child must first get to the top of the elementary school before he is allowed to enter the secondary


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school; but that he should be selected from about the fifth Standard, and thus spend the time from 11 to 13 years of age in the lower stages of the higher school rather than in the higher stages of the lower. A practical difficulty has arisen in consequence of the fact that in secondary schools Latin is usually an important part of the curriculum, and that elementary scholars rarely, if ever, learn anything of that subject whilst attending their own elementary school. We are told in evidence, however, that head teachers are ready to help promising boys over this difficulty, and especially that the London School Board has adopted a scheme under which successful candidates for scholarships at a secondary school are put through a six months' course of preparatory teaching in Latin before actually beginning attendance at the higher school. We were informed by Mr. Fitch, that there is a still greater difficulty in the way of many children taking advantage of such exhibitions to higher schools as they may happen to win. The exhibition usually is only enough to pay the tuition fees; and its winner has to be maintained during the time he holds it. Poor parents, therefore, are often obliged to decline the exhibition for their child, being unable to support him whilst he receives the higher education to which it entitles him. Out of five or six boys in one school in Lambeth who had succeeded in gaining scholarships at an endowed school, two only had parents who could afford to let them take advantage of these privileges.

An exhaustive list of about 1,000 schemes, made under the Charitable Trust and Endowed Schools Acts, now in operation, under which exhibitions are granted to scholars from elementary schools so as to enable them to enter higher schools, and under which payments are made for prolonging their stay in elementary schools, has recently been prepared by the Charity Commissioners, and transmitted to the Education Department, a copy of which has been furnished to us by Mr. Cumin. The object of this Return is to apprise the district inspector of all the cases within his district in which endowments are available for the benefit of scholars in or from the elementary schools which he periodically visits. "At present", says Mr. Fitch, "we have no such knowledge. As we move about among schools, and come in contact with clever and promising children, it would be a great advantage to us, if we were officially cognisant of the means of secondary instruction which exist in the district, and which we might advise the managers and parents to avail themselves of." It is proposed, by distributing to each inspector copies of the schemes affecting any of the schools within his district, to place him in possession of this much-needed information. By this means his attention would be directed to the provision available in the district for enabling children of promise to prolong their attendance in the elementary school, and to the opportunities within their I'each for advancing from the elementary to the secondary school.

In St. Olave's Grammar School in London, for instance, there is a competition held every Christmas; the candidates being boys from the public elementary schools in the neighbourhood. "The successful candidates", Mr. Sharpe says, "are moved through the school by intermediate exhibitions; and then at the end of their school life one or two survive to go to the Universities, and the intermediate ones generally rise to a higher grade of life, such as the Civil Service; and they attend the classes at King's College afterwards, and carry on their education that way." Mr. Sharpe is convinced of the wisdom of the system he advocates, and speaking of an elementary scholar who has won his way to the University, he says: "If he can hold his own with those he finds at the University, it is a decided advantage to him to enter into a higher battle of life." At Manchester scholarships are offered to elementary scholars, giving them admission to the central school, and several scholarships have been won by boys at the Central School, admitting them to the Normal School of Science at South Kensington. Thirty scholarships tenable at the Manchester Grammar School are offered to boys in the elementary schools: some of these, however, we are told, in the last year or two, have been awarded to boys from other schools, there not being a sufficient number of duly qualified elementary scholars to take them all. At Leeds, we are informed, the school board remits the fees of very promising scholars at the Higher Elementary School; and there are 16 scholarships at the Grammar School open to boys from the primary schools; the class of people whose sons take these scholarships being mostly working men, artisans, and the like. The Bradford School


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Board has founded 20 scholarships, of the annual value of 45s each, to be held by scholars from the ordinary elementary schools at the Higher Elementary School. There are also scholarships, some of them founded out of the rates, open to elementary scholars, entitling them to admission to the Grammar School; and in 1885 the Technical College at Bradford offered 42 scholarships to candidates throughout the whole county of Yorkshire, of which 27 were gained by boys from the Higher Elementary Schools. In Birmingham the experiment has been carried on longer, and on a larger scale than in the other instances before us. It appears that about a third of the scholars in the schools on King Edward's Foundation are exhibitioners, and that half of the exhibitions in the seven grammar schools are offered to boys and girls from the elementary schools. A few years ago 30 per cent of all the scholars in these schools had begun their education at an elementary school; that percentage is now almost 50. And although it is reported of the exhibitioners from the elementary schools that at first they show a want of mental alertness and an absence of intellectual acquisitiveness, in some cases they are said in the end to do brilliantly, and we are informed that a considerable proportion of the exhibitioners come from a very humble class in society.

A full consideration of the means now available for enabling promising scholars to proceed from the lower to the higher grades of schools convinces us that there are two wants not yet fully met. These are, first, that the supply of satisfactory secondary schools should be organised, and should be made adequate for the wants of all parts of the country; and, secondly, that increased funds should be provided out of which to create sufficient exhibitions for deserving elementary scholars needing further instruction at those schools. We have refrained from going into the details of this large question, as it is not within our order of reference, and we do not think that we should be justified in expressing any opinion as to the means by which these objects should be secured.





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PART V

Government Examination, the Parliamentary Grant, and the Cost of Public Elementary Education
Chapter I - Government Examination.
Chapter II - The Parliamentary Grant.
Chapter III - Income and Expenditure of Schools.

CHAPTER I

GOVERNMENT EXAMINATION

In approaching the subject of the annual Government examination of elementary schools we cannot fail to be struck with the influence which this examination exercises upon the whole work of the year. The inspection day is the day towards which the eyes of all connected with an elementary school are continually looking forward. The arrangements for the whole year are devised to meet the requirements of the inspector's visit. The course of teaching, the classification of the scholars, the daily progress of the subjects, the attendance of the children, the working staff, the time-table, even the season of the year, and the idiosyncrasy of the inspector, are one and all to be taken into account in their bearing upon this great event of the school year. Whilst we are fully sensible of the value of the annual examination as a spur to keep all parties well up to their work, we are by no means sure that the feeling which it creates and fosters is, under present conditions, a healthy one. For example, it is said to dominate unduly over the proper organisation of a school; and Mr. Sharpe calls attention to this danger, when he encourages teachers to be independent of inspectors, and to consider themselves solely responsible for the organisation of their schools. The effects of the Government examination, under the present system, on the classification and the teaching are evidently very great. A teacher, no doubt, has the power to classify his scholars as he thinks best; but the children must generally be examined in the standards according to the Code. Many teachers allege that the result is to discourage every other form of classification, and to destroy altogether their freedom of organisation. The rigidity of the existing system is illustrated by one witness in a forcible way. He instances a case of 40 boys who may be sent up at one time from the infants' school to the boys' school. According to his view these 40 boys are likely to be kept together year after year till they leave school. But, if freedom of classification were possible, instead of continuing throughout their school life in one compact body, they would soon begin to lengthen out in a line, some moving quickly, some moderately, and the rest slowly. The same witness being asked if there was anything in the present Code to prohibit the free classification which he advocated, described his own experience, under which, in the middle of the year, he promoted the brighter boys to a higher standard, intending, however, to present them for examination in the lower standard; but two months before the inspection his courage failed him and he gave up the experiment. Another witness describes the present system of enforced classification as an irrational one, which places children, not according to what they know or can learn, but according to what has been forced into their minds; and his experience, he says, proves that under it some children are forced on at a rate which nature never intended; while from 20 to 25 per cent of the rest, who could advance two standards in a year, are compelled simply to "mark time". For, he added, if a child passes his standards at the rate of two a year, he will presently arrive at an age when, although his school


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life is not ended, he can earn no more grants for his school. We have before us abundance of similar evidence in the replies to the statistical inquiries made in Circulars A and D. The answers may thus be summarised, that the hard and fast system of classification keeps back clever children in order that dull ones may be pushed on; that it is unfair to children and to teachers; that it involves waste of power and labour in every way; that the gain to the dull is no compensation for the loss to the bright; that the aim is uniform mediocrity; that there is no elasticity and no scope; that it assumes all children equal in capacity, and attention; and that it proceeds on an absurd mechanical basis. Mr. Sharpe reminds us that in theory the Department professes in no way to interfere with the organisation of a school, and that the organisation together with the discipline is one of the elements to be considered by the inspector when assessing the merit grant. Opinions are divided as to whether inspectors do or do not directly interfere in this matter; but indirectly this interference appears to be very real, for ordinarily the detention of a child for a second year in the standard which he has passed inflicts on the managers the same loss as if he had failed in the three elementary subjects, unless the inspector allows it to be placed on the list of exceptions. Mr. Sharpe makes a suggestion for dealing with this difficulty as it affects small schools, proposing that two of the standards as classified under the present Code, should be formed into one group to be passed through in two years. Another witness recommends that if this suggestion were adopted the lower part of the group should be examined more leniently than the upper. Mr. Fitch proposes a still more extensive change in the existing system, with the view of securing more elasticity in organisation and classification.

In our opinion the evidence supports the conclusion that the present practice of many of the teachers, which they doubtless consider to be forced upon them by the Code, leads to some children being unduly detained in the successive standards, and to others being unduly hurried through them, and that consequently the teachers in such cases feel themselves more or less fettered by the system. If Government grants continue to be paid on the same principle as at present, the remedy we propose to meet this complaint is to allow managers and teachers full liberty in the classification of their scholars, subject to a reduction of the grant if this liberty be abused; and in small schools to adopt a simpler classification both for instruction and for examination.

Up to the time when the Code of 1882 was brought into operation, the attendance qualification entitling a scholar to be presented for examination was 250 attendances in the school year, and 150 attendances for half-timers. For this the Code of 1882 substituted the regulation, that all scholars whose names have been on the school registers for the last 22 weeks of the school year must, as a rule, be presented for examination. The aim in making this change is stated to have been on the one hand to secure that the teacher should not be subject to so strong a temptation to falsify the register in order to give a probably successful scholar his attendance qualification, and on the other hand to prevent a school losing its grant for a child, otherwise qualified, through some mere misfortune, such as its accidental absence on the day of the examination. The evidence we have received on the working of this altered rule is by no means unanimous. Some of the inspectors consider that the new rule is no improvement upon that which it supersedes; that it does not ensure an improved attendance; and that it may work disadvantageously for the results of the examination. Mr. Sharpe approves of the change in spite of the objections which have been pointed out. Many of the teachers dislike it very much, for they are not allowed to plead irregularity as a reason for withdrawal, and they complain that irregularity is more prevalent under the present rule than under the old one. One witness admits that the change has removed from teachers a great temptation to make false entries in the registers, and to connive at a backward child not completing his attendance qualification; but another shows how it may encourage the practice, of' bringing about the removal of a child's name from the register in order to destroy


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its attendance qualification. Mr. Diggle describes a "weeding out" process due to the change, under which sometimes, just before the 22 weeks begin, a backward child is passed on from school to school, and so may escape ever being subjected to any educational test. As a partial remedy against this evil, the Code, which at first allowed a name to be removed after six weeks' continuous absence, is now altered in such a way as to prohibit the removal of any name from the register unless the child has died, or has been ascertained to have left the school or neighbourhood. The evidence of the replies to the statistical inquiries made by circulars A and D shows the 22 weeks' system to be very unpopular, with teachers, managers, and school boards. Mr. R. B. Williams, superintendent of visitors in East Lambeth, who approaches this question from a different point of view from the witnesses above referred to, is in favour of examining every child on the roll of the school at the time of the annual examination, if he has been on the roll of any efficient school during the 22 weeks. We are of opinion, however, that if the present system of assessing the Government grant be continued, as in the case of the class examination so in the case of the three standard subjects, every child in the school might well be examined, and that the inspector in making his report should be directed to bear in mind any circumstances affecting the children and the school.

The following evidence gives a striking description of the annual examination before individual examination was prescribed, as it was conducted by Dr. Morell, one of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools at that time:

"He always, when he came to the school, saw its ordinary working; then he would take a class. He went through every class, and asked the teacher to explain the principles of the rules in arithmetic. He would stand and watch him, and then he would ascertain how many could work an example in the same rule correctly, placing the children in such a position that they could not copy, and if 75 per cent worked the sum right, he considered that it was a very good result. He would always insist upon hearing every teacher give a lesson, after finding out what ground he had attempted to cover during the year. It used to be a really very pleasant time."

The following description of an examination, as formerly conducted, was also given to us by the Rev. J. Menet:

"No doubt it differed very much from the present inspection, but the inspection that I knew best was the system of letting the school go on its usual course, as far as possible, listening to the lessons of the teacher, making an accurate statement of all the results of the work in the several classes, giving a thoughtful attention to the various methods of working, and, in short, going into all the details of the school with a view of really giving a fair estimate of the whole work in all its details. That was the inspection with which I was most familiar, and it seemed to me, and I can speak from results that I know, to have been admirably fitted for its purpose, and to have produced excellent results."

Sir Lovelace Stamer thus contrasts the present mode of examination with that which preceded it:

"I do not think that there is sufficient time given, to begin with; and there is a general haste in all the proceedings which, of course, upsets the discipline of the school. My own belief is that the old days of inspection gave the inspectors a far better opportunity of getting at the character of the school than they can possibly have now when the ordinary work and discipline of the school is upset in order to facilitate their inspection."

We recommend that in future the inspection of public elementary schools should be distinctly of two kinds, to be held on different days. The sole object of one inspection would be to secure that all children in the schools are being thoroughly taught the elements of instruction; the first "inspection" would, therefore, be confined to a strict and thorough examination in reading, writing, and arithmetic of each individual child attending school. This examination, confined strictly to the three elementary subjects, would be held on a day of which notice had been given, and its results, designated in future "the report of the examination" would be in the hands of the inspector of the district before his visit. The objects of the second inspection, to be held within a fortnight after the examination, would be, on the one hand, to pass a judgment upon the whole character of the school, and, on the other hand, to give advice and encouragement to the managers and teachers. At this visit the inspector


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would consider the moral tone and discipline of the school, the methods of teaching the aptitude of the teachers, and the condition of the buildings and premises, while he would also thoroughly test the proficiency of the children in all the subjects taught, by hearing the teacher examine the children, by examining classes himself in the subjects included in the syllabus which had not been previously tested at the first examination, or by any other methods he might select. His report upon the school would be based both on the report of the first examination, and on his own inspection. The inspector might at this visit, if he thinks it desirable, test the report of the first examination, and there should rest an appeal from the final judgment of the inspector to the chief inspector of the district.

Under the present system, individual examination means the method by which that portion of the grant which depends on the percentage of passes in the three elementary subjects is ascertained by the individual examination in those subjects of every child presented to the inspector for examination. Class-examination, means the method of judging of the proficiency of a class in certain subjects, geography, history, natural science, needlework, and English, by the criterion of the proportion of children answering well, whether amounting to half, or to three-quarters of such class. If the inspector reports that half the class answered satisfactorily, the half grant amounting to 1s on the average attendance is paid. If he reports that three-quarters answered satisfactorily, the full grant amounting to 2s is paid. Sample or specimen examination means the selection by the inspector of certain children taken from a standard, or of certain standards out of the seven standards, as representative of the work of the whole school in the class subjects. Thus an inspector, if geography and English were taken, might examine half of Standard II in English and the other half in geography, not all in both. Or he might say, "I will take Standards II, IV, and VI in geography, and III, V, and VII in English", and might report on the geography and English of the whole school according to the proficiency of the scholars in the children or standards so selected.

The comparative merits of the two systems of examination known respectively as individual and class examination have engaged much of our attention, and a considerable amount of evidence has been received upon the question. Hitherto individual examination in the three elementary subjects has been the fixed rule in the English Code; and although some kind of sample examination was suggested previous to the issue of the Code of 1882, the suggestion was received with but little favour by the teachers and managers, and was dropped. Sample examination, instead of the present individual examination, is advocated by Mr. Cumin. In the Scotch Code a change has recently been introduced, to which we have already alluded, providing for class examination in the Standard subjects for Standards I and II. One special evil of the system of individual examination is dwelt upon by several witnesses, namely, its tendency to frighten the children; more especially where the teacher impresses upon their minds the fact that by their failure a certain sum of money will be lost to the school. Much of the time now occupied by examining children individually in standard subjects might, it is said, be more profitably employed by the inspector and his staff in making visits without notice, and in listening to lessons given by the teachers; while teachers in preparing for individual examination have to draw too largely on the time needed for training the intelligence of the children. On the other hand the fear is expressed by Mr. Diggle that if the record of individual examination were abolished, many children, and especially the dull ones, would pass through the school without knowing anything about their subjects. Another evil resulting from the enormous amount of work thrown upon the inspector and his assistants by individual examination is stated to be that they are induced to attempt the impossible task of doing two things at once, as, for instance, looking over the sums of one standard whilst hearing the reading of another. Lord Lingen doubts if it would be safe to dispense with individual examination, but Mr. Fitch, as we have already said, is in favour of so far adopting the system now obtaining in Scotland as will do away altogether with the record of individual passes in the first and second standards; and whilst desiring to continue the record of individual examination in Standard III and upwards, he would pay the grant on the lines of a class examination. A similar view we observe is held by other inspectors.


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On the assumption that the present system of assessing the Government grant is to continue, whilst in Standards I and II class examination might take the place of the present individual examination, as in the Scotch Code, we think that individual passes should be recorded from Standard III and upwards, as a guide to managers and teachers, as some security for the thoroughness of the examination, and also as a guarantee to the parents that justice is being done to their children. Whatever alterations are made in the method of examination, however, provision must be made for the individual examination of all children whose parents desire them to be furnished with labour certificates.

Two other subjects still remain to be dealt with under the head of Government examination. These are the "exception schedules", in which managers and teachers claim exemption from examination for certain children upon various grounds; and "Over-pressure", which is alleged by some to be a result of the existing system of elementary education, and more particularly of the annual individual examination. The two subjects are closely connected with each other, for the exception schedule has been adopted for the purpose of preventing, or at any rate mitigating over-pressure. Some form of exception schedule has been in use since the Code of 1882 came into force; but the particular grounds on which exemption from examination could be claimed were first defined with fulness in the Code of 1884.* Opinions vary very much as to whether the present regulations are effective for their purpose. The teachers who appeared before us almost unanimously complained of the working of the exception schedule. They allege that the inspectors discourage withdrawals by the reference they often make in their reports to the number of them, the fear of this disparaging reference operating to keep many cases, thoroughly proper in themselves, from appearing on the schedule of exceptions, lest the merit grant should thereby be affected. They point out that a disallowed exemption results in three ciphers on the examination schedule, for a child who is refused exemption cannot be examined, but is regarded as having failed in all the standard subjects. They claim that cases presented by the managers, especially if they have been entered in the log book, should be accepted without question by the inspectors. It is represented as a further grievance that irregularity of attendance is not admitted among the "reasonable excuses". But there is by no means the same unanimity of opinion among managers. Many managers affirm that the inspectors allow, and that very freely, the certified exceptions that have been placed before them. Some, whilst admitting that this is so, contend that the teachers, for fear of the merit grant being prejudiced, do not use their privilege of placing names on the schedule as freely as circumstances would justify them in doing. Other managers have asserted that the inspectors do not readily accept the entries on the exemption schedule as presented to them, and a doubt is expressed if, in the short time at their command, it is possible for them thoroughly to investigate all the cases brought before them - a view also accepted by one of the inspectors. The inspectors, on the other hand, as a rule, speak in defence of the present regulations. They maintain that they deal fairly with the exception schedule, and that they do not refuse to allow exceptions if proper reasons are given. Mr. Sharpe showed that during the previous quarter in London, 6,000 children out of 81,000, were absent or withdrawn from examination, and that less than 200 were refused by the inspectors on the ground that the reasons alleged were insufficient. The demand of the teachers to be allowed to withdraw 10 per cent of the scholars from examination does not find favour with the inspectors, for they contend that a fixed percentage is ill adapted to meet varying circumstances, but they suggest that further freedom of withdrawal should be allowed. The managers are supposed themselves to prepare the exception schedule, and at any rate they authenticate it with their signature. But whilst both they and the teachers are expressly stated as a rule not to have abused their privilege in entering backward scholars upon it, the position is strongly maintained that these two authorities must

*See Art. 109 (c.) (vi.). See also Summary of Statistical Return A under opinions on the Code.


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not be permitted to have the sole control of this matter, but that it is essential that the inspector should retain the power of vetoing any case which, in his opinion, is improperly placed upon the exception schedule. We must not omit to point out, however, that Mr. Fitch's proposals for lightening the individual examination, would do away altogether with the exception schedule; for in granting greater freedom of classification a full grant and for the standard subjects on the lines of the examination now applied to the class subjects, he would require all scholars not unavoidably absent from school to be examined - a proposal accepted in advance by several of the teachers. Inspectors, we are told, are beginning to be more lenient in the matter of exceptions, and, if they had somewhat larger powers given to them to deal with special cases, possibly in the course of time little further complaint would be heard on this subject.

We have made special inquiry as to the existence of "over-pressure" among the children and the teachers of elementary schools, and as to the causes of the alleged evil, and we have met with a considerable difference of opinion upon this question among the witnesses who came before us. A good many of the teachers affirm that there is still much over-pressure in schools. They define over-pressure as "compelling a child to do work, or to obtain results which the mental ability or physical condition of the child does not justify, and which would not be demanded if the child's best interests were the only thing desired", or as "forcing a child through a course of teaching beyond its power, or compelling a child to do within too short a time what it might perhaps be able to do, had more time been given." Over-pressure exists, a great number of witnesses including the teachers say, in all schools, and especially where the children are very poor, or, so far as over-pressure on teachers is concerned, where the staff is insufficient. One witness characterises it as a growing evil, inevitably resulting from individual examination connected with a money payment. We are told that it is chiefly discernible among under-fed, backward, poor and neglected children, the requirements of the Code being arranged for average children, and therefore being excessive for dull and backward ones. Teachers also, we are informed, especially women and pupil-teachers, often suffer much from the evil of over-pressure. Some say that it is also met with in the case of quick children. On the other hand, there are teachers who deny all personal knowledge of its existence, and they affirm that there is no fear of it under the existing "standards", with the safeguard of the exception schedule. The managers also are divided upon the question, the evidence showing that in London, Birmingham, or Salford now no complaints are heard. Others affirm that it is unknown in schools classed as "excellent", and is chiefly to be met with among ill-fed children, or where there is a deficiency in the number or the quality of the teaching staff. Lastly, among the inspectors we meet with a much nearer approach to unanimity. Canon Warburton notes that where it is the custom after the inspection to indulge in considerable relaxation of effort, trusting for the final results to a "spurt" in the last three months, there the excessive strain put upon the children tells upon the backward ones, and he lays the blame of this unequal distribution of the work over the whole year upon the managers as well as upon the teachers. Mr. Matthew Arnold had met with over-pressure, but more often in the case of precocious than of dull children. Mr. Sharpe doubts if even dull children who are regular in their attendance need be subjected to any over-pressure, and he is of opinion that, with the safeguards of the Code properly used, there is very little over-pressure found. Mr. Fitch disbelieves altogether in the existence of over-pressure, pointing, in proof of this assertion, to the healthy condition of children in school compared with those outside, arguing that the curriculum is much lighter and the number of school hours is far smaller in English than in continental schools, and especially recalling the fact that during the agitation upon the question in 1884 very few parents or school managers took any share in it. It was


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maintained by a large majority of the inspectors who appeared before us that the curriculum of the three standard subjects, together with the class subjects, is not too much for the year's work; and whilst Canon Warburton believes that long home lessons and injudicious "keeping-in" for extra instruction bring discredit upon the whole system, both Mr. Sharpe and Mr. Fitch agree in saying that these two practices are now resorted to but very sparingly. There is little doubt, however, that there is ground for thinking that a considerable number of children attending school are not as fit for study as they should be, that this is very largely due to the fact that they are insufficiently fed and come from very poor or thriftless homes. It must be remembered also that the schools are now necessarily attended by a considerable number of sickly children, and therefore it is almost inevitable that in some cases over-strain will occur. There can be no doubt, however, that the present system of payment on the results of individual examination tends to produce over-pressure in certain cases, although this evil has doubtless been much exaggerated.

It is impossible wholly to separate the question of over-pressure among scholars from that experienced by teachers, and several witnesses, and many of the answers to our statistical inquiries, speak of the worry and anxiety as leading to nervousness, headaches, and other disorders in the case of teachers. Mr. Sharpe points out that the length of time which the staff is engaged in teaching, the mid-day study of pupil-teachers, and the fact that girls are frequently kept standing for long hours whilst engaged in teaching, are sources of possible injury, but he also states that, though isolated cases of it may be found, over-pressure as a general thing does not exist. The answers to the Circulars A and D show that out of 3,759 replies from voluntary managers, only 1,109, or 30 per cent, that out of 385 from school boards, 104, or 27 per cent, and that out of 3,496 from head teachers, 1,133, or 32 per cent, complain of some kind of over-pressure, affecting either head teachers, assistants, or children. No doubt better feeding of the half-starved children, the employment of larger and more efficient teaching staffs, a better distribution of the year's work throughout the year, and improved attendance, would do much to get rid of the mischief. We would, however, express our opinion that the utmost care should be taken to secure that the pupil-teachers are constitutionally strong and healthy. And it is satisfactory to learn that the provisions, inserted first in the Code of 1884, for the prevention of over-pressure, have already produced relief. Nevertheless, we are of opinion, that so long as a money value is attached to each success in the individual examination of the children attending any elementary school, and so long as the teachers are dependent on the grant for part of their income, there is great risk that teachers, in considering their own reputation and emoluments, may endanger the health and welfare of the children. We give due weight to Mr. Fitch's explanation of the reason why the outcry against this evil broke out when it did - namely, that, whereas before the Code of 1882 it was to the interest of the teachers to present as many children as possible for examination, under that Code it became their interest to withdraw all who were unlikely to pass successfully. But we cannot forget that we have to deal with circumstances as they exist, and with human nature as we find it; we are unable, therefore, to look for a complete remedy for over-pressure without some modification of the regulations of the existing Code.




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CHAPTER II

PARLIAMENTARY GRANT

Under the regulations in force up to the introduction of the Code of 1862 the Parliamentary Grant was awarded rather for educational machinery than for any results which that machinery produced; and one of the objections most strongly urged against the system at that time was, that whilst a minority of the children received a satisfactory education, there was no guarantee that the rest were in any true sense of the term educated at all; that, in fact, the teachers directed their attention chiefly to the upper classes and to the bright children, who were likely to do them credit, while the duller ones were neglected, or at any rate given less than their share of individual instruction. The opinion expressed in the Report of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission on this point we have stated at length in the Second Chapter of the First Part of our Report. The Code of 1862, known as Mr. Lowe's Revised Code, to which we have already referred at length, aimed at preventing the possibility of such a state of things. It swept away all the personal payments which had hitherto been made to the teachers; it instituted an individual examination, as a means, not only of assessing the grant, but also of securing that every scholar should have his due amount of instruction from the teacher; and it turned the grant into a single payment to the managers, to whom it was left to distribute the grant as they might think best. The system thus begun, under which grants have been made to schools mainly according to the results as tested by the annual examination, has been popularly characterised as a system of "payment by results"; and we have endeavoured in this inquiry to ascertain what has been the effect of the working of the system upon both teachers and scholars, and generally, also, upon the quality of the education given in our elementary schools.

Taken all together, the evidence of the teachers amounts to a very heavy indictment against the system of "payment by results". Many teachers say that an intellectual teaching does not "pay", but that the teachers have to work up to the hard-and-fast line of the Code, and to study the individuality of the inspector, so as best to prepare their children for winning a high percentage of passes. The system, it is alleged, has the effect of limiting the curriculum of work taken up in a school: for, practically, a subject which has no money value attached to it in the Code is entirely passed by. They say that the method of "pricing subjects" induces all parties to look more to what can be earned than to what is good for the scholars, and that it provides a stimulus, not to good teaching, but to "cram" with the view of getting money. In this way. it is maintained, teachers have become demoralised; and instead of their efforts being directed mainly to the religious, moral, and intellectual education of the children under their care, they are led to consider first, and before all other things, what will pay best, and how they can make most money. In particular, this system, it is said, has led managers to form an exaggerated idea of the importance of the percentage of passes, so that to them the question of the "number and percentage of passes is of far greater interest than that of the children's intellectual welfare." It is said that in treating with a teacher for a vacant appointment the managers' question is, "What percentage have you passed, and what are the entries on your parchment?", and that under this state of things the teacher's professional reputation is at stake, and might suffer considerably. The system in existence before 1862 was said to have resulted in dull children being neglected; but to the present system is attributed, by the witnesses above referred to, the opposite evil of neglecting the brighter and more forward children; and although its abolition might result in lessening the interest now taken in dull and backward children, it would certainly, it is said, destroy at its source what proves to be "a fountain of over-pressure". As regards over-pressure, one teacher thus sums up the action of the Code, "The Code drives the teacher, and the teacher must then drive the child." And it is alleged that even the inspector does not escape from these injurious consequences of the system. "Inspections", says one teacher, "partake very much of the mechanical character of the daily work of the school. The teacher


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aims during the year to secure a certain number of passes, and the inspector tests whether he has succeeded. Beyond this, little, if anything, is done. I hold that the educational value of the inspector's visits, as it existed years ago, has ceased, and this is greatly to be deplored. Besides this, the examination is often conducted in a very confused manner and with so much hurry as to cause many failures." The effect of the system in its application to small schools was especially dwelt upon by those witnesses who were adverse to it; for such schools cannot possibly, they said, teach the whole of the subjects required, and so must fail to earn the full grant. Many teachers, however, deprecated doing away with the individual examination, desiring only that the grant should not be assessed upon the individual results, and some stated that one advantage of the existing system is that it secures to every child some measure of attention from the teacher. But of the teachers who appeared before us, scarcely more than two or three expressed an unqualified approval of the existing system. A very large number of those who replied to Circular D entertain the same objections to payment by results, this complaint being the most frequent of all against the administration of the Code. It must be said, however, that a much more favourable view of the method of conducting inspections under the Code was taken by many teachers. The Memorial presented to us by the National Union of Elementary Teachers, and printed in the Appendix, also strongly condemns the system of payment by results. That section of the body of elementary teachers which is represented by the Union say, that the most important results of school instruction and training cannot be measured; that mechanical results are elevated above those which are educational, and that, in consequence, a false gauge of efficiency has been set up; that the system has injured the classification of schools, and the methods of teaching; has debased educational ideals and demoralised all who have come under its influence; that it has created suspicion and mistrust between inspectors and teachers, and destroyed that harmony of work and purpose between them which is essential to educational progress. The Memorial further declares that the system of payment by results "condemns poor and weak schools to perpetual inefficiency by withholding from them the means by which alone they can be made efficient, and is especially unsuited to the conditions of rural and half-time schools", that "it is a constant and fruitful source of over-pressure upon scholars and teachers, has forced upon the schools a miserable system of 'cram' which secures but few lasting educational results, and gives the scholars little taste or desire to continue their education after leaving the day school"; and that "the more intelligent teaching and the higher intellectual results, which are, on the authority of Mr. Matthew Arnold and others, stated to be obtained in the Continental schools, are mainly attributable to the absence of such a system, which is in force in no other country, and in this country in no other class of schools than those under the Elementary Education Acts." In asking for the abrogation of the system, the teachers do not present an alternative plan, but ask "that some other method of distributing the Parliamentary Grant for Education should be devised which will -

(1) Prevent the subordination of educational to pecuniary considerations in the work of teachers and inspectors.
(2) Prevent 'cram', and encourage intelligent rather than mechanical methods of teaching.
(3) Render possible a rational programme of instruction, capable of being adapted to varying circumstances and localities.
(4) Restore to teachers the liberty of classifying their scholars with sole regard to their attainments and abilities.
(5) Establish an effective system of examination by 'classes' in lieu of that by 'standards'.
(6) Simplify the work of inspection, render unnecessary the exemption of children from examination, and remove the over-pressure upon poor, dull, delicate, and irregular children.
(7) Remove all hindrances to the progress of bright and intelligent scholars."
We turn to the various opinions on this subject which we have collected from the managers of elementary schools who have been called before us. Some seem to be


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distinctly in favour of the retention of the system of "payment by results", seeing in it the only true guarantee the State can have that the education given is efficient, and that every child gets its share of it. Mr. Diggle, Chairman of the School Board for London, who says that if Parliament desires to pay for educational efficiency, he does not know how that can be ascertained, except by individual examination, thinks that the system of payment by results has not an injurious effect upon the minds of the scholars, but he would see no primâ facie objection to a system of administering grants which did not base the payment upon individual passes of individual scholars, so long as the individual examination of the scholars was preserved. Mr. Birley, Chairman of the Salford School Board, maintains that payment for education by results is the most satisfactory way of working the educational system, but he recommends that teachers should have no pecuniary interest in the results, and that they should be relieved by the managers of pecuniary responsibility. On the other hand, many managers condemn this method of assessing the grant under its present conditions almost as strongly as do the teachers. They characterise it as neither desirable nor necessary, distasteful alike to teachers and children, and at best only a partial guarantee of a child's real learning. Some witnesses say that it has killed intelligence and interfered with the natural method of training and teaching in schools; that under it the clever children are sacrificed to the dull; that in its operation it entirely destroys the spirit of education, making the teacher think more how to get the children through the examination than how to fit them for the demands their future life may make upon them; and, worse still, that it may tempt teachers to the use of educational tricks or devices closely bordering upon dishonesty. Some of these "devices" are specified, such as the sending round from school to school the examination questions which have been used in the inspection of another school; keeping in dull and backward children at the dinner hour; devoting the time set apart for religious teaching to some final revision of the secular subjects; and even conniving at backward children being moved to another school just before the examination. Mr. Wilks, a member of the London School Board, from whose evidence we are here quoting, comments in these words upon such reprehensible practices: "I am not bringing this as an indictment against the teachers: The teachers have told me of these things themselves as their confidential friend, and they say, 'It is not in human nature to resist this thing, because we know that our character is at stake.' ... Their local managers judge them by the passes, the money they can earn; and future managers will judge their reputation by the entry which Her Majesty's inspector puts upon the parchment." The teacher's mind, it is further contended, is concentrated upon the pecuniary consequences of his work, and not upon what is in the abstract the best for his children; and the amount of money at stake is often so considerable as to cripple the school if it is withheld. Mr. MacCarthy, a member of the Birmingham School Board, and head master of King Edward's Grammar School, Fiveways, Birmingham, who has had a large experience of the attainments of picked children from the public elementary schools, summarises the result of his observations by saying that these pupils constantly disappoint the expectation formed of them. On being asked to what this is due, he replies, "To want of mental alertness and the absence of intellectual acquisitiveness. There is no desire to go behind the dictum of the teacher, or of the rule, to the reason, and it takes many years of uphill labour to create that healthy desire; some cases seem hopeless. This failing is certainly more marked in those that have had the drilling of the Code than in others, and is, in my opinion, a direct product of payment by results." It is not indeed the general opinion of the witnesses that it would be possible to do away with this system altogether; but it is very generally suggested that by way of reducing the dimensions of the evil caused by it, the proportion of grant depending upon results should be much lessened. This opinion has been very generally expressed in the returns we have obtained in answer to Circular A. By reference to the summaries of replies to Question 5, given for each county, it will be seen that the system of payment by results is a subject of complaint by managers. They condemn it as leading to over-pressure, cramming, superficial and mechanical teaching. Others say that it is not education, but a preparation for examination, that the end is to get grants, that it


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produces a dislike for books and study, and that children are crammed with details from which they receive no intellectual advantage.

On this subject the inspectors gave some very important evidence, but they were by no means unanimous in the opinions they expressed. The effects of the system on the teachers they admitted to be sometimes bad, especially in fostering the unhealthy competition among them for high percentages, and so leading teachers to work for a bare pass, an evil, however, which, some of these witnesses affirm, is being corrected by the merit grant. It is asserted by Canon Warburton that "payment by results" acts as a stimulant to over-pressure; that the "percentage of passes", which is so vital a part of the system, is but an imperfect test of results, since it takes no account of the intelligence of the children and the moral tone of the school. We were told by Mr. Synge that both managers and teachers must rather trim their sails to the examination arrangements than look wholly to the advancement in education of their children. Canon Warburton says that the system is more an expedient for examination than for teaching, being specially regarded by inspectors as a help to accuracy, and Mr. Sharpe describes it as a trap for inspectors with very scrupulous minds, since its excessive minuteness renders them incapable of taking a broad and general view of the work of a school. On the other hand, it is pointed out that the system was, perhaps, almost an absolute necessity when it was introduced; that it has produced good results; that the best teachers are not now influenced by the low money view of the matter; and that, when they are so influenced, the managers are to blame for allowing any large part of their income to depend upon results. It is also contended that the best teachers practically disregard the standards till the last two or three months before the examination; that the "trick" of sending away unpromising candidates just before the examination is easily detected by the inspectors; that the limits of the precariousness of the grant on results in good schools are usually only 10 per cent on the three elementary subjects, since the passes generally range from 85 to 95 per cent. It is said by Canon Warburton that teachers are much more likely to pay individual attention to children who are going to be individually examined, and that, so far as he can see, in order to secure thorough and efficient inspection, the system of payment by results is still necessary, and he questions whether inspectors could be allowed to assess the amount payable to the school on any basis other than the results of examination, at least, he can suggest no other. Mr. Fitch refused to admit that the inspector's report upon a school without the money pressure behind it, would be sufficient to secure improvement in neglected subjects the next year, but he desired to see the English and Scotch Code assimilated so far as to abolish "payment by results" on individual examination in Standards I and II. Mr. Graves would like to see the proportion of grant, which is now dependent upon results, reduced; and Mr. Synge would be very glad to see the system changed, restricting its use to those schools which fell below the level of "good", and largely substituting a kind of class examination, in place of the present examination with its individual record of passes. Whatever evil may have arisen, or may have been possible, under the present system, we desire to record our opinion that it has been largely mitigated by the uprightness and educational zeal of teachers, shown in the high-minded discharge of their duty, notwithstanding the temptations to which they have been exposed.

We have also felt bound to consider, as bearing upon our recommendations, the important evidence to which we have before alluded, which, coming from various quarters, testifies to the disappointing fact that, under our present system, though the results of inspection of schools and the examination of scholars may appear satisfactory, many of the children lose with extraordinary rapidity after leaving school the knowledge which has been so laboriously and expensively imparted to them. We are thus led to believe that a system of "cram" with a view to immediate results, which tends to check the great advance made of late years in all our education amongst all ranks, and threatens to destroy the love of knowledge for its own sake, is prevailing more and more, though under different conditions, in our public elementary schools, and that, unless a large change is now made, as the system must become in working more rigid, so its evils will increase rather than diminish.


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It must be borne in mind, that after all, what is called "payment by results " is a method devised for distributing the Parliamentary grant, not only in some proportion to the work done in each school, but also in such a manner as to satisfy Parliament that the results for which the money is voted, are actually attained. To secure adequate results is, of course, the object of all expenditure. Parliament in voting large payments of public money to school managers requires some security for the intended result. The result to be attained is the efficient conduct of elementary education according to the circumstances of every locality and the requirements and capacity of the scholars; and for a security that these results are attained Parliament looks to the reports of Her Majesty's Inspectors. Payments, however, should be so made as to avoid fixing the managers' or teachers' attention too exclusively on the details on which the grant is based. The details of the instruction which can be tested by examination may not, even in the aggregate, comprise the whole of the work of education, and any payments on these details should be so made as to avoid directing the managers' or teachers' attention into earning the necessary income of the school by the separate requirements and performances to which payment is attached. It has been urged on us, by several witnesses, that the evils arising from any system of payment by results are so deep rooted that there is no escape from them, except by entirely disconnecting the grant to a school from the results of its examination, and giving to each school, deemed worthy to survive, a grant adequate to its needs, or proportionate either to the number of children it educates, or to its staff and machinery. But after weighing carefully all the evidence laid before us, tending to show the evils which arise from the present method of payment by results, we are convinced that the distribution of the Parliamentary grant cannot be wholly freed from its present dependence on the results of examination without the risk of incurring graver evils than those which it is sought to cure. Nor can we believe that Parliament will long continue to make so large an annual grant as that which now appears in the Education Estimates, without in some way satisfying itself that the quality of the education given justifies the expenditure. Nevertheless, we are unanimously of opinion that the present system of "payment by results" is carried too far and is too rigidly applied, and that it ought to be modified and relaxed in the interests equally of the scholars, of the teachers, and of education itself.

The Present Distribution of the Annual Grant per scholar under the several heads of variable and fixed payments is set forth in the table below, and we proceed briefly to enumerate the chief proposals that have been made to us, with a view, while retaining the principle of the dependence of the grant on the results of the examination, to modify the methods of assessing it, so as to correct, as far as possible, the evils complained of.* In order to show the complex character of the existing system, it may be useful to set out clearly how the Government grant is at present distributed.

The following maximum grants are now obtainable in boys', girls', and infants' schools:

Boys' and Girls' Schools

Infants' Schools

*Report of Committee of Council on Education, 1886-7, page xxiii.


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It appears, therefore, from the foregoing list of grants, that the highest amount attainable, under the present system, without specific subjects and cookery is:

For girls, however, in Standards IV and upwards a further grant of 4s per head may be earned for practical cookery; and in Standards V and upwards an additional sum of 2s for each of not more than two specific subjects in the case of boys, and of one specific subject in the case of girls who take up cookery, making the maximum grant attainable for children in the higher standards to be -

The Average amount per head earned during the year 1886 (see Report of the Committee of Council for 1886-87, page xix) was as follows:

The foregoing figures show in what proportions the grant is distributed under its several heads of payment. Since more than two-thirds of the whole amount is variable and uncertain, the managers of schools are always kept in a certain amount of suspense as to the income that will be available for the support of their schools.

A considerable amount of evidence has been taken on the question whether the existing proportion of the fixed to the variable grant, should be increased, so as to leave less room for inflicting financial loss in the event of an unfavourable report. The evidence may be summed up by saying that teachers were practically unanimous in recommending an increase of that portion of the grant which depends on attendance, and a corresponding diminution of that which depends on results. School managers, with a few exceptions, were on the same side. Inspectors were divided in opinion on this point; Mr. McKenzie, Mr. Graves, Mr. Harrison, and Mr. Synge being in favour of an increase in the fixed grant, and Mr. Fitch being opposed to it, and regarding the freeing of a larger portion of the grant from dependence upon results as a retrograde step. Other witnesses, without advocating any increase in the proportion of the grant which is fixed, have restricted themselves to suggestions as to the re-adjustment of the constituent parts of that portion of the grant which is variable. These suggestions have been made, chiefly with a view to diminish the payments on the result of the examination of the individual child, and to increase correspondingly the payment for subjects reported on in classes. The variable portion of the grant now consists of three items, depending respectively on the inspector's report on the child, the class, and the school. These three elements, which go to make up the whole variable grant, constitute respectively 55, 23, and 22 per cent of that grant, or 42, 17, and 16 per cent of the whole grant, fixed and variable together, paid to schools for older children. Of the proposals for modifying the present method of assessing the grant one would wholly abolish the first two elements of the variable grant, viz., the examination of the individual child and of the class, and would pay the whole grant on the basis of the third item, viz., the inspector's opinion of the merit of the school as a whole. Another proposal tends towards abolishing the grant depending on the recorded passes of the individual child, converting it into a payment for the proficiency of the class, while still retaining the grant for general merit. A third proposal, which was advocated by many witnesses who appeared before us, is exactly the reverse of the first. It is to abolish the merit grant, now depending on the inspector's view of the school


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taken as a whole, and to retain the payments in respect to individual and to class examination.

In regard to that portion of the variable grant which now depends on the inspector's opinion of the school as a whole, commonly called the Merit Grant, it was first introduced in the Code of 1882. Its object was in some degree to remedy the ill effects of "the hard-and-fast line of a pass", and although in the "Instructions to the Inspectors" the number of the passes as well as their quality was at first admitted as one of the circumstances to be considered in assessing the grant, in the "Instructions" for 1887 now in force, the quality of the passes, and not their number, is specified as the most important of the factors for determining the degree of merit.‡ The introduction of this particular item of grant was originally accepted by the teachers, who knew well that a high percentage of passes is quite consistent with an unintelligent quality of work, and that some encouragement was needed to ensure the improvement of its quality and to bring out the intelligence of the children. But many teachers now complain that the merit grant, as actually applied, has intensified mechanical teaching, and increased over-pressure. They contend that it is a form of grant which it is almost impossible to assess otherwise than inequitably, and therefore unfairly, and that it fails to test order and discipline, and is apt to become the one regulation of the Code which most affects the teacher's reputation. Mr. Diggle draws attention to the remarkable difference in the award of the "excellent" merit grant in the several divisions of London, and does not think it explicable on the ground that there is a great difference in the schools. Dr. Crosskey objects to the terminology of the merit grant as misleading to parents, and to the use of the word "excellent" in reference to schools which may be overcrowded or imperfectly supplied with books and apparatus. Sir Lovelace Stamer, Chairman of the School Board of Stoke, considers that the progress of the brighter children through school is retarded by the stress laid on the quality of the "passes", as the main factor of the merit grant. Mr. Hanson, Vice-chairman of the Bradford School Board, while approving of the idea of the merit grant, expresses the opinion, that in practice it is found very difficult to work even by the most conscientious men. Some inspectors admit that it has not wholly fulfilled its objects, some deprecate the personal responsibility which falls upon them in arriving at a judgment upon such a variety of factors, one acknowledging that it has produced a great deal of rivalry, ambition, envy, bitterness, and emulation between teachers, and that it has given rise to the allegation (which is, however, emphatically denied by all official witnesses), that the proportion of "Excellents" to be given in a district is arranged beforehand without any view to the actual circumstances of the several cases. Another inspector admits that under the present system he has almost necessarily to call that "excellent" which is not so. Several inspectors propose to modify the existing system by inserting intermediate grades, as "very fair" between "fair" and "good", and "very good" between "good" and "excellent", especially in infant schools. Others would distribute the merit grant among subjects, making, for example, a grant of 3s for excellent reading, 2s 6d for good reading, and 2s for fair reading, and similarly for the other standard subjects. The "Instructions" to inspectors seem to have thrown upon this grant a burden much in excess of the letter of the Code, and much beyond what the small amount of the grant can properly bear. In assessing it, moreover, the "special circumstances" of individual schools do not seem to have been taken into account to the extent contemplated when the Code of 1882 was drawn up. One of the objects of the grant was, we understand, by payment for thorough work, to encourage small schools and schools in poor districts to take up a limited curriculum and to master it, instead of attempting, in the hope of a large grant, a wide range of subjects, in excess of the powers either of the staff or of the scholar.

‡See Revised Instructions, 1887, s. 48.


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Admitting to the full the difficulties involved in assessing the Merit Grant, and the drawbacks of that unhealthy competition between teacher and teacher which appears to have arisen out of it, we cannot forget that this form of grant was accepted by those who would be affected by it, on the ground that the general character of the school and the quality of its work would be thereby recognised; and that as yet it has had but a comparatively short trial. If the plan of the distribution of the grant which we shall hereafter recommend be adopted, there is no need to make any recommendations as to the merit grant itself. But, if not, we are of opinion that the weight of the evidence given to us is against the retention of the merit grant in its present form, in schools for older children. We suggest that the classification of schools as "Fair", "Good", or "Excellent", be discontinued. It seems to us that this classification, or any similar system of grading schools, must necessarily convey exaggerated ideas of the relative merits of different schools, since a school which attains the degree of merit required to place it in one of these categories, may barely surpass a school which only just falls short of it. We suggest that if the present system of payment by results be retained it would be better that the moneys now available for the merit grant should be devoted in such proportions as the inspector may deem expedient to reward superior intelligence displayed by scholars in particular subjects, and other merits also not now recognised by grants, the particular merits for which these grants are awarded by the inspector being stated in his report. Organisation and methods of instruction are best left free from the control of the inspector, who may certainly advise respecting them, but should not, in our opinion, have it in his power either to fine or to pay the school directly for them, as items in the grant. If he does so, there is danger lest an unwise passion for uniformity should lead either the inspector or the Education Department unduly to interfere with the various methods of school management and instruction which may be taught in the training colleges, or which may be tried by different school managers and teachers.

The next question to be dealt with under the head of the parliamentary grant, is that of the "17s 6d limit". The history of this limit may be shortly stated. The Code in force before 1870 limited the parliamentary grant to half the expenses, and was not to exceed 15s per head on the average attendance. In 1870 the average cost of aided schools was 25s 5d per head, and the average grant was 9s 9¼d. In the debates on Mr. Forster's Bill, however, the annual cost of an efficient school was estimated to be about 30s per head, of which the State, the managers, and the parents were each assumed to contribute about one-third. This sum (30s) was made the basis of all calculations of school expenditure during the discussion of the Bill, and was taken as the probable future cost of an efficient school. The addition of 50 per cent to the 10s grant, originally proposed by the Bill was avowedly intended, while encouraging improvement generally, to raise the State contribution from one-third to one-half of the annual cost, and at the same time to reduce the charge on the managers to one-half (5s) of their existing responsibility. Under the new Code, therefore, of 1871, the grant was not to exceed either the amount raised locally (including school pence), or 15s per head of the average attendance. This latter limit was removed by the Code of 1875, by which time the average cost per child had risen to 32s 5¼d, and the grant to 12s 7¼d. Some schools, however, were more expensively conducted, and in the board schools the average cost of maintenance had risen in 1876 to £2 1s 4d. School managers, moreover, had not found in the working of the Code the relief promised to them in 1870; the subscriptions to Church schools having risen from 7s 5¾d in that year to 8s 8¾d in 1875, and in Roman Catholic schools from 6s 3d to 8s 1½d. The Act of 1876, accordingly, in anticipation of a further general increase in the cost of schools per head, took 35s as the measure of the reasonable average outlay in elementary education, and, as before, fixed upon half that sum, or 17s 6d as the future limit of the grant, which was to be paid without reference to the amount locally raised. But it provided, at the same time, that if a school exceeded the normal rate of expenditure, it should not do so without a corresponding increase of local effort, whether voluntary or by rates; and it required that the grant, if in excess of 17s 6d, should be limited to that amount unless met penny for penny from local sources.

There is an almost universal feeling of objection to this limit in its present form, more especially among school managers: indeed amongst the various complaints made to us by those managers to whom Circular A was addressed, this objection was by far the


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most frequent. It is alleged by witnesses that it presses hardly upon small and poor schools where the fees are necessarily low, although the work done may be above average efficiency, whilst it is said that schools charging higher fees, or schools in wealthy neighbourhoods where liberal subscriptions can be obtained, run no risk of having their grant diminished; that it discourages teachers and managers in their efforts to improve their schools, the first result being a deduction under this rule; that it is a disability which especially affects voluntary schools, since school boards by means of the rates can escape its worst results. It is said even to offer a premium to extravagance in board schools, whilst appearing to offer a premium on inefficiency in voluntary schools; and that it is inconsistent with a professed principle of the Code, viz., "payment by results", since when the results are produced, the payment is not forthcoming. We are informed that it acts capriciously, for managers often find certain items of expenditure, which are not expressly specified in the Code, disallowed from their annual balance sheet, at a time when it is too late for them to procure the money to make good the deficiency of income. The Statistical Returns elicited by Circular A show that out of 3,759 schools 434 or 12 per cent sustained deductions under the 17s 6d limit, amounting altogether to 5 per cent of the grant to those schools. The answers to Circular D give 336 Departments which sustained deductions out of 3,496 who sent replies. The total deduction under this limit, in 1886, from a grant of nearly £3,000,000, did not exceed £24,000, being a little less than 2d in the £ of the whole grant made to voluntary schools generally, and 1½d. in the £ of the whole grant made to board schools. The discouragement inflicted on schools affected by the limit thus imposed is not, however, to be measured by the amount of this deduction.

Some ask that the 17s 6d limit should be abolished altogether, and that the amount of grant earned, whatever it may come to, should be paid; and they even go so far as to recommend that the abolition should be accompanied with no conditions as to the amount of fees and subscriptions to be raised; the ground of their contention being that the work having been done, managers should be able to demand payment for it as a right. Others, on the contrary, while admitting that a fair proportion of the cost of education should be required to be provided locally, and that it would, therefore, be an unwise and an unnecessary step to abolish all limits to the amount of grant to be received, nevertheless plead that the cost of education has greatly increased in the past few years; that more funds are an urgent necessity; and that the concession made in the Act of 1876, whereby the old 15s limit was replaced by the present 17s 6d limit, does not now go far enough. The request is made, that the limit should be raised; and it is contended that as the limit was put at 17s 6d in 1876, avowedly on the ground that the cost of education had gone up to 35s a head, of which 17s 6d is the half, the fact that the average cost per head now closely approaches 40s, is ground enough for asking that the limit be raised to 20s. It may, however, be replied, that schools which spend 40s a head, are not affected at all by the 17s 6d limit, nor to any great extent by the requirement that in order to claim the whole grant earned, the locally raised income must equal the grant to be received.

On the other hand, Lord Lingen, who was up to the year 1870 Secretary to the Education Department, and subsequently Secretary to the Treasury, very emphatically contends for the imposition of a double limit - a first limit, which should prevent the grant ever exceeding the locally raised income, and which, of course, would go far to repeal the concession in the Act of 1876; and a second limit, which should keep the whole grant below a fixed sum, to be determined by the population of the school district, and by a scale specially adjusted thereto. Some of Her Majesty's Inspectors endorse this view, arguing that one effect of retaining the existing limit is, that it induces supporters to contribute, when perhaps they would not otherwise do so. The fear is also expressed that, if the limit were wholly removed, many managers would throw their schools entirely into the teachers' hands, which would result in schools being farmed by the teachers who would thus be left at liberty to earn as much in the way of grants as they could. And the opinion is maintained that, with the dis-


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appearance of the limit, the additional income would often go to relieve subscriptions, rather than to improve education. Mr. Brodie, Her Majesty's Inspector, however, is equally emphatic in condemning the present system, which, he says, offers grants with one hand, and takes them away with the other. But, whilst advocating the removal of limits, he suggests that in all schools the excess of grant over 17s 6d a head should be spent in improving the necessary requisites of the school, in increasing the stipends of the pupil teachers, founding school libraries, and providing everything in the shape of books and apparatus which will tell on the school work - a condition, however, which practically might be somewhat difficult to enforce.

In weighing all the evidence for and against the 17s 6d limit, we are compelled to admit that it acts as a discouragement to improvement in certain cases, and we recommend that the provision in the Elementary Education Act of 1876, upon which this limitation is based, be accordingly repealed. We see, however, some danger in the proposal to abolish all limits, for we have little doubt that, in many instances, school managers now make efforts to keep up the amount of the local income of their school, in order not to lose any part of the grant earned, efforts which they would be tempted to relax if restrictions were wholly swept away. Nor do we believe that the amount of the Parliamentary grant per head will bear indefinite expansion. We think, therefore, that any modification of the present limits must be considered in relation to the general question of the total amount of the Parliamentary grant.

The Act of 1876 made provision for assistance to schools in small or sparsely populated districts, and special grants of £15 or £10 were made to schools in districts having a population less than 200 or 300, with no other available school nearer than two miles. Under these provisions, in the year 1886, grants of £10 were made to 1,330 voluntary, and 239 board, schools; and of £15 to 830 voluntary, and 116 board, schools. The amount of these grants was £29,580. We are of opinion that this form of aid to small rural schools might well be extended, and we think that, provided the arrangements made by section 19 of the Act of 1876 as to the school district be in all cases maintained, all schools having an average attendance of less than 100, and not being within two miles of any other available elementary school by the nearest road, or recommended by Her Majesty's Inspector, under exceptional circumstances, on the ground of difficulties of access, might be admitted to a special grant, increasing with the smallness of the school, but not to exceed £20 in all This grant might increase by 6s 8d for each child less than 100 in average attendance at the school, so that the maximum grant of £20 would be payable to schools having not more than 40 in average attendance. This special and increased grant to the smaller schools would enable us without hardship to insist on the application of the extended curriculum which we have recommended as the minimum for all schools, and would enable managers to strengthen their staff so as to teach that curriculum effectively. The enforcement of a curriculum of such a character as has been recommended must entail, both upon small rural schools, and upon those in poor districts of towns, a considerable increase in the cost of maintenance, by necessitating an addition to the staff, and in other ways. Considering, therefore, the much greater burden laid upon such localities than upon more wealthy districts by the cost of providing schools, we could not in justice make these recommendations unless a larger Government grant is afforded to such special localities. We would call attention to the fact that in the leading countries of Europe, as shown by our foreign returns in the Appendix, special aid is given by the State to schools in poor districts, whether urban or rural. The special grant to poor districts should only be given where the fees are, in the opinion of the Department, so low as to enable the inhabitants of this poor district to attend the school with ease. We are of opinion that the special grants we have suggested for thinly-peopled or for poor neighbourhoods should, as in the Act of 1876, not be affected by any general rules as to the reduction of grant.

Before passing from this subject, we think it necessary to make some observations on the gross expenditure upon elementary education. Mr. Forster, when bringing in the Bill of 1870, impressed upon his hearers the necessity of combining "efficiency with economy". Referring to the burden which the measure would entail upon the payers both of rates and taxes, he advocated "the least possible expenditure of public money", consistent with the attainment of his object, and pointed out that "it ought to be the aim of Parliament to measure what they give, not so much by the rate of expenditure, as by the efficiency of that expenditure". While recognising the fact that the ideal standard of elementary education has risen largely since 1870, we are


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somewhat surprised at the extent to which persons of reputed authority in such matters appear to make expense the chief test of efficiency; and we were not prepared for the apparent disregard of economical considerations, shown in the course of some of the evidence laid before us, in the plans advocated for carrying out the legitimate system of elementary education, and in the arrangements required to bring it within the reach of the great masses of the people.

We discuss elsewhere questions affecting the age of the scholars, and the standard and subjects of instruction that can properly be looked for in elementary schools. We wish here to say a few words as to the cost of such schools, the expenditure on which has rapidly increased, and is now, as we have shown, largely in excess of the sum contemplated as necessary by the Act of 1870. We think that, in the interest of education itself, the time has come when serious efforts should be made to limit the cost of the maintenance of aided schools to such a sum as will allow the managers to carry out their duties efficiently, but without any undue strain on local resources, whether provided voluntarily or by rates. It is to be borne in mind that these resources are likely, ere long, to be further, and perhaps largely, drawn upon to meet the rising demands for secondary education.

We have considered how far it might be expedient for the State to place a maximum limit upon the expenditure of public elementary schools. But we have come to the conclusion that it would be impossible to fix any one limit which would not either cripple small or medium-sized schools, or be excessive for large ones; and it should be remembered that any limit that might be fixed, though theoretically a maximum, would, in fact, be quoted as justifying expenditure up to that amount, and might thus, in the cases of large schools, act as an encouragement to extravagance. On the other hand, it would be extremely difficult to devise a scale of limitations which should be adapted to all the varying circumstances of elementary schools. Moreover, so far as board schools are concerned, while we are of opinion that there has undoubtedly been in some cases extravagant expenditure in the past, we think there are reasons to hope that this evil will be greatly diminished in the future For in most districts in which the system of board schools has been largely developed, the education rate has risen to a point which has thoroughly awakened the vigilance of the ratepayers.

While we recommend the retention in some form or other of each of the three constituent elements of the Variable Grant, we think that the following modifications of the present system, which are based on suggestions we have received from numerous witnesses, would offer the maximum of relief with the minimum of disturbance. We propose that the Fixed Grant be increased to 10s per child in average attendance, and that the conditions on which the fluctuating grants are made be so far modified as to secure that their amount shall depend on the good character of the school as a whole and on the quality of the acquirements of the great majority of the scholars rather than on the exact number of children who attain the minimum standard of required knowledge. In order to carry out these recommendations, it would be necessary to treat the individual examination which we have already recommended, not as a means of individually assessing grants, but merely as testing the general progress of all the scholars. In determining what amount of grant the Government should make in the future, we also think that schools should be assisted according to their deserts, so as to promote efficiency; whilst no undue pressure should be placed on dull children, and no unnecessary anxiety and worry caused to managers and teachers. Under present circumstances we are of opinion that the average amount of the variable grant should not be less than 10s for each scholar in average attendance.

Further, as the child's future improvement depends so greatly upon an intelligent knowledge of the three Rudimentary Subjects, we think that in distributing the variable grant special stress should be laid upon efficiency in the elementary subjects. In addition the Inspector should report separately on each of the following points: 1. Moral training; 2. Cleanliness, both of school and scholars; 3. Quietness; 4. Attention; 5. Obedience; 6. Accuracy of knowledge; 7. General intelligence; 8, Classification; 9. Instruction of pupil teachers. The Report should also record in detail the results of examination in each subject of instruction, and should state specifically the grounds on which any reduction of the full grant is recommended. When managers and teachers know exactly on what the judgment is grounded, we believe that appeals against the inspector's report will be much less frequent, and that in most cases it will be confirmed by those who know the school. Should the Inspector's judgment be challenged, the further advantage will be secured by the report being thus specific, that the particulars being precisely set forth, it can be submitted in detail to appeal.


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We do not suggest the foregoing proposals as applicable to the case of Infant Schools. In regard to these we do not deem it necessary to recommend any change in the existing system of payment.

We also think it would be well if the inspector reported annually upon the Physical Exercises, and whether the school possesses Lending Libraries or has established School Penny Banks.

We cannot recommend so substantial an addition to the fixed grant without, at the same time, laying stress on the necessity of increased facilities for the removal of incompetent teachers. Where such incompetence has been proved, and after due notice has been given, it should be in the power of the Department to declare a school in default, and thereupon to suspend the payment to it of any grant. We think further that, whatever be the ordinary basis of payment to schools, the Department must retain its present power of ordering deductions from the grant, or even its total forfeiture, for grave faults in instruction, discipline, or of morality in the scholars, or for dishonesty in conduct and management of the school.

Following the analogy of the grant for Cookery which is already given, not on examination, but on the condition that the children have been duly taught, it has been suggested to us that improved Science teaching in our elementary schools should be secured, rather by payments toward special science teachers, than by grants founded on the results of the examination of the children in science. In like manner the great improvement which has resulted in many schools, through the appointment of an organising master or local inspector, points to the expediency of encouraging school boards, and associated managers of voluntary schools, to appoint such persons, and we suggest that the Parliamentary grant might be partly employed in paying a portion (not more than half) of the salary of such persons, as well as of efficient teachers of drawing, who might circulate among a number of schools.

Before we close our recommendations as to the grants to be made henceforth to all public elementary schools, voluntary or board, we must record our opinion that if the managers of a public elementary school, which has once been passed by the Department as efficient and suitable, are ordered by that authority, under pain of "default", to make alterations or additions to the buildings or playground, a grant in aid of the local expenditure required to carry out these improvements should be made by the Education Department.

It has been our leading object to make such recommendations as would, in our opinion, secure, within a reasonable period, that none but good schools should be acknowledged by the Education Department as satisfying the requirements of the State. It will have been observed that, with this purpose in view, we have recommended that two separate days of examination and inspection should be established in all cases in place of the single day now in use; that duly trained teachers should gradually be substituted in all cases for those now untrained; that a system of pensions for teachers should be instituted so as to facilitate the removal of those no longer equal to their onerous duties, the power of the inspectors to insist on the removal of teachers being meanwhile increased; that the essential subjects of instruction of all schools should be brought more into conformity with the practical requirements of the people; and lastly, but as of the greatest importance, that a high standard of moral training should be insisted upon by the State as a necessary condition of an efficient school, a training which we have asserted can only be based upon responsibility to Almighty God. Having taken these securities for the efficiency of all schools, we do not think that there is any cause whatever to fear that the increase which we have above recommended of what is technically known as the fixed grant would tend to diminish the zeal of the managers and teachers, or to lower the standard of instruction of the children. On the contrary, we are confident that, by thus largely diminishing the uncertainty and anxiety heretofore caused by the dependence of the school upon the results of individual examination, and by weakening the inducements to pursue the delusive and irrational system of "cram", fuller scope will be allowed to the educational influence of the teachers, and a higher, more enduring, and more healthy tone will be given to the instruction. We must further put on record the conclusion to which we have come, after careful consideration of the information at our disposal, that the present large annual outlay, as it is now distributed, does not secure for the Nation commensurate results. We have therefore felt it our duty to make such recommendations as will, we hope, give to the country the inestimable advantage of thoroughly efficient and suitable primary schools in return for its present large outlay. If, notwithstanding the retrenchments we have proposed, some increase of expense should be thrown upon the public funds, we are convinced that the charge will not


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be grudged when the people are satisfied that the education provided does, by its thoroughness and depth, better equip the scholars for the duties and responsibilities of their after life. We desire here to state that our recommendations should be taken as a whole, and not as single suggestions to be detached from each other, and to be adopted separately.

Our recommendations as to grants in this chapter are made on the supposition of the continuance of the present system of administering the Parliamentary grant, and may be modified by proposals to assist all schools from the county rates. Whatever be the form which the Parliamentary grant, may assume, we are of opinion that managers may reasonably ask not to be placed, in respect of it, at the mercy of the Ministry of the day. Managers, whether of voluntary or board schools, undertake onerous and laborious duties, in addition to which managers of voluntary schools incur not infrequently serious personal pecuniary responsibility. It, therefore, appears to us to be proper that the share of the cost of education, which is provided out of Imperial taxation, should cease to be dependent upon a Minute of the Privy Council, a survival of the earlier and more tentative phases of the education question, and should be protected, at least to a substantial extent, by the terms upon which the grant is awarded being embodied in an Act of Parliament. We would further recommend that when any changes have to be made in the Code it should henceforth lie before Parliament for at least two months, in print, before it comes into force.

In completing our review we are compelled to declare our conviction that the time is come when, for the best interests of education, some more comprehensive system of administration shall be found, with a view, first, to remove, as far as possible, the grave and inequitable inequalities between the two systems of voluntary and board schools as now existing; and secondly, to eliminate, as far as possible, for the future, the friction and collision which has so often and so injuriously arisen between them. We do not venture now to draw the precise outline of such an administration in the form of a recommendation, because we feel that, in the present uncertainty as to what may be the form which county government may take, it would be premature to do so.

CHAPTER III

INCOME AND EXPENDITURE OF SCHOOLS

The financial side of the question of education, has, in the course of our inquiry, engaged a large share of our attention. The gross increase in the expenditure on public elementary schools between the year 1860 and 1886 is largely due to the additional number of scholars brought under efficient education, for whereas in the former period the proportion of the population under instruction in aided schools was only 5 per cent, it had increased in 1886 to between 16 and 17 per cent. But there has meanwhile also been a steady growth in the costliness of elementary education. In the year 1876, the average annual cost per scholar in average attendance, taking all descriptions of elementary schools together, was £1 14s 8d.† In 1886 the sum was £1 19s 5d,‡ a rise of 4s 9d a head, or of over 13 per cent, in ten years.

Between the years 1860 and 1886, the cost of school maintenance per head rose in Church of England schools from 19s 6¼d to 36s 5½d; in British, Wesleyan, and undenominational schools from 18s 3¾d to 38s, and in Roman Catholic schools from 13s 7½d to 33s. It is to be borne in mind, however, as has been already stated, that the cost per head before 1862 does not include the grants to members of the school staff, which were afterwards paid direct to the managers. The increase on one item of school expenditure, the amount paid in salaries, accounts for another part of this great difference in the cost of education at the two periods referred to, for the average stipends of schoolmasters have gone up from £94 to over £120, or to £132 in the case of principal and to £90 in the case of assistant teachers, whilst in the case of the mistresses there has been an average increase from £61 to £73, or to £80 in the case of principal teachers and to £63 in the case of assistant teachers.

Lord Lingen makes the following statement in regard to the increased costliness of education. After allowing that the educational requirements of the present time cause

†Report of Committee of Council, 1876-7, page 380.

‡Report of Committee of Council, 1886-7, page 255.


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the cost per scholar to be very considerably increased, he goes on to say: "My own opinion is, be it worth what it may, that the cost per scholar is larger than it need be at this time." He accounts for the increase of the cost in several ways. One is that, in his opinion, "the salaries of the teachers in many of the large towns are larger than they need be"; and another is that, since school boards having unlimited funds to deal with, "the golden rule of 'making things do', is very much overlooked in the board schools". He thinks, too, that the increase of the parliamentary grant has led to extravagance. Two other causes of the increased cost of education he specifies: the first is "that there has been a great impulse of public opinion in favour of education, and some impression that the more you spend upon it the more efficient it is; the other is that it is largely due to the rivalry between the board and voluntary schools." We express no opinion upon this evidence; having already fully dealt with the question of salaries in our previous chapter upon teachers and staff.

The fund for elementary education is derived from three sources, the parliamentary grant, local resources in the form either of rates, subscriptions, or endowments, and school fees. The portion of the whole cost of school maintenance borne by the State in 1860 is stated by the Department to have been 10s 6d per head in all classes of schools, to meet a local outlay per head, in Church of England schools of 19s 6¼d, in Roman Catholic schools of 13s 7½d, and in all other schools of 18s 3¾d; but, as we have stated above, this does not include the grant paid direct to teachers by the Education Department. In the year 1886, out of a total income of £6,827,189 contributed for the maintenance of all elementary schools, the amount set down under the head of Government grant is £2,866,700, or about 42 per cent.¶ It is to be remarked that not only has the gross amount of the education grant grown enormously since 1860, and more especially since the passing of the Education Acts of 1870 and 1876, but the amount of grant per head paid to the managers has also very largely increased, namely, from 10s 6d in 1860 to 13s 3¼d in 1876, and to 17s 2½d in 1886. The rapidity of this growth is, in Lord Lingen's view, to be regarded as the natural consequence of the educational legislation of 1876, when the obligation to provide half the income from local sources was removed, provided the grant did not exceed 17s 6d per head; and he advocated the view that the amount to be provided for the future from the central government ought to be no more than a third of the whole cost. In order to bring about this reduction, he would sweep away the present complicated system, for he considered that it exposes the State to "demands on a variety of points, on some of which, from time to time, demands for more money are made with success", and that it "has a tendency to increase the aid that is to be obtained from the State, as being the subscriber on whom, through a great variety of accesses, the greatest pressure can be exercised." In its stead he would bring in a system providing that the State should give a fixed subsidy, bearing a certain fair proportion to the whole cost of education, that that subsidy should be paid to and distributed by local bodies, hereafter to be created, with considerable areas of administration, and having ample powers to raise other money by local rates, and that these local bodies should be empowered to propose equitable and liberal terms to the denominational schools, so as to induce them to co-operate in the new scheme. Mr Cumin suggests that the subsidy proposed in Lord Lingen's scheme, to be paid out of the Parliamentary grant to the central local authority, should vary according to the reports given by the Chief Inspector upon sample schools visited by him in the district under that local authority; with the result that instead of the individual schools suffering for any inefficiency, the whole district would be fined on their account. We foresee great difficulties in the practical working out of this scheme.

The portion of the cost of education which is borne by the rates differs in amount very widely in different localities, and it must be remembered that the amount so raised for school maintenance very inadequately represents the whole of the charge which education now places upon the ratepayers. From the last Report of the Committee of Council (page xl) it appears that whilst £1,276,917 was raised from rates in England and Wales in the year 1886 for school maintenance, the other charges upon the education rate brought up the sum total to £2,526,495, the average rate in the £

¶Report of Committee of Council, 1886-7, page 252.


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having grown from 6.3 pence in 1883-4 to 7 pence in 1885-6 in England, exclusive of Wales. In this sum is included the interest and repayment of loans raised for building board schools, as well as the cost of administration of school boards. We have it, further, in evidence that this amount would be very largely increased were it not for the fact that voluntary schools supply so great a number of children with elementary education outside the walls of the board schools. In Liverpool, Tynemouth, and London it is said that the cost to the rate would be doubled, and in Sheffield still further increased if the voluntary schools were extinguished. We gladly record the debt of gratitude due to the promoters of voluntary schools, who, at much personal sacrifice, have established and still maintain a system, which provided in 1886 for the education of 2,882,339 scholars, leaving but 1,671,412 to be educated at the cost of the ratepayers out of a total for the whole country of 4,553,751. Assuming that the cost of maintaining elementary schools does not rise beyond the present scale of school board expenditure, the transfer to the rates of the education of the children now provided for by voluntary effort would involve a further charge of more than £2,000,000 a year for the maintenance of these schools, in addition to an immediate capital outlay of a very large sum for building schools, in place of those which were not transferred to school boards. In the year 1876 it was stated in the House of Commons by the Vice-President of the Committee of Council on Education, that out of £15,250,000 spent on school buildings since Government aid had first been given to elementary education, £13,500,000 had been supplied by voluntary donors. As a rule, the value of the sites for the schools was not included in this calculation of capital expenditure. it must also be remembered that many schools have been built entirely at the cost of voluntary subscribers in the 12 years since 1876. It may be stated that the loans at present outstanding for the cost of the erection of board schools amount to £16,727,691.

Between 1870 and 1884, Mr. Cumin says the amount annually raised in voluntary subscriptions for voluntary inspected schools rose from £418,839 to £732,524, which is an increase of 74 per cent. But this source of income has been subject to fluctuation, as we have shown in an earlier part of our Report. The additional sums compulsorily exacted as school rates from supporters of voluntary schools, many of whom conscientiously disapprove of board schools for reasons which we have already described, cannot be inconsiderable, although the exact amount is necessarily a matter of conjecture. Many witnesses advert to the heavy pressure on those who not only support voluntary schools, but are called on to contribute to the rates by which board schools are maintained in the same district. Agricultural and commercial depression has fallen with severity upon those classes of the community to whom is chiefly due the support of voluntary schools, and it is, therefore, remarkable that their zeal for voluntary education, if tested by pecuniary results, should under adverse conditions receive such liberal expression. At the same time it is to be noted that the income derived from endowments has steadily increased; part of this addition arising from the appropriation to educational purposes of local charities previously applied to other purposes, and part arising from benefactions given for the permanent maintenance of schools. The root of the difficulty is put in very few words by one voluntary school manager: "Our friends will not pay school board rates and also provide voluntary contributions." This state of things, in the opinion of a large number of witnesses, constitutes a great hardship for the supporters of voluntary schools, some of whom are beginning to complain very bitterly. "We are now compelled", they say, "to pay large school-board rates, and it is too bad that we should be called upon to tax ourselves again for the support of one particular school, and they suggest that they ought in some way or other to be considered and relieved, more especially as the voluntary schools are to so great an extent saving the pockets of the ratepayers." But there are many who think that if a system was established whereby voluntary schools should be helped out of the rates, the ratepayers might claim to have control, not only over the appointment of the teachers and the secular instruction given in the school, but also over the religious instruction; and they doubt the practicability of entering upon such a course without endangering the independence


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of their schools. There are others, on the contrary, who think that voluntary schools should share in the rates.f In making this claim, they state their willingness to have their accounts publicly audited, and they would allow the local inspector and the guardians to visit their schools; but they would in no way suffer the ratepayers to interfere with the appointment of the teachers or with the religious teaching, nor would they agree that the ratepayers should exercise general control over the schools. Some witnesses contended that subscriptions paid to a voluntary school should, to that extent, be accepted in lieu of a payment toward the school rate; in support of this view we had presented to us a petition numerously and influentially signed. There are said to be 250,000 signatures attached to the petition. On the other hand, an opinion was expressed by several witnesses that such an arrangement would probably lead to endless confusion.

Lord Lord Lingen has put his view of the case of the voluntary school managers in very clear terms: "The voluntary schools do not share in the rate. The board schools are supported by the rate. In every other respect (grants from the State, and fees and endowments if there are any) the two classes of school stand on the same footing. But you have this broad difference between them, that the one has got a legally enforced sum to draw upon to any extent in the shape of the rates, the other has got a voluntary, and, therefore, quite uncertain fund as the correlative source of income. That, of course, makes the broadest possible distinction between the maintenance of the two sets of schools"; and "it is much more difficult for voluntary schools to keep themselves in existence than it is for board schools." Lord Lingen goes on to say: "Supposing you had the whole country mapped out under educational authorities, I should then like the State to deal only with those local authorities and to pay them a certain proportion which, I think, might be calculated on the population. I then would take away the bar which the 14th section" (the Cowper-Temple clause of the Act of 1870) "now imposes upon aiding those schools which adopt precise religious instruction. That bar I would take away. Inasmuch as the local bodies would have to tax themselves for the work done by the voluntary schools if they failed, my impression is, that if left to themselves they would come to terms with the voluntary schools. I have not thought out all the conditions that might have to be imposed in working that scheme out, but I think that the local bodies would much more easily solve such questions than the State would." He also stated that, in his view, the independence of the voluntary schools in the selection of their teachers, and in respect to the religious and moral discipline "would be absolutely uninterfered with". Under this plan the local authority, he says, "would have to work the detailed examination of the schools; and the central authority would have to work the general inspection of the schools."

The difficulties, political and otherwise, which would attend upon any attempt to repeal the Cowper-Temple clause, appear to us so great, as to prevent our recommending that Lord Lingen's plan, whether in other respects advisable or not, should be adopted, if the repeal of that clause were a condition of the scheme being accepted by Parliament. We doubt, however, whether it would be advisable to adopt Lord Lingen's proposals as a whole, for this reason, among others, that we should desire to see a greater degree of control in educational matters than he seems to think necessary retained in the hands of the Education Department. But we do not understand him to advocate, as has been supposed, the general abolition of the Cowper-Temple clause. That clause would not necessarily affect voluntary schools receiving annual aid from the rates, any more than it does at present, when they receive such aid from the guardians in the shape of fees for poor children. We do not see, therefore, why this principle should not be extended further, and rate aid, in respect of their secular efficiency, given to voluntary schools (as it is now given to industrial and reformatory schools) without the imposition of a clause which, under the Act of 1870, affects those schools only which are locally provided and supported entirely out of the rates. The cost of the maintenance of voluntary schools has been largely increased by the rivalry of rate-supported schools. If the power of the purse, upon which school boards have to draw has involved the managers of voluntary schools in a large, and it may be uncalled for, expenditure, there is good reason why that purse should be made to


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contribute to the thus increased cost of the voluntary system. The voluntary system is not merely a part, but the foundation of the whole of our national education. It was to be supplemented, not supplanted, by the rate system. The two systems, as the constituent and co-ordinate parts of the complete machinery of national elementary education, appear to have a common claim for support, not merely on the taxes of the country, but upon the general resources of the localities in which they carry on, side by side, identical work with equal efficiency; and that claim is all the stronger because local resources are saved from many heavy burdens by the supporters of voluntary schools. The time, indeed, seems to have come for a new departure. The country is now provided with a national system, in the sense in which Mr. Forster spoke of his Bill, as "the first attempt in providing national education", because it would "provide for the education of every child of the nation". The supply of schools is complete; a full staff of teachers has been provided, and 4½ millions of children are on the registers of inspected schools. The great majority of these schools, containing 64 per cent of the scholars on the rolls, have been erected, and are supported, by voluntary effort; the promoters of which are nevertheless rated for the maintenance of the school board system in school board districts. We think that if, in the impending reorganization of the local government of the country, education were recognised as one of the most important branches of that local government, and arrangements were made for gradually connecting it, more or less, with the civil administration of each locality, much of the unhealthy competition between the two school systems would disappear, and the expenditure caused by their rivalry would be reduced. Such an arrangement would also tend to decentralize the present system in a way of natural local development, relieving the Education Department of innumerable administrative details, and largely reducing the cost of its staff, while retaining for the Education Department powers of general control, which have been of the greatest value to education in the past. With this view, we desire to call attention to the recommendation made in 1861 by the Duke of Newcastle's Commission,* that grants should be made from the county rates to elementary schools, for the proficiency of the scholars in reading, writing, and arithmetic, to which might be added such subjects as singing and needlework. We think it reasonable and just that the supporters of voluntary schools, should retain the management of these schools on the condition of bearing some substantial share of the burden of the cost in subscriptions. But it does not seem either just or expedient to allow the voluntary system to be gradually destroyed by the competition of board schools possessing unlimited resources at their command. We therefore recommend that the local educational authority be empowered to supplement from local rates the voluntary subscriptions given to the support of every public State-aided elementary school in their district, to an amount equal to these subscriptions, provided it does not exceed the amount of ten shillings for each child in average attendance. Where a school attendance committee is the authority, the rate should be chargeable to the separate school district affected.

The school boards might in time, if not at once, be merged in the local authorities charged with the general civil administration. Every voluntary school might in that case receive some return from the rates to which its supporters contributed; while every ratepayer would be interested in the welfare of the schools of this class, because he would know that the rates would be increased by the burden of supplying the place, out of the rates, of such of these schools as might cease to form part of the efficient supply of the district. We offer these suggestions in view of the probable increase in the cost of school maintenance, which may result from the adoption of some of the proposals made in our Report; in the belief that the vitality and efficiency of the voluntary system, and its hold upon public favour, have been proved by the educational history of the last 18 years; with a knowledge of its harmonious working alongside of the board system in towns such as Liverpool and in other large centres; and in the expectation that the claims of its supporters to take part in filling up deficiencies in the supply of school accommodation throughout the country will, henceforth, be fully recognised and secured.

Managers of voluntary schools make a further complaint that their school buildings are rated to the poor, and that they have, among other things, to pay rates upon them towards the maintenance of board schools.! It is made a special ground of complaint that whilst, in the case of board schools which are rated, the money comes out of the pockets of the whole body of ratepayers, including, therefore, the managers and sub-

*Report of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, page 545.


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scribers to voluntary schools, in the case of voluntary schools it has to be provided exclusively by the voluntary contributors, and, as the business carried on in the buildings is carried on for no profit, it is contended that to assess them to the rates is inequitable and unfair, since it is charging a rate upon buildings that could never be let for any purpose. On the other hand it is laid down in repeated legal decisions that under the existing statutes, all property, with one or two exceptions, such as places of worship, is rateable; and in estimating the rateable value of schools, account would have to be taken, not only of whether they would be profitably conducted under their existing educational trusts by any person renting the premises, but also whether their trust deeds permitted those premises to be sold and occupied by a tenant not subject to the condition of using the buildings for an elementary school. The want of a uniform basis of assessment is specially complained of, some schools being assessed upon the school accommodation, some upon the average attendance, and some, again, at so much per cent on the capitalised value of the site and of the building. The smallness of the rateable value of these buildings, as compared with the gross rateable value of the towns in which they exist (in Newcastle only £4,000 out of £756,000), is commented upon by one witness, who says that whilst it is excessively hard for an individual school to pay a rate, the loss to the whole rate through exemption of the individual school would be inappreciable. Lord Lingen is against all exceptions, but the general feeling of a large proportion of the witnesses is in favour of public elementary schools ceasing to be assessed to the rates. In the London School Board district the sum charged for rates on the board school buildings is estimated at 3s 11d a child; the gross annual charge running up to £67,833. Mr. Diggle recognises the fact that in the case of board schools rated to the poor, a commission is paid first to collect the rates which come into the school fund, and then a further commission when the rates on the buildings are paid by the school authorities; and he condemns the rating of school buildings on the ground that "the incidence of it is unjust and inequitable". We therefore recommend that public elementary schools for which no rent is paid or received should be exempted from local rates.

The income derived from school fees is an item which has grown even faster than the average attendance, having increased between 1870 and 1886 from £502,023 to £1,812,917, or from 8s 4¼d to 10s 5½d per head. Its amount per head varies very much in different kinds of schools; averaging 11s 2¼d a head in 1886 in all voluntary schools, to which amount it has risen from 8s 4½d per head received in 1870. In 1886 school fees amounted to 9s 1¼d in all board schools, but they ranged generally from 16s 1¾d a head in Wesleyan schools to 5s 11¾d a head in the board schools at Birmingham.††

Two methods are in use for relieving indigent parents from the burden of paying their school fees. Where a child of such parents is attending a board school, the school board has the power to remit the school fees; but where it is attending a voluntary school, assistance towards paying the school fees can be obtained by law only through the guardians. But many managers of voluntary schools, especially Roman Catholic, largely remit fees to children in attendance; 12.67 per cent attend free in Roman Catholic schools, and 2.66 per cent in schools of the Church of England. The number of children whose school fees are remitted by school boards varies in different localities. It amounts to 6 per cent in Huddersfield (12,600 out of 303,715), to about 4 per cent in the London school board district, and to 33 per cent in Birmingham.

In the case of 127,458 children attending voluntary schools, the school fees are paid by the guardians, at a cost to the rates of £40,684 5s 5d; the guardians also paid £9,042 19s 5d in respect of the attendance of 33,070 children at board schools; these include certain fees paid on behalf of families receiving out-door relief. A great many witnesses complain that it is difficult to get fees paid by the guardians; parents refuse to apply for them on account of the fact that the guardians in many cases compel the applicants to appear before their board. "They feel", says one witness, "the humiliation, not only of seeking relief at all, but of having to ask in formâ pauperis; they have to go to the same office, and to the same officer, as if they were applying for out-door relief, and the same time of attendance is generally appointed

††Report of Committee of Council, 1886-7, page x.


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for them. They object to the exposure of their private family circumstances, and to the offensive examination subsequently by the relieving officer, who goes through the rooms of their homes, and makes inquiries at the workshops and works, and so on; and they also object to the harshness and oppressiveness of the guardians, who treat every applicant more or less as an impostor, or as being lazy or inebriate." Similar objections are repeated ever and over again. and various suggestions are made in order to mitigate what is looked upon by many as a considerable grievance. One suggestion is, that the school attendance committee of the union should undertake the duty of providing for the payment of these fees; this committee holding in many respects the same position towards education in the parishes of the union, as the school board does in the district over which it has authority. Another suggestion is, that the guardians and the school board should occupy the same office, which should not be associated with the relief of the poor, to which all parents might come, whether they desire to have fees remitted at a board school or paid for them by the guardians at a voluntary school, a suggestion which we observe is already carried into practice at Sheffield and Manchester. A third suggestion is to the effect that a joint committee composed of a certain number of poor law guardians and of members of the school board should be entrusted with this duty. But by far the larger number of witnesses would prefer that one authority should undertake both tasks, paying fees to voluntary schools, and remitting them for the board schools; and the school board, where it exists, has been proposed by some few witnesses as the best authority to carry out this work. No substitute for the board of guardians has been as yet suggested for school districts in which there is no school board.

Even should no alteration be made in the law, we think it would be highly desirable that boards of guardians generally should make arrangements for entertaining applications for the payment of school fees, quite apart from those for claiming out-door relief, and in any case that they should institute inquiries by their officers into the circumstances of applicants for school fees, instead of requiring them to attend at the workhouse or at relief stations. We are of opinion that in all cases the guardians should pay fees direct to the school managers, and not include them in any lump sum given for relief. We also think that they should be required to pay fees for children under five years of age where the parents are indigent, or for children who have passed the limit of obligatory school attendance, should the parents of these latter children be willing to send them to school. If the district councils proposed in the Local Government Bill now before Parliament should be established, we recommend that the payment of fees for indigent children should be at once confided to them, and that these school fees should be charged upon the rates. Supposing this duty to be laid upon the district councils, they should have the same power now possessed by school attendance committees under the Act of 1876, of appointing local committees in each parish, and the local authority to which was confided the power to pay fees for poor parents in rural districts should be required to make provision for the local hearing of applications for the payment of school fees in the various villages.

In view of the alleged fact that tables of fees in certain localities are somewhat capriciously arranged, many witnesses believed that it would be an advantage that in all voluntary schools the Education Department should be empowered definitely to fix the fee to be charged. Mr. Fitch's answer to such a proposal is, "I do not see the advantage of it. I think that the managers are the best judges of the capability of parents in a neighbourhood, and also of their own financial position. I do not see the need for the exercise of any authority by the Department in that matter." And Mr. Cumin, taking the same view, says, "The managers, it appears to me, are the best judges of the sort of education and of the cost of the education that they provide, and, therefore, I should leave them as free as they are now." We cannot recommend that any censorship of fees charged in voluntary schools should be entrusted to the Education Department. We point out, however, that an effectual remedy against excessive fees would always be in the hands of the inspector of the district, who can pronounce a school charging excessive fees to be unsuitable to the


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population, and accordingly report it to the Department as, in his opinion, unsuitable for the district.

One other subject connected with the finances of elementary education has come under our consideration, namely, the question of free education. We have received evidence for and against the abolition of school fees, of which we proceed now to give a summary. Those who advocated the total abolition of fees based their case upon several separate considerations. They said that the fee system is a hindrance to education, that it causes great injustice to children by reason of their being so frequently sent home for their pence, and that the parents are continually urging poverty as an excuse for keeping their children at home. It was further alleged that if school fees were abolished, a great cause of irregularity of school attendance would be removed. The collection of the fees, too, was said to be a waste of time to the teachers, who might be more profitably employed in the work of teaching. The principle of the payment of fees in London, in the opinion of Mr. Buxton, the late Chairman of the School Board, had broken down; and he alleged that no machinery can properly be devised for equitably adjusting the fees over so vast an area. Mr. H. E. Williams thought that gratuitous education would get rid of many of the difficulties and discriminations between the most wretched persons and others. Mr. T. B. Powell, a school board visitor and representative of the Trades Council, thought it logical and fair that education, being compulsory, should be free. It was alleged by another witness that fees in London are very difficult to recover, and that the whole system worries the teachers. Dr. Crosskey advocates free education on the following grounds. He says: "I think it is a corollary of the system of compulsion; I think it would make education far more widely diffused; that it would stop a great many social jealousies and troubles; that it would relieve many extremely hard and cruel cases; in fact in every direction I am prepared to defend it." He is prepared further to advocate that if a national free system were established, no public aid should be given to any school where fees continue to be charged. One working man represented that fees bear very heavily upon a poor man with several children and uncertain employment, who, having got his children on the school register, is compelled to send them to school regularly, while his richer neighbour, who could afford to pay a fee of 1s a week, may or may not send his children to school at all. Another, on the contrary, confessed that the tax is not very great or very heavy, although he thought that free education would be an improvement, and further he stated that any parent that chooses to apply, who is sufficiently poor, can get remission of fees easily enough. Mr. Buxton admits that there has not yet been any very decided demand for free education in England, and that the average attendance in America, where all schools are free, is nothing like so good as in England. Here, he added. "I think that that is because of the peculiar circumstances of America; they have no compulsion, they have a population in which there is a continually shifting mass of emigrants, and over a large part of the country an extremely thin population. I think that is quite enough to account for it." Mr. R. B. Williams, Superintendent of Visitors in the division of East Lambeth, stated that he had taken out facts, which showed that the attendance of children whose fees were remitted was 82 ½per cent, while the general attendance was 78 per cent. Dr. Crosskey, too, on being asked what would be the feeling of parents paying high fees, if school managers now charging them were compelled, as a condition of obtaining the grant, to open their schools to all comers, in whatever condition of life, or from however bad a home, gave this answer, "I reply, that no doubt at the present moment, in consequence of our extreme neglect of education in the past, we have large classes of roughs, large classes of uneducated people, and large districts in which there are very sordid surroundings; and there are some temporary difficulties; but I believe that as the people are educated it will be both possible and desirable to fill a town with sufficient schools for the whole population, and then, by having enough of them, provision will be made for parents of every class of society. We have obstacles to remove, without doubt, which are the result of neglect, and there are exceptional means necessary now."

On the other side, it is said that parents generally do not complain of being oppressed by the payment of fees, and that, in cases where the parent is out of work, children


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are allowed to attend school without the fee. The abolition of fees, it is said, is neither generally demanded by the parents, nor required on account of any educational exigency. Besides, it is added, the total effect of school fees is favourable to regularity, for parents who have paid for a week's schooling like to have full measure for their money. Experience, too, it is said by some witnesses, shows that it is the free scholar who is the most irregular in his attendance, but another witness accounted for this by the statement that these children came from the poorest homes. Mr. Diggle, in a table which we have elsewhere printed|| has shown that in London the lowest percentage of attendance is to be found where the fee is a penny, and that practically, with both boys and girls, the higher the fee the better is the attendance. Again, it is maintained that the schools in which the highest fees are charged are the most popular, and an instance is quoted from Liverpool of a school which had formerly been a free school being turned into a penny school with the result of increasing the regularity of the attendance of the children who had previously belonged to the school, and also of increasing the number of scholars, though the witness stated that these children came from the poorest people. In reply to the statement made by the friends of free education, that the collecting of the fees wastes a good deal of the time of the head teacher, a member of the Manchester School Board gives the results of an experiment tried in 10 school departments, with an aggregate attendance of 1,523 children, who paid fees on the Monday morning. in nine of those departments the average time occupied was from eight to nine minutes; in the tenth, where the head teacher did all the work, the classes meanwhile going on with their lessons, the time taken was forty-five minutes It is urged, further, that parents take a pride in paying for their children's education, and that, with the abolition of fees, the poorer ratepayers who have no children to educate would have a just ground of complaint, in having to pay as much in the shape of rates as those parents whose children attend the schools. Mr. Fitch expresses his opinion on this point as follows: "I have always felt", he says, "that the payment of fees by the parents was a most valuable thing, partly because it provides a very large fund ... and partly because it is the one contribution towards public education which is most cheerfully and most appropriately paid, and by those persons who have the strongest interest in having the work done." "The influence of the parents", "the right of choice of schools which they exercise now, and the very legitimate weight which their wishes have with teachers, it appears to me, would be sacrificed if the payment of fees was given up, and I should be sorry on many grounds to see that done." He goes on to say, "while on the other hand it would be most mischievous to impose an universal free system in a great number of districts where people pay fees most cheerfully now, I do not see in principle any reason why the same thing should not happen here as happens in Germany and in many other countries, viz.: that a given municipality should be at liberty to free its own schools, and to make its own arrangements with the managers of voluntary schools. In this way the free system might be tried in any locality where .the people believed in it, and were prepared out of their own rates to pay for it." He says, in conclusion, "I should be very sorry to see schools freed by larger grants from the public Treasury. That would practically throw too much of the influence over schools on to the Department." It is a striking circumstance, not to be overlooked in the consideration of this question, that in the purely rural districts such a thing as a free elementary school is almost unknown, and as bearing upon the effect of giving gratuitous education in such districts, we think it well to quote the testimony of two able witnesses who tried the experiment in rural evening schools. Miss Castle, head mistress of Duncton National School, near Petworth, stated that when she gave up fees in her evening school it dwindled and fell to nothing, and the Rev. W. D. Parish, Vicar of Selmeston, gave evidence to the same effect.

Mr. Cumin puts the case of free education as follows; he says, "Free education means that by Act of Parliament, if a board or a volunteer sets up a school and charges a fee, that is illegal. Therefore, you would, by establishing free education, take away the option of anybody to set up a school and charge a fee. I think that


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that would be a tyranny which would not be endured by the people who conduct schools, and certainly, I should say that it would never pass the House of Commons. In fact, it seems to me impossible. My notion is, that there are many cases where there ought to be free schools, but that is a purely local question; and what I would suggest as a solution of the difficulty, is to make free schools a question of local option. If a board choose to set up free schools, they may do so, and if a board choose to have paying schools, they should be allowed to do so."

We observe that Mr. Buxton proposes to throw the cost of the abolition of fees upon the Consolidated Fund, fearing a reaction against education if too much of the burden of the cost is thrown upon localities; and his plan is to take the average sum per head which school fees now annually amount to, nearly 11s 2d, and to make to every elementary school, rich as well as poor, an extra grant from the Education Department of that amount per head. It is obvious to remark that the incidence of this compensation would be most unequal; and Mr. Buxton admits that those school boards whose average fees are now higher than the sum just named, viz., 11s 2d, would be prejudiced financially, and have in consequence to raise a greater sum from the rates. In some cases where the fees at present are low, the result might be to throw nearly the whole burden of the cost upon the Consolidated Fund. From the Report of the Committee of Council for 1886-7, page 248, it appears that the amount paid in school pence during the previous year in board and voluntary schools was as follows: by scholars, £1,763,189; by guardians, £49,727. It may be added that many persons entertain the opinion that the assumption by the State of duties primarily belonging to its individual members not only violates sound principles of political economy, but also tends to sap that independence of character which differentiates English methods of conducting the affairs of life from the action of other countries, whose citizens are content to leave to a superior and central authority the initiation and conduct, as well as the control, of all undertakings for the public weal.

If, as we think, provision of the due necessaries of education, as well as of the necessaries of life, is part of the responsibility incumbent on parents, it may well be believed that public contributions and private benevolence are already doing all that can be safely required of them in augmentation of the payments properly exacted from parents. On the whole, we are of opinion that the balance of advantage is greatly in favour of maintaining the present system, established by the Act of 1870, whereby the parents who can afford it contribute a substantial proportion of the cost of the education of their children in the form of school fees.





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PART VI

Local Educational Authorities

The whole area of England and Wales is at present divided between two classes of local educational authorities - the school board and the school attendance committee; the former created by the Act of 1870, the latter by that of 1876. In respect of the former of these authorities, the first question raised before us concerns the method of its election, which is defined by section 29 of the Act of 1870. The ratepayers elect a school board by the method known as cumulative voting, which, giving to each elector as many votes as there are members to be elected, permits him to distribute his votes among the candidates in whatever proportion he may please. The effect of such cumulative voting is to enable even small minorities of the electors to return a candidate of their own way of thinking, when they would have no chance of doing so by voting in the ordinary way. Lord Lingen was asked for his opinion on the working of the cumulative vote in school board elections, and whilst disclaiming any special experience, he expressed himself "in favour of the cumulative vote everywhere". When further asked whether, apart from official experience, he was satisfied with the practical working of the principle, he replied, "On the whole, and as things go, I am satisfied". On being still further pressed whether he did not recognise the disadvantages which some persons saw in the working of the cumulative vote, he gave it as his opinion that it secured "a more responsible body of managers and a more careful body of electors than simply the vote per head of the ratepayers." Mr. Cumin, who was at the Education Department at the time when the original Bill, which resulted in the Education Act of 1870, was drafted, and has ever since had official cognisance of the working of its provisions throughout the country, is substantially of the same opinion, notwithstanding the anomalous results which he admits sometimes issue from cumulative voting. He gave as his chief reason for wishing to retain the cumulative vote, that, with all its drawbacks, it secured the representation on the school board of the different denominations, without which he thought it doubtful whether school boards would be able to enforce all round the byelaws for compelling attendance, on the ground that it was not possible to secure the confidence of religious bodies and parents in any other way.

Several witnesses pointed out the anomalies which had arisen in the working of the cumulative vote within the limits of their own observation, specifying, amongst other things, the uncertainty of the result; the occasional elimination of valuable members of a school board; the defeat of popular candidates; the election of the representatives of some popular cry quite outside educational questions; and the occasional failure of a majority of votes to return to the board a proportionate number of representatives in harmony with their views. We have not, however, taken so much evidence on this part of the subject as we should otherwise have thought necessary, because the whole question was inquired into carefully by a Committee of the House of Commons in 1885. Before that Committee, Sir F. Sandford, Mr. Forster, and Mr. Cumin, all gave strong evidence that the working of the Act of 1870 had been greatly facilitated by the fair representation of different schools of opinion on school boards. Mr. Forster expressed his conviction that "the result has been a far better working of education, because if there had not been this proportional representation, those who had the charge of education up to that time would very likely not have been represented".

At the same time it cannot be denied that the cumulative vote has certain drawbacks. In consequence of the impossibility of the electors being able to judge of the probable success of the candidates, the tendency is to cumulate votes on one candidate instead of distributing them among several. For instance, in the first Marylebone election for the School Board of London, where there were seven seats, and where therefore, each voter had seven votes. Miss Garret received 48,000 votes, while the lowest successful candidate, Mr. Watson, came in with 8,400 only. In fact, a popular


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candidate tends to weaken his own side, and the desire, as far as possible, to diminish this tendency leads to a certain amount of wire-pulling. It is also to be observed that, if a party endeavours to return a number of members which is not an aliquot part of the number to be elected - for example, 4 out of 15 - the division of the votes becomes a matter of much difficulty. In the system known as the single transferable vote, under which the elector places the numbers 1, 2, 3, against the several candidates, in the order of his preference, the surplus votes of any candidate are passed over to another in the manner thus indicated by the elector. This obviates the waste of voting power, diminishes the opportunity for wire pulling, and is regarded as simpler than the present system.

On the whole, we are in favour of retaining some form of proportional representation in our school board elections, and we should be glad to see the adoption of the single transferable vote, which possesses the advantages of the cumulative vote, without the inconvenience which sometimes arises in the operation of the latter. We are also of opinion that it would be advisable to divide the larger towns into constituencies, each returning not more than five members of the school board.

The expense attending candidature for a seat on the school board in large constituencies was dwelt upon by several witnesses as a serious inconvenience to the candidates, and as an injury to the cause of education. In London, where this evil culminates, the late Chairman of the School Board tells us that several elections have cost him £700 each, and he has heard of over £1,000 being spent by a single candidate on a school board election. He would be glad to see a limit imposed by law to the expense, similar to that which exists in the case of parliamentary elections, and he thinks that Parliament is bound to find some cheaper mode of electing a school board. These, no doubt, are extreme cases, but we have been informed that it costs nearly £300 to contest a seat on the school board at Hull, and at Leeds about £60. The recommendation we have already made that the constituencies be subdivided will, if adopted, have the effect of much diminishing the cost of elections. One natural result of the costliness of a contest is that it tends to limit the choice of candidates. Some witnesses complain that the worry of electioneering is affecting the character of school boards. We learn with regret that school board elections sometimes run on other than on educational lines. One specific abuse has been brought to our notice, to which school boards themselves have it in their own power to put an end, viz., the interference of board school teachers in the election of a new board. Such a power every school board, in our opinion, ought to exercise when it becomes necessary, and we think that the practice alluded to should be strictly forbidden.

The length of time for which a school board ought to be elected has been another subject on which different opinions have been expressed in evidence before us. The elections are at present triennial, and the whole board goes out of office at one time. Complaints have been made to us of the want of continuity in policy thus liable to occur between one school board and that succeeding it; and it has been suggested by several witnesses that two-thirds only of the board should vacate their seats at each election, so as to leave a nucleus round which the new elements might form themselves. Closely connected with this question of the partial retirement of the board is that of the length of the period for which it is to be elected. Lord Lingen, in advocating the retirement of two-thirds of the members at each election, would make school board elections biennial. But the prevalent opinion among witnesses seemed to tend towards lengthening, rather than shortening, the period of office, so as to make elections less frequent. The late Chairman of the London School Board, however, would not desire that the board should be elected for a longer period than three years, and he thought that a general election was better on the whole than a partial one. Mr. Cumin apparently looks forward to the time when County Boards shall greatly diminish the number of local elections. Pending, however, any such legislative changes, we are not prepared to make specific recommendations on this point. In the event of school boards not being superseded by some other local authority, we think that a somewhat longer term of office, with partial renewal, would be an improvement.

At the time when we were taking evidence on this subject, the present Local Government Bill had not been brought forward. On the assumption that the ele-


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mentary education of the country remains outside the scope of that Bill, we proceed to consider what should be the local organization of our elementary education. A good deal of evidence has been offered to us for and against the universal establishment of school boards, but this proposal has been regarded by its opponents not so much in the light of its intrinsic merits, as in view of the bearing it has on a very different proposal, viz., universal board schools. It is worthy of remark that the scheme of County Boards, dealing with education, shadowed forth by Lord Lingen, and approved by Mr. Cumin, involves something of the nature of universal school boards, so far at least as that it would involve the levying of a universal school rate. It is true that Lord Lingen hopes that means might be devised for preventing the absorption by County Boards of voluntary schools. But according to Mr. Cumin's estimate of the operation of the scheme, voluntary schools would not survive five years. Were this anticipation to be realised, the result would be that universal school boards would soon lead to universal board schools. It is more than a matter of probability that much of the opposition to a general establishment of school boards is due, not so much to jealousy or dread of interference by representative ratepayers in the work of voluntary school management, as to disapproval of the restriction of distinctive religious teaching, imposed upon the rate-supported schools by section 14 of the Act of 1870.

Passing next to the other form of local educational authority - the school attendance committee - it must be borne in mind that its duties are by no means of the same wide and responsible kind as those of the school board. The former body was created almost solely for the purpose of enforcing attendance in those school districts in which there was no school board. They have nothing to do with the educational supply, except so far as they are bound to notify to the Department any deficiency of accommodation that may occur in their district; and even the duty of paying fees for indigent parents lies not with them, but with the board of guardians. We have already in the chapter on school attendance had occasion to refer to the manner in which the enforcement of school attendance has been carried out by school boards and school attendance committees. But any shortcomings in the results of the working of compulsion are so dependent on other causes, such, for example, as the attitude of the local magistrates towards compulsion, that it is difficult to draw any positive conclusion from the school attendance as to the efficient working of the local authority. Many representatives of school boards have been examined as to the working of their boards: but one or two witnesses only have given evidence before us as the result of their official experience of school attendance committees. Canon Willes, who has been the Chairman of the School Attendance Committee of the Lutterworth Union, in Leicestershire, deposes to the satisfactory manner in which its work has been carried on from its first appointment, and to the great success which has attended its efforts to secure regular attendance at school. Several witnesses, not being members of attendance committees, have been questioned as to the efficiency of the latter in their own school districts, and the evidence given has varied very much according to locality. It must not be forgotten that school attendance committees have the power of calling into being local committees in any school districts within their union, for the purpose of assisting them in securing school attendance. It has been previously mentioned that the existence of such local committees has not come prominently before us, and we conclude, therefore, that they have not been extensively formed; but evidence has here and there been given, in the course of our inquiry, indicating that such local committees exist in some places.

On the whole, we judge that the school attendance committees, which are chiefly established in rural districts, have administered the law of compulsion at least as well as rural school boards, and that many of them are improving in their work as time goes on. The tables of school attendance arranged in counties are favourable to the rural districts, in which school attendance committees abound. But, it must be added that, according to testimony before us, attendance is more easy to enforce in the country than in towns, the latter being mostly under school boards. There is one weakness to which we would call attention in connexion with local authorities, that they have no longer periodically to render any account of their work, either to the Education Department or the Local Government Board. We think that an annual return ought to be made to the Education Department by every local authority, giving the following statistics, viz., the number of attendance officers employed, of meetings


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held, of parents interviewed, of summonses taken out, and of convictions obtained, also the cost of legal proceedings and any other information relative to their duties which the Education Department may require. This will afford to the Department a better opportunity of calling to account either a school board or a school attendance committee for any obvious negligence or maladministration. The character of the information which we propose should be given is shown by the returns published in the Report of the Education Department for 1878-79, p. xxxvi.

It has been thought by several witnesses that the small rural school boards, which are notoriously weak as educational authorities, might with advantage be grouped together, so as to represent a larger area than at present; that this would lead to a more effective board being elected in consequence of the extended choice which would thus be given of members to form the board; and the Union has been suggested as the only legally recognised area at present offering itself for such a purpose. It is said that a more independent authority might thus be secured, and that the management of schools should be largely delegated to voluntary local committees. But in the present uncertainty as to the form which county government may hereafter take, it would be premature to make any definite recommendations as to the nature and the powers of the local educational authorities which it may be necessary to constitute. Since we entered upon the consideration of this part of our Report, a Bill for the reform of the local government of England and Wales has been laid before Parliament; our colleague, Sir Francis Sandford, has prepared a scheme by which he proposes to fit into the county machinery provided in that measure, the educational system of the country as we propose that it should be amended. Without expressing any opinion on Sir Francis Sandford's plan, we think it worthy of consideration, and insert it as an Appendix to this chapter of our Report.

MEMORANDUM AS TO MODE OF BRINGING EDUCATION WITHIN THE SCOPE OF THE LOCAL GOVERNMENT BILL

1. The Local Government Bill proposes to set up Councils for -

A. Each County, including -

Ridings of Yorkshire.
Divisions of Lincolnshire.
London.
10 large boroughs.
B. County Districts -
(a) Urban =
Boroughs
Urban Sanitary Districts.
(b) Rural = Rural Sanitary Districts.
2. It transfers to these Councils, certain powers, duties, and responsibilities, now exercised -
in the case of County Councils, by the Home Office, Board of Trade, Local Government Board, Quarter Sessions.
in the case of District Councils, by Local Authorities, under various Acts,
3. It enables -

Clauses 3. 34. A. - County Councils to establish, maintain, and contribute to reformatory and industrial schools.

Clause 8 (2). To take over, hereafter, under Orders in Council, statutory administrative powers of the Education Department, and of "public bodies" corporate or incorporate*

Clause 23. (2a) To make certain grants to "poor school boards" now administered by the Education Department.† (Act of 1870, sec. 97.)

*This, it is presumed, will include school boards. If so, they may be merged in County Councils. But the area of a county is, as a rule, too wide for the efficient administration of the duties of a school board by one central body acting for the whole county.

†A certificate of the Local Government Board is to be required in the case of these grants. But all the information on which they are awarded is in the hands of the Education Department.


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Clause 27(2). To delegate certain duties* to committees of their own body, or to petty sessions, or to the District Councils.

Clause 68. To make loans to school boards.

Clause 45. B. District Councils to take over, in urban districts, the powers, duties, &c. of improvement commissioners, and local boards, and in rural districts of sanitary authorities.

Clause 47. To administer the Public Libraries Acts.

Clause 71. To establish general district accounts, special district accounts.

Clause72 (i, iii) To borrow on the security of the rates, whether general or special.

4. I think that it would be advisable either in the Bill itself, or by subsequent legislation -

To abolish all school boards and attendance committees, and to transfer† their functions to -

I. The County Councils of

(a) London.
(b) The 10 large boroughs,
who should be empowered, in carrying out this part of their duties, to appoint committees, chosen to the number of one-third from outside their own body.‡

II. The District Councils§ which will be set up apparently for -

(a) Boroughs, and urban districts, with more than 10,000 inhabitants.
(b) County districts, of nearly equal size, in which the smaller boroughs will be merged.
5. These Councils would have the powers of school boards and school attendance committees, generally, and in particular in regard to:
1. Providing, maintaining, and managing rate schools.
2. Administering the compulsory byelaws, and appointing special attendance officers for the purpose.
3. Paying fees for poor (not pauper) children. Paupers to continue to be paid for by the guardians.
4. Borrowing for the purpose of providing schools. The approval of the Department|| as well as the consent of the Local Government Board, should be required in such cases.
District Councils should have the further duty of -
5. Charging the special district rate of any parish or parishes with the cost of providing and maintaining school accommodation for, or common to, such parish or parishes. The general district rate would, on the other hand, have to bear all the common charges of the district for compulsion or otherwise administering the Act. But the parishes which have provided, and continue to maintain, their own supply would not be rated for parishes failing to do so.

6. Appointing local committees for parishes or groups of parishes under the Act of 1876 (section 32).

*The only duties that can be so delegated are those which are transferred to the County Councils by the Bill itself. The clause, moreover, expressly bars the delegation of powers transferred to the County Councils from a Government Department. A County Council could not, therefore, as I read the Bill, delegate any of its educational functions, with a few exceptions, to a District Council, or even to a committee of its own body.

†This is in accordance with one of the leading principles of the Bill, viz., the concentration in a single body of the powers of numerous local authorities, elected under varying suffrages, for intersecting areas, and worked at considerable cost. The last triennial election of school boards, although in very many districts there were no contests, cost upwards of £50,000, and their charges for administration amount to nearly £300,000 a year. Several town-boards have no schools under their management, and the school attendance committees appointed by town councils are working very efficiently. It would lead to much administrative confusion, and to endless local disputes, if the dissolution of school boards were to be left optional, and not determined, once for all and universally, by the Bill.

‡These councils will probably be too large to deal with education save by a committee, and it would be well to have the assistance on that committee of women, and of experts who may be disinclined either to face the worry and cost of an election or to take part in the ordinary municipal duties of the council.

§It would be a great gain to get rid of the small rural school boards; and the new districts will probably be of such a size that school board powers could be discharged with convenience and efficiency by the councils of these districts. Some statutory provision, however, will be required, to enable the Local Government Board (1) to rectify the boundaries of school board districts which do not coincide with those of county districts; and (2) in concert with the Education Department, to apportion the liabilities of the merged boards.

||By the Bill (Clause 72. 1. i.) the consent of the Education Department is expressly barred. Yet the control of the supply of schools is a matter in which the Department, is most specially interested, though the Local Government Board should certainly be consulted before the rates of any locality are charged with further loans. The outstanding liabilities for school board loans amount to some £17,000.000.


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6. If this were done, there might be transferred, by Order in Council to the County Councils (of counties proper) the duties of the Education Department in respect of -

School Supply* which would include the power of uniting parishes into one school district, of combining parishes (e.g., for the supply and maintenance of a common school), of making one parish contributory to another (to meet the case of a few children living on the borders of two or three parishes); and of requiring District Councils to keep up the school supply of their respective districts.

7. The Education Department would continue to exercise their present general power of control; and would act as a Court of Appeal for District Councils objecting to the requirements of County Councils (under paragraph 6).

8. In addition to the administrative functions already specified† -

1. County Councils should act, by committee, as the educational authorities of their respective counties.
2. Her Majesty's inspectors of the districts within a county should be ex-officio members of the education committee of the county, and of a board of examiners to be appointed by the Council.
3. All public elementary schools, within the county, whether voluntary or rate supported, should be annually examined by this board.
4. Grants on the average attendance should be made from the county rate, for the three R.'s at the rate of 6s (or 7s 6d) i.e. 2s (or 2s 6d) for each, according as 75 per cent of the scholars passed fairly, or well.‡
5. Labour passes should be granted by this board.
9. It would tend still further to decentralise our present system, and to reduce the number and cost of officers, both on the outdoor and indoor staff of the Education Department, if the county examinations were extended to singing, needlework, and drawing. A payment of 2s 6d (in all) on the average attendance might be made by the County Council in consideration of these subjects being taught in a school, with a reduction in respect of any of them in which fair proficiency was not shown.

10. As the great rise in the expense of elementary education, since it was adjusted in 1870, an expense which will not be lessened by some of the recommendations in our Report, has been mainly caused by the large outlay of schools boards on rate-schools, it seems reasonable (1) that the rates should contribute to the cost of the voluntary schools, thus increased, and consequently (2) that the ratepayers should be represented on the management of these schools.

It may be hoped that without sacrificing a healthy educational rivalry between voluntary and rate schools, any excessive and injurious competition between them will be lessened by the abolition of the school authorities, elected ad hoc, whose interest naturally lies in the extension of the system which they administer.

11. The County Council should accordingly have the right -

(1) To examine the accounts of every public elementary school, a copy of which should be filed in the office of the Council.
(2) To appoint, after consulting the District Council within whose jurisdiction the school lies, one member of the managing body of each such school.
12. The financial effect of these proposals would be that a school might receive per child in average attendance -
1. 15s from local effort (fees and subscriptions or rates), according to the Act of 1870.
2. 10s from the County Council (paragraphs 8 (4) and 9).
3. 10s from the Department, as a fixed grant.
4. 10s also from the Department,§ in respect of the subjects not covered by the county grant (No. 2); including English, history, geography, and elementary
*The County Councils would thus be charged with the duty of the local organization of education, while its administration would be given to the District Councils, working within areas which they could easily manage.

†The first four of these proposals are based on the recommendations of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission in 1861 (Report, Vol. 1., page 544). H.M. Inspectors would give the committees the benefit of their educational and administrative experience, would help to secure a reasonable amount of uniformity, and would keep the county authorities in touch with the Central Department. The fifth proposal would follow on the examination of the three R's being entrusted to the County Council.

‡These grants, in the case of a voluntary school, would be made in respect of secular instruction only, which, but for the existence of that school, would at present have to be given to the same children in a board school at a greater cost to the rates. No rate money would be spent on the teaching of religion, which would continue to be provided by the voluntary subscribers.

§The central grant (20s) would thus be met by a larger amount (25s) from local sources. These two amounts make up the sum (45s) which in our report we recommended to be fixed as the annual cost per head of an elementary school.


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science, with gymnastics, cookery, field husbandry, or gardening, and such other practical instruction as might be given in the school.

13. It should further be provided by Act of Parliament, that -

1. Standards III and V should be the universal standards of partial and total exemption from school attendance.
2. Rate schools may be transferred to voluntary managers by the Councils of Town-Counties, and by District Councils with the consent of the County Councils.*
3. New voluntary schools, after being carried on for a year, with an average attendance of not less than (40) scholars in urban, and (30) in rural districts, should be recognised as entitled to claim annual grants.
14. If in any year the county grant to schools amounted to more than the produce of a [3d] rate, any excess over the sum raised by such a rate should be paid to the county by the Education Department from the Parliamentary Grant. The policy of the Bill is to do away with such grants in aid; but education is of Imperial necessity, and the principle of directly lightening the pressure on local rates, in extreme cases, is recognised by the Act of 1870, s. 79.

E. R. Sandford.

10 April 1888.




*This consent should be required, as the County Council will be charged (see Proposal 6) with the supervision of school supply.


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PART VII

Summary of Leading Conclusions and Recommendations

We have now completed the inquiry, undertaken by Your Majesty's command, into the present working of the Education Acts, as well as of the Codes which year by year, after being laid before Parliament, become part of the law regulating Elementary Education.

We have endeavoured to ascertain how far the existing provision for Elementary Education is adequate and suitable, and how far the machinery provided by the Education Acts is calculated to meet satisfactorily any future requirements.

We have inquired into the nature and efficiency of the management of existing schools, both voluntary and board schools, into the composition and qualifications of the staff of Your Majesty's Inspectors, into the number and preparation for their work of the various classes of Elementary Teachers, into the efficiency, character, and sufficiency of the existing Training Colleges, and into the Working of the Law of Compulsory Attendance at school.

We have also taken evidence regarding the Education provided in our elementary schools, concerning the Religious and Moral Training they afford, and concerning the Curriculum of Secular Instruction; and we have further considered the possibility of engrafting on the present school course some system of Technical Instruction.

Nor have we thought it beyond our province to consider the means by which Elementary Schools may best connect themselves with the Higher Education of the country.

We have endeavoured to come to conclusions on the nature and effects of the annual examination of schools by Your Majesty's Inspectors, and on the method of determining and distributing the Parliamentary grant.

We have likewise considered the Cost of Elementary Education, and the proportions in which it is borne by the parents, the State, and local contributions, whether from the rates or voluntary subscriptions.

The methods of Election, and the general composition of existing Local Educational Authorities, have come under our notice; but in making suggestions under this head we have borne in mind that the Bill before Parliament for dealing with Local Government, should it pass into law, will probably affect the course which it may be desirable to adopt hereafter.

We now humbly lay before Your Majesty the following summary of the leading conclusions at which we have arrived.

SUPPLY OF SCHOOLS

(1) That under the present conditions of elementary education, we accept the existing rule, that in the case of populations containing the ordinary proportion of the upper classes, "after making due allowance for absence on account of sickness, weather, distance from school, and other reasonable excuses for irregular attendance, school seats should be provided for one-sixth of the total population": and that on the whole the demand for school accommodation has been fairly met.

(2) That the power of deciding on the claims of schools to be supported out of the Parliamentary grant can hardly be placed in other hands than those of the Department, to which it has been committed by statute, and should not be placed in the hands of a local body.

(3) That the remedy for the grievance felt in the case of certain schools, pronounced by the Department to be unnecessary, seems to lie in a more liberal interpretation of the term "suitability", and in a close adherence to the spirit of the provisions of the Act of 1870.

(4) That, in any fresh educational legislation, it should be enacted that no transfer of a school held under trust should take place without the consent of a majority of the trustees, and that the Department should not sanction such terms of transfer as interfere with the original trust beyond what is required for the purposes of the


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Education Acts; and that provision should be made that no structural expenses, involving a loan, should be incurred without the consent of the trustees who lease the building.

(5) That we see no reason why voluntary effort should not be entitled to work pari passu with a school board in providing accommodation to meet any increase of population subsequent to the determination of the necessary school supply arrived at by the Department after the first inquiry of 1871. If a similar inquiry were held periodically, say, every five years, voluntary effort might be recognised in the interval between two inquiries as entitled to meet any deficiency not ordered to be filled up by the school board on the requisition of the Department. "We do not think that the letter, much less the spirit, of the Act of 1870 would be violated by such an arrangement, or by its being distinctly understood that an efficient school, whether provided to meet a numerical deficiency or specially required by any part of the population, would be admitted by the Department as part of the supply of the district, and be entitled to claim a grant as soon as it was opened.

STRUCTURAL SUITABILITY OF THE PRESENT SCHOOL SUPPLY

(6) That the time has come when the State may be more exacting in requiring for all children a proper amount of air, light, and space, suitable premises, and a reasonable extent of playground.

(7) That we approve the rule of the Department that 10 square feet and 100 cubic feet should be the minimum accommodation provided for each child in average attendance, in all school buildings in future to be erected.

(8) That, so far as the Department have any voice in the planning of a new school, the provision of a playground should, as a rule, be recommended, and if possible, separate ones for the two sexes.

SCHOOL MANAGEMENT

(9) That voluntary schools should be placed under a body of managers in all cases where efficient managers can be obtained; and that as any system of management which allows schools to be farmed by teachers is emphatically to be condemned, effective measures ought to be taken to render its continuance impossible.

(10) That so long as the parents are not a preponderating element, they should be represented on the committee of management, but that, so long as voluntary schools do not receive aid from the rates, there seems no sufficient reason why the management clauses of their trust deeds should be set aside in order to introduce representatives of the ratepayers.

(11) That some form of voluntary combination is strongly to be recommended by which voluntary schools not only may strengthen their position financially, but also improve the quality of the education given in them. By means of such a combination, instruction by experts in useful subjects, such as cookery and the rudiments of elementary science, might be given, which the larger school boards are able to command for their schools.

(12) That it would be very advantageous for school boards, and especially the larger boards, to associate with themselves local managers in the supervision of their schools.

(13) That the accounts of voluntary schools should be as open to public inspection as those of board schools.

INSPECTORS OF SCHOOLS

(14) That while the public service requires inspectors to be men of wide and liberal training, it is neither fair nor wise to prevent elementary teachers from rising to the rank of inspectors; and that the opening to such teachers of the highest offices in connexion with education would tend to elevate the tone and character of their profession.

(15) That in making future appointments to the office of inspector, it would be desirable, in regard to a larger proportion of them than at present, to give special weight to the possession of an adequate knowledge of natural science.


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(16) That it would tend to secure a greater uniformity of standard among the inspectors, if the chief inspectors ceased to have charge of small districts of their own, and confined themselves to the larger areas which they have to supervise, so that their whole time and attention might be given to such supervision.

(17) That such arrangements ought to be made as will admit of more frequent "occasional visits" to schools, and of more time being given to the annual examinations both of schools and of pupil-teachers.

(18) That in large towns the experiment might be tried of appointing sub-inspectresses to assist in the examination of infant schools, and of the lower standards. Such persons should have been teachers in elementary schools, or have had experience as governesses in a training college.

(19) That the inspectors' assistants should be chosen from the pick of the elementary teachers who have acquired adequate experience. That the initial salary should be such as not to deter the best head masters from applying for the post, and should be raised to £200 a year.

(20) That any special examiner called in to assist the permanent staff should possess some knowledge or experience of the conditions of elementary school education.

(21) That the same amount of publicity might with advantage be given to the annual reports of Her Majesty's Inspectors in the case of voluntary schools as in that of board schools.

TEACHERS AND STAFF

(22) That the minimum staff of teachers in a school required by the Code should be considerably increased.

(23) That the head-master should be free to give general superintendence to the whole work of the school, but that he should not be dissociated from actual instruction; and that if the general requirements of the Code as to teaching staff be raised, the organization of the school may be left to the managers and head teacher, subject to satisfying the inspector that the results are satisfactory.

(24) That in framing regulations for fixing the qualifications required of teachers, it will be desirable to bear in mind that there are some with a natural aptitude and love for teaching who have not received a college training, but who could not be excluded from the profession without a loss to our schools.

(25) That the employment of women of superior social position and general culture as teachers has a refining and an excellent effect upon schools.

(26) That the salaries of teachers ought to be fixed, and should not fluctuate with the grant.

(27) That a superannuation scheme should be established by means of deferred annuities, supplemented by the Education Department out of monies provided by Parliament, according to the scheme recommended in the body of our Report.

(28) That, having regard to moral qualifications, there is no other available, or, as we prefer to say, equally trustworthy source as that of pupil teachers, from which an adequate supply of teachers is likely to be forthcoming; and that, with modifications tending to the improvement of the education of the pupil-teachers, the system of apprenticeship ought to be upheld.

(29) That it would be advisable to recur to the system of allowing pupil-teachers, where the managers desire it, to be apprenticed at the age of 13, for a period of five years.

(30) That it would be well so to arrange the conditions of apprenticeship as to give pupil-teachers at the age of 16 facilities for withdrawing from work for which, they may have little liking, and also to give to the school managers an opportunity of ceasing to employ any pupil teacher who at that age is found to be unsuited for the work of teaching.

(31) That pupil-teachers should be allowed, especially in their first year of service, more time for their own studies during school hours than is now common, and that, without in any way superseding the responsibility of head teachers, their private instruction should, wherever possible, be supplemented by central class teaching, in respect of some compulsory, as well as additional subjects.

(32) That, to encourage managers of voluntary schools as well as school boards to extend the advantages of central class teaching to their pupil-teachers, extra grants should be offered to those managers or boards who successfully adopt that course.

(33) That, in districts where central class instruction is obviously impossible, extra


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grants should be made to managers who successfully employ other special means to secure the thorough instruction of their pupil-teachers.

(34) That more time and attention should be given by inspectors to the annual examination of pupil-teachers.

TRAINING COLLEGES

(35) That the contention, that it is wrong in principle for the State to contribute towards denominational training colleges, is obviously inadmissible so long as 69 per cent of our elementary schools, containing 56.37 per cent of the scholars, are themselves denominational, and comes too late in the day after the State has entered into binding engagements with these institutions.

(36) That the preponderance of testimony is decidedly adverse to any such fundamental change as that which the imposition of a conscience clause on residential training colleges would involve, and the recommendations we make for giving enlarged facilities for training are accordingly based on the supposition that the relations of the State and the denominational training colleges will not be seriously disturbed.

(37) That we see no reason why grants should not be made to any residential training college which may hereafter be established by private liberality on an undenominational basis, with a conscience clause in the trust deed.

(38) That it would be a doubtful economy for the State to attempt largely to reduce its maintenance grants to the present colleges.

(39) That an additional year of training would be a great advantage for some students, and we only hesitate to recommend it from the doubt whether it is as yet feasible; but that picked students from training colleges might even now with advantage be grouped for a third year course of instruction at convenient centres.

(40) That while unanimously recommending that the experiment of a system of day training for teachers, and of day training colleges, should be tried on a limited scale, we would strongly express our opinion that the existing system of residential training colleges is the best; and this recommendation is made chiefly with the view of meeting the cases of those teachers for whom for various reasons a residence at a training college cannot at present be provided.

(41) That existing training colleges should be permitted to receive day students, on terms, in regard to instruction in religious subjects, similar to those of the Endowed Schools Act of 1869 (section 16).

(42) That, considering the large need which exists for more ample or more generally available opportunities of training, and the importance of giving every facility for training to those who now obtain certificates without it, an experiment should be made of training non-residential students in connexion with local university colleges, subject to the condition that only a limited number of students should receive Government assistance towards their training. Such a number of students should be aided by the Department as are found practically necessary to complete the supply of trained teachers, who should be largely substituted for the present mass of untrained and uncertificated teachers.

(43) That, without defining too minutely how the new day training colleges should be administered, their government should be both educational and of a local representative character.

(44) That whilst recommending that facilities should be afforded in one or other of the ways suggested for the establishment of day training colleges, we think that no portion of the cost of establishing or maintaining new day training colleges should fall upon the rates.

(45) That in these proposals, the following points will require the serious attention of Parliament.

1. The question of security for the religious and moral instruction of those who are to be trained as teachers.
2. The constitution of a governing body at each centre, corresponding to the managing committee of a training college, which, at some pecuniary risk, will be responsible for the professional, as distinguished from the general, education of the students, and will provide model and practising schools under its own direct control and supervision.
3. The adjustment of the financial relations of the governing body with the Department, more especially in regard to the security to be given to the State that the

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students after being trained at the public cost will devote themselves to the work of elementary teachers.
4. The means of securing that the supply of trained day students shall not exceed the probable demands of the country.
ATTENDANCE AND COMPULSION

(46) That, though there are undoubtedly very considerable local shortcomings calling for amendment, the vast increase in the school population receiving regular instruction, obtained in the short period of 17 years, is a result of our educational legislation which may be considered most satisfactory; and that the absence of any serious opposition on the part of the wage-earning classes to compulsion, notwithstanding its grave interference with their homes, is largely owing to the gradual steps by which it has been introduced. That, accordingly, we cannot endorse any general condemnation of the manner in which "compulsion" has hitherto been administered.

(47) That, while we do not desire to see either the standard or range of elementary education unduly restricted, a prolonged school life in the case of children preparing for many employments, including agriculture, is often incompatible with the practical instruction of the field or workshop, which must necessarily commence at an early age.

(48) That, subject to the provision in section 9 of the Act of 1876, the minimum age for half-time exemption from school attendance should be 11, and the minimum age of full-time exemption 13.

(49) That the clause (appearing on page 166 of the Report of the Committee of Council, 1885-6) which directed Her Majesty's inspectors to explain to school authorities that a child is bound to attend school full time whenever it is not beneficially and necessarily employed, and that a bonâ-fide half-timer means a child who is legally at work when not at school, should be re-inserted in the annual instructions to inspectors.

(50) That constant vigilance should be exercised by the Department, both through their inspectors and by means of periodical returns, with regard to the action of local authorities, for the purpose of securing the attendance of children at school, in conformity with section 27 of the Act, 1876, and that the Department should report to Parliament at stated intervals upon the whole subject.

(51) That local committees should be more generally appointed under section 32 of the Act of 1876; and that school attendance committees should hold meetings from time to time in various parts of their district, accessible to the population.

(52) That in all cases returns of absentees from each school should periodically be called for by the local authority.

(53) That an annual return ought to be made by every local authority to the Education Department, giving the following statistics, viz., the number of attendance officers employed, of meetings held, of parents interviewed, of summonses taken out and of convictions obtained; also the cost of legal proceedings, and any other information relative to their duties which the Education Department may require. The character of the information to be given is shown by the returns published in the Report of the Education Department for 1878-79, p. xxxvi.

(54) That the truant and day industrial schools established in several large cities under the Act of 1876, have been found efficacious as a means of enforcing compulsion on certain classes of children.

(55) That it is the duty of the State to step in between children who are employed in theatres and those parents whose cupidity seeks to make a profit out of their employment. Certain provisions in the Act of 1876 bear upon these cases, but they do not stop all employment between the ages of 5 and 14, and they do not apply to children under five years of age. We are informed that the London School Board has been most anxious to deal with this evil, but has found that its legal powers are insufficient. The law on this subject is stated to be defective, and we recommend that it be strengthened; and that, from considerations of health as well as of morality and education, a remedy for a state of things which affects a large number of young children would be to bring theatrical employment under the Factory Acts.

(56) That the suggestion to appoint a special magistrate for London to adjudicate on school attendance cases, who could hold sittings in the various districts of the metropolis at an hour and place when other police cases were not being heard, is, in principle, objectionable.


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RELIGIOUS AND MORAL TRAINING

(57) That while we desire to secure for the children in the public elementary schools the best and most thorough instruction in secular subjects, suitable to their years and in harmony with the requirements of their future life, we are also unanimously of opinion that their religious and moral training is a matter of still higher importance, alike to the children, the parents, and the nation.

(58) That there can be no doubt, from the statement of the witnesses, whether favourable or hostile to teaching religion in day schools, and from the testimony afforded by the action of both school boards and voluntary schools, as to the opinion of the country generally on the subject of religious and moral training in day schools, and that all the evidence is practically unanimous as to the desire of the parents for the religious and moral training of their children.

(59) That to secularise elementary education would be a violation of the wishes of parents, whose views in such a matter are, we think, entitled to the first consideration.

(60) That the only safe foundation on which to construct a theory of morals, or to secure high moral conduct, is the religion which our Lord Jesus Christ has taught the world. That as we look to the Bible for instruction concerning morals, and take its words for the declaration of what is morality, so we look to the same inspired source for the sanctions by which men may be led to practise what is there taught, and for instruction concerning the helps by which they may be enabled to do what they have learned to be right.

(61) That the evidence does not warrant the conclusion that religious and moral training can be amply provided otherwise than through the medium of elementary schools.

(62) That, in the case of a considerable number of children, if they do not receive religious instruction and training from the teachers in the public elementary schools, they will receive none, and that this would be a matter of the gravest concern to the State.

(63) That all registers should be marked before the religious teaching and observances begin, scrupulous care being taken, in accordance with the letter and spirit of the Education Acts, to provide for the case of children whose parents object to such teaching and observances.

(64) That it is of the highest importance that the teachers who are charged with the moral training of the scholars should continue to take part in the religious instruction, and that any separation of the teacher from the religious teaching of the school would be injurious to the moral and secular training of the scholars.

(65) That we cannot recommend the plan which has been suggested of religious instruction to be given by voluntary teachers on the school premises out of school hours. That such a plan would be no efficient substitute for the existing system of utilising the school staff and the hours of school attendance for this purpose, a system which has taken deep root in the country, and appears to give general satisfaction to the parents.

(66) That the State cannot be constructively regarded as endowing religious education, when, under the conditions of the Act of 1870, it pays annual grants in aid of voluntary local effort for secular instruction in schools in which religious instruction forms part of the programme.

(67) That the 14th section of the Act of 1870, which forbids any denominational catechism or formulary to be taught in board schools, merely provided for perfect neutrality among Christian denominations. It does not exclude from the schools instruction in the Religion of Nature, that is, the existence of God and of natural morality, which, apart from belief in the existence of God, cannot be intelligibly taught or understood.

(68) That the conscience clause is strangely misconstrued, when it is understood to "prevent the possibility of any allusion to religious subjects during the ordinary hours of instruction", or to preclude a teacher from "bringing the sanction of the Christian religion to bear" on any moral offence, such as lying, which requires attention during these hours.

(69) That inasmuch as parents are compelled to send their children to school, it is just and desirable that, as far as possible, they should be enabled to send them to a school suitable to their religious convictions or preferences.

(70) That in schools of a denominational character to which parents are compelled to send their children, the parents have a right to require an operative conscience


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clause, and that care be taken that the children shall not suffer in any way in consequence of their taking advantage of the conscience clause.

(71) That the absence of any substantiated case of complaint, and the general drift of the evidence, convince us that the conscience clause is carefully observed both by teachers and managers.

(72) That we recognise, nevertheless, the importance of removing, if possible, any suspicion of unfair play or undue influence in the administration of the conscience clause from the minds of those who entertain such impressions. And any further precautions which might tend in that direction, without compromising still higher interests, are deserving of the most careful consideration.

(73) That, greatly as the estimate of the value of the religious instruction given in board schools varies with the standpoint from which it is regarded, there is good ground for concluding that where care is bestowed on the organisation of such instruction, and sufficient time is allowed for imparting it, it is of a nature to affect the conscience and influence the conduct of the children of whose daily training it forms a part. That it is much to be hoped that the religious and moral training in all elementary schools may be raised to the high standard which has been already reached in many of them.

(74) That exactly the same facilities to hold annual examinations of their schools in religious knowledge should be given by law to school boards as are now allowed under section 76 of the Act of 1870 to the managers of voluntary schools.

(75 ) That increased support should be given by the State to the moral element of training in our schools, almost the only reference to the importance of such matters made by the State being that which is made in the Code under the head of Discipline.

(76) That general, fundamental, and fixed instructions to Her Majesty's Inspectors should be laid down as to moral training, making it an essential condition of the efficiency of a public elementary school, that its teaching should comprise such matters as instruction in duty and reverence to parents, honour and truthfulness in word and act, honesty, consideration and respect for others, obedience, cleanliness, good manners, purity, temperance, duty to country, the discouragement of bad language, and the like.

(77) That it should be the first duty of Her Majesty's Inspectors to inquire into and report upon the moral training and condition of the schools under the various heads set forth, and to impress upon the managers, teachers, and children the primary importance of this essential element of all education.

CURRICULUM OF INSTRUCTION

(78) That standards have been shown to be of too much value for the purpose of examination to make it prudent to dispense with them, but they should be carefully revised with a view to some modifications in the method of examination, and in the grouping of standards, especially in small schools; and should be applied so as to give perfect freedom of classifying scholars according to their attainments and abilities.

(79) That there is room for much improvement in reading; that it would be of advantage to increase rather than to diminish the number of books to be read in each standard, but that the spelling requirements should be diminished, and that unless the scholars are taught to read with ease, and acquire a taste for reading, their school learning will not be followed up in after life, and that accordingly the establishment of school libraries is strongly to be recommended.

(80) That too much importance is attached to spelling as a separate subject in the course of elementary education; and that the art of spelling accurately is most certainly learnt, often unconsciously, by the practice of reading.

(81) That if drawing were universally taught, as we recommend, handwriting would probably receive more attention than it does, with the result of its becoming both better in form and more legible.

(82) That the standards of the Code in arithmetic require to be carefully reconsidered, bearing in mind the importance of arranging them on sound educational principles, of graduating them so as to be well within the compass of the scholars of both sexes, and of giving some choice of rules that may be taught in the higher classes, so as to meet the industrial requirements of different districts. The exercises should be thoroughly practical, and of a kind likely to be met with in everyday life.

(83) That it should be distinctly recognised that, as the time of the girls is largely taken up by needlework, the time they can give to arithmetic is less than that which


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can be given by boys, and that this disadvantage will best be compensated, not by exceptional leniency in the annual examination, but by modifying the arithmetical requirements of the Code in the case of girls.

(84) That the Inspectors should be instructed at their annual visits to see that the children have been taught, as far as their years permit, the principles of the rules of arithmetic, as well as their working.

(85) That, while it is desirable to allow great freedom to teachers in the instruction of their scholars, it is evident that if they are not assured as to the limitations of the knowledge which will be required from their scholars in the official examinations, they are tempted to ramble superficially over too wide a field in order to prepare for any possible questions which they anticipate may be put by Her Majesty's Inspector.

(86) That we are opposed to the introduction of a set of official Government text-books; but that, with the view of indicating to managers and teachers the range of study intended to be covered by the requirements of the Code, a more or less extended programme should be published for each subject similar to those adopted in the Science and Art Directory, with a view of showing within what limits the official examinations would be confined; and, also, that in the syllabuses for pupil-teachers definitions in programmes of studies, which leave no doubt as to their interpretation, are specially required.

(87) That, as respects the Class subjects, a provision in the present Code which permits the managers of a school, with the approval of Her Majesty's inspector, to substitute for the scheme of instruction in the Code syllabus, a different and clearly defined scheme of lessons, and thus to secure a perfect understanding between the teachers and the inspector, is especially suitable when a large number of schools in the same district adopt a common scheme; that many managers and teachers would do wisely to avail themselves of this provision; and that the Department and the Inspectors should encourage them to do so.

(88) That the arrangement now adopted in the Code for "Mechanics" might advantageously be adopted for other subjects, namely, the provision of alternative courses, precisely defined, of which the managers of a school may select the one preferred by the teachers, and most suitable to the capacities of their scholars.

(89) That, as far as practicable, the children should be grounded in all the four Class subjects, and that when only some of them are taken, the selection should be left to the school authorities.

(90) That the provision of the Code, which requires that if only one class subject is taken it must be "English", should be repealed.

(91) That children should have the advantage of learning by heart suitable passages of English poetry.

(92) That, under the head of grammar, both parsing and analysis should be retained; but that exercises in word building and Latin prefixes should be left entirely to the discretion of the teacher.

(93) That geography, if properly taught, is a branch of elementary science which should not be separated from the other branches, and might well be taught along with object lessons, in accordance with the recommendation of the Royal Commission on Technical Instruction.

(94) That in Standard VII the time allotted to geography might advantageously be devoted to specialising some particular branch of the subject.

(95) That the restriction of history to the Fifth and higher standards has greatly discouraged its systematic teaching.

(96) That in the earlier standards it may be expedient not to attempt more than the general outline of English history, and in fuller detail a few of its most interesting epochs or the lives of its most eminent characters; but that in the higher standards the Code might provide that scholars acquainted with the outlines of English history should devote all the time allotted to it in Standard VI or VII to acquiring a knowledge of some part of our constitution and of some of our national institutions.

(97) That the Inspectors should ascertain whether the children retain the facts of history stated in the historical reading books, as well as whether they understand their meaning.

(98) That the Code should provide a syllabus for instruction in history for those who may wish to avail themselves of its guidance.

(99) That drawing is a subject of the utmost importance, and that at no time in a child's life can it be so easily taught as during the period of schooling.

(100) That to make drawing compulsory for girls is surrounded with difficulties, especially as regards some of the present teachers. Itinerant teachers duly qualified


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might be able to conduct the teaching in a group of schools, especially in rural districts; and, for many of the employments which girls of the class ordinarily attending our elementary schools may be expected to follow, an elementary knowledge of drawing would be of great practical utility.

(101) That it would be impossible to enforce singing by note in every school in the country.

(102) That the grant for singing by ear tends to secure attention to the cultivation of the voice and ear, and that without this encouragement there is reason to fear that the attempt to give any musical training would be abandoned in many schools.

(103) That it is satisfactory to find how large a number of schools secure "good" as their report upon needlework, and that every endeavour should continue to be made to ensure that needlework, one of the most important branches of a girl's education, should be thoroughly practical and efficient.

(104) That a system of lessons adapted to good and economical cottage cookery would be of the greatest value to the girls in elementary schools, who will in most cases have hereafter to prepare the food of their families; and that, as the present system, though new and tentative, is making real progress, it should be left to time and to experience to suggest changes to be made in it.

(105) That the Department might overcome any difficulties of expense and organisation which, especially in small and in poor schools, now prevent the general introduction of lessons in cookery, by suitable encouragement to itinerant teachers, combinations for a teacher, and the like.

(106) That, whilst Specific subjects are quite suitable for some schools, they are incapable of universal application.

(107) That simple instruction in elementary principles of physiology might be given with advantage, which would enable girls to apply intelligently, and to appreciate in after-life, the practical maxims which secure health in a household.

(108) That in Wales permission should be given to take up the Welsh language as a Specific subject; to adopt an optional scheme to take the place of English as a class subject, founded on the principle of substituting a graduated system of translation from Welsh to English for the present requirements in English Grammar; to teach Welsh along with English as a class subject; and to include Welsh among the languages in which candidates for Queen's scholarships and for certificates of merit may be examined.

(109) That the introduction of elaborate apparatus for gymnastic exercises into playgrounds, is not to be recommended.

(110) That in towns, the best results, both physical and moral, might be expected from the introduction of some system of physical instruction such as that recommended by the War Office; but that care must always be taken in applying such training to delicate or underfed children.

(111) That we must look principally to the training colleges in the future for the gradual introduction into elementary schools of a safe and scientific system of physical training; and that provision should be made for conferring, through experts appointed by the Department, special certificates on teachers, duly qualified to conduct it, and possessing the requisite elementary knowledge of anatomy.

(112) That the quality of the education in elementary schools would be greatly improved if the Code contained several schemes of instruction, so as to provide for various classes of schools a curriculum varying in breadth and completeness with the number of scholars in attendance and with the character and requirements of the population. Each scheme, however, should encourage the extension of the teaching of the necessary subjects beyond the prescribed limits.

(113) That in sparsely peopled districts the number of subjects taught must often be fewer than in towns; but that even in small rural schools a larger measure, of instruction might be secured than that which includes only the three elementary subjects now required by law; and that facilities should be given to managers to introduce other subjects, in accordance with the varying circumstances of the localities.

(114) That the following subjects of elementary instruction, are to be regarded as essential, subject to the qualifications which we have already made:

Reading.
Writing.
Arithmetic.
Needlework for girls.
Linear drawing for boys.
Singing.

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English, so as to give the children an adequate knowledge of their mother tongue.
English history, taught by means or reading books.
Geography, especially of the British Empire.
Lessons on common objects in the lower standards, leading up to a knowledge of elementary science in the higher standards.
(115) That, as the meaning and limits of the term "elementary" have not been defined in the Education Acts, nor by any judicial or authoritative interpretation, but depend only upon the annual codes of the Department, on whose power of framing such codes no limit has hitherto been imposed, it would appear to be of absolute necessity that some definition of the instruction to be paid for out of the rates and taxes should be put forth by the Legislature. Until this is done, the limits of primary and secondary education cannot be defined.

MANUAL AND TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION

(116) That by technical instruction, we mean instruction in the scientific or artistic principles which underlie the industrial occupations of the people (including especially handicrafts, manufactures, mining and agricultural labour), and in the manual practice involved in the application of such principles.

(117) That drawing, as we have already recommended, be made, as far as practicable, a compulsory subject in all boys' schools: and that with respect to girls, drawing, though it be not made compulsory, should be encouraged under suitable conditions.

(118) That though boys while at school should not be taught a trade, some elementary instruction in science is only second in importance to the three elementary subjects.

(119) That whatever ought to be the ordinary course of instruction in elementary schools it should be carried far enough to secure the thorough grounding of the scholars in the essential rudiments of learning, before they are encouraged to take up a more special course, which might encroach upon the time needed for their general education.

(120) That the curriculum of elementary scientific subjects might vary according to the special requirements of each locality.

(121) That object lessons should be continued in the lower standards in succession to similar teaching in the infant school.

(122) That the experiment of employing an itinerant teacher of elementary science by a combination of schools is worthy of being tried.

(123) That the curriculum in the ordinary elementary schools might often include not only instruction in the elementary principles of science, but also in certain standards elementary manual instruction in the use of tools; and in higher schools and evening schools this work might be carried still further.

(124) That if technical instruction of this kind is to be given in our schools, it should not be applicable to boys under 10 years of age. The ultimate object of such instruction, however, might be furthered by judicious systematised science teaching given to the younger scholars, in which they should be associated in preparing specimens, helping to make models on their geography lessons, and so forth.

(125) That examinations in science should as far as possible be conducted orally and not on paper, especially in the first five standards.

(126) That, if it should be thought that children ought to receive some instruction in manual employment other than that which the elementary schools available for their use can give, the best way of meeting the need would be by the establishment in connexion with some higher institution of a workshop for boys of exceptional ability, or for others to whom it was considered desirable to give this instruction.

(127) That arrangements might be made to substitute attendance at such a centre on one or two afternoons in the week for attendance at the elementary school.

(128) That the higher grades of elementary schools in which more advanced science is taught, and where a certain number of children stay beyond the Seventh Standard, may be regarded as continuation schools.

(129) That if the system pursued in such schools were much further developed, it would offer a temptation so to enlarge the curriculum as practically to convert primary schools into secondary schools, in which a portion of the cost of the education of the children of wealthier persons would be defrayed out of the rates or Imperial funds.


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(130) That nothing should be done which might discourage existing voluntary effort on the part of the manufacturers and employers of labour to promote technical instruction, or which might lead our artisan population to trust rather to the artificial teaching of a school than to the practical and diversified training of the workshop.

(131) That the control of technical education should be placed in the hands of municipalities, where there are municipalities, and in the hands of the rating authorities, where there are no municipalities. The national and imperial character of London, the conditions of its organisation and industry, and the absence of any central municipal authority, will require exceptional treatment.

(132) That the immediate direction of technical schools, either by delegation or otherwise, should be placed in the hands of a body mainly composed of persons interested in the trades of the locality, and experienced in its industries.

(133) That, where sufficient local interest in technical instruction is proved to exist either by voluntary subscriptions or by the levy of a rate, a contribution from the Parliamentary grant may be properly made to reinforce the local resources; but that, although they might be aided by scholarships for the cleverer children of the wage-earning classes, provided out of public funds, technical schools should be made as far as possible self-supporting by means of fees.

(134) That, whereas, when the Education Act of 1870 was passed, and voluntary effort was encouraged to co-operate further in the provision of elementary education, technical instruction, was not contemplated; the managers of voluntary schools may fairly expect liberal aid to supply this form of instruction, on a footing of equality with board schools.

(135) That as a guarantee to the State against the danger of schools taking up subjects merely as a means of earning additional grants, and not with any special reference to the wants of the locality. Imperial grants for efficient instruction in all elementary technical subjects to managers of voluntary public elementary schools should be supplemented by contributions from the rates of the district in which the schools are respectively situated; Provided always that the Education Department define the subjects allowed to be taught in each standard, and the maximum number of subjects that may be taught, and provided further that no grants to voluntary schools be made from the local rates in any district except for subjects which the school board of the district has introduced into one or more of the board schools, or which the rating authority has declared to be needed to meet the educational requirements of its inhabitants.

(136) That it is desirable that the management of technical instruction should be entrusted to the Education Department, and not to the Science and Art Department.

(137) That such central authority in London should interfere as little as possible with the various methods of promoting technical instruction which may commend themselves as suitable to the varying circumstances of different localities, provided that these methods appear generally sufficient to attain the object in view.

VARIOUS CLASSES OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS

(138) That the State should continue to recognise voluntary and board schools as together forming the national provision for elementary education; and that both ought to continue to participate on equal conditions in the Parliamentary grant.

(139) That the local supporters of small rural schools are much overburdened by the circumstances under which they have to meet the requirements of the Education Code, whether from voluntary sources or from the rates.

(140) That a larger, and in many cases, a better staff ought to be provided for such schools, and that in the case of schools which from the peculiarities of the neighbourhood are of necessity exceptionally small, their difficulties should be met by special grants.

(141) That the necessity for having some form of evening school for the purpose of fixing and making permanent the day school instruction is almost self-evident; and that it would be worth the while of the State to spend more money on such schools.

(142) That the evening school system should be thoroughly revised; that a special curriculum and special schedules of standards and subjects should be allowed, suitable to the needs of a locality, and that the local managers should be encouraged to submit such schedules to the Department for approval; that the provision embodied in the Code requiring all scholars in evening schools to pass in the three elementary subjects


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as a condition of taking of additional subjects should cease to be enforced; and that no superior limit of age should be imposed on the scholars.

(143) That the success of evening schools will largely depend upon great freedom being given to their managers and teachers, but that the Department should take ample securities for their educational efficiency; and that, if this is done, more money might be given as a fixed grant, and less made to depend on the results of individual examination.

(144) That the evening schools of the future should be regarded and organised chiefly as schools for maintaining and continuing the education already received in the day school, but that, for some years to come, it will be necessary in many places to repeat in the evening school, in greater or less proportion, the course of instruction previously given in the day-school.

(145) That where it is impossible by grouping, or otherwise, to make up the number (20) of scholars now required to be presented to the Inspector in order to claim a separate examination of an evening school, some other provision should be made for examining such scholars.

(146) That the recommendation of the Industrial Schools Commission that the educational inspection of reformatory, industrial, day industrial, and truant schools should be transferred to the Education Department, might be extended to workhouse schools; since, in the case of children attending public elementary schools from the workhouse, the results, so far as their intellectual education goes, appear to be satisfactory.

ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS AND HIGHER EDUCATION

(147) That the State should recognise the distinction between elementary and secondary education to a greater extent than has been as yet attempted.

(148) That, however desirable higher elementary schools may be, the principle involved in their addition to our system should, if approved, be avowedly adopted; and that their indirect inclusion in the present system is injurious to both primary and secondary instruction.

(149) That if the curriculum of higher elementary schools is restricted within due limits, avoiding all attempts to invade the ground properly belonging to secondary education, and if due precautions are taken to secure that promising children of poor parents are not excluded from the privileges to be enjoyed in them, such schools may prove to be a useful addition to our school machinery for primary education.

(150) That, if due precautions are taken to secure that all who would be likely to profit by the teaching in higher schools should have an opportunity of being promoted to them, some system of grading schools might be of advantage to the progress of elementary education in great centres of population.

(151) That a knowledge of the principles of agriculture, which might be taught in higher elementary schools, where such existed in country places, would be of great value to those children who might hereafter be engaged in agricultural labour.

(152) That in certain cases the object of higher elementary schools might be secured by attaching to an ordinary elementary school a class or section in which higher instruction was provided for scholars who had passed the Seventh Standard. That liberal grants made, as in Scotland, to the managers of elementary schools for advanced instruction to scholars who have passed the highest standard, would facilitate the provision of such higher instruction in the smaller and less populous school districts.

(153) That we cannot recommend any general system of grouping small rural schools, though there are, no doubt, cases in which such grouping may be advisable for the better instruction of the older scholars.

(154) That the supply of satisfactory secondary schools should be organised, and made adequate for the wants of all parts of the country; and that increased funds should be provided out of which to create sufficient exhibitions for such deserving elementary scholars as would profit by the more advanced instruction given in those schools.

GOVERNMENT EXAMINATION

(155) That the practice of many teachers may lead to children being unduly detained in the successive standards, or unduly hurried through them, and that the teachers in such cases doubtless feel themselves more or less fettered by the present


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system. That if the grant continues to be distributed on the principles of the existing Code, managers and teachers should be allowed full liberty in the classification of their scholars, subject to reduction of the grant if this liberty be abused; and that in small schools a simpler classification both for instruction and for examination should be adopted.

(156) That so long as a money value is attached to each success in the individual examination, and so long as the teachers are dependent on the grant for part of their income, there is great risk that the teachers should endanger the health and welfare of the children by too exclusive regard to their own reputation and emoluments.

(157) That if the present system of examination in the case of the Class subjects were applied to the three elementary subjects, every child in the school might well be examined.

(158) That, supposing the existing system of payment by results to continue, whilst in Standards I and II class examination should take the place of the present individual examination, individual passes should be recorded in Standard III and upwards.

(159) That, whatever be the system of examination, provision must be made for the individual examination of all children whose parents desire them to be furnished with labour certificates.

(160) That in future the inspection of public elementary schools should be of two kinds, to be held on different days. That the sole object of one inspection should be to secure that all children are being thoroughly taught the elements of instruction; the first inspection should, therefore, be confined to a strict examination of each child in reading, writing, and arithmetic. The objects of the second inspection, to be held within a fortnight after the examination, should be, on the one hand, to pass a judgment upon the whole character of the school, and, on the other hand, to give advice and encouragement to the managers and teachers. That at this second visit the inspector should consider the moral tone and discipline of the school, the methods of teaching, the aptitude of the teachers, and the condition of the buildings and premises, while he should also thoroughly test the proficiency of the children in all the subjects taught, by hearing the teacher examine the children, by examining classes himself in the subjects included in the syllabus, and not previously tested at the first examination, or by any other methods he might select. His report upon the school should be based both on the report of the first examination, and on his own inspection. That the inspector might at this visit of inspection, if he thought it desirable, test the report of the first examination, and that there should rest an appeal from the final judgment of the inspector to the chief inspector of the district.

THE PARLIAMENTARY GRANT

(161) That the present large annual outlay, as now distributed, does not secure for the nation commensurate results.

(162) That the distribution of the Parliamentary grant cannot be wholly freed from its present dependence on the results of examination without the risk of incurring graver evils than those which it is sought to cure. Nor can we believe that Parliament will continue to make so large an annual grant as that which now appears in the Education Estimates, without in some way satisfying itself that the quality of the education given justifies the expenditure. Nevertheless, we are unanimously of opinion that the present system of "payment by results" is carried too far and is too rigidly applied, and that it ought to be modified and relaxed in the interests equally of the scholars, of the teachers, and of education itself.

(163) That, while Parliament in voting large payments of public money to school managers, requires some security for the educational results, and looks to the reports of Her Majesty's Inspectors for security that these results are attained; payments should be made so as to avoid fixing the manager's or teacher's attention too exclusively on the details on which the grant is based.

(164) That, while it is desirable to retain in some form or other each of the three constituent elements of the variable grant, which depend respectively on the inspector's report on the child, the class, and the school, the following modifications of the present system would offer the maximum of relief with the minimum of disturbance:

(1) that the fixed grant be increased to 10s per child in average attendance:
(2) that the conditions on which the variable portion of the grant are now made be so far modified as to secure that the amount shall depend on the good character

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of the school and on the quality of the acquirements of the, great majority of the scholars, rather than on the exact number of children who attain the minimum standard of required knowledge:
(3) that individual examination should be treated, not as a means of individually assessing grants, but merely as testing the general progress of all the scholars:
(4) that schools should be assisted according to their deserts, so as to promote efficiency; whilst no undue pressure should be placed on dull children, and no unnecessary anxiety and worry caused to managers and teachers:
(5) that the average amount of the variable grant should in present circumstances be not less than 10s:
(6) that in distributing the variable grant, special stress should be laid upon efficiency in the three elementary subjects.
(165) That the merit grant should not be retained in its present form, in schools for older children. That the classification of schools as "Fair", "Good," or "Excellent", be discontinued. That if the present system of payment by results be retained, the moneys now available for the merit grant should be devoted in such proportions as the inspector may deem expedient to reward superior intelligence displayed by scholars in particular subjects, and other merits not now recognised by grants, the particular merits for which these grants are awarded by the inspector being stated in his report.

(166) That the Inspector should report separately on each of the following points: 1. Moral training; 2. Cleanliness, both of school and scholars; 3. Quietness; 4. Attention; 5. Obedience; 6. Accuracy of knowledge; 7. General intelligence; 8. Classification; 9. Instruction of pupil teachers. That the Report should also record in detail the results of examination in each subject of instruction, and should state specifically the grounds on which any reduction of the full grant is recommended.

(167) That, whatever be the ordinary basis of payment to schools, the Department must retain its present power of ordering deductions from the grant, or even its total forfeiture, for grave faults in instruction, discipline, morality in the scholars, or honesty in the conduct and management of the school.

(168) That we cannot recommend so substantial an addition to the fixed grant as we have done, without, at the same time, laying stress on the necessity of increased facilities for the removal of incompetent teachers. That where such incompetence has been proved, and after due notice has been given, it should be in the power of the Department to declare a school in default, and thereupon to suspend the payment to it of any grant.

(169) That in regard to infant schools we do not deem it necessary to recommend any change in the existing system of payment of the grant.

(170) That, inasmuch as the enforcement of a curriculum of an extended character, such as we have recommended, must entail both upon small rural schools and upon schools in poor urban districts a considerable increase in the cost of maintenance, by necessitating an addition to the staff and in other ways, a larger Government grant should be afforded to such special localities.

(171) That the present form of special grants of £10 or £15 made under section 19 of the Act of 1876 to small rural schools might well be extended, and that all schools having an average attendance of less than 100, and not being within two miles of any other available elementary school by the nearest road, or which, under exceptional circumstances owing to difficulties of access, should be recommended by Her Majesty's Inspector for such aid, might be admitted to a special grant, increasing with the smallness of the school, not to exceed £20 in all; this grant might be made at the rate of 6s 8d for every child below 100 in average attendance, so that the maximum grant would be payable to schools having not more than 40 in average attendance.

(172) That this special grant should only be given where the fees are, in the opinion of the Department, so low as to enable the children in the district to attend the school with ease, and, as in the Act of 1876, should not be affected by any general rule as to the reduction of grant.

(173) That the great improvement which has resulted in many schools, through the appointment of an organising master or local inspector, points to the expediency of encouraging school boards, and associated managers of voluntary schools, to appoint such persons, and the Parliamentary grant might be partly employed in paying a portion of (not more than half) the salary of such persons, and that of efficient teachers of drawing, who might circulate among a number of schools.

(174) That the 17s 6d limit acts as a discouragement to improvement in certain cases, and that the provision in the Elementary Education Act of 1876, upon which this limitation is based, should be repealed.


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(175) That as the Parliamentary grant will not bear indefinite expansion, any modification of the present limit must be considered in relation to the general question of the total amount of that grant.

(176) That, if the managers of a public elementary school, which has once been passed by the Department as "efficient" and "suitable", are ordered under pain of "default", to make alterations or additions to the buildings or playground, a grant in aid of the local expenditure required to carry out these improvements should be made by the Education Department.

(177) That our recommendations as to annual grants are made on the supposition of the continuance of the present method of assessing them, and that they may be modified by proposals to assist all schools from the county rates.

(178) That the time has come when serious efforts should be made to limit the cost of the maintenance of aided schools to such a sum as will enable the managers to carry oat their duties efficiently, but without any undue strain on local resources, whether provided voluntarily or by rates.

(179) That the terms upon which the Parliamentary grant is awarded should not be dependent on a minute of the Privy Council, but should be embodied in an Act of Parliament.

(180) That when any changes have to be made in the Code it should henceforth lie before Parliament for at least two months, in print, before it comes into force.

(181) That the time is come when, for the best interests of education, some more comprehensive system of administration should be found, 1st, to remove, as far as possible, the grave and inequitable inequalities of the two systems of voluntary and board schools as now existing; and 2ndly, to eliminate, as far as possible, for the future, the friction and collision which have so often, and so injuriously, arisen between them.

INCOME AND EXPENDITURE OF SCHOOLS

(182) That it is reasonable and just that the supporters of voluntary schools should retain the management of these schools on the condition of bearing some substantial share of the burden of the cost in subscriptions. But it does not seem either just or expedient to allow the voluntary system to be gradually destroyed by the competition of board schools with unlimited resources at their command.

(183) That there is no reason why the principle of voluntary schools receiving annual aid from the rates should not be extended, and rate aid, in respect of their secular efficiency, should not be given to voluntary schools (as it is now given to industrial and reformatory schools), without the imposition of the Cowper-Temple clause, which, under the Act of 1870, affects those schools only which are provided and supported entirely by the rates.

(184) That the rate for this payment should, in the case of a school attendance committee, be chargeable on the separate school district affected.

(185) That the local educational authority should be empowered to supplement from local rates the voluntary subscriptions given to the support of a public State aided elementary school in their district, to an amount equal to these subscriptions but not exceeding ten shillings for each child in average attendance.

(186) That, if, in the impending re-organization of the local government of the country, education were recognised as one of the most important branches of that government, and arrangements made for gradually connecting it, more or less, with the civil administration of each locality, much of the unhealthy competition between the two school systems would disappear, and the expenditure caused by their rivalry would be reduced.

(187) That, in the event of no alteration being made in the law, boards of guardians should make arrangements for entertaining applications for the payment of fees apart from those for relief, and that they should institute inquiries by their officers into the circumstances of applicants for school fees, instead of requiring them to attend at the union, or at relief stations.

(188) That, in all cases the guardians should pay fees direct to the school managers, and not include them in any lump sum given for relief, and that they should be required to pay fees for children of indigent parents, under five, or who have passed the limit of obligatory school attendance, in cases where parents are willing to send such children to school. That if the district councils proposed in the Local Government Bill now before Parliament should be established, the payment of fees for indigent children should be at once confided to them, and that the fees should be


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charged upon the rates. That, supposing this duty to be laid upon the district councils, they should have the same power now possessed by school attendance committees in each parish, and that the local authority, to which should be confided the power to pay fees for poor parents in rural districts, should be required to make provision for the local hearing of applications for the payment of school fees in the various villages.

(189) That public elementary schools for which no rent is paid or received should be exempted from local rates.

(190) That the fees in voluntary schools should not be subjected to supervision by the Education Department.

(191) That, if, as we think, provision of the due necessaries of education, as well as of the necessaries of life, is part of the responsibility incumbent on parents, it may well be believed that public contributions and private benevolence are already doing what can be safely required in augmentation of the payments properly exacted from parents.

(192) That the balance of advantage is greatly in favour of maintaining the present system, established by the Act of 1870, whereby the parents who can afford it, contribute a substantial proportion of the cost of the education of their children in the form of school fees.

LOCAL EDUCATIONAL AUTHORITIES

(193) That, in the event of school boards not being superseded by some other local authority, a somewhat longer term of office, with partial renewal, would be an improvement.

(194) That it would be advisable to divide the larger towns into constituencies, returning not more than five members each.

(195) That some form of proportional representation should be retained in school board elections.

(196) That the single transferable vote should be adopted, which possesses the advantages of the cumulative vote, without the inconvenience which sometimes arises in its operation.

(197) That all interference of board school teachers in the election of a new board should be forbidden.

(198) That, in the present uncertainty as to what may be the form which county government may take, it would be premature to make any definite recommendations as to the nature and the powers of the local educational authorities which it may be necessary to constitute under the new conditions of local government, now under the consideration of the legislature.

All which we humbly submit to Your Majesty's most gracious consideration.

(Signed)
CROSS (Chairman).
*HENRY EDWARD CARD. MANNING.
NORFOLK.
HARROWBY.
BEAUCHAMP.
F. LONDIN.
*NORTON.
*FRANCIS R. SANDFORD.
*B. F. SMITH.
JAMES H. RIGG.
ROBT. GREGORY.
THOMAS D. C. MORSE.
*CHARLES H. ALDERSON.
JOHN G. TALBOT.
S. G. RATHBONE.
F. Cavendish Bentinck,
Secretary,
27th June 1888.

*These Commissioners sign, subject to the reservation or reservations which bear their signatures.


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RESERVATIONS

I have willingly signed the Report of the Royal Commission on Elementary Education, because in the main I agree in its conclusions and recommendations; but it has not treated of the one subject which I believe to be chief in importance, and of the most vital influence in the education of the people of England and Wales.

When the Commission opened its sessions, and during the whole course of the evidence, it seemed inevitable that the inconvenience and anomaly of the two existing systems, the Voluntary and the School Board Systems, should become manifest; and that some higher and more comprehensive administration, which should combine them both, and place them upon a just and equal level, would be recommended by the Commission to the Legislature. It cannot be believed that in the year 1870 it was intended to place the voluntary system in a position of such unjust inequality in relation to the new system of school boards. By the interpretation of the Act of 1870, a practically unlimited multiplication, paid for out of the school-rate, has been given to the board school system. From the voluntary system the power of multiplication has been practically taken away, not only by the refusal of State aid in building, but by the frequent refusal to recognise schools founded by unaided voluntary effort. Again, the voluntary system is aided from one source only of public revenue. The board school system is aided from two. It receives Government grants on terms of perfect equality with the voluntary schools, and it has the absolute control of the Education rates, from which the voluntary schools are as absolutely excluded. This unequal treatment of the two systems has also caused for the last 17 years a most unequal competition, in which in every branch of expenditure the board schools are able to outstrip the heavily-weighted system of voluntary schools. Nevertheless, in the comparative efficiency of the two classes of schools, in respect to the three elementary subjects, which are the substance of all education, the board schools exceed certain voluntary schools by one or two per cent., or by only decimal points, and after all are not the highest in comparative success. It has hitherto appeared very improbable that the Commission should close its Report without pointing out these unjust inequalities and suggesting, at least in outline, some future legislative remedy.

The most sanguine friends of the voluntary system cannot believe that it will ever recover the whole population of England and Wales; neither can the most devoted advocates of the board school system believe that it can ever extinguish the voluntary system, which is the shelter of the religious liberty of the people, and of the rights of conscience in parents, and gives freedom to the inextinguishable religious denominations of our country.

We stand, therefore, at a point at which we are compelled to choose one of two courses: either to perpetuate our present fragmentary educational legislation, which hitherto has grown up piecemeal, involving the gravest inequalities in the measures of State aid, burdening thereby the supporters of the voluntary system with the maintenance of their own Christian schools, and with the payment of rates for a system which they conscientiously reject; or of framing some higher, more comprehensive, and more equitable law, by which these unjust inequalities shall be redressed.

Some new and larger statute for national education, equal and common to all, ought to restore the liberty of multiplication to the voluntary system; and to eliminate the contentions which now exist, to the serious injury of our schools.

It might have been reasonably hoped that the Report of the Commission would have contained, not only minute and careful recommendations in alleviation of school management, founded upon the actual practice and conditions of the past, but that, guarding against any premature schemes founded upon Bills which are as yet of uncertain character, it would have given some forecast of future legislation, founded upon principles more comprehensive, more just, and more in conformity with the desires and religious convictions of the immense majority of the people of England

HENRY EDWARD CARD. MANNING.


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I sign this Report with the following reservation on the subject of the Parliamentary Grant.

I think that the present mode of Parliamentary support of national education, by payments on piece-work in detail, should not only be modified as the Report proposes, but entirely abandoned.

The many objections made to it by teachers, managers, and inspectors - that it degrades education to earning prizes on got-up exhibitions; that it limits the curriculum of instruction for all scholars, under all circumstances, and only crams an evanescent knowledge; that it depreciates subjects, however important, which are not paid for; and that it altogether gives a false gauge and estimate of school work - apply even to its partial application, as inherently fraught with mischief without any equivalent good. The Report, somewhat inconsistently with its proposal of any retention of payment on results, concludes "that individual examination should be treated, not as a means of assessing grants, but merely as testing the general progress of all the scholars". It admits that payment on results of examination was a device for satisfying Parliament that there were some results justifying the expenditure. But in the fear expressed in the Report "that Parliament will not continue so large an annual grant without a guarantee of the quality of education given", the confusion becomes apparent between piece-work results and good quality of education. Indeed, the Report afterwards acknowledges that "the details of instruction which may be tested by examinations may not, even in the aggregate, comprise the whole, or the main part of the educational result required."

The modification of the present mode of Parliamentary grant proposed in the Report, is that one half should be a fixed capitation on average attendance; and the rest, which should in average amount be not less, should be liable to deductions, or total forfeiture, for grave faults in instruction, discipline, or morality. For this variable half of the grant there are supposed to be "moneys now available for the merit grant (proposed to be abolished) which might be devoted to rewarding (not the work of the school but) superior intelligence displayed by scholars in particular subjects." I ask why make payment for the work of education vary inversely with the difficulty, i.e., the want of intelligence of those educated; and why deduct from the means of efficiency by way of correcting any causes of inefficiency? It is recommended that the salaries of teachers should be fixed, so that their attention may not be turned to earning payments in detail; it must, therefore, be supposed, in proposing deductions from the grant, that to inflict forfeitures on managers for the teacher's failures is the way to promote efficiency in teachers. If managers have sufficient means certainly supplied them for their undertaking, any failure in it may fairly be demanded to be set right; or, if the defect be persisted in, the work may be transferred to other management than that in such default. It is not a competitive exhibition for highest prizes that is wanted, but an adequate use of means given for good education of the children under care.

In all other countries, as one of the Appendices shows, State subventions to schools are calculated on the requirements of each locality according to its population and circumstances. Reports made, not on stated days but in casual and constant inspection, award credit to good working, and bring to notice the various causes of any defects. If defect is attributed to the unfitness of any teacher for the post assigned him, he is otherwise placed, or removed. The school is not mulcted of its means of better teaching, nor sacrificed to save the bad teacher. In all undertakings income falls off by bad success, but success cannot be obtained by reducing the means of the undertaking.

It may be feared that our mistaken system has not only demoralised our national educators, but has gone on so long as to have habituated them to it, and make them unwilling to change. The work is measured by the annual editions of the "Code", which are estimated by their comparative capacity for earning prizes, or for stimulating artificial exhibitions.

But all doubt whether the simpler mode of fixed and adequate school support pursued by all other nations is applicable here is entirely removed by the fact that some of our larger school boards have already adopted it in wasteful duplication with the piecework system. They are able, by their unlimited command of local taxation, to bear the fluctuation of Treasury aid. They pay fixed salaries to their teachers, and act on their own inspectors' reports in correction of any failures of the work.

Some think that inspectors would shrink from giving reports which might involve the degradation or dismissal of a teacher, but these school boards have not found it so.


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The report recommends increased facility for the removal of incompetent teachers and more power in the Department to declare a school in default and suspend payment to it.

The partial retention of variable grants does not, therefore, get rid of the difficulty of having to trust inspectors to give judgment with such heavy consequences; and as it neither offers a true or effective stimulant to the teacher's work, nor fairly distinguishes or appraises the best teachers according to their various task; nor secures, but rather misrepresents, the main results of education, it affords no equivalent good for the obvious and manifold mischief of such a principle of school support.

NORTON.

I cordially agree with the Report as a whole. But there are some points, in regard to which I cannot entirely accept the conclusions, or opinions, set forth in the Summary of Recommendations, or in the text itself.

To these I should have taken more formal objection than I may have done, while the Report was under consideration, if I had not hoped, from the active part taken by the whole of my colleagues in discussing and drafting the Report, during a period of 50 days, that it might be signed, with reservations, by every member of the Commission. That hope, at almost our last meeting, was disappointed; but in making the following observations on a few of the points in question, I do not wish to dissociate myself from any responsibility for the result, now published, of our protracted inquiry.

PART III

CHAPTER 2

We recommend that "existing schools should gradually" be required to provide 10 square feet per scholar in average attendance. I do not think that this requirement should be enforced in the case of schools erected, with the aid of a building grant, according to plans recommended, and insisted on, by the Department, and providing 8 feet per scholar. In many such cases the original promoters though anxious to supply, at considerable cost to themselves, a larger amount of superficial space than 8 square feet, were not allowed to do so. It would be manifestly unjust to require the present managers either to reduce the attendance below the number formerly approved, or to enlarge schools which, as planned, efficiently accommodate that number. The cubical space in such schools is ample; while to increase the superficial area by widening the school rooms would not provide seat accommodation for a single additional scholar. Rules and requirements which are reasonably imposed upon the huge educational factories of modern days, are not called for, or suitable, in the case of smaller schools. The space in board schools, with large classes of scholars, is necessarily arranged on a different plan from that adopted in schools of an ordinary size; and the 10-feet rule was introduced at the express and urgent request of the school boards themselves, to meet the special circumstances of the masses of children with which, in many cases, they had to deal. Some of our best and most popular voluntary schools would be the first to suffer from the imposition of a 10-feet rule.

CHAPTER 5

As to pupil-teachers, generally, I am afraid that we have dealt with them too much as pupils, and too little as teachers. We have thought more of training them as scholars, in large schools, than of the need for them to assist in smaller schools. To give them more time, for example, for their private studies, will weaken the teaching power in a school, or call for the employment of a costly staff; while to raise the


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standard of examination during, and at the close of, their service, will tend to over-pressure, especially in the case of girls. To enable them to come up to the ideal standard of attainment which some desire, they would, I believe, have to give up teaching altogether. But I have seen enough of other examinations to feel sure that a large proportion of our pupil-teachers would, even now, hold their own in competition with young persons of the same age, coming from schools of a high class, whose time has been given wholly to study.

We have at present a staff of 28,000 pupil-teachers, serving for four years; so that some 7,000 of them yearly finish their engagements. The recruits for this army are to be selected for their aptitude for teaching; they are henceforth, if not thoroughly efficient to be specially weeded out at the age of 16, and not as now, at the end of any year of their service; they are to be highly taught at centres, or by special teachers at great, and increased, cost to taxes, rates, or voluntary contributions; and then, being thus strung up to concert pitch, some 5,000 of them, who cannot be admitted to the training colleges from want of room, and will not be able to go on in the profession, by other ways, which we are unwisely closing against them, will be yearly thrown upon the world. This, in case of the girls, may be a good thing for the general education of the country, which they will leaven; but it will not appear so to themselves; while, as for the boys, I fear they will become a discontented class, and somewhat difficult to deal with. Nor will it make the pupil-teacher system popular, if so many school managers, who have spent time, money, and trouble upon training these superior young persons, find that their labour has been expended in vain.

As regards what is termed the centre system of training pupil-teachers, I believe that it is attended with serious dangers and disadvantages which go far to neutralise any improvement which it may effect in the intellectual instruction of the pupil-teachers. The old system created very real bonds of affection, as well as of responsibility and duty, between the teachers and their young apprentices. Under the centre system, even when carried out with the practical good sense which characterises all the educational arrangements of the Liverpool school board, these bonds are liable to be greatly weakened. It substitutes a divided responsibility, and demands a divided obedience. While the pupil-teachers attend the schools in which they are apprenticed for one part of the day and the centre school for the other part, it is not easy to maintain adequate supervision of their conduct. And if the "centre" school is held after dark, this objection to the system becomes serious; and, in the case of girls, seems insuperable.

In large towns, there is in almost every school a staff of certificated teachers, among whom the instruction of the pupil-teachers could be divided, in accordance with provisions introduced into the Code of 1876 in furtherance of such a plan. The instruction could thus be carried on by, and under the general supervision of, the head teacher, without weakening the sense of responsibility either in him or his apprentices, and without interfering with the relations of respect and affection which ought to bind him and them together. In country schools, with rare exceptions, it would not be possible to make such arrangements; but neither would it be possible to adopt the centre system in any form.

The introduction of that system has, in London, been made the occasion of diminishing the work of the pupil-teachers in the schools where they are apprenticed, and putting their instruction into the school hours; and there is perhaps something to be said for this, whether associated with the centre system or taken alone. But it clearly adds very considerably to the cost; and the economical side of this question ought not to be lost sight of.

An account of the London system is given in our Report. From this, it appears that its cost is twofold, viz., the amount paid for the collective instruction of the pupil-teachers, and the salaries paid to them during their first two years of service, when they are not counted on the school staff. I am informed, by a very competent authority, that during the year 1887 the total number of pupil-teachers under instruction in London was 1,636. The salaries under the latest scale paid to boys were 5s per week, and to girls 3s a week - £13 a year for males, and £7 16s for females. The net cost of their instruction was £6 0s 10d per head. Thus it appears that each male pupil-teacher cost the board about £19 a year, and each female pupil-teacher nearly £14 a year, during the first two years of their apprenticeship, for which they rendered no remunerative service in the board schools.

To form a right judgment of the system it is essential that these facts should be known. I regret that they do not find a place in our Report.


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I will not here dwell upon the fact that, while the power of the purse tells greatly in favour of central teaching as carried out by school boards, it would not be in accordance with our educational system to flood the country with a body of ex-pupil-teachers however, highly instructed in secular subjects, who have not had the religious training required for the teachers of the majority of our schools and scholars.

CHAPTER 6

I agree with the Report in thinking that the present training colleges well fulfil the object for which they were founded, viz., the provision of well qualified teachers for elementary schools, but I believe that we have somewhat over-rated the need "for further facilities for training".

The annual waste of certificated teachers, which the Education Department puts at 6 per cent, was calculated a good many years ago. The improved position and prospects of teachers might be expected to retain them at work longer than in the past; and they have had this effect, as is shown by the Government statistics for the four years 1882-6.

The official year ends on the 31st of August.

In the year ending at that date, 1882, the inspectors found 20,397 trained teachers employed in aided schools.

In the following years some 5,520 students* left the training colleges after a residence of two years.

In 1886 there were 23,181 trained teachers at work.

If we add to the number at work in 188220,397
the number of students trained in 1882-65,520
25,917
and subtract the number at work in 188623,181
this will show the waste in the four years to have been2,736

And one-fourth of that number (684) will have been the annual waste.

This number, 684, being 3.3 per cent of the number (20,397) with which we first started, may be taken as the annual rate of waste of trained teachers of both sexes.

Similar calculations give -

2.5 per cent as the annual waste of trained men.
4.2 per cent as the annual waste of trained women.
6.6 per cent as the annual waste of untrained teachers.
6.4 per cent as the annual waste of untrained men.
6.7 per cent as the annual waste of untrained women,
and 4.8 per cent as the present waste of all certificated teachers (trained and untrained) of both sexes.
If we take the future number of certificated teachers at 50,000, divided according to the present proportion of the sexes, into -
20,000 men, and
30,000 women;
if we require them all to be trained for two years, and reckon the waste on men at 2.5, and on women, at 4.2 we shall need† -
1,760 trained teachers yearly, and
3,520 places in training colleges to produce them.
These places will be divided into -
1,000 for men. 2,520 for women.
*This does not include the full number who left at Christmas 1885, the whole of whom could not have been inspected before 31st August 1886. I have also taken into account the exchange of trained students between England and Scotland. The only Roman Catholic colleges are in England; while many teachers in the northern counties come from Scotland.

†Men, 20,000 at 2.5 = 500. Women, 30,000 at 4.2 = 1,260.


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But there are, even now, such places for -

1,441 men.
1,774 women.
3,115
There is therefore (disregarding for the moment the question of sex) a deficiency of only 405 places in training colleges to be made up, if each of our 50,000 teachers is to be trained for two years.

But we must leave a way for untrained teachers to enter the profession, if for no other reason, out of consideration for the great number of pupil-teachers who yearly complete their engagements, and cannot enter training colleges, from want of room or of means. I should be glad to see this number reduced, by refusing to employ pupil-teachers in town schools with large classes, and requiring such schools to be "staffed" with assistants, either certificated or preparing to attend the examination for certificates, under the supervision of the certificated staff" of each school.

But if we even went so far as to sanction the grant of only 203 certificates yearly to untrained teachers, we could keep up the rest of the requisite supply from the existing training colleges, by turning 441 of the present places for men into accommodation for women.

We have at present room to turn out yearly 720 trained men and 887 trained women, or 430 more men and 417 more women than are required to keep up the present supply of trained teachers.

If the suggested redistribution of the sexes were carried out, we could turn out 210 more men and 587 more women annually than would be required for the same purpose. These would gradually take the places of the present teachers who have not been trained in the technical sense of that word, and would do so in about 15 years, - if during that period the examination for certificates were closed against untrained candidates - a heroic measure which I should be very sorry to see adopted. It would tend to place the country at the mercy of a "Union"; it would seriously hamper school managers in their choice of teachers; and would keep out of the profession many of a class who, especially in the case of women, are now amongst its most valuable and efficient members.

In offering these remarks and calculations, I recognise the difficulty of carrying out a redistribution of the accommodation in the existing colleges between the sexes, and I admit the necessity of making further provision for training women. I think also that it would be advisable, as in Scotland, to open up facilities to the best of the pupil-teachers to receive a somewhat higher training than may now be afforded by some of our training colleges. But the University colleges, as they are styled, that are springing up throughout the country have yet to prove that they can supply such higher training efficiently. They cannot at present offer to their students the advantages afforded by the ancient Universities of Scotland.

For women, therefore, I would advocate the establishment of a few new residential colleges, and their admission as day students to the existing colleges.

For men, I think that we may fairly propose not only, as in the case of women, the admission of day students; but an experiment on a limited scale of a system of non-residential training, in connexion with institutions for higher education, whose authorities satisfy the Department that suitable arrangements can be made, for the professional as well as the general instruction of those who are preparing for future employment as teachers.

At the same time, in order to encourage and prepare pupil-teachers to enter upon one of the courses of training thus opened to them, I would recommend that, after a prescribed date -

(1) No one should be recognised as the principal teacher of a school who had not passed successfully the examination for the second year; and
(2.) No pupil-teacher should be apprenticed in any school unless one of the staff of that school had passed in the first or second division of the same examination.
The class-lists for 1883-4-5 show that in these three years, out of 1,184 men and 4,989 women who passed as acting teachers for the second year, 44 men and 94 women were placed in the first division, and 263 men and 1,326 women in the second division, while only 199 men and 411 women passed the examination for the first year. The success of the acting teachers in the examination for the second year,


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on which they enter with many obvious disadvantages as compared with students in training, and in which they are tested by precisely the same standard as the students, is very striking. It is, to my mind, conclusive against any proposal to close the entrance to an honourable career against young persons, who generally come from the ranks of assistant teachers, having previously been pupil-teachers, and who, in these two capacities, if they have served under conscientious teachers, have had opportunities of acquiring practical skill, not always enjoyed by students in training colleges.

CHAPTER 7

I object to the unqualified recommendation that "subject to the provision in section 9 of the Act of 1876, the minimum age for half-time exemption from school attendance should be 11, and the minimum age of full-time exemption, 13." The reference to the Act appears to me illusory. In the present condition of the labour market, both as to employment and wages, and bearing in mind the many statutes, of recent date, in which 10 is fixed as the age at which, upon certain conditions, a child may go to work, I doubt if the former limit (11) will be generally accepted; while if we look at the prevalence in this country of early and fruitful marriages, it appears to be very unwise to increase the existing pressure upon parents by preventing children of 10, who have reached a reasonable standard of proficiency, from beginning to contribute to their own support.

In foreign countries, where school life does not begin so early, but is continued to a later age, a door is always left open by which poor but proficient children may pass from school to work, if, as I hope will be the case with us, they go on with their education in evening, or continuation, schools. But in these countries there is not the same home necessity for early employment as in England. Marriage before there is a reasonable prospect of being able to maintain a family is discouraged, if not by the State, by the guilds of labour; and families are not so large as with us. Our Foreign Returns, of which I am sorry we have made so little use, show this. In Austria, only 13.6 per cent of the population are of school age (6-14) as compared with 18.30 (between the same ages) in this country. In Belgium, 13.8 are of school age (6-13) as compared with 16.19 here. In Hungary and Italy, where the school age is the same (6-12) the proportions are 12.3 and 12.1 against 14.04 in England. In France the proportion of children from 6 to 13 is only 12.2 per cent, as compared with 16.19 here; while from 4-16 the proportion is 20.9 against 27.57 in this country. As regards Prussia, to which I should have been glad to refer more particularly, the returns are not quite explicit; but I believe that in consequence of the progress of the manufacturing industries, and the increased prosperity of the operative classes in that country, the proportion of children now approaches more nearly to that of England, than it did before recent wars drained the manhood of Germany so terribly.

Even if 11 were accepted in the towns of England, as the earliest age for leaving school at all, that limit would not be suitable for the country, where the boys ought to go early to the fields, and girls do go early to service. And I strongly object to the abolition of all passes to full-time work before 13, in employments not dealt with by the Factory and Mines Acts, if a reasonable standard of proficiency has been attained. Such passes are a great incentive to school attendance, and the special restrictions of these Acts upon early labour are called for by considerations of health. I think that, as in Scotland, the 3rd Standard, if passed at or after 10, should be adopted for partial, and the 5th Standard for total exemption from school attendance, with a provision, if possible, for continued instruction in evening schools; and I should make every child stay at school up to 14 unless he had passed the 5th Standard. Even in country districts the 5th Standard might, with advantage, be adopted as the full-time standard, so long as (1) the byelaws provide that the attendance of half-timers at school shall be regular during certain prescribed months, in which juvenile labour is not required by the farmers; and (2) the local authority takes means to secure, under the 11th section of the Act of 1876, that the children who claim partial exemption are actually and bonâ-fide employed when absent from school. It seems to be forgotten that, under the second clause of that section, habitual idlers may be sent back to school up to the age of 14, whatever standard of education they may have previously passed.


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PART V

CHAPTER 2

In the final revision of our chapter on the Parliamentary Grant, a recommendation previously adopted as to the limit (45s) to be put on the expenditure of an elementary school, in ordinary cases, was struck out. Now the points which determine whether a school is primary, higher, or secondary, are generally understood to be the age of the scholars, the curriculum of studies, and the cost of instruction. By these tests, e.g., the endowed schools are graded by the Charity Commissioners, while for elementary schools, a limit of 30s was virtually fixed by the Act of 1870. The reasons for now proposing a higher limit of expenditure, and that only upon certain items, were stated in the Report before it was altered, and some of these reasons now appear in the text. The passage struck out will be found in the summary of our Divisions. I regret that that passage was omitted, and replaced by a somewhat vague appeal, made in the interests of economy, to the vigilance of the ratepayers, which has certainly hitherto failed to check the extravagance of some school boards. Those who pay the bulk of the rate are either overborne by the votes of the lower class of parents, to whom even a 1s rate, combined with a nominal school fee, if any is charged to them, means comparatively little; or they are tempted to send their own children to schools which were not originally intended for their use, and where their presence is objected to, either as subversive of discipline, or as leading to the introduction of subjects beyond the legitimate range of elementary education. It is well to bear this last point in mind, as I see that the "executive" of the "National Union of Elementary Teachers"* proposes to omit from their title the term (elementary) which led us to pay so much attention to their opinions and feelings during the course of our inquiry.

I am sorry that anything in our Report should seem to under-rate the value and importance of "Standards", to cast a slur upon the principle of "Payment by Results", introduced by the Revised Code, or to imply that under the present Code, sufficient freedom of classification is not secured to managers and teachers. I fear that if some of our recommendations are acted on, we may see revived the scandals disclosed by the Report of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission. That report led to the adoption of a system which was not intended to be of universal application, or to be administered by an overgrown central department. It was meant to create throughout the country a large number of typical schools, which eventually, when a National system was established, were to be dealt with by county boards, by which they would be paid, on the detailed results of the examination of several million children. But the system, even as worked by the Department at great cost, though it may now be ready for revision in the case of the younger scholars, has made possible many of the improvements in education realized of late years; by laying a solid foundation in the elementary subjects, and making them the first and chief consideration in testing the merits of every aided school. When we find, moreover, that no fewer than 200,000 scholars between 7 and 11 years of age were, in 1886, found under instruction in infant classes, on methods suited for young children of four and upwards; that, in London, some 6,000 scholars out of 80,000, were absent, or withdrawn, from examination, for reasons approved (save in 200 cases) by the inspectors; while 5,400 scholars in Birmingham were allowed to be kept back a standard, it is plain that the evidence of the managers who admitted to us the sufficiency of the present arrangements, for dealing with sickly or backward children, is more to be relied upon than the statements of those teachers who claimed greater freedom from restriction in such cases. It is to be hoped that a more general adoption of a system of fixed salaries will enable schoolmasters, henceforth, to give more consideration to the interests of their scholars, and less to their own emoluments, or to the amount of the grant they can obtain for their employers. There are drawbacks to that system, but it might possibly lead to a desirable improvement in the salaries of school-mistresses; and, in the case of large schools, to a more equitable distribution, than at present, of the school fund between the "supervising" teacher, and those who bear the brunt of the work of the school.

*This body appears, from our evidence, to comprise about one-third of the certificated teachers of England and Wales.


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PART VII

SUMMARY OF RECOMMENDATIONS

The greater number of our recommendations may be carried out gradually by changes in the Code; but some will require legislation to give effect to them. I think that we ought, in concluding our Report, to have summed up briefly the main points to be borne in mind, when Parliament is asked to deal further with the subject of our protracted inquiry. In endeavouring to supply this omission, I desire to base my proposals on the Report of the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, and on the leading principles of Mr. Forster's great Act, as modified by subsequent legislation.

I believe -

1. That now, as in 1870, the people of England wish their children to have the benefit of sound moral training, and a Christian education.
2. That the maintenance of Christian schools is vital to the maintenance of the Christianity of England.
3. That, in the well-known words of Lord Lansdowne's Instructions to Her Majesty's Inspectors, dated 4th July 1840, "No plan of education ought to be encouraged in which intellectual instruction is not subordinate to the regulation of the thoughts and habits of the children by the doctrines and precepts of revealed religion."
4. That, while the rights of conscience are duly secured and respected, the principle thus laid down has been recognised, more or less fully, by the managers of all voluntary and board schools throughout the country; with a very few exceptions, in which the wish to make instruction purely secular is prompted by no avowed hostility to religion itself.
5. That, whatever influence upon the morals and character of children may happily attend the religious instruction allowed by law to be given in board schools, such instruction is necessarily limited; and, when confined, as it often is, to the mere reading of passages from Holy Scripture, without note or comment, must be lifeless and mechanical.
6. That so long as efficient schools supplying, at the cost of the managers, distinctive religious instruction, desired by the parents, are available, it is unjust to withhold annual grants from these schools, with the result of compelling children to attend other schools, where such instruction cannot be given.
Starting with these principles, and premising that whatever instruction is to be given in elementary schools must be thoroughly efficient, I will now consider on what lines we ought to proceed for the future.

In 1870 legislation was demanded by the voice of the country, to meet the urgent needs of a vast number of children whose education could not be overtaken by the voluntary system, which alone existed at that time. The Act then passed recognised that system as having provided generously, but not universally, for the wants of the population. It called for its further assistance, allowing and aiding it to complete the required school supply, as far as it could do so, within a limited period. Then, but not till then, the Act fell back upon the power of the rates, which it intrusted to school boards, with express directions to supplement, but not to supplant, the existing system.

That system was founded upon private zeal and munificence, upon religion, and upon the voluntary co-operation of the parents, whose conscientious rights were respected. The new system was based upon enforced contributions, upon a restricted course of indefinite religious teaching, if any were given, and upon compulsory attendance.

In consequence of the great, and in some quarters unexpected, efforts of the friends of the old system, it has largely held its own in the rural districts, though its extension has been checked in some towns, with a large labouring population, owing to the unlimited power of the purse enjoyed by school boards.

But the first and main object of the Act of 1870 has now been accomplished. Elementary education is universally available; the country is covered with a sufficient


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supply of efficient schools; and the attendance of scholars, though still short of the ideal standard, is satisfactory and improving. A breathing time is given to us to look around, and into the future.

At present we have a National system, in so far that a school seat is provided for every child in the Country who will, or may be compelled, to occupy it. But the system is not national in the sense of being one and uniform, or of its making it the desire and direct interest of every resident in a district to see that all the seats in that district, whether provided at private or public cost, are occupied. There is often, though not always, conflict between volunteers and school boards, where there ought to be harmony. I believe that the desirable co-operation between the two constituents of the existing system can be brought about, by securing that voluntary zeal shall neither be supplanted, at the cost of the rates, nor discouraged from continuing to contribute, on fair and equal terms, to the growing requirements of any increasing population.

With this view, I think that it ought to be provided by law that -

1. The Education Department should be guided by conditions prescribed by Statute, in determining what schools are to be recognised as public elementary schools, contributing to the efficient school supply of a district, and therefore entitled to claim annual grants.
2. New voluntary schools, after being carried on efficiently for a year, with a certain average attendance, varying in number in town and country, should be recognised as entitled to claim annual grants, as is now the case in districts not under school boards.
3. The managers of voluntary schools so recognised should be entitled to continue to give, at their own cost, in these schools, distinctive religious instruction to all children not withdrawn by their parents, under the provisions of the Conscience Clause.
4. The local authority of the district (whatever it may be hereafter) should grant to the managers of efficient voluntary schools an annual payment from the rates, not exceeding a certain fixed sum per head, for the proficiency of the scholars in secular subjects; that is for instruction which the law would require to be given in other schools, at an enhanced cost to the rates, if the schools provided and maintained by voluntary managers were discontinued.
5. The ratepayers of the district should be represented, to a limited extent, on the management of the schools so aided.
6. The term "elementary" should be defined, and a distinct line drawn, as far as possible, between primary and secondary education.
7. In districts where no separate provision can be made for education higher than elementary, the local authority should enable voluntary schools to provide such higher education as may be given in rate-schools, or where there are no such schools, may be regarded by the local authority as called for by the circumstances of the district.
Such statutory provision as I have indicated would relieve voluntary managers from any undue anxiety as to the position of their schools; it would recognize their claim to participate, but only to a limited extent, in the rates to which they so largely contribute; it would increase the efficiency of the schools themselves as places of secular instruction, and would give the ratepayers generally a direct interest in the welfare of schools, whose failure would increase local burthens to an enormous extent, in providing and annually maintaining the rate-schools that would be required to fill their place.

F. R. SANDFORD.

1. Whilst concurring generally in the conclusions and recommendations of the Report, I am content to leave the division lists to indicate the minor points on which I have found myself unable to agree with the majority of my colleagues. But on one or two vital questions I deem it necessary to assign the reasons which have led me to a different conclusion from that embodied in the Report.

2. Considering the comparatively short time that has elapsed since the State first intervened in the matter of national education, I regard the results already attained, however far they fall short of perfection, as distinctly a success and not a failure. I should, therefore, desire to see the methods of distributing the parliamentary grant,


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which have led to these results, upheld and improved rather than radically altered. With certain modifications and relaxations, such as a moderate extension of class examination, a reasonable margin allowed for failure in standard examination, and further graduations in the merit grant (the retention of which, recommended in the Report in the case of Infant Schools, I should be prepared to extend to schools for elder children) I regard the existing system of payment by results as the best solution yet found of the complicated problem, how best to secure -

(a) A fair distribution of the parliamentary grant amongst a multiplicity of schools, existing under the most various conditions.
(b) Justice being done to each individual scholar, without unduly fettering the freedom and enterprise of the teacher.
(c) An approximately uniform standard of judgment in the examination of schools among a body of over 300 inspectors.
3. I fear that the rigorous enforcement of a duplicate examination of every school, which is recommended in the Report, would prove cumbrous and costly, and that the advice therein tendered to the body of inspectors will not assist them in the discharge of their important and anxious duties.

4. I cannot concur in the recommendation of the Report that voluntary schools should be able to claim annual support out of the rates, for the following reasons:

(a) I regard the proposal, thus to reopen the settlement of 1870, as unstatesmanlike, and undesirable in the interests of voluntary schools. It goes beyond the original proposal of Mr. Forster's Bill to enable school boards to contribute, at their discretion, to the maintenance of voluntary schools; a proposal, however, which was deliberately withdrawn before going into committee on the Bill.
(b) I concur in the opinion expressed by Lord Lingen in his evidence that grants out of the rates towards the maintenance of voluntary schools involve, in principle, the repeal of the Cowper-Temple clause; a fundamental change which I think it undesirable, in the interests of voluntary schools, to ask for, and which I have no reason to think that Parliament would grant.
(c) I fear that the receipt of aid out of the local rates would give the ratepayers such a right to share in the management of voluntary schools as would endanger the freedom of their religious training, and the liberty they now enjoy to appoint teachers in accordance with their trust deeds.
(d) Speaking only for church schools, which, however, constitute four fifths of the existing body of voluntary schools, I fear that a claim given to them on the rates would strike at the root of that voluntary support on which their permanent existence depends. It would involve levying a substantial school rate for the first time in 10,239 parishes, in which there is now no school board, and which are chiefly supplied by church schools, taking no account of those parishes in which there is a school board, but no board school. Such an unwelcome demand would, I fear, strike a death blow at the voluntary subscriptions by which these schools are now supported. Mr. Cumin, whose scheme for aiding voluntary schools out of the rates was laid in detail before us, candidly expressed his opinion that, if it were adopted, five years would see the end of all voluntary schools.
(e) Moreover, in the case of that large proportion of voluntary schools which now pay their way, a claim to aid out of the rates would involve a large additional expenditure of public money, without any equivalent advantages to education.
(f) Considering that the rate of surrender of church schools to school boards has been of late years an annually decreasing one, and that it did not last year amount to more than one in a thousand; considering, further, that other causes besides the lack of annual support, (amongst other things, the demand for additional school supply) - are accountable for many of these surrenders, I am not prepared, in the hope of arresting them, to concur in recommending a change which would, in my judgment, subvert the settlement of 1870, threaten the independence and religious freedom of the whole body of church schools, and strike a fatal blow at their subscriptions, leaving to them little that was voluntary but their name.

B. F. SMITH,
Archdeacon of Maidstone.


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Though in general agreement with the Report of the Commission, I am unable to concur in some of the conclusions arrived at in the chapters on Curriculum, p. 203, and Government Examination, p. 273.

1. I am opposed to the retention of the present system of standards, except so far and so long as they may be required for passing children to labour. For this special purpose they have a use; but their administration ad hoc should be transferred bodily to the local or county examiner, who fell still-born from the Report of the Newcastle Commission, but who in new circumstances may yet assert his vitality. We have recommended an age-limit for exemption from school; a recommendation which, if adopted, facilitates the withdrawal of the standards. To continue to impose on the ordinary work of a school these prescribed minima, framed for an abstract average child, but unsuited to the varying capacities of children and even to those of a single child, to make it the chief business of teachers to teach down to them, and of children to practise and re-practise them, and finally to bring the inspector upon the scene to register performances in these minima, with strict injunctions to keep within their limits, is a scheme of education which is at once depressing and sterile. It destroys the rational classification of scholars; it stereotypes mediocrity of attainments.

2. I dissent from the proposal to extend the system of compulsory recorded individual examination from children qualified by a certain attendance to all children attending school.

Apart from the question of its extension, the educational value of such a system seems to me to be exaggerated. People credit examination with more than it is in its nature to effect. Thus, we have been told on high authority that individual examination is the only system which will secure the due and proper education of the great mass of the children. If this be so, how comes it, that now when it has been in full force for more than a quarter of a century, the complaint is general and emphasised in the Report of the Commission, that "much of the knowledge acquired in the elementary school is very soon forgotten", and that "witnesses of all classes testify to the imperfect hold of knowledge gained in the elementary school". A security which imperfectly holds something which is very soon forgotten is not a security which inspires any great confidence among investors.

It may sound like a paradox, but I believe it to be true, that individual examination in the form in which it is applied to elementary schools is necessarily a perfunctory examination. When children have to be examined by millions, the amount of time and attention that can be bestowed on each child is very small. There is no analogy between the examination of the limited number of scholars in our Grammar schools and that of the millions in our elementary schools. The former come substantially from homes in which the demand for juvenile labour is not felt, enter and leave at prescribed ages, attend with regularity, and their number admits of their attainments being from time to time thoroughly tested by an examiner. The latter are a heterogeneous multitude, drawn from homes which dispute them with school, entering and leaving at the most various ages, attending capriciously; but in numbers which preclude the most conscientious inspector from more than scratching the real attainments of each child. In the one case individual examination is an affair of hours if not days; in the other, so far as Reading, the key of knowledge, is concerned, of minutes.

Minutes, however, mount in the aggregate to colossal proportions; whatever benefit may accrue from individual examination is counterbalanced by the immense cost of time which it involves. There are some 3,000,000 children in the schools to which it is proposed to apply it. Each of these children must read to the inspector. I will assume that each reads, on an average, for two minutes. Time must be found, then, for the inspectors, acting concurrently throughout the year, to devote 100,000 hours to the mere hearing of the Reading. The whole inspecting staff consists of about 300 officers, with a working day limited at the outside to five hours. It follows that each of these officers must devote about 66 days in the year, or more than one fourth of his available time, to this single duty. I cannot imagine a greater misuse of his time and opportunity. This enormous slice of his energy is to be directed not to ascertaining that the children understand what they read, are interested in what they read, remember what they have read; all this, or any part of this, cannot be squeezed into a two-minutes' test. It is to be devoted exclusively to listening to the mechanical drip of the reading pass or the reading failure, leaving the intelligence of the individually-examined child and the mental cultivation which his books have brought to him an unknown quantity.


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The chief objection to compulsory recorded individual examination is that it is omnivorous. We are told by many witnesses that it has crowded out inspection. "Inspection", says Mr. Menet, late chaplain of the Hockerill Training College, "as distinguished from examination, has almost ceased to exist." "I think that one learns much more from the inspection", says Mr. Synge, a Chief Inspector, "than from the examination", and he admits that the time spent on the "many details" of the latter, is taken from the "larger work" of inspection. It is serious to be told on the authority of two experts of this encroachment on the best means open to the inspector for informing himself of the condition of the school on which he passes judgment. Let me briefly explain what "inspection" includes. It includes visits without notice, which have long been recommended by the Department, but of which the same Chief Inspector, whom I have quoted, says, in his evidence, "The thing is impossible. We have not time for it." It includes a careful visitation of the school premises, and their structural and sanitary condition. It includes the hearing of lessons given by the assistant and pupil-teachers. It includes a study of the methods employed in the teaching of the various subjects, and of the degree in which the scholars apprehend principles, as well as turn out "results". Lastly, it includes, or should include, conference with managers, counsel with the teacher, criticism, suggestion, encouragement; the altered tone in the relation between teachers and inspectors seems to me to show how much this is needed. I do not suppose that all the matters comprised in "inspection" are neglected, but I think that the Commission has had much evidence of their being necessarily scamped; and for this a pile of 3,000,000 specimens in black and white for the Treasury to pay upon is not an adequate compensation.

I would free the inspector from any compulsion to examine nominatim, and to record the examination nominatim of all the children on the schedule, a compulsion which it is now proposed to make yet more stringent by requiring him to examine individually every child attending the school; and I would restore to him, within well-defined limits, some part of the freedom of action allowed him up to the year 1862. The object and scope of his examination should be clearly set forth; the heads of his report should be specified in detail; but the means for arriving at the children's knowledge should be left to his judgment and discretion. What he is to do should be prescribed, not how he is to do it. At present he works entangled in a network of Lilliputian regulations. To deny him a reasonable discretion as to his choice of procedure is virtually to admit that he is unfit for his post. It is for the Education Department to secure that this discretion is placed in the right hands, and that it is wisely, skilfully, and considerately exercised.

The examination should be by classes, the class replacing the child as the unit of recorded examination. Every class should be examined in sufficient detail to assure the inspector of the character and efficiency of the instruction in it. The attendance in each, the number examined, and the proportion of scholars acquitting themselves well or otherwise in each of their subjects, should be recorded. But behind and below the proficiency shown by the class the report of the inspector would not go except in the way of distinguishing exceptional merit in individuals. The report upon the school would summarize the attainments of the children in the several classes. I should rely on the domestic examinations instituted by the teacher for securing that no child was advanced from one class to a higher without possessing the requisite amount of knowledge.

3. With regard to the plan of inspection recommended by the Commission, of a double visit, on one day for examination in the elementary subjects, and on another for the rest of the work, I should have preferred to lay down no rigid rule on the subject. I think that it would involve administrative difficulties in the apportionment of the work between the inspector and his assistant, and tend to devolve too much work on the latter. I fear, too, that if two announced visits in the year are made obligatory, a third and un-announced visit will generally be deemed to be superfluous; and that, in consequence, visits without notice, which seem to me of the greatest value, will become even rarer than they are now.

C. H. ALDERSON.

27th June 1888.


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REPORT

OF

The Hon. E. Lyulph Stanley, Sir John Lubbock, Bart, M.P., Sir Bernhard Samuelson, Bart., M.P., Dr. Dale, Sydney Buxton, Esq., M.P., T. E. Heller, Esq., Henry Richard, Esq., M.P., and George Shipton, Esq.

Reasons for dissenting from the Report of the Majority of the Commission, and Summary of our own Recommendations.

We humbly lay before your Majesty the following report:

We regret to be unable to sign the report which has been agreed to by the majority of our colleagues. After a long period of co-operation in the work of hearing witnesses, digesting returns, and deliberating upon conclusions, we should have been glad if we could have so far agreed with them as to have been able to sign their report, subject to reservations as to certain points of dissent. But unfortunately in the present case the differences of opinion, which apply as much to the general tone and arguments of the report as to its summary of conclusions, have been so many and so important that our signature would have conveyed a false impression. The proposal, more especially that voluntary schools should be enabled to claim aid from rates, would, it appears to us, re-open the whole settlement of 1870; and, further, while we recognise that the formation of the character of the children attending our elementary schools is of paramount importance alike to the children, the parents, and the nation, we fear that the recommendations regarding religious instruction contained in the report of the majority would lead to a renewal of bitter disputes and rivalries, which were and are happily subsiding. These differences alone, even in the absence of any others, compel us to set forth our conclusions in this report.

Some of us have desired to set out their deductions from the evidence, and the arguments by which they support their recommendations at considerably greater length, and they have done so in the separate report which follows this one.

Before entering upon the consideration of the questions on which we dissent from the majority, it may be convenient that we should point out some of the more important conclusions of their report on which (subject, as to some of us, to points of detail set out in our fuller report,) we agree generally with them, in order that we may give our united support to these recommendations, as to which we are in substantial agreement.

We agree, as to the school supply, that accommodation is needed throughout England and Wales for one-sixth of the population, though in certain districts, such as Lancashire and the West Riding, the requirements amount to nearly a fifth.

As to the structural suitability of the present school supply, we agree with the majority that "the time has now come when the State may well be more exacting in requiring for all children a proper amount of air and space, suitable premises, airiness, and lightness of site, and reasonable extent of playground"; and we approve the rule of the department that 10 square feet and 100 cubic feet should be the minimum


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amount of accommodation provided for each child in average attendance in all school buildings in future to be erected.

That superficial area is but a rough approximation to the actual accommodation of a school, and that the truer criterion, especially in schools for older children, is to be found in the amount of seat room provided.

That the proper measure of a school's accommodation should be the seat supply, and that measure might well be acted on by the Department in any review of the sufficiency of the accommodation in accordance with the ground plans of the school submitted to them.

That existing schools should gradually, but within reasonable limits of time, be brought up to the higher estimate of the space required for school accommodation.

That care should be taken that the school furniture should always be suited to children. It should always be the first consideration in the fittings of a school that they should be primarily adapted to day-school education, due regard being had to the age, size, and physical comfort of the scholars.

As to school management, we agree that the farming of schools to teachers should be prevented. That the accounts of voluntary schools should be made public.

That co-operation among managers of voluntary schools, such as exists at Huddersfield, would greatly improve these schools, and that we should be glad to see help given towards the salaries of inspectors, science teachers, &c.

We agree, generally, in the recommendations of our colleagues as to the inspectorate; but we wish to lay special stress on all ranks of the inspectorate being thrown open to elementary teachers, and on the importance of securing that inspectors shall have had practical experience as teachers.

That the teachers ought to be paid fixed salaries, which should not vary with the grant.

That it is desirable that the head teacher should not be dissociated from actual instruction in addition to general superintendence, but that no definite rule should be made interfering with the discretion of managers and head teachers in the organisation of the school.

That the imperfect preparation of the students at entrance is a serious obstacle to their progress in the training colleges.

That the Code requirements as to staff should be considerably increased.

That pupil-teachers, especially in their first year of service, should be allowed more time during school hours for their studies than is now common, and that the instruction given by the head teachers should be, wherever possible, supplemented in respect of some of the compulsory as well as the optional subjects by central class teaching.

That extra grants should be offered to those managers who successfully adopt this course.

That where central class teaching is obviously impossible, grants should be made to managers who successfully employ other special means to secure the thorough instruction of their pupil-teachers.

As to training colleges, while regretting the limitations which restrict the force of our colleagues' recommendations, we are glad to agree with them in desiring a third year of training for selected students; and the extension of training generally by the association of day students with places of higher general education; and in the recommendation of a conscience clause for day students who might be admitted to the existing training colleges.

As to compulsion, we cordially concur in the recommendation that the minimum age for half-time exemption from school attendance should be 11, and for full time exemption 13, and that half-time should only be conceded to those who are beneficially and necessarily employed at work.

We agree with the majority that the process of recovering fines under the Summary Jurisdiction Act of 1879, by distress instead of by commitment, has, in some cases, encouraged parents to defy the law, and has added greatly to the labour involved in carrying out compulsion.

We agree in recommending the establishment of truant schools; that local committees should be more generally appointed under section 32 of the Act of 1876;. and that school attendance committees should hold meetings from time to time in various parts of their district.

We agree also in the recommendations made by our colleagues in reference to children at theatres, that theatrical employment should be brought under the Factory Acts, with necessary modifications.


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As to the curriculum, we agree that drawing should, as far as practicable, be a compulsory subject for all boys, and that in the case of girls it should be encouraged under suitable conditions.

We think, with our colleagues, that history might be introduced earlier than at present into the school curriculum. We approve of the extension of the practical teaching of cookery. We agree that the present special preference of English above the other class subjects should be removed from the Code.

We agree in the continuance of the recognition of teaching singing by ear, but we believe that gradually singing by note may become practically universal. We approve of the extension of systematised physical exercises, and we think that it is through the training colleges that the teaching of a safe and scientific system should be introduced generally into our schools, by making instruction in these exercises, and some knowledge of physiology, a part of the college curriculum.

We agree also generally with our colleagues in the minimum curriculum laid down by them for village schools, which includes reading, writing, arithmetic, needlework for girls, linear drawing for boys, singing, English, so as to give the children an adequate knowledge of their mother tongue, English history, taught by means of reading books, geography, especially of the British Empire, and lessons on common objects in the lower standards, leading up to a knowledge of elementary science in the higher standards.

We agree largely in some of the recommendations of our colleagues on other points of the curriculum, especially in reference to the increase of the number of reading books, the diminution of the importance to be attached to spelling, especially in the lower classes, the re-construction of the arithmetic standards, and the importance of securing an intelligent understanding of arithmetical principles as well as mechanical accuracy in the application of rules.

We agree that the system of standards should be so applied as to give perfect freedom of classifying scholars according to their^attainments and abilities.

We agree with our colleagues in recommending several schemes of instruction, so as to provide for various classes of schools curricula varying in breadth and completeness with the number of scholars in attendance, and with the character and requirements of the population, though we regret that the efficacy of this recommendation is much diminished by no provision being made in the chapter on the Parliamentary grant for additional aid towards the increased cost of such an extended scheme.

We agree with our colleagues that it is desirable that there should be school libraries in every school. And we also agree as to the inexpediency of introducing recognised Government text-books.

We agree, heartily, with the very valuable recommendations of our colleagues as to evening schools.

We also agree, generally, with them as to industrial schools, and the education of workhouse children.

We also agree that Welsh schools, owing to the wide prevalence of the Welsh language, need special treatment, and we agree, generally, with our colleagues on the subject of Welsh schools.

As to elementary schools and higher education, subject to the remark that we regret the reserves which accompany some of the recommendations, we agree that higher elementary schools are a useful (we would rather say a necessary) addition to our school machinery for primary education; and that due precautions should be taken not to exclude the promising children of poor parents from the privileges to be enjoyed in them. That, where such schools cannot be founded, higher classes for children who have passed the 7th Standard should be attached to an ordinary elementary school; that the supply of satisfactory secondary schools should be organised and should be made adequate for the wants of all parts of the country; and that increased funds should be provided out of which to create sufficient exhibitions for deserving elementary scholars needing further instruction at those schools.

We agree with the majority of our colleagues that facilities should be given whereby poor persons may obtain the payment of moderate school fees for their children in voluntary as well as in board schools, without any association with ideas of pauperism. That the guardians should pay the fees of the children of those receiving out-door relief direct to the school managers.

That fees should be paid on behalf of poor persons for children, whether under five years old or exempt from legal obligation to attend school.

We agree with the majority, in the event of some form of proportional representation being retained, as to which we are not all of the same opinion, that large towns should


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be divided into constituencies returning not more than five members each, and a majority of us consider the best mode of securing proportional representation to be the single transferable vote.

We also agree that a longer term of office, with partial renewal, would be an improvement in the constitution of school boards.

We now desire to pass to those portions of the report from which we dissent, and to indicate the reasons why we are unable to sign the report of the majority of our colleagues, and we shall conclude by setting out some recommendations in addition to those as to which we concur with our colleagues.

In reference to the introductory or historical part of the report down to the year 1870, while we agree that some notice of the previous state of things might be expedient, we cannot accept the responsibility for the detailed history of the progress of elementary education from the establishment of an Educational Committee of the Privy Council in 1839 down to 1870. Moreover, the earlier part of this period down to 1860 was dealt with by the Duke of Newcastle's Commission. If, however, it were necessary for us to form an opinion, we should say that the deficiencies in popular education, both in quality and extent, and the structural defects in existing schools, were greater than the historical summary of our colleagues admits; and we think that the need for an Act establishing popular education on a secure basis was urgent at that time.

But we are content to begin our consideration of elementary education in England in the year 1870, using what had gone before as matter of illustration and explanation, but not of independent treatment.

We pass to the question of school supply, dealt with in chapter 1 of part 3 of the report.

We dissent from the mode in which the right and duty of school boards to supply accommodation for their districts is stated in the report. Sec. 18 of the Education Act of 1870 runs as follows: "The school board shall maintain and keep efficient every school provided by such board and shall from time to time provide such additional accommodation as is in their opinion necessary in order to supply a sufficient amount of public school accommodation for their district." The right thus conferred on school boards has been generally treated by our colleagues as the contention of Mr. Cumin, or of the Department, or of the law officers of the Crown. It appears to us that the words of the Act quoted are perfectly clear, and we are strongly of opinion that the attacks so frequently made against the Department for recognizing and sustaining the prior right of school boards to supply any deficiencies of accommodation are without foundation, and that the Department would have been guilty of disobedience to the Act of Parliament had it acted otherwise than it has done.

The suggestion that the action of the Department has been at variance with the language used by Mr. Forster when he had charge of the Bill in the House of Commons is not supported by any evidence. No such passage was produced to us; on the contrary, passages in Mr. Forster' s speeches affirm the principle which he is suggested to have opposed. On the 27th June 1870, Mr. Forster said, (Report of Debates on Education Bill of 1870, p. 299). that "If the school board filled up the gap absolutely and entirely, keeping pace with the population there would be no room for any one else; but he had not that faith in human nature to suppose that that would be immediately and thoroughly done in every case, and wherever it was not done any person who was anxious to supply the deficiency would be in precisely the same position as at the present time."

It is stated, as ground of complaint against the Department, that they refuse to exercise the discretion of giving or refusing grants to unnecessary schools which the 98th section of the Act of 1870, in order to meet the equity of exceptional cases, put into their hands, and that it is contended that the interpretation thus given to the Act conflicts with the whole idea of religious liberty, which should give to the parents the right of deciding in what faith their children should be educated, and further on it is stated that the interpretation put upon sec. 98 of the Act by Mr. Cumin is somewhat strained. The section says: "The Education Department may refuse a grant if they think the school unnecessary."

The fact is that the first recorded instance where the Education Department refused a grant to a school on the ground that it was unnecessary was in 1876, when the Duke of Richmond and the present Lord Harrowby were at the head of the Education Department, and the case occurred in a non school board district at Keynsham,


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where a Church of England school existed and where a British school was refused annual grants.*

We must therefore dissent from the whole of this summary of the law as to unnecessary schools, and from the impression conveyed, which is that the Education Department has strained the law in favour of school boards and against the recognition of denominational schools.

We dissent from the statement of our colleagues (p. 60) that when the first deficiency of school provision has been supplied, the school board has, under section 18 of the Act of 1870, only a right and not a duty to supply further and future deficiencies.

The earlier part of the section gives the school board the right to supply the deficiency, but the later part of the section describes the function of the school board as a duty, and enacts that the Education Department may send a requisition to the school board, requiring them to perform the duty of supplying a sufficient amount of public school accommodation, and, failing obedience, the Education Department may pronounce the school board in default.

In reference to the paragraph "Remedy for Grievances", while we concur with the majority of our colleagues in the statement that the remedy for such grievances as those of the Roman Catholics in the Dan-y-craig case lies in a more liberal interpretation of the word "suitability", and while we would recommend the amendment of the law in this respect so as to bring it in harmony with the Scotch Education Act, we must dissent from their statement that it also lies in a close adherence to the spirit of the provisions of the Act of 1870. This imputation on the Department is we think, unwarranted. The spirit and the letter of the Act of 1870 do not recognize the right of volunteers to compete with the school board in supplying new State-aided schools for the population. We wish further to point oat that the extension of the meaning of suitability as recommended by our colleagues will involve the supply of board schools under popular management where at present only denominational schools exist, and where the population is not wholly of the denomination of the managers of the school.

In reference to the question "Who may use the supply?" discussed on pp. 60 and 61, we regret the suggestion of a doubt as to the right of all to use the public elementary schools. Even before 1870, persons of the middle class could send their children to elementary schools receiving Parliamentary aid, though capitation grants were not paid in respect of the education of such children; and even this restriction was swept away by the Act of 1870, which merely defined an elementary school as a school at which elementary education is the principal part of the education given, and at which the ordinary payments from each scholar do not exceed 9d a week. The legal right of persons above the operative class to use the schools was challenged by an amendment to exclude the children of persons in receipt of £150 a year from the board schools. This amendment was moved by Col. Beresford on clause 14 of the Bill, and negatived; and we entirely concur with the opinion which Mr. Forster expressed when he said that in many cases there might be considerable advantage in having children of all classes attending the same school. The Education Act for Scotland announces in the preamble its purpose as being "that the means of procuring efficient instruction for their children may be furnished and made available to the whole people of Scotland", and we claim the same advantage for England also.

In reference to the paragraph on voluntary managers, and to the suggestion that the practically sole control of so many village schools by the clergy has the confidence of the country and has worked well, without in any way disparaging the unselfish efforts of the clergy, we are strongly of opinion, that in the country, where there can generally be but one school for the compulsory attendance of all, whatever their religious belief, it is a serious disadvantage that the control of the school should be in the hands of one religious body, and that the community generally should be excluded from a voice in the selection of the teacher and the management of the school, and we shall be greatly disappointed if, among the changes imminent in local government, provision is not made to remedy this state of things.

In reference to the chapter on Her Majesty's inspectors, we do not consider that the suggestion that the examination is made competitive finds any general justification in the evidence; on the contrary, we are of opinion that the evidence rather points to the fact that, owing to the poverty of the voluntary schools, some of the inspectors have lowered their standard to a minimum lower even than the Code, for fear of

*See also the case of the Buckingham School Board, 1875.


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shutting up schools which depend on the grant for existence, and which yet fall below the standard of teaching which would deserve recognition and payment, and that this is the danger against which it is most important to guard, and not a tendency to make the examination too difficult.*

In reference to provisionally certificated teachers, we think the conclusion that the system has served its purpose, and is now dying a natural death, is incomplete and inadequate, especially bearing in mind the startling fact that 63 young persons, who failed in the scholarship examination in 1885, were nevertheless recognised by the Department as qualified to take sole charge of schools having an average attendance of less than 60.

We are strongly of opinion that no person should be recognised even as an assistant at the close of pupil teachership without at least passing the scholarship examination in the 1st or 2nd division, and that no one who has not satisfactorily passed the certificate examination should be recognised as a head teacher.

As to pupil teachers, we strongly dissent from the proposition (p. 88) that having regard to moral qualifications, there is no other equally trustworthy source from which an adequate supply of teachers is likely to be forthcoming. Indeed, bearing in mind the statement of our colleagues, in an earlier part of the chapter, as to the valuable influence of women of superior social position and general culture, we can hardly reconcile the two statements, and we are certainly of opinion that the moral securities we should look for in our future teachers are not likely to be diminished, but on the contrary greatly increased by a wider course and a prolonged period of preliminary education before students are trusted with the management of classes.

In general we consider that the pupil teacher system is now the weakest part of our educational machinery, and that great changes are needed in it if it is to be continued the future. We should deplore the reduction of the commencing age to 13, recommended by our colleagues, and we think rather that no pupil teacher should entrusted with a class till he or she is at least 15 years of age; the first year two of apprenticeship being almost entirely employed in learning.

As to training colleges, we do not think that chapter in the report does justice to the greatness of the need for better training.

We cannot admit that Mr. Matthew Arnold favoured us with but few details of the points of superiority in foreign teachers. His evidence and his recent report to which he referred us, are full of emphatic assertions and illustrations of the very great superiority, in his judgment, both in the culture of the professors and in the breadth of treatment of the curriculum in German and French as compared with English training colleges, and the better preliminary training of the students, as causes of the greatly superior teaching efficiency which he recognised especially in the German schools.

We think that the figures given on page 95 disprove rather than prove the adaptation of our colleges to our school system, for while 56.2 per cent, of the school children are said to be in denominational schools, the Education reports show that 662 students were in undenominational, and 2,610 students in denominational colleges in 1887, or nearly 80 per cent in denominational and 20 per cent in undenominational colleges. If the proportions in the colleges were the same as the proportions in the schools, there would be about 1,850 students in denominational colleges instead of 2,610, and 1,422 students in undenominational colleges instead of 662. Moreover, we cannot admit that the annual grant to training colleges constitutes a binding engagement with the State, and we are clearly of opinion that Parliament is entitled to review the conditions on which these grants are made.

In reference to the conscience clause in residential training colleges, we dissent from the arguments and conclusions of the report of the majority. The statement that its introduction would destroy all unity of christian family life, whether in a denominational or undenominational college, and would interfere fatally with the framework of ordinary domestic and moral discipline, has, in our opinion, no sufficient foundation.

Practically, an informal conscience clause does exist in the British and Foreign colleges, where the students are free to go to their own places of worship, and where even Jews have been admitted to training. When we bear in mind the ease with which the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge have adapted themselves to the conditions of religious freedom, and the widest divergence of theological opinion, when we find

*See chapter 14 on comparison of board and voluntary schools.


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the same religious liberty working well at the female colleges of Girton and Newnham, we cannot but feel that the mode in which the possibility of a conscience clause has been criticised is far too emphatic.

We must bear in mind that a majority of all the teachers who now get their certificates, and a large majority of the women who get certificates, are not brought up in these residential training colleges, but take service as acting teachers and then sit for their certificates, and yet these untrained teachers are largely employed by the clergy in their village schools. If the discipline of a residential denominational training college were necessary for the formation of the character of a teacher, the clergy would not appoint these acting teachers in the large numbers they now do.

But we must still further dissent from the report of the majority on the ground that we consider the concessions they make to an alternative system of training are too grudging and restricted. Thus they put a veto on the interesting scheme for training suggested by Mr. McCarthy, of the Birmingham School Board, which we should be glad to see tried experimentally, at any rate, in one or two towns.

Our colleagues state that if his proposals were carried out they would at once lead to a claim from the existing colleges for largely increased grants. We fail entirely to see any ground which would justify such a claim. They estimate the cost to the State of each student trained on Mr. McCarthy's plan at £50. Students in existing training colleges cost the State about £100 for each master and £70 for each mistress trained. We cannot understand what moral claim those who now get £100 or £70 per student have to receive more, because others are to be paid £50 per student. The report also complains of Mr. McCarthy's scheme that it would pro tanto supersede the pupil-teacher system. We think in so far as it did this, it would substitute a far better system, and we may refer to the evidence of Dr. Graham, of the Roman Catholic training college at Hammersmith, as indicating that in his judgment a plan of training not very dissimilar from Mr. McCarthy's would be a good one.

We think that the other schemes suggested to us of training students in connexion with places of higher education deserve a much heartier support than they receive in the report of the majority, and we also think that if professional training is to be extended for our elementary teachers, it is improper to prohibit any aid being derived from the rates. Such aid would be a trifling charge compared with the total cost of education, and would bring an ample return in the increased efficiency of the teachers. If twice as many students were in training as are now, that is, if 3,200 more students were trained in day training colleges, we believe that a Parliamentary grant materially lower than that now made on behalf of a student in existing training colleges with reasonable fees of students and a small subvention, which might often prove unnecessary, from the school board or other public authority would suffice to defray the cost of training in connexion with local colleges existing or to be founded.

The recognition of urgent need for more trained teachers is of little value unless effective machinery is provided whereby that need may be met, and we consider the statement of our colleagues that they "cannot doubt that the liberality of those who are anxious to see day training colleges provided will furnish whatever sums are needed", is an assumption which experience does not justify, nor is it reasonable, when an urgent public need is acknowledged, to wait in expectation that private liberality may relieve the public from its consequent pecuniary obligations.

We assent to the continuance of grants to the existing denominational training colleges, partly in deference to the strenuous desire of the advocates of denominational education to preserve a strongly denominational system of training with vigilant domestic discipline, but we cannot assent to the statement in the report that the existing system of residential training colleges is the best both for the teachers and the scholars of the public elementary schools of the country, and we only acquiesce in the continuance of these grants in the hope that the system of training now in force in Scotland may be largely imitated here, in the association of training with higher education, in the great extension of facilities for day students and in the liberal recognition of the rights of conscience, and we look to the adoption of these reforms as enabling us hereafter to dispense almost entirely with the employment of untrained teachers.


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In reference to the chapter on attendance and compulsion, we record our opinion that more emphasis should be laid on the want of thorough teaching in our schools, as a reason for the lack of interest and consequent bad attendance of scholars, and for the readiness of parents to withdraw their children from school. We agree with Mr. Stewart that a well found, well taught, school will rarely have to complain of bad attendance.* When we remember the evidence of Mr. Muscott, that, owing to the difficulty of teaching the various standards in a village school, the teacher does not encourage the children to continue their schooling beyond the Fourth Standard, and that in some districts the fees are deliberately raised after the Fourth Standard, for the purpose of obtaining the labour of the children; we think that more prominence should be given to the unsatisfactory state of many of our schools, as a reason for the indifference or reluctance of parents to send their children to school regularly or for a longer period.

We are also unable to agree with the report, in omitting to condemn the manner in which compulsion has hitherto been administered. We think the evidence shows that the magistrates generally have failed adequately to support the local school authorities in enforcing the law, especially in relation to the obligations of the Act of 1876 as to children between 13 and 14, which has become largely a dead letter through the opposition of the magistrates.

In reference to the recommendations of our colleagues as to religious and moral training, we repeat our strong opinion that in the education of the young the formation of the character is of the highest importance. But, having regard to the great diversities of opinion among our countrymen on religious subjects, and having serious doubts whether moral training can be satisfactorily tested by inspection or examination, we do not believe that the recommendations contained in this portion of the report of our colleagues would promote the object which we desire.

We recognise that for the great mass of the people of this country, religious and moral teaching are most intimately connected, and that, in their judgment, the value and effectiveness of the latter depend to a very great extent upon religious sanctions. We think that the present liberty of religious teaching, recognised by the law for local managers, is an ample security, that so long as the prevalent opinion of the country remains unchanged, the education of the children and the formation of their character will be based upon those principles which are dear to the mass of the people.

Bearing in mind the fact that in only 8 per cent of the voluntary schools answering our circular were the registers finally closed before the religious teaching and observances, and that about the same proportion appeared in the returns from head teachers, we dissent from the proposal that the present liberty of managers should be interfered with by requiring them finally to close all registers before the religious teaching and observances. At the same time, in the interest of discipline and punctuality, we should be glad to see any regulations introduced which would not be exposed to the charge of indirectly enforcing that attendance on religious teaching which should be voluntary; we therefore recommend that, where there is but one room and one teacher, attendance be not compulsory till after the time of religious teaching, but where there is more than one teacher and a class room, that children withdrawn from religious teaching be given secular instruction in a separate room.

We dissent from the statement that the fourteenth section of the Act of 1870 merely provided for perfect neutrality among Christian denominations. Jews, free-thinkers, and any other persons who refuse to entrust the religious teaching of their children to others, are all equally entitled both under section 14 and under section 7 to a perfect exemption from any instruction in religious subjects at any time while the school is open.

We think that the evidence shows that the moral teaching under our present school system has been most valuable, and this is given throughout the whole school time largely by the personal influence of the teacher, and is not confined to specific religious teaching, but can also be given through secular illustrations.

While we attach the very greatest importance to the moral element in our national education, we differ from our colleagues in their recommendation that it is to the

*Stewart, Ed. Report, 1887-88, p. 548.


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State we should look for increased support to the moral element of training in our schools. We would rather look to the local interest taken and to the influence that managers and parents can bring to bear on the conduct of the school, together with the personal character of the teacher for maintaining that high moral standard among the scholars which it is the object of the State to secure. While we approve of the present requirement that the managers shall satisfy the inspector that all reasonable care is taken in the moral training of the children, we think it would be a misfortune if in any way the duty of fully ascertaining the moral conduct of the school were transferred to the inspector from the managers. The inspector can notice manifest faults of conduct, but he cannot really estimate the full value of the higher moral influences that are found pervading a thoroughly good school.

While we insist upon moral teaching and believe that more systematic moral teaching if given with earnestness would have a very valuable influence on the characters of the scholars, we think that any systematic inspection of morals by Her Majesty's inspector, such as is suggested in the chapter on the Parliamentary grant, would not only be of no value, but would, where the local managers and teachers did not themselves feel the importance of moral influences, be of positive injury as leading to hypocritical and mechanical teaching of that which must come from a free expression of conscientious conviction.

In reference to the chapter on the curriculum, we dissent from what seems to be suggested in the contrast between England and Scotland, namely, that the English people should permanently continue to accept an inferior type of popular education to that which exists in Scotland.

We must further point out that the recommendations of our colleagues on the Parliamentary grant fail to give effect to some important parts of the chapter on the curriculum with which we agree. Thus, the chapter on the curriculum recommends several schemes of instruction, so as to provide for various classes of schools a curriculum varying in breadth and completeness with the number of scholars in attendance, and with the character and requirements of the population. But in the chapter on the Parliamentary grant, no additional provision is made for aid, beyond what may be given for the minimum elementary curriculum required of village schools.

We dissent from the recommendation on page 140, that the instruction to be paid for out of rates and taxes shall be fixed by the Legislature. If all that is permissible to be taught in an elementary school is henceforward to be fixed by Parliament, a proposal from which we dissent, then the limitations should apply equally to voluntary as to board schools. But we think that the right of managers now recognized by the Code to teach other subjects, in addition to those mentioned in the Code, should continue.

The whole of the paragraph entitled "Limits of Elementary Education yet to be defined" seems to us unfriendly to the desirable progress of our educational system.

We dissent from the recommendations of our colleagues as to the management of technical schools when established. This question is one on which we took no evidence, and, in so far as technical schools deal with secondary education, lies beyond the limits of our reference, but if we may venture upon an opinion, we would say that whether the municipality be associated in their management or not, we think it desirable that the school board should also be associated, and that these schools, which should be the crown and development of elementary education, should be in touch and close sympathy through their management with our elementary school system.

The severance of all financial connexion between local authorities and voluntary schools was one of the prominent features of the Act of 1870 as it was passed, and it was to avoid the burning questions likely to be raised if local aid from the rates were granted to schools under denominational and not under public management, that the Parliamentary grant was largely increased.

We hold strongly that local public support implies local public management, and therefore while some of the instruction given by school boards, such as instruction in cookery, and collective instruction of pupil-teachers, or practical, scientific, artistic, technical, or manual teaching in centres, might possibly be thrown open under suitable regulations to the scholars or pupil-teachers of voluntary schools, we cannot see our way to support a proposal to impose on the ratepayers a contribution in support of voluntary elementary schools.

We dissent from the recommendation of the report, that where any structural or sanitary improvements are demanded by the Education Department in schools which


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have been already recognised for annual grants, the State shall contribute to such alterations.

It is our duty to point out that a large number of schools are structurally much below any proper standard of efficiency. The Education Department, ever since 1870, having regard to the great pressure in the matter of school accommodation, has been extremely indulgent in tolerating unsatisfactory premises. Nevertheless, for several years past, a steady pressure by the inspectors, coupled in many instances with a growing sense on the part of the managers of what is due to the children, has led to great improvements in lighting, ventilation, class-rooms, furniture, &c.,in many schools. There is no reason why those who have been most remiss in making the school buildings suitable, should profit by their own delay, and get the help of public money to do that which more public-spirited managers have already done at their own cost.

This proposal would amount to a renewal of building grants in their worst form as an encouragement to long accumulated neglect.

The proposal would also arrest voluntary action by managers in the way of improving school premises. Henceforward, managers would be tempted to wait till the inspector insisted on some improvement in order to obtain the Government subsidy before executing it.

If this proposal were conceded, then if an unsuitable building wore absolutely condemned, analogy would suggest a building grant for the purpose of supplying new premises.

We must dissent from the recommendations of our colleagues in Part 4, Chapter 4, as to the transfer of schools to school boards.

Their proposed amendment of section 23 of the Education Act, 1870, would make the consent of the trustees as well as of the managers of a school necessary before a school could be transferred.

There is no obligation proposed by our colleagues on the trustees to conduct the school themselves as a public elementary school in the event of their refusing to transfer it, and we are of opinion that buildings dedicated to the purpose of elementary education and aided by a Parliamentary building grant should, if the existing managers are unable or unwilling to conduct schools in them, be transferred to the local authority charged with the duty of making sufficient school provision for the district. We therefore not only dissent from the recommendations of our colleagues, but recommend that where any building which has been aided by a Parliamentary building grant, exists for the elementary education of the poor, and is not used on week days for such purpose, the school board should be entitled to have the use and occupation of the building for the purpose of supplying school accommodation for their district.

We also dissent from the recommendation of the majority that in a transferred school no structural expenses involving a loan should be incurred without the consent of the trustees who lease the building to the board. We think that in the case of a building erected for educational purposes, the interests of education alone should be taken into account when structural alterations are under consideration, and the Education Department, which must sanction the loan, is the proper guardian of these interests.

We dissent from the recommendations in the chapter on the Parliamentary grant, that the terms upon which that grant is awarded, should be embodied in an Act of Parliament. This would mean in practice that the Code, instead of being issued by the Department as at present, should be part of an Act of Parliament. Such a course would tend to stereotype education, to discourage and delay improvement, and would limit the future control of the House of Commons over the expenditure, as the money would have to be voted and spent in accordance with the terms of the Act, which could not be altered without the consent of both Houses of Parliament.

We object to the proposal made by our colleagues in their chapter on income and expenditure of Schools, p. 190, that voluntary schools should be enabled to receive help from the rates up to a possible maximum of 10s a head, on the ground already indicated, that such a proposal seems to us unsound in principle, destructive of the settlement of 1870, and certain, if it became law, to embitter educational politics, and intensify sectarian rivalries.

We dissent from the recommendation on page 192, that the Education Department should not be entrusted with any censorship of fees in voluntary schools. It is as necessary that the poor should be secured a reasonable fee in districts where there are no board schools as where there are, and we think the remedy suggested, of the possible action of the inspector illusory, as it would only be used in a very extreme case.

We think that if the fee system is to be maintained, it needs many corrections to make it work fairly and tolerably to the poor, and to prevent the imposition of varying


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fees in the same school from being used as a means of oppression and of selection and exclusion of scholars.

We dissent from the chapter on local educational authorities, because we think it essential while recognising the continued existence of voluntary schools that there should everywhere be an educational authority able at once to meet a deficiency and provide schools, whereas at present in the absence of a school board, delays are repeatedly interposed before the Education Department finally orders the election of a board, and the provision of necessary accommodation.

We also regret that the remarks on page 199 on rural school boards should have stopped short without recommending that which was supported by nearly all the evidence we took, the extension of the area of the rural school board from the parish to a unit, such as the Union or new proposed county district.

In recording our dissent from so many of the conclusions of our colleagues' report we would add that we have further this general objection, that their report appears to us too often to approach proposals for the improvement of education from the point of view of considering how such improvements may affect the interests of certain classes of schools rather than how far they are desirable; and that it does not do justice to the wish that we entertain for an expansion of education, a widening of its aims, and its establishment on a broad base of local support and popular management, which would enable us to dispense with much in the present system of State aid and examination which we think unfavourable to the best modes of imparting knowledge.

There are certain points, which were either raised by our preliminary syllabus of points for inquiry, or by the evidence, or which we think worthy of note, on which we now proceed briefly to express our conclusions.

In reference to the question to what extent provision should be made for children between three and five, we are of opinion that, without dictating any exact proportion between the supply of places for infants and for elder children, it is important that there should be ample accommodation for infants, and that the attendance of children under five years of age should be encouraged.

We think in addition to the recommendations made as to the character of the accommodation in recognised efficient schools, that no building should be permitted to be used as a school, whether recognised as otherwise efficient or not, which is not satisfactory on sanitary grounds, and that any building used as a school should be certified as fit to hold such a number of children as can with due regard to their health and comfort be properly instructed in it, and that any overcrowding of such a building should be an offence, and should expose the occupier to the forfeiture of the certificate, and that it should be an offence to conduct a school in uncertified premises.

We think that it would be a material improvement and tend to raise the general education of the country if, for the purpose of school supply, smaller country parishes were consolidated, and the smaller school boards united; and, provided the areas of administration are sufficiently large, we think that in those cases where there are no school boards, there should be a competent local representative authority to whom should be entrusted the supply and management of any additional schools required.

We recommend that throughout the country, where there is a reasonable number of persons desiring them, there be schools of an undenominational character, and under popular representative management.

We recommend that persons desirous of starting a voluntary school be admitted to the receipt of annual grants on their satisfying the Education Department that there is a reasonable number of persons desiring such a school, for whose children no sufficient provision exists, regard being had to the religious belief of their parents.

We recommend that pupil-teachers be not indentured, except in schools where Her Majesty's inspector is satisfied that due care will be taken in their instruction and training.

That where, in the opinion of Her Majesty's inspector, such due care has not been taken, the permission to have pupil-teachers may be withdrawn.

That in the earlier part of their apprenticeship pupil-teachers be not reckoned on the staff, and that, in the case of unsatisfactory pupil-teachers, there be a discretion in the Department to determine their apprenticeship not later than the end of their third year.


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That the results of the yearly examination of the pupil-teachers should be promptly made known to the managers, and that, if necessary, the matters not tested at the collective examination should be examined at a special visit to the school.

That the "person over 18 approved by the inspector" recognised by Art. 84 of the Code, should cease to be accepted, except in small country schools with less than 60 in average attendance, and that in any case she be required in a year to qualify by passing an examination.

Ex-pupil-teachers should not be recognised beyond a certain age unless they pass the certificate examination in the first years' papers, and after two years interval in the second years' papers.

No acting teacher who has not got his parchment, and no person who henceforward passes lower than the second division on the second years' papers should be recognised as a head teacher.

We recommend that there be a re-adjustment of the existing grants to training colleges, so as to aid more students in day training colleges without any considerable further demand upon the public funds.

We recommend that no student be sent away from a training college without an appeal to the Education Department, which shall deal with the case as may seem equitable to it.

We recommend that the Department be specially directed to review the school supply of the country, and that the conditions under which certified efficient schools (not being public elementary schools) are now recognised be altered, so that no such school be recognised after a given date which does not comply with the educational and structural requirements imposed on public elementary schools, and which does not year by year come up to the standard of a good school.

We recommend that in infant schools the principles laid down in the instructions to inspectors should be fully carried out, and that no pressure, direct or indirect, be put upon teachers to classify the infants otherwise than according to their intellectual and physical development, or to give prominence to direct instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic to the younger children, and that the Department should encourage the special training of mistresses for infant schools, and secure that their preparation shall be as complete and thorough as for other departments.

That in lieu of the present standards, detailed graded curricula of instruction be set forth by authority varying in fullness with the capabilities of varying classes of schools.

In reference to the subject of technical and scientific instruction, we draw an important distinction between technical instruction or instruction which is designed with special reference to, and as a preliminary training for, the commercial or industrial occupations of life, and manual instruction regarded as a training of the hand and eye so as to bring them under the control of the brain and will, as a general preparation for the future career in life, whatever it may be.

Bearing in mind the age of children in elementary schools, it may be a question whether technical instruction, as we have defined it, should be commenced any earlier than the Sixth Standard. But we are of opinion that, after the children have left the infant school, transitional methods should be adopted, which will develop their activity and train their powers by drawing in all cases, and by such other means as, for instance, modelling, or the collection and mounting of botanical specimens.

This training would, on the one hand, be advantageous as naturally leading up to technical instruction, and, on the other hand, far from interfering with the more literary studies, the latter would, we believe, benefit considerably by the variety and relief which would thus be introduced.

We recommend that the examination of the scientific teaching given in our elementary schools should be mainly oral, especially up to and including the present Fifth Standard. If science is to be well taught, care should be taken that where the ordinary teachers are not qualified, specially trained teachers should be employed.

Higher grade schools should be encouraged which will prepare scholars for advanced technical and commercial instruction.


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Care must be taken not to interfere with general instruction in order to press forward technical or special teaching.

Technical teaching in the school cannot replace the practical teaching, which is best learnt in the workshop.

In ordinary elementary schools good teaching of drawing and of elementary science are the best, and in the lower classes the only fitting preparation for the work of the technical school, and these subjects should be generally taught.

Technical instruction should cover commercial and agricultural, as well as industrial instruction.

In reference to the Parliamentary grant, and to payment by results, we are of opinion that the best security for efficient teaching is the organization of our school system under local representative authorities over sufficiently extensive areas, with full power of management and responsibility for maintenance, with well graduated curricula, a liberal staff of well-trained teachers, and buildings, sanitary, suitable, and well equipped with school requisites. That it should be the duty of the State to secure that all these conditions are fulfilled, and to aid local effort to a considerable extent, but leaving a substantial proportion of the cost of school management to be met from local resources other than fees of scholars, and by its inspection to secure that the local authority is doing its duty satisfactorily.

Such a system, in our opinion, would enable us to dispense with the present system of State grants variable according to the results of yearly examination and inspection. which, in our judgment, is far from being a satisfactory method of securing efficiency, and is forced upon the country by the irresponsible and isolated character of the management of the majority of our schools. In the meantime, as the system we prefer cannot in deference to existing denominational interests be secured, we recommend that there be a material change in the method of distributing the grant, that a larger fixed grant be given in consideration of increased requirements in the matter of staff premises and curriculum; that more money be given towards specific educational objects, such as the salaries of special teachers of science, drawing, cookery, &c., of local inspectors and organising masters, of the better instruction of pupil-teachers, and further aid to secure the diminution of their hours of work, especially during the earlier years of apprenticeship. Further aid should be given to small rural schools which especially need such aid and must be costly, and the grants should be larger to managers whose fees are low than to those who have a large fee income. As to the residue of the capitation grant, which we think must, under the present conditions of English education, continue variable, we recommend that the present system of paying a percentage grant for the standard subjects shall cease; that there shall no longer be a general merit grant, but that the variable portion shall be distributed among the various subjects of instruction included in the recognised curricula, on the principle of the present class grant. We think, further, that schools which properly take up a fuller and more thorough course of studies should receive larger grants to meet their larger local expenditure.

We think that, whether free education be or be not desirable, no practicable scheme for universal free schools, consistent with the continuance of the voluntary school system, has been presented to us.

We think that where a school board wishes, it should be at liberty to make any one or more of its schools free, or to lower the fee without requiring the consent of the Education Department.

We think that in voluntary as well as in board schools the Education Department should be required to approve the fee in order to secure that it is not beyond the means of the generality of the parents.

We think that the fee should cover all the cost of the school to the parent, and should, as a rule, be uniform, not rising with the class or standard.

All these conclusions we humbly submit to Your Majesty's most gracious consideration.

E. LYULPH STANLEY.
JOHN LUBBOCK.
B. SAMUELSON.
R. W. DALE.
SYDNEY BUXTON.*
THOMAS EDMUND HELLER.
HENRY RICHARD.
GEORGE SHIPTON.
July 12, 1888.

*Subject to the reservation bearing his signature.


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RESERVATION

I feel obliged to express dissent from the above report on one point, namely, on the question of the abolition of school fees.

The arguments and the evidence are, it seems to me, on the whole, in favour of the introduction of a system of free schools - a system, however, not compulsory, but permissive. In order to obviate any injury to the voluntary system, the same terms ought to be offered to voluntary as to board schools; namely, that the managers of any and every public elementary school should, if they desire the abolition of the fee, be entitled to demand an additional annual grant from the Consolidated Fund. This additional grant might be calculated on the general average of the fees charged throughout the elementary schools of the country, and depend on the average attendance at the particular school in question.

SYDNEY BUXTON







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We, the undersigned Commissioners, in addition to the report dissenting from the majority, and summarising our own conclusions which we have already signed, beg to submit to Your Majesty this further report, discussing more in detail the evidence taken by us, and the general position of Elementary Education at the present day.

CHAPTER 1

SCHOOL SUPPLY

The Act of 1870 found this country in a lamentable position of deficiency in respect to the supply of schools, the quality of elementary education, and the attendance of children at existing schools.

The accommodation needed in that year was for 3,682,000 scholars, and the total number of places in schools under Government inspection was 1,878,000, or little more than one-half of that number. Even these were not well distributed, nor could the buildings, in many cases, be considered anything but most unsatisfactory; and the education given, which, according to the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, was generally far from efficient, is represented by many witnesses not to have improved between 1862 and 1870. The total number of children in average attendance in inspected schools in 1870 was 1,152,000; the total number on the roll of the same schools was 1,693,000, or about 46 per cent of those who should and might have been at school.

To meet, and, as far as possible, to remedy, this state of things, was the object of the Act of 1870. It was introduced, avowedly as a compromise between the various persons, parties, and bodies who were interested in the question of education, and whose conflicting views had till then prevented any general scheme of legislation. Many were in favour of establishing a national system, under popular management, in the place of the voluntary and mainly denominational schools, which, up to that time, were the sole recognised means of public instruction. But the Government of the day determined not merely to accept the aid which voluntary bodies had hitherto given to the work of education, but while throwing on the school boards then called into existence the primary duty of supplying existing and future deficiencies of school provision, to give special facilities for a limited period to voluntary effort to assist in meeting those deficiencies, and not to exclude their co-operation in the future.

Mr. W. E. Forster, in the debate on the third reading of the Bill, after noticing some of the changes which the measure had undergone in its passage through the House of Commons said - "The principle of the Bill has been adhered to, and I think the mode in which it has been decided to carry out that principle is not unworthy of it. The principle was this: a legal enactment that there shall be efficient schools throughout the kingdom, and compulsory provision for the schools where needed, but not unless such need were proved. It was in these words that I described the Bill when I introduced it, and when we send the Bill up to the other House this principle will still be in it."

The history of elementary education since the passing of the Act of 1870 has been one of remarkable progress, and considering the many burning questions which are closely associated with the relations of the State to education, we may congratulate ourselves that, on the whole, so much good work has been done with comparatively little friction.

Dealing first with that which was put most prominently forward by the framers of the Act, the supply of efficient schools throughout the kingdom, we proceed to consider how far that object has been accomplished.

For many years the Education Department has assumed that school provision is needed for one-sixth of the population in any locality. The bulk of the children attending elementary schools are between the ages of 3 and 13, and the proportion of children of the whole population between those ages was in 1871 rather more than 23 per cent. About a seventh of the population are reckoned as above the class


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usually frequenting elementary schools; and, after deducting these, a further deduction of one-eighth is made for various causes of absence, including the proportion of children under five whose parents prefer not to send them to school. The more recent census figures show that the proportion of children between 3 and 13 to the whole population is larger than when this estimate was framed.

Jt has been urged on the Commission by some witnesses that children between three and five should not be reckoned in estimating the need for school provision, and it appears to be suggested in some questions and answers that it is barely legal to make provision for them. In reference to this point, it may be observed that long before the Act of 1870 was passed, the encouragement of the attendance of young infants was a characteristic of English education. This country took the lead in the establishment of infant schools, and Parliament recognised them by grants of money from the early days of capitation grants. They were a part of the existing system of education when the Act of 1870 was passed; the Code in force in 1870 recognised and provided for payment on account of them; and it seems difficult to imagine any illegality in a system which has been for many years sanctioned and aided by the Codes of the Education Department and by Parliamentary Votes. A very few witnesses, specially the Rev. D. J. Stewart, have questioned the advantage of admitting these very young children into school, but the overwhelming mass of testimony - with which we agree - is in favour of their retention, not only on grounds of convenience to poor parents whose children are cared for, while they themselves are set free for their work, not only on the ground of the happiness of the children who are received in warm, bright rooms, and animated by cheerful occupations, instead of being relegated to the streets, but on the ground of the valuable moral training in habits of tidiness, order, and obedience, and the awakening of their intellects, and development of their activity by the suitable methods of the kindergarten now so widely practised in our best infant schools.

Other critics, among whom the Rev. J. Diggle, Chairman of the London School Board, may be included, do not absolutely object to the reception of these infants, but think an undue amount of accommodation has been provided for them.

On this point it may be noted that the Education Department has never dictated the proportions in which school provision should be distributed between boys, girls, and infants, and the different school boards in the country have used their own discretion in planning their schools. If yearly averages are made the test of the accommodation needed, then rather more accommodation should be provided for boys than for girls; for undoubtedly the value of an elder girl in the household leads to greater irregularity of attendance, which makes the average attendance in a girls' school almost invariably lower, and commonly lower by two or three per cent than in boys' schools; but it would be a great mistake on this account to diminish the relative size of the girls' schools. So too there are exceptional circumstances which will be dwelt on hereafter, which cause infants' schools to be extremely fluctuating in their attendance, and therefore render it necessary that there should be an apparently larger surplus of accommodation in infant than in boys' or girls' schools. The testimony of Mr. Williams, Superintendent of Visitors of East Lambeth, is very strong in favour of the ample provision of infant school accommodation. But even supposing that in the distribution of a thousand school places rather fewer should be allotted to the infants, this would not affect the principle that places are needed for at least a sixth of the population, for we find, as will be shown further on, that in districts where there is no very large proportion of infant accommodation, school accommodation is required by more than a sixth, sometimes by nearly a fifth of the population of the district.

Experience has proved that where sufficient schools are provided it is common to secure the enrolment of one-sixth and more than one-sixth of the population. In Lancashire and in the West Riding it is not uncommon to find close upon a fifth of the population on the roll of the public elementary schools of the town. The same is shown by the evidence of Prebendary Roe as to the small rural parishes of Somersetshire. A minimum school provision for one sixth of the population is therefore a moderate demand for the Education Department to make; and where the population is largely made up of the operative class, it has been found necessary to supply schools for nearly a fifth.

On the assumption that all the school places in the public elementary schools of the country are available and. suitable, it would appear that the deficiencies of school accommodation have been substantially overtaken.

In 1870 one-sixth of the population was 3,682,000, and the public elementary school accommodation was 1,878,000 places, or about 51 per cent of the amount needed.


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No doubt there were many uninspected schools in those days, mostly belonging to the Church of England, which were supplying some kind of education. It was alleged by the National Society that there were 600,000 places in such schools. There were also a certain number of similar schools not connected with the Church of England, and some private adventure schools and dame schools, a few of which still exist, but not in numbers sufficient to affect materially the figures of school accommodation at the present time.

Comparing the year 1870 with the year 1886, we find that in the former year one-sixth of the population of England and Wales was 3,682,000, and there were 1,879,000 school places, 1,559,000 children on the roll, and 1,152,000 children in average attendance in day schools inspected for annual grants; thus the school places were 51 per cent, the children on the roll 42 per cent, and the children in average of the attendance 31 per cent of one- sixth of the population.

In 1886 one-sixth of the population was estimated at 4,645,097. In day schools inspected during the year the school places were 5,145,000, the scholars on the roll 4,506,000, the scholars in average attendance 3,438,000; thus the school places were 111 per cent, the scholars on the roll 97 per cent, and the average attendance 74 per cent of one-sixth of the population.

Again, in 1870, though a much smaller proportion of the population was provided with schools, the relation the number on the roll bore to the accommodation was 83 per cent, in 1886 the number on the roll was 87 per cent of the accommodation.

In 1870 the average attendance was 61 per cent of the accommodation. In 1886 the average attendance was 67 per cent of the accommodation.

The regularity of attendance in 1870 was expressed by the fact that the average was 74 per cent of the number on the roll. In 1886 it was 76 per cent of the number on the roll, notwithstanding the fact that large classes of the population who could not previously be reached have been swept into school.

The Church of England schools have gone up from 1,365,000 places to 2,549,000 places, a growth of 1,184,000 places, and this in spite of the transfer of a considerable number of church schools to boards. Of this increase, a large proportion is probably due to the improvement of the schools which in 1870 were not under Government inspection, but if we take those brought under inspection as containing 500,000 places, or even at the full number of 600,000 estimated by the National Society, we shall still have evidence of great activity and voluntary effort on the part of members of the Church of England to extend the school system connected with their principles.

The school boards, which had practically no schools except a handful of transferred ones (many of them ragged schools) before 1873, had 1,750,000 places in the year ending August, 1886; of these a certain number, probably more than 160,000 were in transferred schools, but the great bulk of these places have been provided in new schools built by loans at the cost of the several localities on the security of the rates.

The whole increase of voluntary schools since 1870, is from 1,878,000 places to 3,417,000 places, an increase of 1,539,000 places, of which, 1,184,000 places being due to the Church of England, the remaining 355,000 places must be distributed among the Roman Catholics, the Wesleyans, the British and other undenominational schools.

Now, if all this accommodation were well distributed, and were fully available, it might be said that there was a sufficient margin to enable us to consider the work of school provision practically complete, except in localities where a sudden growth of population might disturb our calculations; but there are two or three reasons why we cannot reckon on these nominal 5,145,000 places to the full extent. In the first place they are very unequally distributed. Taking the table at page xli. of the Report of the Committee of the Privy Council for 1886-7, where the total number of school places is given at 5,200,685 (it may be noted that the figures often differ in various parts of the blue books according as they are the figures of the schools inspected within the year or the totals of schools receiving annual grants), we may compare the accommodation county by county with the population according to the census of 1881. Of course, in some parts of England, the population has increased since then, and we have not therefore an accurate standard of comparison, but even allowing for this, it will be found how unequally the school provision is distributed. Thus in Lancashire the theoretic proportion of one-sixth was 575,744, the school provision was 780,134 places, an excess of nearly 205,000 places, or more than 37 per cent. In Yorkshire the excess of school places over one-sixth of the population was 120,000, or nearly 25 per cent; in Durham, 35,000, or more than 24 per cent; in London it was 11,000, or not quite 1¾ per cent; in Wales it was 81,000, or nearly 31 per cent.


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On the other hand, in the principal towns of England with more than 100,000 inhabitants, there is accommodation for less than a sixth of the population. Thus, in Liverpool, the estimated population in 1886 was 586,320, and the school provision in the return to our Circular B 85,765 places, or 12,000 less than one-sixth. In Birkenhead the estimated population was 95,370, the school provision 15,416, or about 600 less than a sixth. In Hull the estimated population was 191,501, and the school provision 29,924, or 2,000 less than a sixth. In Sheffield the population was 310,957, the school provision 47,416 places, or 4,300 places less than one-sixth. In Sunderland the population was 127,487, the school places 17,858, or about 3,300 less than one-sixth. In Newcastle the population was 155,117, and the school provision about 2,500 less than one-sixth. In Birmingham the estimated population was 434,381, the school places were 62,915, or about 9,500 less than one-sixth. In Nottingham the estimated population was 217,733, the school places were 33,570, or about 2,700 places less than one-sixth. In Bristol the estimated population was 220,915, the school places were 32,366, or about 4,400 less than one-sixth. In Portsmouth, with an estimated population of 136,276, the school places were 4,000 less than one-sixth. In Brighton the school places fell short of one-sixth of the population by about 2,500.

The annexed Table shows the growth and the relative proportions, from 1870 till now, of all public elementary schools, of voluntary and of board schools to one-sixth of the population:

[click on the image for a larger version]

These figures show how far the deficiencies of school provision existing in 1870 had been overtaken by 1886.

The constant demand for new schools which still continues in the urban and populous districts of England can only be effectually met by the action of school boards. In cases where school boards have not been called into existence there has


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been delay and difficulty in securing school provision, and many inconveniences are shown to have resulted, as may be seen in the pages of the yearly blue books. Where school boards exist, the practice of the Department has put administrative hindrances in the way of the power of providing schools which was conferred on the boards by the Act of 1870. Section 18 of the Act of 1870 provides, "The school board shall maintain and keep efficient every school provided by such board, and shall from time to time provide such additional school accommodation as is in their opinion necessary in order to supply a sufficient amount of public school accommodation for their district." These words, are very clear - the discretion is vested in the school board, and it is their opinion which is to determine the amount of additional accommodation necessary. If any further proof were needed of this, it would be found in the fact that Mr. Cawley proposed in committee to amend clause 18, by inserting the words "with the sanction of the Department" in order that there might be power "to prevent the possible vagaries of a board elected by a political or sectarian party which might unnecessarily erect a school for their own purposes", but Mr. Forster said "he did not think a school board should always be asking the sanction of the Department", and the amendment was withdrawn.

The Department has a discretion as to whether it shall promote a provisional order for the compulsory acquisition of a site, and whether it shall or shall not recommend a loan, but the school board, by sections 18 and 19, was clearly intended to have power at its own discretion to set up schools if it could dispense with these two aids. The Department, however, having to consent to the fee, claims the power, by withholding that consent, to prevent the school from being conducted as a public elementary school in compliance with the Code and, therefore, to subject the board so conducting the school to a surcharge. It is not desirable that the Department should in this way defeat the plain meaning of a section of an Act of Parliament, and there is no reason why the elected representatives of a locality should not enjoy the full power which the above section of the Act gives them. It is necessary that the Department should have all the powers given by the Act to compel school boards to build sufficient schools, but it is of no advantage to education to prevent a school board from establishing a school where they think one necessary.

In considering the question of school supply, it is sometimes contended that the Education Act was intended only for the working class, and that it is an abuse for the public elementary schools to be used by the children of well-to-do people. This contention is most often maintained in reference to the board schools, but it finds no support in the Act of 1870; on the contrary it is inconsistent with the Act. Before 1870, the elementary schools of the country received no aid on account of scholars who were considered above the working-class. They were not expected to be excluded from the schools, but they had to be returned on a schedule in such a way that they might not be the means of earning government grants for the school.

It was proposed by Colonel Beresford in committee on clause 14 of the Act of 1870, to insert these words, "Provided always, that no parent shall be entitled to send his or her child or children to be educated at such public elementary school whose net income shall amount to £150 a year." The amendment, however, was negatived, and in the debate of June 24th, on the motion that the Speaker leave the chair, Mr. Horsman having said "The Vice-President of the Council indeed said that, he spoke in the interests of the children, and that his Bill insured that every poor man's child should have the benefit of religious instruction", Mr. Forster interjected "I never said that. The Bill ensures that elementary instruction should be given to the whole community."

The Act of 1870 imposed only one restriction on public elementary schools as to fees, and that was that the ordinary payments in respect of the instruction from each scholar should not exceed ninepence per week. And the construction put upon this enactment has allowed individual scholars to pay fees amounting to several pounds a year, provided the average fee does not exceed ninepence. Prebendary Richards has a Church school at Isleworth where the boys in the upper department pay £5 a year fees, and yet the parliamentary grant is paid for them.

It is important to bear this in mind as to the Act of 1870; because the only reason why schools are not demanded for all the population between certain ages is, that in fact many of the well-to-do abstain from using the elementary schools of the country, but they have by law a perfect right to use them, and in proportion to the growing popularity and efficiency of our public school system, we may expect to see persons in easy circumstances use them more and more. We know that the elementary schools in Scotland are largely used by the middle class, and the same is the case in


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America and in the colonies, and already there is evidence in this country that where the schools are good there is a growing tendency to use them among classes who previously held aloof from them.

Should those who now send their children to small private schools at charges ranging from three to six guineas a year (a considerable class at present), turn to the public elementary schools and use them, they would probably get a far better education than they do now, and would be recouped for what they feel the heavy burden of the rate. There is no reason or law against their doing so, and the children of persons of the same station on the Continent habitually frequent the public primary schools of their country, and we are of opinion that their presence in our elementary schools in larger numbers will be a good thing for the schools and for themselves.

It may also be noticed that it will be commonly found that with the increase of school provision, not only is the proportion of the child population under instruction increased, which is natural; but what might be less expected, the schools as they multiply are frequently fuller than when they were few, the inference being that as education spreads and the margin of uneducated children becomes narrower, the appreciation of education also spreads, the schools are improved by the competition, and all, board and voluntary alike, benefit by the improved tone of public opinion.

CHAPTER 2

CHARACTER AND STRUCTURAL SUITABILITY OF THE PRESENT SCHOOL SUPPLY

In our previous chapter we have shown that, roughly speaking, school provision is needed throughout England and Wales for one-sixth of the population, though in certain districts, such as Lancashire and the West Riding, the requirements rise to nearly a fifth. We have shown what has been done to supply this deficiency, and that if we reckon all schools as fully available, without regard to structural defects, to local excess or deficiency, to high fee or other cause of unsuitability, this proportion is now provided, and more than provided, for the country as a whole.

But in addition to the fact that many schools are so placed that their surplus accommodation is not available to meet school deficiencies elsewhere, there is a further deduction to be made from the nominal totals of school accommodation. In the case of board schools the accommodation is reckoned in the senior departments on the number of seats which correspond roughly with 10 square feet per child. In the voluntary schools the accommodation is reckoned throughout at 8 square feet per child. If the voluntary accommodation were measured on the same basis as the board accommodation, the nominal number of about 2,400,000 places in senior departments could only be reckoned at four-fifths of their present number, a reduction of 480,000 places.

But this is not all. The board schools have been built on plans approved by the Department, and are well-lighted, of suitable width, and so arranged as to make all their space properly available. The Department refuses to recognise a school above a certain width as suitable to seat children beyond a certain number of rows of seats; but many voluntary schools have been built largely for parochial or denominational, and not solely for school purposes; they are therefore often large rooms, 30, 36, and even more feet wide; great undivided halls, which at 8 feet per child, would in some cases seat 400 or 500 children, but in which it would be undesirable to teach even 200 children, on account of the noise and confusion of several classes working at once. Moreover, in many cases the class-rooms of voluntary schools are quite unfit to be reckoned as class-rooms, being often more like closets than rooms, too small for effective use, and such as the Department would not sanction if the plans were submitted to it.

If, in addition to these considerations, we bear in mind the number of schools which charge fees of 4d and upwards, and are therefore not available for the poor, and yet have a large number of unused places, if we consider the Roman Catholic schools in Protestant districts, built larger than was needed for the Roman Catholic population; and if we also bear in mind the schools larger than are required for their immediate district, but which are not available for children at a distance, we shall see that so far


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from there being an excess of school provision, the country is still considerably behind a sufficient supply of school places, even on the assumption of one-sixth of the population being enough.

In the earlier years, after the passing of the Act of 1870, the deficiency to be encountered in the matter of school accommodation was so vast, that it was not politic for the Education Department to examine too curiously into the quality of the school provision then available. A very great strain was thrown on the resources of the populous and growing districts where school provision was mostly needed. Where school boards were doing their best, a temporary recognition of accommodation not thoroughly suitable, was expedient as a makeshift. For the same reason, while school boards are actively engaged in making further provision for school accommodation, the Education Department recognises as a temporary measure the crowding of the board schools to the limit of 8 square feet per child, the standard permitted in voluntary schools. But now that the chief stress of school provision is past, the time has come when the State may justly claim for all children that amount of air and space, that suitability of premises, airiness, and lightness of site, and reasonable extent of playground which are provided where the education of children has been made a public and municipal duty.

No reason can be alleged why if 10 feet per child are needed in a board school, less than that should be considered sufficient in a voluntary school. Indeed, anyone who is familiar with many voluntary schools, especially in towns, will recognise that the new board schools can be crowded on the basis of one child to 8 feet, with much less hindrance to the teaching, and with much less sanitary injury from foul air than the older and less well-arranged schools. The time is come when even in well-arranged schools 10 feet should be treated as the minimum floor space for each child in average attendance, and this should apply to infant schools as well as to senior departments. When we consider the great importance in a well-conducted infant school of plenty of free floor space for games, for action songs, dances, and marching, and all the other cheerful methods now recognised as essential for a good infant school; and when we also bear in mind the very great difference in attendance in an infant school between summer and winter, the great depletion to which an infant school is subject by the removal of, perhaps, a third of its numbers on one day, after the examination, and the wave of infantile epidemics which often sweeps over such schools and leaves them half empty for months together, we shall see that any rule of accommodation based on yearly average attendance should be based on considerably more than 8 feet per child.

In the Scotch Code, it is now stated that 10 square feet of area for each child is to be considered as the normal scale of an efficient school.

Indeed, we are of opinion that the rule of measuring accommodation by yearly average attendance is a very mischievous rule in the interest of school efficiency. Mr. Stokes, Her Majesty's Inspector for the Southwark division of London, has called attention to this in the following weighty remarks: "A school cannot properly be filled by its average attendance unless no child is ever absent from it. For as soon as cases of absence have occurred, compensation to make up the full average cannot be gained without improper overcrowding. In the returns of the department 'average attendance' is calculated for periods of twelve months. In every year there are days or seasons of extreme cold or storm or epidemic sickness when the infant school will be half empty. Defect in heating apparatus during winter is cause enough. Indeed, want of warmth within the room empties fin infant school more effectually than rain or snow outside. I was formerly acquainted with an infant school designed to hold about 300 children, and which continued to draw grants upon an average attendance of nearly its whole complement. Yet during winter for weeks together that school was rarely attended by more than 30 infants. If on 25 days in the year the attendance was as low as 30, then 6,750 attendances would be lost, and in order to make up the average attendance to 300 a day, an aggregate of 6,750 children must one day or another be admitted in excess of the accommodation. The injurious effect of overcrowding upon health is lessened in fine weather by having doors and windows always open, and by keeping classes in the open-air in the playground, but the injury to instruction cannot be met, since a teaching staff adequate to manage 250 or 300 cannot properly attend to 400 or 500 children. The mistress cannot teach a double number at midsummer because her scholars absented themselves at Christmas. Overcrowding at particular seasons will henceforth be checked by the inspector's visit of surprise. The point I wish to insist on is, that it will not be enough to provide accommodation in school for


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the average attendance of children, but places must be provided for all or nearly all the children, because all or nearly all will attend together at certain seasons, and all, or nearly all, will be absent together at other seasons under the influence of causes operating upon the bulk of them." (See Report, 1871, pp. 72-3).

In the same Blue Book, p. xvi., the department lays down a similar rule as to accommodation. The report of the Education Department states: "We assume that in England and Wales with a population of upwards of 22 millions, the average daily attendance at efficient schools ought to amount to about three millions, the accommodation for this number of scholars ought to be considerably in excess of the average daily attendance, and to provide for a maximum attendance of not much less than four millions." And in the Education Report for 1872, p. xvii, the same principle is affirmed.

The rule of the Department, which really indicates the extreme limit of overcrowding, the violation of which will entail possible forfeiture of the grant, has too often been treated as a normal and reasonable measure of the proper relation between the accommodation and attendance; and the difference between the accommodation and the yearly average attendance is frequently quoted as empty places and available accommodation which are urged as reasons against further school supply.

The proper measure of a school's accommodation should be the seat supply, and that seat supply should be authorised by the Department according to the plans of the school, and as it is shown on the plans. This would get rid of a great deal of nominal accommodation which is not, and never can be available, but which appears in yearly official returns of the Department, and is consequently most misleading. And this seat accommodation should have reference to the number on the roll and not to the average attendance. Even then a school may be overcrowded though the number on the roll do not exceed the seat accommodation, if it be the average number on the roll throughout the year. It often happens that in a large school there are upwards of 200 infants promoted to the senior departments. Either admission must have been refused for two or three months before the examination in order to keep room for these expected new comers, or the senior department with its 400 or more places and the same number of occupants, must be overcrowded with an excess of 100 scholars until the gradual departures of scholars bring down the number on the roll to a balance with the accommodation. And. again, in a large school divided into class-rooms, as is now fortunately growing more and more the practice, it is impossible to secure that the classification of the children shall coincide exactly with the accommodation of the rooms. Taking the normal unit of a class-room as 60, which is the rule of the Education Department in passing plans for school buildings, it is probable and usual that the 6th and 7th standards in such a school as we are considering, will number only 40 children, and the 5th perhaps 50 children. Again, in the lower part of the school, the 2nd or 3rd standard may contain 110 or 120 children, making two classes, neither of them giving an average of more than 50, and yet each requiring a separate teacher in a separate room. To meet these constantly recurring difficulties of classification there must be some elbow room, some surplus accommodation, but this is not vacant or unused in any reasonable sense of the term.

It may be noted that in the General Report for the year 1886, of Mr. Blakiston, Chief Inspector of the Northern Division, we find this paragraph: "We are glad to report general improvement in regard to the state of school buildings and premises. More attention is paid to cleanliness and repairs, and to the supply of apparatus. But in view of the evil effects of habitual and temporary overcrowding which we are constantly encountering, we are unanimous in recommending that the minimum in all voluntary schools and in infant schools be raised from eight to ten square feet per child."

Another very important matter which needs attention in schools is the ventilation. The rule of the Department requiring a minimum of 80 cubic feet for each child is of very little value for sanitary purposes. These 80 cubic feet are measured throughout the whole school, and are taken on the yearly average. Thus in an infant school at its fullest in the hot summer months we may find a particular class-room so over-crowded, that instead of 80 cubic feet, each child may have much less, possibly only 50. Moreover, the calculation of fresh air by cubic feet in the room is a very unscientific and unsatisfactory method of securing the result aimed at. It is the constant changing of the air rather than the size of the reservoir which determines the sweetness and freshness of the room. Those who enter almost any school towards the close of the school session know how rare it is to find the room pleasant and pure, and how common to find it almost unbearable. The unconsciousness arising from use makes even the


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teacher not sufficiently careful on this subject, and the dislike of draughts, and the wish to economise coal, are other reasons why this question of ventilation needs serious consideration in reference to the planning of schools.

The lighting of schools is a matter which has been far too much neglected hitherto. Many schools built by architects who know nothing of scholastic needs, or of hygienic requirements, have lofty open go chic roofs, with picturesque casemented windows low down in the wall. The plans circulated by the department in the annual blue book from 1840 to 1850 suggested and recommended such designs and elevations, and gave building grants on them throughout the country. Even where the windows and ventilation are carried high up, a cross light is very common, and a left side light is comparatively rare. Indeed, the official model plans just referred to, positively recommended an arrangement by which a cross light became imperative. And when the School Board for London first began to submit plans by which a side light was secured to the great majority of the class-rooms, objections were raised in the first instance by the Education Department, though waived on the School Board pressing their contention.*

All who take an interest in education agree that a playground is one of the most important adjuncts of a school, valuable for the health of the children, for the formation of their moral character, and as a most important aid to discipline; and by affording means of suitable shore breaks in the course of the daily instruction a preventive of over-pressure. The Department has recognised this to some extent by laying down in its rules that the minimum area for a school site should be a quarter of an acre. This is not really sufficient for a large town school where five or six hundred children, and more, are congregated. A playground is far more essential in a town than in the country. But questions of cost and the difficulty of securing sites have caused a very large proportion of the voluntary schools in towns to be without this essential adjunct. However expedient it may be not to press hardly on schools already in existence and doing the best they can under disadvantageous material conditions, there is no reason, now that the education of children has become a public duty, why any new schools should be recognised which are in any way inferior to what the Department would secure and insist upon if they were erected by a school board. It is the interest of the children and of education which the Department and the country have to consider, and not how cheaply a substitute may be found for the discharge of a public duty.

The returns to our circular B show what a large amount of unsuitable and unavailable accommodation is still recognised by the Education Department, especially in Lancashire. A special examination of the case of Stockport will show how far the abolition of the school board of that town, sanctioned by the Department on the plea that the accommodation was sufficient, was really in the interests of education.

Meantime, we may call attention to the rules of the Education Department on school planning, which show what are the suitable arrangements for health and for education on which the Department now insists.

1. The accommodation of each room depends not merely on its area, but also on its shape (especially in relation to the kind of desk proposed) the position of the doors and fireplaces, and its proper lighting,

2. The proper width of a schoolroom is 18 to 20 feet or 22 feet, Accommodation is calculated by the number of children seated at desks and benches. Wasted space cannot be considered.

4. (a) The walls of every schoolroom and class-room, if ceiled at the level of the wall plate, must be at least 12 feet high from the level of the floor to the ceiling, and if the area contain more than 360 superficial square feet, 13 feet, if more than 600 feet, then 14 feet.

(b) The walls of every schoolroom and classroom, if ceiled to the rafters and collar beam, must be at least 11 feet high from the floor to the wall-plate, and at least 14 feet to the ceiling across the collar beam

5. The principal entrance to a school should never be through the cloak room. The latter should be screened off or separated. Gangways should be at least 4 feet wide, and amply lighted from the end. Hat pegs should be 12 inches apart, and of two tiers. There should be a separate peg numbered for each child.

6. Class rooms are calculated at 10 square feet if not providing accommodation for more than 60 children. The minimum size of class room is 18 feet by 15 feet.

*Note. - This was before the appointment of the present advising architect of the Department.


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The class rooms should never be passage rooms from one part of the building to another, nor from the schoolrooms to the playground or yard, and should be on the same level as the schoolroom. Each should be easily cleared without disturbance to any other room.

8. Windows - (a) The light should as far as possible be admitted from the left side of the scholars. All other windows should be regarded as supplementary or for summer ventilation. In cases where left light is impossible, right light is next best. Where neither is possible, the light should be admitted from a high point.

(c) The sills of the main lighting windows should be placed about four feet above the floor, and the tops of some should always reach nearly to the ceiling.

9. Staircases. No triangular steps or "winders" should be used in staircases, each step should be about 13 inches broad, and not more than 6 inches high. The flights should be short, and the landings unbroken by steps.

12. Number of closets and privies required.

for girlsfor boys
Under 50 children32
Under 100 children53
Under 150 children63
Under 200 children74
Under 300 children85

13. Desks. Benches and desks graduated according to the ages of the children should be provided for all the scholars in actual attendance.

14. - (a) Every school should have a playground.

(b) In the case of a mixed school, playgrounds must be separate for boys and girls.

15. Infant schools. Infants should not, except in very small schools, be taught in the same room with older children, as the noise and the training of the infants disturb and injuriously affect the discipline and instruction of the other children.

19. The width of an infant school should be in proportion to its size, and may be 24 feet.

20. The accommodation of an infant schoolroom is calculated at 8 square feet for each child, after deducting wasted and useless space.

The above extracts from the rules of the Department indicate a standard of school accommodation which, if applied to voluntary schools, would very materially diminish their nominal accommodation, and yet it cannot be said they are unreasonable or excessive; indeed if the French official regulations for school planning be compared with them, it will be seen that in many respects the English standard is lower than that of our neighbours.

The question of school furniture and material falls partly under the head of school provision, partly under that of school management. The desks and benches which are part of the original equipment of the school, may more properly be touched upon here. It is not advisable that any absolute rule should be laid down as to the character of the desk, whether single, dual, or longer; but care should be taken that the school furniture should always be suited to children and to day-school use. Too often the school exists "a double debt to pay", and we find heavy benches and reversible desks evidently intended quite as much for parish meetings of adults, tea parties, and feasts, and other general purposes, as for the instruction of the children. It is a piteous sight to see, as one may sometimes, infants with their legs dangling in the air, and children kept for a long time sitting on benches with no backs to them. Many old schools have improved their furniture, but too many still go on with desks and benches of the most unsuitable character, and the time has come when the Education Department should insist on the improvement of this part of the school material.

The Blue books are full of complaints by the inspectors of the unsatisfactory character of the school buildings and furniture in too many schools.

Thus, in the Education Report for 1886-7, Mr. Blakiston, Chief Inspector for the North-Eastern Division, whose remarks we have already quoted as to the need for 10 square feet per child and for better ventilation, writes, p, 265, of the deficiencies, in many schools otherwise satisfactory, as to cloakroom arrangements, means of washing, and facilities for drying wet boots, &c.; he calls attention to the bad lighting, and to the general want of pictures in the schools; he further complains, p. 270, of inconvenient desks and bad lighting.

Mr. Johnstone quotes Mr. Vertue, p. 320, as to badly lighted, badly ventilated, and dirty rooms, and Mr. Greene as to the want of desks for infants, and the deficiency of local maps and of globes.

Mr. Williams, Chief Inspector for Wales, says, p. 364, the ventilation of schools is seldom good, and also finds fault with the heating. On this point he quotes


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Mr. Munro, p. 341; he quotes, on the same page, Mr. Bancroft, who says, "A large number of the old school buildings, which were accepted after the passing of the Act of 1870, I would gladly see pulled down and rebuilt or replaced by new ones; but, in the present bad times with agriculturists, it is difficult and indeed hardly possible to get managers to move in the matter." Mr. Morgan Owen is quoted, p. 342, as to the substitution of a wood floor for tiles in deference to a recommendation 11 years old; he also complains of class-rooms unsuitably furnished.

Mr. Oakley, p. 423, reporting of the practising school of the Bangor Training College, finds the apparatus and desks not yet altogether satisfactory.

Mr. Fitch finds fault with the premises of the Norwich Training College, and with the equipment of their practising school, pp. 465-6.

In 1885-6, Mr. Barry, Chief Inspector for the West Central Division, complains, p. 246, of want of class-rooms and cloak-rooms, and of playgrounds, of unsatisfactory offices, of bad light, and of bad desks.

Mr. Oakley, the Chief Inspector for the North-Western Division, speaks of the schools in the suburbs of Manchester where several of the rooms are defective as to ventilation or in some other respect, and where the accommodation for infants often falls short of modern requirements (Education Report, 1885-6, p. 265), and he quotes Mr. Freeland (p. 269) that the premises in the Burnley District are in many cases ill adapted for modern requirements. At p. 270 Mr. Coward is quoted for the statement that "in estimating school accommodation, 8 square feet per child is wholly insufficient, and produces overcrowding with its obvious ill effects. What is called over-pressure is greatly due to overcrowded rooms."

Mr. Stewart (p. 308) quotes Mr. Milman, who still finds stone floors in the Leamington District, and apparently has difficulty in getting the managers to do away with them.

Mr. Stokes, reporting on the South-Eastern Division, says (p. 330) that visits to Canterbury, Ramsgate, Maidstone, Folkestone, Beckenham, Dorking, Reigate, Croydon, Hastings, Eastbourne, Arundel, and Worthing, leave upon his mind an impression that in a large number of cases the school premises are inadequate in size and inferior in condition. He says, further, the allowance per child of 8 square feet of floor space measured over main rooms and class-rooms is wholly inadequate for the serious purposes of discipline and instruction, and to accept schools as accommodating a larger number of children than they can really teach is but to encourage irregular attendance. At p. 332 he quotes Mr. Markheim from the Dartford Division: "Every village is or is being supplied with a school, but a great number of schools are overcrowded, and the accommodation has evidently been provided to meet the minimum of actual requirements without due allowance for the increase of population." P. 333, Mr. Stokes says, that in Rochester and Chatham the school buildings are at best old-fashioned and ill-arranged, and at least two of them are distinctly bad. Mr. Ley and Mr. Routledge both ask for a second survey of school accommodation by the Education Department. Mr. Routledge says "A few of the older buildings, such as Boughton Wesleyan School, were passed as satisfactory in what we may call ' the dark ages,' and it is very difficult for the district inspector to condemn them now after so many years of vested interest. It would be well for the chief inspector to call for a special return of such buildings, and to pay a personal visit to them when so reported." Mr. Routledge calls particular attention to the necessity of simple and effective ventilation, and to the offices, which should either be earth or water-closets. He objects to overgrown galleries, to the sacrifice of day-schools to the interest of Sunday schools or other parochial purposes, to dual desks, and to schools without a class-room and a gallery.

In the Blue Book for 1884-5, our colleague, Mr. Alderson, reporting on the South-Western Division, quotes Mr. Codd (p. 250), as to the want of playgrounds and class rooms in the Barnstaple district.

Mr. Blakiston quotes Mr. Rooper (p. 266): Of the townships around Bradford "the premises of the Cleckheaton schools are the least satisfactory both in quality and quantity. The town decided, after the Act of 1870, to dispense with a school board, and to trust to voluntary agency. These experiments are always exceedingly interesting, but nothing justifies them short of success. The rough unplastered interior of St. Luke's resembles a stable more than a schoolroom, and children are refused admission because there is absolutely no room for them. The British school is so inconvenient for teaching the number of scholars in attendance as to make any but its present teacher despair; while the want of a class-room at Westgate drives the reading lesson into the open air."


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On the same page, Mr. Colson complains of the buildings and furniture in the Northallerton district.

Mr. Blandford (p. 297) quotes Mr. Kynnersley as to the want of school accommodation in the centre of Birkenhead, a town that has succeeded in avoiding the formation of a school board; and as reporting that in Chester the old buildings of the parish of St. John, which had been continued till 1884, were defective in every good quality. Chester is another town in which there is no school board.

Mr. Lott (p. 298) notes the inadequacy of the infant school supply of Derby.

Mr. Fitch reporting on the Eastern Division of England and on East Lambeth, quotes Mr. Oliver on the Boston district (p. 307), as to the need of class-rooms; and Mr. Synge reports of Norfolk, on the same page, that the school supply in that district is not complete, and that there are schools still existing which were passed in 1871, but have never come into the ranks of certified efficient or annual grant schools.

In the report for 1883-4, Mr. Bernays speaking of Durham, says, (p. 252), "The offices, though better than they were, are not yet what they should be, and I have still considerable difficulty in getting either managers or teachers to see that they are properly kept, but where warnings are unheeded, the reduction or loss of the merit grant will doubtless have the desired effect."

Mr. Cowie, at p. 279, gives an instance of the long suffering of the Department, and of the power of resistance of a small rural school board in resisting school provision. At Shaugh Prior, the parish has had a school board since 1874, and for nine years from that date the board contrived to stave off the question of providing efficient schools.

Mr. Danby, at p. 287, complains of insufficient desk accommodation for infants in the Edmonton Division, and, at p. 289, he notes the inadequate care bestowed on light, warmth, ventilation, arrangement of desks, position of offices, &c. He also criticizes the convertible desks, movable platforms, and the like, introduced into schools, which are intended to serve a double purpose.

Mr. Gleadowe, writing of the Crewe district, says (p. 298), "In buildings we are much worse off than many of our neighbours, most of the buildings were established years ago, and there are comparatively few rooms that thoroughly satisfy present requirements." And at p. 300, he speaks of the unsatisfactory buildings of a school in Crewe, where the board has not made any provision for school supply.

Mr. Moncrieff writes of the Bristol district (p. 342), "ventilation is generally defective, and I do not doubt the truth of Mr. Ewen's closing words, 'that defective ventilation causes many headaches that are put down to long hours, anxiety, or hard study'."

Mr. Sharpe, writing of the City of London, says (p. 379), of the voluntary schools, after excepting two held in temporary premises, which are to be rebuilt: "All the other buildings can only be regarded as fair, except the Graystoke Place Board School, which presents the usual excellent features of a .board school, Aldersgate Ward, Lady Holles' Charity, and Bishopsgate Ward Girls' School, i.e., there are really only four good school buildings in the City."

Mr. Stevelly, speaking of the Hull voluntary schools, says (p. 38): " The walls, floors, and out-offices, should, in many instances, be cleaned much more frequently than they are." He gives as a reason for this neglect the insufficient pay of the school cleaner.

Mr. Stokes (pp. 401-2), speaks of the badness of the old Southwark schools, and of the progressive improvement of the board schools; on page 404, he speaks of the evil of overcrowding, and repeats the opinion we have already quoted, that the accommodation should not be reckoned on the average attendance, but on the highest number ever present. He notices at p. 408, as to the south-eastern district generally, the unsatisfactory character of much of the school accommodation, a repetition of which complaint we have quoted from him in the year 1885-6.

Mr. Tremenheere, reporting on the schools in the Kendal district, urges (p. 410), that there should be a review of the character of the schools, and of the quality of the teaching in schools passed in 1871. He says, the requirements of Circular 137 are really absurdly inadequate in the year of grace 1883.

It will be evident, on a perusal of the reports of Her Majesty's inspectors, that much has been done of late years in the direction of improving furniture and premises, in compliance with the representations of the inspectors; and there is a large amount of testimony that great willingness has been shown by many managers of voluntary schools to introduce needed improvements in the structure and arrangements of their


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schools; there is, therefore, no reason to think that any good managers would object to the demand that the structural suitability and efficiency of all schools should now be made completely satisfactory.

As a rule, we may say, that in the rural districts, where the voluntary schools are mainly responsible for the education of the children, it is not so much schools that are wanting, as well-equipped and well-arranged schools; what we need is the improvement of some of the existing schools rather than the establishment of additional school provision.

in addition to public elementary and certified efficient schools, there are a certain number of private adventure schools, which are accepted by the educational authorities, as furnishing a part of the school supply of the district. We are of opinion that no insanitary or otherwise unsuitable premises should be used as a school. Before any building is used as a school, the premises should be approved on structural grounds by Her Majesty's inspector, who should certify the number of children for whom it may properly be used, and any person using a building not so certified as a school, or for more children than the number for which it was certified, should be guilty of an offence, and power should be taken to close the school.

To sum up the question as to the sufficiency in quantity and the adequacy in quality of the school provision now existing, we may say that nominally, except, in the large towns and rapidly growing industrial districts, the accommodation is sufficient in quantity for the child population of the country, and though the apparent abundance of school provision is subject to some deduction, yet the stress and pressure of school building is over. But when we come to the question of quality, much is lacking, and requirements of efficiency which were kept in the background, while so much work had to be done may now be justly pressed. There is a practically universal agreement among the witnesses that the 8 feet per child in average attendance should be raised at any rate in senior schools to 10 feet, and this would be a great and proper improvement to introduce also in infant schools. As to school furniture, much has been done, and is being done, to improve it by managers, who in many cases respond willingly to the recommendations of the inspector, and we may rely on the Department to continue their action in this direction. But the time has come when the seat accommodation as shown on the plans should be substituted for any mechanical measurement of square feet in determining the amount of school places available. This would, in the mass of schools, be equivalent to a 10 square feet measurement, but measurement by seat accommodation is needed for the purpose of ascertaining the real scholastic utility of many large halls, used for, rather than adapted to, school purposes. As to lighting, the Department should take more pains to secure in all new schools the best light for the health and comfort of the children and of the teachers, and even in old schools, by skylights and the alteration of windows to introduce considerable improvements. In the ventilation and warming of schools, also, two matters which should be treated together, there is great need for improvement. And adequate playgrounds should be an imperative necessity in all schools applying for recognition. In noting the improvements needed in this part of the means of education, it would not be just not to recognise the great willingness that has been shown, in many cases, by voluntary managers to meet the growing demands resulting from a sounder appreciation of what is due to education, and the wonderful progress that has been made by school boards in the excellence of their plans and arrangements, progress which makes many of the new schools of our larger boards as great improvements on the schools built 10 years ago, as those schools were on their predecessors built before 1870.

CASE OF STOCKPORT

The Act of 1876 permits by section 41 the dissolution of a school board by the Education Department under certain special conditions. First, that two-thirds of the persons present and voting of the same body as that charged with the power of calling a school board into being should concur in its dissolution. Secondly, that the board has no school or site for a school in its possession or under its control, and that the Education Department are satisfied that there is a sufficient amount of public school accommodation for the district. Thirdly, that no requisition has been sent by the Education Department to such school board requiring them to supply public school


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accommodation. And, fourthly, that the Education Department itself, after taking all the circumstances of the case into consideration, is of opinion that the maintenance of a school board is not required for the purposes of education in the district.

There have not been many cases of the dissolution of school boards under this section, but one of the most important was the case of the borough of Stockport. This large town, with a population at the census of 1881 of 59,583, had a school board, but there being a great number of voluntary schools, the board had no schools of its own; and as the friends of denominational education were in a considerable majority in the town council, they passed a resolution by the requisite majority for the dissolution of the board, which was assented to by the Education Department on November 13th, 1879, and since then there has been a school attendance committee in Stockport. The chairman of that committee attended before us and gave evidence which will be found at pp. 155-160 of our Third Report.

Before examining his evidence it may be well to state certain facts which appear from returns furnished to us by the managers of the public elementary schools of Stockport. These schools appear according to the most recent report of the Education Department to number

According to the general rule of the Department, accommodation is needed for one-sixth of the population, in which case about 10,000 school places would be the proper school supply of Stockport. But in Lancashire and in the more industrial districts, it is found that accommodation for one-fifth of the population is not excessive, and on that basis of calculation school places for 12,000 would be requisite. In either case it would appear at first sight that the town of Stockport is sufficiently provided with school places. But the character as well as the nominal amount of school places should be examined before we can finally accept the figures before us. It must be remembered that these 13,825 places are generally reckoned by measuring all these schools at 8 square feet per child in average attendance. But the nearly unanimous testimony of those who have given evidence on the subject is that, at any rate in senior departments, 10 ft. per child is requisite.

The schools of Stockport with 13,825 nominal places, have according to their return, 3,631 places for infants, and 10,194 places for senior scholars. Assuming all the buildings to be well arranged and otherwise suitable, we should then, according to the rules of the Department for school planning, have, reckoning the senior departments at 10 feet per child, places for 3,631 infants and for 8,155 seniors, making a total of 11,786 places, which would be nearly equal to the one place in five found desirable in the manufacturing towns. But the size and shape of the rooms generally make it impossible to reckon the real space available equal to the above theoretic computation.

In reference to the regulations of the Education Department as to building quoted in the last chapter, there are many regulations about lighting, offices, cloak rooms, playgrounds, &c., which there is no reason to believe are satisfied in such buildings as the Stockport schools are shown to be by the measurements given. But dealing only with the following rules laid down by the Department, - (1) That the maximum available width for desks is 22 feet in a school-room, and that the accommodation is to be measured by the seats shown (which by other detailed regulations works out at rather more that 10 feet per child, but may be taken at 10 feet up to a width of 22 feet, all extra width not being available). (2) That class-rooms for not more than 60, may be measured at 10 feet per child, provided they are not smaller than 18 x 15 feet, below which dimensions they are not recognised. (3) That the minimum height of small rooms is 12 feet, or 11 feet to the wall plate if ceiled at the collar beam. (4) That the maximum width for an infant school-room to be measured at 8 feet is 24 feet, - we find the following results in the Stockport schools.


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The 3,631 infant places are reduced to 3,004; there being among them rooms with the following dimensions:

60 feet x 30 = 1,800 sq. ft. 225 accommodation at 8 square feet. (No class room.)
52 feet x 32½ = 1,680 sq. ft. 210 square feet accommodation at 8 square feet.
60 feet x 28 = 1,680 sq. ft. 210 square feet accommodation at 8 square feet.
33 feet x 30 = 990 sq. ft. 124 square feet accommodation at 8 square feet.
47 feet x 35 = 1,645 sq. ft. 206 square feet accommodation at 8 square feet.
39 ft. 7 x 31 = 1,227 sq. ft. 153 square feet accommodation at 8 square feet.
45 feet x 28½ = 1,282 sq. ft. 160 square feet accommodation at 8 square feet.
88 feet x 28 = 2,864 sq. ft. 308. (No class room.)

The following are some of the dimensions of the class-rooms:

At St. Thomas' Infant School, three class-rooms, each 12 feet x 25½.

Brinksway Infant School, a class-room 14 feet x 10.

Chestergate British Infant School is 30 x 26, and 10½ feet high, having an area 780 feet. It should by the rules of the Department have a minimum height of 14 feet.

Union Chapel British Infant School has two class-rooms, each 23 feet x 12, being 3 feet narrower than the minimum allowed, and they are 11½ feet high.

Brentnal Street Wesleyan Infant School has four class-rooms less than the minimum width of the Department's rules, one 15 x 14, one 18 x 14, one 11½ x 14, and one 11 x 14 feet.

Portwood Wesleyan Infant School has two class-rooms 13½ feet wide.

Edgeley Wesleyan Infant School has two class-rooms 14 feet wide, and one 12 feet wide.

New Bridge Lane Wesleyan Infant School has three rooms, all 10 feet high, the largest having an area of 1,282 square feet, it should, therefore, be 14 feet high; the other two rooms are respectively 14½ x 12½ and 11½ x 11 feet.

St. Mary's Roman Catholic Infant School, Heaton Norris, has a class-room 14 x 14 feet and 10 feet high.

No one can consider such infant schools as those measuring the one 60 feet by 30, the other 88 feet by 28. neither of them having a class-room, as in any way satisfactory for the education of infants, much less the one as suitable and available for 225 and the other for 308 infants.

Passing from the infant schools to the senior schools, we find in St. Mary's National School a class-room in the girls' department 18-6 x 13-2 by 10-6 feet in height, thus contravening the principles recognised by the Department, both as to width and height.

In St. Peter's National School there are two class-rooms, one 13-4 x 12 feet by 10-7 in height, the other 13-4 x 12 by 10-7 height.

St. Thomas' National School has a room described as a class-room, 50 feet by 37 feet, and 8 feet high. Such a room, measured at 8 feet per child, would be set down as accommodating 231 children. It is difficult to think of any educational use to which it could properly be put, except as a sheltered playground or drill shed in wet weather. This school has a higher grade department where the fees are 6s and 9s a quarter. In this department there are two class-rooms 24 x 25½ feet and 11 feet high, and one room 12 feet x 25½ feet and 11 feet high.

Edgeley, St. Matthew, has three class rooms, 14 feet wide.

Christ Church, Heaton Norris, has four class-rooms, two 10½ feet high and two 10 feet high.

Chestergate British School has two class-rooms, 10½ feet broad by 10½ feet high.

Hanover Chapel British School has two class-rooms, 10 feet broad.

Union Chapel British School has two class-rooms, each 20 x 12, one 18 x 10, and another 10 feet by 10.

Brentnall Street Wesleyan, described as a higher grade school, and charging in the upper classes, 8d, 9d, and 1s a week, has class-rooms 21 x 14 feet, 15 x 14, three rooms each 11½ x 14, and one room 12 x 8 feet.

Portwood Wesleyan, also called a higher grade school, and charging 9d in the upper school, has a class-room 15 feet by 13½ feet.

Edgeley Wesleyan School has two class-rooms 14 feet wide.

On the other hand. New Bridge Lane Wesleyan Senior School, with accommodation at 8 square feet for 217 children, has no class-room.

St. Mary's Roman Catholic School, Heaton Norris, has a class-room 17 x 10 feet, and one 9 x 8 feet, and 9 feet high.


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Other rooms might have been mentioned which fail to come up to the standard laid down by the Education Department.

If the schools were re-measured and recognised according to the official rules above-mentioned, apart from the question of height, which has not been considered, they would contain instead of 13,825 places, 8,619 places, a deficiency of 1,380 places on a population of 60,000, even if one-sixth of the population were an adequate school supply, which, in these Lancashire towns it is not; and the population of Stockport is now between 63,000 and 64,000.

But in addition to the character of the premises, the fee charged has to be considered. In all the Stockport schools, except the Roman Catholic schools, the fee for the higher standards goes as high as 6d, and in some schools higher. In St. Thomas' mixed the fee is 5d, and, possibly, these children may continue through all the standards. In some cases it is stated that the means of the family are considered in fixing the fee, but there is no school where a poor man can, as of right, send his child and give him a complete elementary education and claim his reception at a moderate fee of 2d, or, at most, 3d. Even in the infant schools it seems common to charge a fee of 3d to children of 5 years old.

In Stockport, in 1884-85, the average attendance was 8,776; the grant earned in 1884-85 is £8,399, or 19s 2d a head.

The subscriptions amounted to £600, or 1s 4 1/3d a head, and the fees to £8,214 or 18s 9d a head.

The total expenditure was £16,899 or £1 18s 6d a head.

Thus the parents contributed 48.6 per cent of the total cost.

The taxpayers contributed 49.1 per cent.

The subscribers who have the whole management contribute 3.5 per cent.

The evidence of Mr. Leigh, Chairman of the School Attendance Committee of Stockport, is very instructive. He thinks one or two free schools might be erected. He notices that at the time of the dissolution of the school board, 300 or 400 Protestant children were attending Roman Catholic schools. He states that there has been a steady raising of the school fee for the last 15 years. They have, he says, had some difficulty owing to teachers refusing children who have been turned out of other schools. He also says, there are certain schools which have succeeded in erecting themselves into middle-class schools virtually, and they exclude as much as they can these exceptional children (waifs and strays). The fees in Stockport go up, he says, to 9d, 10d, and upwards, rising with the standards and the higher subjects. He adds that the schools are ill placed, crowded in some parts of the town and deficient in others, though that has been somewhat remedied. One school was an old manufacturer's warehouse, a portion of it was converted into a school, another portion into a chapel. It is a matter of suspicion that some of the schools are farmed to the teachers, and he says: "We generally expect that the schools shall be self-supporting, with the Government grant and the children's fees. It is an exceptional circumstance for anyone to have to subscribe to schools within the borough, as I understand." In the Blue Book for 1886-7, we find Mr. Blandford's report, p. 293, that Mr. Lomax reports of Stockport: "In some of the best attended and most efficient schools in this district, persistent irregularity on the part of a scholar is punished by expulsion from the school, but recourse to this extreme expedient is seldom needed." Mr. Blandford remarks on this, p. 294: "The managers and teachers, especially of a voluntary school which has obtained the merit grant of excellent, or even of good, being, as to its support, in great measure dependent on the amount of grant earned, do not look with favour upon the admission or retention of children, who, being irregular in their attendance, are likely to have an adverse influence on the amount of grant earned. Head-teachers are slow to admit children of this description, and when admitted they are not without ingenious devices for excluding them from the annual inspection, or of getting rid of them altogether." Then, after quoting the remarks of Mr. Lomax, he adds, "Upon this I have to observe that the expulsion of children from a school in the receipt of annual grants on account of irregular attendance, is, in my opinion, wholly unjustifiable."

The conclusion we draw from the case of Stockport, as thus described, is:

First, that school accommodation should be suitable and good, as well as numerically sufficient, before it can be considered under the Act of 1876, that a school board is unnecessary, and that in the case of Stockport, the school provision is in its character and structural accommodation highly unsuitable.


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Secondly, there should be schools with a reasonable fee for all standards, available for the population, and that where the voluntary schools are not of this character, board schools should be established; and this applies to Stockport.

Thirdly, that the working of the voluntary schools mainly by means of the fees and the grant, leads to undue taxation of the poor by raising the fees, and is an incentive to dishonest management in the way of excluding unsatisfactory children; and that these evils are best remedied by schools under public representative management.

CHAPTER 3

THE PUPIL-TEACHER SYSTEM; ITS DEVELOPMENT FROM THE MONITORIAL SYSTEM; ITS DEFECTS; ATTEMPTS TO IMPROVE IT

The most important subject of our inquiry, that which lies at the root of all educational progress, is the quality of the teaching and the character of the teacher. We owe a duty to him and to the children to secure that their work shall be done with no external hindrances, with the best appliances, and with well adapted premises; but after all, the main factor in the success of the school is the teacher; a well educated, able, and high principled man or woman will be successful, even in dark uncomfortable rooms, with scanty school material, and with the most unpromising scholars, swept in from the streets; but a shiftless, mechanical, unconscientious head teacher will soon ruin a school, though he have every external help and though he received it in good condition.

We shall do well, therefore, in dealing with the education given in our schools, to begin by considering the qualifications and training of our teachers; and, first of all, we must examine the main source of our supply of teachers, that specially English contrivance - the pupil-teacher.

In the infancy of the educational movement in England, two men, Bell and Lancaster, hit on the same device for a rapid and cheap extension of popular education, - Dr. Bell, a clergyman, and afterwards associated with the National Society; Mr. Lancaster, a Quaker, the founder of the British and Foreign Society; they were championed by the two political parties, and an angry literary warfare raged round their respective merits as the inventor of the monitorial system. It would be unjust not to recognise the enthusiasm and the public spirit which both these men showed in working as pioneers in the cause of popular education. But when we look back at the competition for the honour of having invented this method of teaching, we are apt to be surprised that no one on either side of the educational belligerents should have flung on the other the reproach of having advocated such a system rather than vindicate it for his own party. The importance of their work is chiefly in this respect, that they both aimed at introducing collective instead of individual teaching. If the mass of the people were to be educated, it was clear that the schools would have to be large. It was clear also that teachers did not exist, and that the cost of supplying teachers in reasonable numbers would be greater than the public opinion of the day was ripe for. In these conditions both Bell and Lancaster fell back on the expedient of making one able and vigorous man multiply himself through the agency of the cleverer boys of the school, who were picked out as monitors, and entrusted with the subordinate education of the classes. The plan was glorified to this extent, that it was contended that by it one master could educate a school of six or seven hundred children; that a child only needed to know how to read, to teach even that which it did not know, for instance, arithmetic, and that through certain economical devices one book would suffice for a whole class. The monitorial system crossed the channel, and became under the name of "le système mutuel" the weapon with which the liberal party in France assailed the clergy, and sought to oust them from the control of education. The following passages from the work of M. Gréard, "l'enseignement primaire à Paris de 1867 à 1877" may equally be applied to the monitorial system in England, and indicates what its character really was. He says, page 77, "All that was needed was to collect the children round reading charts. The calculations had been made. A building 150 ft. long by 30 ft. wide should hold 1,000 scholars directed much


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more easily by one master than 30 children under the old system. Moreover, but one book of 140 to 200 pages was needed, which the children never touched, and which consequently lasted several years, &c."

Mr. Gréard goes on to explain the striking character of the exhibition which these schools afforded, and which was calculated to impress the spectator, and cloak the hollow and false character of the education; the elaborate system and hierarchy of the monitors, the complicated code of signals and orders, the discipline with which directions were transmitted; all this may also be found in the writings of Joseph Lancaster and in old articles of the Edinburgh and Quarterly Reviews.

The great spring of the mutual school was the monitor. The greater number of the scholars knew no teacher but him, it was through him that the master saw, spoke, and acted. The great object, therefore, was to have good monitors, and they were the objects of all his care. The school only opened for the scholars at 10. From 8 to 10 was the class time of the monitors. Unfortunately the special object of this class dictated the direction and spirit of its teaching. The interest of the master was promptly to form a good instrument. As for the pupil, it was much less a question for him to learn thoroughly for himself than to learn rapidly and for others. Even among the picked scholars, there must needs be different aptitudes and different degrees of aptitude. Instead of seeking to make the monitors learn from one another and to sweep them forward in that great current of general emulation which, under a common direction, ends by rousing all, the class was divided into groups, and the monitors had their own monitors. No thought was given to the balanced development of the faculties, but advantage was taken of the dominant disposition of each. One had the group of grammar, another that of arithmetic. There was an excessive subdivision of labour without any generalization or unity. The word of the master, which alone quickens, reached the monitors separately, never or rarely collectively. Moreover, a great part of the two hours' instruction was devoted to the recitation of the theory of the ordinary methods of the mutual school. The first object was to drill them to their trade.

What kind of master is such a preparation likely to produce? It has been well said that teaching is learning twice over, but this is only for those who reflect on what they have learnt and on what they teach. In order to bring the light into the intelligence of another we must first kindle the light in ourselves. This supposes the enlightened penetrating and persevering action of an intelligence comparatively ripe and formed. From the class where they had sat as scholars the monitors passed, as though at the touch of a wand, into the teachers of the class of children whom they were to instruct.

They were not even to use a book. Teaching by books was prohibited, at least in the beginning. All they could do was faithfully to transmit the letter of the lesson they had received, for how should they have seized its spirit? Consequently, all they were called upon to do was to apply exactly the mechanical processes in which they had been drilled.

These children under this mechanical discipline often mistook and confounded the formulas they were called on to apply. The only remedy for this was to drive into them by constant repetition their daily course of instruction.

In 1836, when M. Victor Cousin was in Holland, he learnt and proclaimed the worthlessness of the mutual or monitorial system, and declared the system of class teaching by competent teachers the only system worthy of responsible beings. About the same time the late Sir James K. Shuttleworth, whose name is so intimately associated with English education, was introducing from Holland the pupil-teacher system, which superseded the monitorial system in England.

The pupil-teacher system was, undoubtedly, a great step in advance. It secured that the commencement of the teaching career should be at 13, the age when the monitor was disappearing from the school. It provided a graduated system of yearly instruction from the head teacher by which the pupil-teacher was to secure some of the benefit which a secondary school might elsewhere give; and by yearly grants liberal in proportion to the remuneration of child labour, it practically furnished an endowment which continued the education of the most promising children till they could enter the training college at the age of 18. No wonder, then, if the system on its introduction was hailed with a chorus of approval, and that old inspectors who remembered the five or six years before Mr. Lowe's Code when the pupil teacher was finally superseding the old monitorial schools, should look back to that period as a golden age.


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Whatever the capabilities of the pupil-teacher system as administered by the Education Department from 1855 to 1861, it must be remembered that Sir James Kay Shuttle-worth himself only looked upon it as transitional, and leading up to a system of adult-trained teachers.

When he began his work of training at Battersea, one of the main difficulties which he encountered was the utter state of unpreparedness of the students. He saw that if full advantage was to be got from the training college the material must be not absolutely raw on its reception; that something to develop the vocation for teaching was needed as a preparation. The pupil-teacher's apprenticeship was the means by which this end was to be obtained, and in the state of English society and of English secondary education at that time, it was an admirable expedient. The youth was indentured directly to the head teacher, who received a direct personal payment for each pupil-teacher whom he trained. He was required to give him special instruction out of school hours for seven and a half hours a week, but not in the night school or along with other pupils.

Not every master or school was entrusted with pupil-teachers; satisfactory security had to be given that the lad or girl would see good teaching and good school methods; and a certain number of posts in the Civil Service were promised to be thrown open to those who at the close of their apprenticeship did not pursue the profession of teacher. The staff, too, required by the department was more liberal in proportion to the numbers taught than that which the late regulations have insisted on, and the number of schools under Government inspection was so small, that a comparatively small number of pupil-teachers was required, and therefore young people of special aptitude and educational zeal were more likely to be secured. Nevertheless, Sir James Kay Shuttleworth stated in his evidence before the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, vol. 6, p. 323. "What will occur, I hope, with respect to the pupil-teacher grant, will be, that there will be a gradual substitution of assistant-teachers for pupil-teachers, and the assistant-teacher will cost the Government somewhat less than two pupil-teachers. He will stand in the place of two pupil-teachers." And at a somewhat later date Sir James Kay Shuttleworth, in a letter to the Times of January 2, 1871, on the supply of teachers to the new schools to be called into existence, said, "The proportion of the teaching staff ought not to be less than one for every 25 scholars, and that of the assistant teachers ought to be much greater than it is. In a school of 150 scholars there ought to be one principal teacher, two assistant and three pupil-teachers. For 100 scholars, one principal, one assistant, and two pupil-teachers. ... We may rather expect that the regulations of the department as to the instruction of pupil-teachers, as to the standard of attainments and skill to be required in each year of the apprenticeship, and as to the conditions of their admission into training colleges, will be more stringent than they have recently been. This will be the first step towards such improvements in the curricula of study in those colleges as will ensure the more complete fitness of the certificated masters for their duties. I hope also to see that a third year's study will be encouraged for masters of superior elementary schools." And even as early as 1853, in his book, "Public Education as affected by the Minutes of the Privy Council from 1846 to 1852", he says, page 130, "Elementary schools cannot be deemed to have received a satisfactory development until every 60 scholars are in charge of a teacher or assistant of 18 years of age, who has passed through five years' apprenticeship, and is aided by a pupil-teacher. Even this arrangement would ultimately give place to one of a more satisfactory nature." But whatever might have been the effects of the pupil-teacher system as it was projected and conducted before Mr. Lowe's Code, serious alterations were introduced to its disadvantage at that time. The number of hours of instruction per week was reduced from 7½ to 5, the fixed payment to the pupil-teachers from the Government was abolished, and the result was that their salaries were often reduced, and an inferior set of pupil-teachers introduced into the schools in consequence.

Since the Education Act of 1870 there have been various changes in the system, such as raising the initial age of apprenticeship to 14, and allowing a reduced term of three, and even two years, with a higher age of entrance and greater intellectual attainments, and a restriction of the number of pupil-teachers permitted to be employed in a school having regard to the numbers of the adult and certificated staff. As a matter of fact, the falling off in the number of pupil-teachers as compared with adult assistants, has been increasing of late years far beyond any obligation


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imposed on managers by the Code. The evidence given us in reference to pupil-teachers was very unfavourable.

Many witnesses did not see how to dispense with them, mainly on the ground that if they were abolished it would be difficult to recruit the staff of adult teachers; but the almost invariable testimony, both of the witnesses whom we examined and of the inspectors in their reports published in the yearly Blue Books, is that, whether we look at these young people as teachers or as students, they are the most unsatisfactory part of our educational system.

And this testimony is the more striking when it comes from those who have sympathy with the institution of pupil-teachers, and are not prepared to see it abolished.

Thus the Rev. J. Stewart says, that the pupil-teacher system and training are the proper way to keep up the supply of teachers, and he would revert to the old system before 1862; he finds fault with the centre method of instruction. But the faults which Mr. Stewart finds with the pupil-teachers of the present day may be noted long before the revised Code, and in Mr. Stewart's own old reports the most serious complaints may be found of the difficulty of getting pupil-teachers, and of their very moderate attainments; and in 1877, before any central system of instruction had been established, he complained (Blue Book, 1877-8, p. 546), that the moral bond between the head-teacher and the apprentice was relaxed, and that many pupil-teachers never received any practical instruction during their apprenticeship. Mr. Matthew Arnold, whose old praises of the pupil-teacher system taken from his report to the Duke of Newcastle's Commission, a generation back, will be found quoted several times in the evidence, was forced reluctantly to admit that while his affection for the system remained unchanged, he recognised that the time had come for substituting a higher order of teaching, and for relying more on adult and well-trained teachers.

Mr. Sharpe told the Commission that were he a school manager, with a given amount to spend on staff, he would spend it on adults and not on pupil-teachers.

Not to burden this chapter with quotations, the complaint is general that the pupil-teachers teach badly, and are badly taught. The wretched state of their preparation when they enter the training colleges will be dwelt on when that part of our educational system is dealt with, and the remarkable thing is that the witnesses while complaining generally of the backwardness and ignorance of pupil-teachers, lay special stress on their inability to teach, and on their ignorance of school management.

So, too, in so far as the cry of over-pressure has any real justification, it is mainly to be found in the case of pupil-teachers.

We now proceed to discuss the question of the better instruction of the pupil-teachers whose shortcomings under the present system may be summed up as great meagreness of knowledge, crudeness, and mechanical methods of study, arising largely from neglect of their training by their head teachers. In order to remedy these defects, efforts have been made in various parts of the country to introduce reforms which may render pupil-teachers of value as a source of supply for the future teaching staff of the country.

The first to deal systematically with the instruction of the pupil-teachers, on a large scale, were the authorities of the Roman Catholic Training College at Liverpool. Mr. H. Hughes, Her Majesty's Inspector for Liverpool, in his report for 1873, says (Ed. Report, 1873-4, p. 109): "I wish to bear testimony to the good work carried on in Liverpool by the sisters of Notre Dame in bringing up well-trained pupil-teachers. At their convent in Mount Pleasant, to which the Liverpool Training College is attached, they board about 50 pupil-teachers, gathered from different parts of the country, who are employed in schools in the town taught by the sisters; at a branch convent in Everton Valley about 40 others are shortly to be received. The plan, as it is here carried out, appears to be an admirable one, and, under fitting circumstances, well worthy of adoption by other communities."

In 1876 Mr. Hughes again reports (Ed. Report, p. 498-9): "The Liverpool School Board has now established an organised system of instruction for the female pupil-teachers in its employ, a college having been recently opened in a large house given for the purpose by Mr. S. G. Rathbone, Chairman of the Board. Of this college the board's inspectress is the principal, and the governing council consists


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of members appointed by the board, the inspector and inspectress being ex officio among the number. Here the pupil-teachers attend about twice a week, those of the first and second years being relieved of their school duties on one afternoon each week for the purpose. ..."

Mr. Hughes gives details in the same report, showing the excellent results of the teaching of the Roman Catholic pupil-teachers, illustrated by their position in the Queen's scholarship examinations.

In 1881 Mr. Harrison reports (Ed. Report, 1881-2, p. 314): "Lastly, a scheme which has long been under consideration for supplementing the instruction given by their mistresses to the pupil-teachers in the voluntary Protestant schools, has now been realised by the establishment of a college for female pupil-teachers." He goes on with details of the scheme, and expresses his preference for this mixed system where the head-teacher remains the private tutor of the pupil-teacher, and a mixed system of lectures and individual instruction is in force. He testifies to the continued good results at the scholarship examination of the training of the Roman Catholic female pupil-teachers.

Mr. Harrison was examined before us, and gave valuable evidence as to means of improving the pupil-teacher system, and as to the good work done in Liverpool. He says: "I am not very much in love with the pupil-teacher system, " but I regard it as absolutely necessary for the present for keeping up the supply of teachers, and I would rather improve it than sweep it away. ... If I were free from all considerations, I would do away with the pupil-teacher system entirely. ... I should like to see all first year pupil-teachers made half-timers. They are not fit to take charge of a class, so that the loss to a school would be very small, and the leisure thus given would be devoted to the preparation of their own lessons, and would enable them to begin their career with a really good start. They would be relieved for the first year of the hard task of teaching all day and learning after school hours. This would be a very sensible alleviation at the most tender age in the somewhat hard career of a pupil-teacher, especially in the case of girls. In the second and other years I should like to see pupil-teachers free for one afternoon a week at least, when central instruction is open to them, &c." He insists that the central instruction should be supplementary, and that the tie between the head-teacher and the pupil-teacher should be maintained. He goes on to eulogise the central system of teaching as it prevails in Liverpool, and gives illustrations of its successful results. He would insist on all pupil-teachers passing the scholarship examination; he would make the examination at the end of the third year of apprenticeship the test of fitness to continue in the career of a teacher; he would abolish the fourth year's examination, and substitute the scholarship examination to be taken after the close of the four years' apprenticeship. Mr. Harrison states that in Liverpool, both in board and in voluntary schools, they practically get the pupil-teachers at 16 instead of at 14, and that in many cases this is a great improvement, though he would leave managers free to take them at the lower age.

We had much other evidence from Liverpool, both from Mr. Hance, clerk to the school board, and from representatives of the voluntary schools, of the great advantage of the central system of instructing the pupil-teachers. We may state that the benefits of the system as applied by the Liverpool School Board are mainly limited to the girls.

Mr. Hance has handed in the following table, comparing the percentage who passed in the first class at the scholarship examination of the pupil-teachers from the board schools of Liverpool, with the average of the pupil-teachers from the Kingdom at large.


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The School Board for London nearly 12 years ago introduced, to some extent, a centre system of instruction for the pupil-teachers, but was compelled by the EducationDepartment to abandon it, owing to the wording of the Code and of the indenture, which then required the instruction to be given to the pupil-teacher by the principal teacher of the school. Representations were made from the London School Board to the Education Department, urging such modifications of the Code as should permit of collective teaching of the pupil-teachers, and also urging an alteration of the indenture so as to substitute a maximum of four hours for six hours a day, and a maximum of 20 instead of 30 hours a week for teaching in school (London Board Minutes, 7 February 1877). Relaxations were made until at length the words ran: Schedule VI, section 5, "The pupil-teacher, when the school is not being held, shall receive without charge from a certificated teacher special instruction during at least five hours a week, &c." When this alteration in the Code made it lawful, the London School Board at once organised classes for the pupil-teachers. These were at first on two evenings and on Saturday mornings, and the pupil-teachers made three attendances a week, amounting in all to seven and a half hours. They were taught by certificated masters and mistresses, both heads and assistants, and from voluntary as well as from board schools, who were selected for their special aptitude as teachers of their subjects, and were paid 5s an hour. At each centre there was a registrar who superintended the work and was answerable for the discipline, but who did not, as a rule, teach. These centres were also under the general superintendence of the board inspectors. The classes were mixed. These classes continued for three years, and educationally their success was proved by the remarkable improvement in the position of the London Board pupil-teachers in the scholarship examination. In 1879, before any special organisation of their instruction had been established, the results of the July examinations for the scholarship were as follows:

This result shows no material difference between the London Board pupil-teachers and the rest of the country, subject to this remark, that the London School Board required all its pupil-teachers to sit for the scholarship, while a very large number of the pupil-teachers throughout the country are content with passing the examination for the last year of their apprenticeship, and so passing into the ranks of ex-pupil-teachers. Moreover the failures are not recorded for 1879 on the two sides, and that element of possible inequality is not set forth. But, in the scholarship examination of July 1884, after two years and a half (January 1882 - July 1884) of evening centre teaching, the following results were obtained:


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Great as was this success as far as preparing the pupil-teachers for their college course, it was felt that preparation in their studies was not all that was needed in training pupil-teachers.

When the agitation on the question of over-pressure was at its highest, many of those who did not believe much in the general extreme accusations which were brought against our educational system, felt that there was some truth in that part of the strictures which complained of the overwork of the pupil-teachers. Inspectors, heads of colleges, managers of schools, doctors, and others, had often thought and said that to expect a youth, and especially a girl from 14 to 18, to be working in school all day, and in the evening to attend lectures or other instruction, and to prepare ms or her own studies and school work, was an excessive tax on all but the thoroughly strong, and those of an equable and firm temperament.

But this leisure for study could not be secured without releasing the pupil-teacher for a substantial part of the school hours from school work. Mr. Mundella, by his Code of 1882, insisted on limiting the school hours of the pupil-teacher to a maximum of 25, but even this slight restriction was a good deal opposed at the time by some managers. In addition to the physical question there was a question of morals, or at any rate of manners and propriety to be considered. Friends of education, have long desired to attract teachers from more cultivated and refined homes to take service in elementary schools. It was found that in proportion to the seriousness and thoughtfulness of the parents of the girls apprenticed, there was an increasing reluctance to let their daughters be out habitually week after week till eight at night in attendance at the centre, possibly two miles from home; and it was felt desirable, so as to avoid over fatigue, and in order to co-operate with the reasonable wish of respectable parents, that an end should be put to night teaching, and that the pupil-teachers should have their evenings for quiet study at home.

The London School Board therefore re-organised its pupil-teacher classes, of which it established about a dozen, with about 180 pupil-teachers on an average in attendance at each. To these the junior pupil-teachers and candidates come as half-timers on the five working week-days, and on Saturday mornings, for three hours at each attendance, thus getting 18 hours of systematic instruction every week. The pupil-teachers in their third and fourth years attend two afternoons during the week, and on Saturday mornings, thus getting nine hours a week of definite systematic instruction (besides three hours each alternate week for the girls for needlework).

At first the needlework and the scripture instruction were left to the head-teachers, but it was afterwards thought that these subjects also could be better and more thoroughly taught at the centres, and now the sole educational duty of the head-teacher is the training of the apprentice in the art of teaching. The head teachers are expected also to take a friendly interest in the work done at the centre, and the better head-teachers do take that interest, and co-operate with the responsible teachers at the centres. In order to secure that the heads do not neglect their part of the work, there is a book called the "Pupil Teachers' Journal", in which are entered on the one side the marks assigned by the teachers of the centres for the home work done by the pupil-teacher, and a quarterly summary note of conduct and progress. On the other side of the page are spaces where the head-teacher of the school is to enter weekly a note of the progress of the pupil-teacher in the school, remarks on model lessons, object lessons, criticism lessons, &c. Thus the journal is, or should be, a complete record of the progress of the pupil-teacher in the double capacity of student and of teacher.

The relations of the pupil-teachers to the staff of the school, had, of course, to be re-cast when this system was introduced. This has been done by ceasing to count pupil-teachers till their last two years on the staff of the school. The juniors are to be familiarised with school methods by being directly associated with the trained teachers of the school, so as mainly to observe and study their methods, while helping occasionally in minor details of school work. During the afternoon absence of the senior pupil-teacher, the junior may be entrusted with a class or section of a class, but the afternoon has been chosen for the absence of the senior pupil-teachers, because that is the time when classes can be more easily grouped, and a subordinate member of the staff more easily spared.

The Bradford board, who have also introduced collective teaching for their pupil-teachers, have gone a step further, and have made even the senior pupil-teachers half-timers in the schools.

This plan of instructing the pupil-teachers has met with a good deal of opposition, but has now thoroughly justified itself to those who have the working of it on the


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London School Board, including members of the board, inspectors, and head-teachers. Its results, as preparing the pupil-teachers for their college course, have been most successful. The figures for 1885 and 1886 given at pp. 1,036-7 of our Second Report show the same marked superiority over the rest of England that was shown in 1884. The percentage of failure for the London board pupil-teachers and for the rest of England is also given. In 1885 it was for London pupil-teachers 5.5 per cent, for the rest of England 35.7 per cent, and in 1886 it was for the London pupil-teachers 1.10 (mis-printed 110), and for the rest of England 35.3 per cent. The following table gives the results of the Scholarship Examination, July 1887.

[click on the image for a larger version]

The results of the yearly examinations of the pupil-teachers show the same marked superiority of the centre teaching as the scholarship examination. The evidence of Mr. Martin, sub-inspector of the Marylebone division, may be referred to on this point. (Vol. 3, Appendix A, Table XVII.)

The great success of the central classes for the instruction of the pupil-teachers of the London School Board, has led the managers of the Church of England schools in Marylebone to form an association for the collective teaching of their pupil-teachers in nearly all the subjects of yearly examination. They have not, however, relieved the pupil-teachers of any of their work in school.

In the whole of England there are nearly 28,000 pupil-teachers; of these, last year 2,765 passed "well", and earned the £3 grant; 11,224 passed "fairly", and earned the £2 grant; the remainder passed below "fairly", being percentages of about 10 per cent well, about 40 per cent fairly, and 50 per cent below fairly. Of the London Board pupil-teachers in 1886 (Second Report, p. 1,036), 25.7 per cent passed "well", 57.3 per cent passed "fairly", and 17 per cent passed below "fairly".

It is sometimes alleged that this method of training may give the pupil-teachers a fuller measure of knowledge, but that it diminishes their interest in the school and their power of teaching. As to this we may refer to page 1,036 of our Second Report, where it will be found, that of the London Board pupil-teachers 70 per cent were qualified at the end of their apprenticeship under Article 52, that is to say, they were specially recognised by the inspector on the ground of their practical skill as teachers, and were consequently recognised as provisionally certificated teachers competent to take charge of small schools. The remaining 30 per cent were qualified under Article 50, to take posts as assistant teachers. Moreover, one of the subjects in which the pupil-teacher has to pass every year, according to Schedule V. of the Code, is " teaching," the examination in which is practical in the school, and failure in this part of the work would be noted in the yearly report. It is the very rarest thing to find any remark on any one of the 2,000 pupil-teachers of the London School Board for a defect in this respect. The reports of Her Majesty's Inspectors are published by the School Board in the half-yearly reports of the School Management Committee which were before us.

The subjects of instruction at the centres, are the subjects in which the pupil-teachers are examined according to the Code. The science, however, is taught on a fixed plan so as to secure some appreciation by the students of scientific principles, and some general knowledge of the laws of nature, rather than with the primary object of securing a pass which will count for marks at the scholarship examination,

A very striking result of the work of the centres has been to secure a growing esprit de corps and sense of professional self-respect among the pupil-teachers. Formerly they were isolated, and though they might under a conscientious and able head-teacher get some stimulating effects from his or her teaching, yet they missed the sympathy of numbers. At the centres they re-act on one another, and become


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proud of their progress and of the honour of their centre. They have also clubs and games which do much for the formation of character. Since the day centres have been at work, there has been a marked improvement in the quality of the candidates. In our Second Report, p. 1,036, will be found a table showing the proportion of pupil-teachers, under the School Board for London, who have previously been at secondary schools. The Board has lowered the salaries of pupil-teachers since all these advantages were afforded them, but this has not checked the supply, on the contrary, there is a growing facility in securing them; though in the case of boys the difficulty still continues, which has been felt and noticed in the reports of Her Majesty's Inspectors for more than 20 years, that the competition of employment in which lads can rapidly earn good wages stands in the way of getting boy pupil-teachers. (Sharpe, Report of Education Department, 1863-4, pp. 144-222). It is believed, however, that year by year under the present system a better class of pupil-teachers will be secured - more intellectual, of more responsibility and professional zeal, and better trained for their work.

The question has been raised whether the central system of teaching the pupil- teachers as organised by the London School Board is not too expensive for general imitation. On this point we refer to an appendix to this chapter by our colleague, Mr. Lyulph Stanley.

In Huddersfield there has been a marked improvement in the pupil-teachers, partly owing to the fact of the more careful selection of candidates, and to the establishment of a Seventh Standard School, from which some of the pupil-teachers are drawn, and where they have been carefully taught. The board has also a system of central teaching for the extra subjects, e.g., French, drawing, singing, English literature, and science, but not for the ordinary subjects of examination. They also group all the pupil-teachers in one school, instead of letting those in the separate departments be entirely taught by their own head-teacher. The girls are excused one half day a week from school-work. Mr. Tait attributes much of the success of the Huddersfield board pupil-teachers in the scholarship examinations to the fact that for the last three years they have had collective instruction in the extra subjects.

In Birmingham the pupil-teachers are excused from attendance at their school one half day a week. They are instructed in classes in the mornings and afternoons, and on Saturday mornings. They also attend twice a week in the evenings for two and a half hours each time, and, in all, have 10 hours a week instruction.

The Rev. J. Gilmore, chairman of the Sheffield School Board, stated that, on the whole, personally, he was not quite satisfied with the centre system of teaching at Sheffield. He gave figures, showing that they did badly at the scholarship examination, but he attributed the failure mainly to a bad initial selection. To remedy this defect, he has since selected candidates who had passed the Seventh Standard, and he stated that with a careful selection of candidates, and with the changes they hope to make in the central system, it will be satisfactory in future, so far as the pupil-teachers are concerned. The system now in existence in Sheffield does not appear to be as thoroughly organised as that in Liverpool, Birmingham, or London.

A return from the Glasgow School Board, dated 30th November 1887, published in our Appendix, page 8, No. 8, shows that the pupil-teachers of that board, who have been under collective instruction, but have not been excused from teaching during the full time permitted by the Code, have done better, both at the scholarship and at the yearly examinations than other pupil-teachers. This evidence shows that the statement of Dr. Morrison as to the inferiority of the pupil- teachers of the Glasgow School Board, resulting from their being taught at centres, is incorrect.

In concluding our examination of the pupil-teacher system, we strongly recommend that, wherever it is practicable, a central system of instruction of the pupil-teachers should be introduced, such as has been described in various towns.

In country districts encouragement should be given to group the pupil-teachers from neighbouring schools as far as possible for instruction. This might certainly be done, at any rate, on Saturday mornings; and more time should be secured for study, and less, especially in the earlier years, should be spent in teaching in school.

As to the training of the pupil-teachers in the art of teaching, for which we ought mainly to rely on the teachers under whom they serve in school, greater care will


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have to be exercised by inspectors and by managers to secure that this important part of their education is not neglected.

We think that the apprenticeship of pupil-teachers might be limited to schools where an experienced head teacher is certified by Her Majesty's Inspector to be fit to take charge of pupil-teachers, and this should not be until, at any rate, the head-teacher had got his or her parchment; and that if in the opinion of Her Majesty's Inspector the head teacher has neglected the teaching and training of the pupil-teacher, he should be liable to be disqualified for having charge of pupil-teachers.

The pupil-teacher should not, during the first year at least, be reckoned on the staff, and should be used in the school as a learner to be associated with the head-teacher rather than as a cheap assistant. The proper use and education of the pupil-teacher should have much weight in determining the merit of the school; and unpromising pupil-teachers should be removed from the profession not later than the close of the third year of their apprenticeship.

Many complaints have been made to us by witnesses, and in the answers to our circulars, of the length of time which now elapses before the Education Department communicates to the managers the result of the yearly examination of the pupil- teachers. This is owing to the fact that a part of the examination is conducted at the school at the time of the yearly inspection. We think that the managers and pupil-teachers ought to know the results of the pupil-teachers' yearly examination within a reasonable time, and that, if necessary, the inspector should satisfy himself as to the matters not tested at the collective examination, at a special visit to the school.

APPENDIX BY THE HON. E. LYULPH STANLEY ON THE ESTIMATED COST OF THE CENTRAL INSTRUCTION OF PUPIL-TEACHERS UNDER THE SCHOOL BOARD FOR LONDON

There are nearly 2,000 pupil-teachers employed by the London School Board. These would have been reckoned while working full time in the schools under the former system of the Board as supplying staff for 60,000 children at 30 each, now only half of them are reckoned, and they are reckoned at 40 each, making a diminution of staff of 20,000. These have to be replaced by adult assistants, reckoned at 60 each, which makes an additional staff of 333 assistants necessary, three-fourths of whom are women. If these were all trained and certificated, and receiving the average salaries of teachers under the present scale of the board, their salaries would amount to more than £30,000. On the other hand, the improved condition of the pupil-teachers has enabled the board to make a material reduction of salaries during the first two years amounting on 2,000 pupil-teachers to about £7,000 a year. Again, the board, as part of its plan, requires the pupil-teachers to sit for the scholarship in the year following the expiration of the indenture, and retains them in the meantime as ex-pupil-teachers, the number of whom will amount, when the scheme is in full operation, to at least 450. These take the place of certificated assistants, who would otherwise be employed; thus making an economy of nearly £60 a head, or £27,000 a year, so that the net financial loss in adult staff will be about £3,000 a year, without considering the saving resulting from the reduced salary of pupil-teachers, for which is secured a far more efficient and better taught pupil-teacher, and who, it is hoped, will provide a far better class of trained teachers when those who are now pupil-teachers come out of college. As to the cost of instruction of the pupil-teachers in the centres, it was estimated for the year 1886-7 at £11,300, or about £3,000 more than would have been paid under the old system to the head-teachers, but in that estimate credit was taken for only £2,000 grants from South Kensington. £2,700 has been paid. Moreover, under the centre system, the grants on the pupil-teachers who pass yearly are much higher than they were formerly; these grants, however, are paid to the credit of the schools, and, therefore, do not appear in the accounts of the pupil-teacher centres. There is an additional charge for interest and sinking fund on the permanent pupil-teachers' schools erected which will not reach £2,0O0 a year, even when those in course of erection are opened. Thus an additional cost of £3,000 for an adult staff, and of £4,300 in teaching and for interest and sinking fund on the pupil-teachers' schools has enabled the board materially to relieve the pressure on the pupil-teachers, and very greatly to improve their training and education. Against the cost must be set the £7,000 a year by which the salaries of the pupil-teachers have been reduced. We have, therefore, an estimate of a net cost of £300 a year, which, distributed over 320,000 children in average attendance, amounts to about a farthing per head, and in reality the cost of the system will


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disappear, as many pupil-teachers enter the service of the board for a shortened period of apprenticeship of three or even of two years, and thus count for 40 on the staff for two-thirds of their pupil-teacher life.

CHAPTER 4

EX-PUPIL-TEACHERS AND ACTING TEACHERS

State of Students on entering into Training Colleges

We have already dealt with the pupil-teachers, and shown how far that initial stage in the career of the teacher answers the purpose of suitably preparing young persons for their future profession. There is a large body of testimony from the witnesses that they do not see how to dispense with pupil-teachers as a means of recruiting the body of adult teachers. At the same time the overwhelming mass of the evidence is that these young people are unsatisfactory as teachers, and ill-taught and ill-trained as scholars. The central system of instruction, if coupled with a considerable relaxation as to the hours of work in school, may remedy these defects, and preserve whatever advantages there are in determining the mind while young to the choice of the teaching profession, and securing familiarity with practical school work at an early and impressionable age. But at present the great mass of testimony is that the training colleges are unable to do all that they should for their students, on account of the unprepared and crude state in which they receive them. This initial difficulty should be fully recognised, as while there is a great deal of evidence of the valuable results of college training, and of the general marked superiority of the trained over the untrained teachers, yet there is also much evidence to show that even in the training colleges we do not always get that liberal and intellectual teaching which we have a right to expect. But it may well be that if the students on admission were better taught, more receptive, and with a more awakened intelligence, the work done in the colleges would be of a much higher quality than it is now; and this preliminary fact of the general low state of education of the candidates for admission should be borne in mind, in justice to those who are responsible for their education in the colleges. The following table, taken from the yearly reports of the Education Department for the last nine years, shows the numbers passing high enough to entitle them to Queen's scholarships, and those passing third class or failing.

TABLE

CANDIDATES FOR ADMISSION TO TRAINING COLLEGES

[click on the image for a larger version]


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In the last three years, distinguishing between pupil-teachers and non-pupil teachers -

In the same three years less than a fifth of all the candidates passed well or in the first class.

Turning from statistical tables to the remarks of inspectors, we have the observations in the Blue Book of 1886-7 of two new inspectors of training colleges, Mr. Oakley and Mr. Fitch, who have recently succeeded Mr. Sharpe and Canon Warburton in the inspection of male and female training colleges.

Taking the male candidates first, we find that Mr. Oakley (p. 408) quotes his colleagues on the subject of arithmetic, and while finding much neatness and accuracy in plain sums, says, "These reports show that arithmetic is well taught as regards mechanical and accurate work, but greater attention should be paid to proof of rules and to the reason of processes."

On School Management, Mr. Oakley, after quoting from his colleagues' reports (p. 410), says, "The general inference to be drawn from these reports is, that though two out of the three revisers consider the papers, on the whole, fair, there is great room for improvement in this important subject, and that at a large number of schools the pupil-teachers have had little instruction or assistance in it."

The defenders of the pupil-teacher system mainly base their case in support of that system on the early familiarity acquired with school management, and for the sake of this familiarity they are willing somewhat to sacrifice the general education and intellectual development of the pupil-teacher; Mr. Mansford, for instance, says "I do not think that very much could be done in a year or two to teach a man how to teach, and, therefore, if they came up well instructed but bad teachers, I should say that it would be more fatal to their success as elementary teachers than if they came up poorly instructed and good teachers." In view of this contention, it is a matter for serious reflection to find that the weight of the evidence shows that the bulk of the pupil-teachers finish their career both poorly instructed and bad teachers.

Mr. Oakley, summing up the opinions of his colleagues on grammar and com- position, says (p. 411), "These extracts seem to show clearly that there continues to [be] a great absence of culture and general intelligence on the part of a considerable number of candidates."

"With regard to the reports on geography and history", he says, "I think the reports on geography and history (from which I have given extracts) show some improvement, and are not discouraging. We must not forget that it is very difficult for a pupil-teacher to write a good paper on history, which would require wider reading than it is reasonable to expect " (p. 412). It is instructive to compare this somewhat hopeful summary with the detailed observations on which it is based, as showing how merely mechanical is that which is accepted as not discouraging.

Of Euclid, algebra, and mensuration, Mr. Oakley says (p, 413), "These reports on the progress made in the very elementary mathematical work required are far from '" satisfactory; very few candidates can work the easiest geometrical deduction. It is extremely desirable that greater attention be paid to this important branch of the syllabus."

Latin and French are the luxuries of pupil-teachers. It is only under exceptional circumstances that they have an opportunity of learning them, and what is done does not appear from the examiners' reports to be worth much.

Turning now to the female training colleges, and to the report on them by Mr. Fitch, Mr. Fitch observes (p. 432), "It is a disappointing fact that notwithstanding the previous preparation [of pupil-teachership] nearly one-fourth of those who had enjoyed it, and who had presumably passed the inspector's examination at the end of each of the years of their apprenticeship, proved unequal to the demands of the very simple examination for admission to training colleges."

Mr. Fitch understates the case, for he has omitted to notice that among those whom he has reckoned as passing, 306 passed in the third class, which is too low to qualify for admission to a training college.

He goes on to observe: "Of the total number of 1,969 female candidates who succeeded in passing the admission examination at Midsummer, 1885 [this number


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should be 1,663, deducting the 306 who did not pass, in the sense of qualifying them for Queen's scholarships] only 940 found entrance as first year students into colleges at the beginning of the year 1886. The rest for the most part became assistant teachers, and will after serving in that capacity for a year, probably present themselves as untrained candidates for certificates." With these we shall have to deal hereafter, and also with the provisionally certificated teachers, many of whom are authorised by the Department to take charge of small village schools, though they may have failed in the scholarship examination.

It might be thought that a sifting, by which only 940 out of 1,663 successful candidates are admitted to college, should secure the pick of them, especially as the colleges, though not bound to accept students in order of merit, seem at present very largely to be guided by their place on the scholarship list, where denominational considerations do not close the door to intending students. How far do the 56 per cent of the candidates who, having passed the examination, enter college, satisfy the college authorities and Her Majesty's Inspectors of their fitness to enter upon a course of training?

Mr. Fitch begins by pointing out that the smaller and more remote colleges, not having the pick of the students to choose from, are forced to fill their ranks with students passing low, and that, therefore, to judge the work of a college exclusively by the results of the certificate examination, irrespective of the qualifications at entrance, would be unfair. The college authorities complain that often the certificates as to health are untrustworthy, and there is no doubt that sickly students have been admitted whose subsequent break-down has helped to swell the cry of over-pressure.

"More frequent subjects of complaint on the part of the training college authorities" (says Mr. Fitch, p. 432), "relate to the deficient preparation of the candidates in the art of reading, and in the knowledge of even the elementary principles of teaching. It is feared that many masters and mistresses think the ability to read evinced by the power to pass the Seventh Standard is sufficient, and accordingly give to their pupil- teachers little or no practice in elocution during the four years of their apprenticeship.

"The revised syllabus of pupil-teacher work, which came into operation in 1883, prescribed for the first time a definite progression on the part of pupil-teachers in the knowledge and experience of teaching during their second and succeeding years of apprenticeship. Although some improvement has thus taken place, the full effect of the new regulations is not yet visible, and the colleges have great reason to complain of the ineffective preparation of the candidates in this respect. In schools in which the staff is weak, the pupil-teacher is often told to teach, but he is not trained or taught to teach, and the amount of guidance he receives from the head teacher is often very small. He is considered too exclusively in the light of a cheap assistant, and not sufficiently as an apprentice who has to learn the art and mystery of a craft. It is too common for a head teacher to entrust the whole work of a class to a pupil-teacher in the first or second year, and to give the youngest class to the youngest teacher. Collective and object lessons are required of pupil-teachers in their third and fourth year, before they have listened to any model lessons from their masters or mistresses, or have received any directions as to the right way of preparing them. The efforts now being made by the richer school managers, notably by the School Boards of London and Liverpool to reduce the hours of work, and to provide with a shorter period of actual teaching a larger amount of effective supervision in study, are most valuable, and will doubtless be largely imitated by managers whenever circumstances will allow." (Fitch, Education Report, 1886-7, p. 434.)

Mr. Fitch goes on to describe the attainments of the candidates at the scholarship examination as reported on by his colleagues.

Mr. Blandford reports some improvement in school management, but the marks assigned are comparatively low.

Mr. Byrne says, "In the papers committed to me, I observe that more attention might be paid to instructing pupil-teachers in the drawing up of notes of lessons, which is the subject of the first and most important question. Far too many of the answers betray an ignorance of the proper form in which notes should be drawn up, of the right mode of stating the facts, and of dealing with -them for the purpose of instruction. They are rather disjointed jottings down of thoughts that occur to the writer in regard to matter and method, than a workmanlike statement of the notes of a lesson." Mr. Cornish, Mr. M. Owen, Mr. Steele, and Mr. Synge are also quoted, the only quotation at all favourable is from Mr. Synge, who says, "The only question on which conspicuous ignorance was shown was that which required a statement of the reason of certain processes in arithmetic. Those who attempted


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to answer the question seemed to think that a statement of the method or trick by which they arrived at the result, was an explanation of the reason of the process, and at all events sufficient for a class of children."

We have a somewhat more favourable report upon English grammar and composition; Mr. Curry, Mr. French, and Mr. Holt White, are all quoted as noticing either improvement, or at any rate, fair success. Mr. Howard, too, notices an improvement, though he complains of the bad effects of certain text books.

In geography and history the inspectors generally seem to find what can be got from industry, but not what is the result of intelligence. In map drawing the work is in many cases fair, and in history the facts of the text book have been learnt; when we hope to go farther we seem to be disappointed.

In arithmetic, too, neatness and accuracy are commended, but intelligence seems absent.

In domestic economy the same criticism seems to apply.

Generally it cannot be said that either Mr. Oakley or Mr. Fitch gives a bright account of the abilities or education of the students on their entering the training colleges.

If we turn to the Blue Book of 1885-86, and look at the last reports of Mr. Sharpe and Canon Warburton, we find Mr. Sharpe noting an advance in the quality of the candidates for admission; but we need to measure the previous level of attainments before we can say that the advance implies any real amount of knowledge. He says (page 403), "In the last scholarship list there was a perceptible rise in the quality of the knowledge of the highest pupil-teachers from board schools. It was to be expected that the better class, who were naturally eager to learn, and had formed habits of study, would profit by the variety of able teachers selected for special subjects. The subjects worst prepared at entrance are the Elements of English Grammar, Constitutional History, and Algebra. In the first and third of these the failure undoubtedly arose from want of practice, in the second from want of a good text book. But greater variety is to be found in their knowledge of the art of teaching. Some have evidently been overworked drudges in ill-staffed schools, others have evidently taught before experienced and kindly teachers."

And at page 404, Mr. Sharpe says, "I have noticed that there is some improvement in the attainments of the candidates for admission, but I am assured that there is scarcely any in their teaching skill, though most of them have been apprenticed for four years as pupil teachers, and that model and criticism lessons are almost unknown to students before admission." Mr. Sharpe goes on to quote a scheme of the Nottingham school board for securing a valuable course of such lessons, which, says he, "if generally adopted, would tend greatly to correct the defect which is really the weakest point of the pupil-teacher system."

Canon Warburton, in his report for 1885, lets the various inspectors speak for themselves. The general result is the same - careful drill and want of intelligence; these are generally noticed as subjects for commendation and for regret. On the important subject of school management, Mr. Stewart says, "The quality of the answers is for the most part poor, and reveals a lack of systematic training and practical experience. The answers given by those who had been pupil-teachers were somewhat better than those written by candidates who had not been pupil-teachers. When pupil-teachers receive a regular course of training in school management, and carry into every-day practice the principles of teaching as contained in some text-book, better results may be expected, but not till then " (page 438j Blue Book, 1885-86).

Turning now to the answers sent to the Commission by the principals of training colleges. Question 15 was "Have you in the last ten years noticed any improvement or falling off in the students admitted to your college, or in their preparedness", and Question 21, "Have you any other suggestions to make respecting training colleges? "

In answer to these questions, seven male principals think that there has been improvement, seven think that things are much the same, and three think that there has been a falling off.

In answer to Question 21 it is suggested by Canon Daniel that there should be greater strictness in the examination of pupil-teachers and candidates for admission into training colleges.

The late principal of Chelsea, Canon Cromwell, in answer to Q. 15, says, "In my opinion they are not so well grounded as formerly in the necessary subjects of education; hence we cannot rely on the foundation of their knowledge."


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The principal of Peterborough says, in answer to Q. 15, "It appears to me that there is a falling off in the preparedness, due, I suppose, to the modern craze for doing so 'many' things." On the other hand Bangor, Carmarthen, Culham, Hammersmith, and Westminster all report a decided improvement, York a slight improvement. The principal of Winchester, while on the whole reporting improvement, makes the following remarks: "They are of a slightly better class, with a better tone. Their mathematics are somewhat improved. Instruction seems to be very rarely given to pupil-teachers in reading, school management, writing, or music. On inquiry a short time since, I found that out of 56 students only 13 had any instruction or practice in writing during their apprenticeship, and most of them had only had this for a few weeks before the scholarship examination." In the female training colleges there is a distinct preponderance of opinion that the quality and preparedness of candidates have fallen off. Of 25 colleges four make no answer. Four say there has been improvement, namely, Lincoln, Liverpool, Southlands, Stockwell, but all these speak with reserve as to the amount. Eight colleges - Bristol, Cheltenham, Chichester, Derby, Home and Colonial, Norwich, Ripon, Whitelands - consider, on the whole, that the gains and losses compensate, or that things are much as they were. Nine colleges speak of a falling off; these are Bishop Stortford, Darlington, Durham, Oxford, Salisbury, Swansea, Truro, Wandsworth, Warrington, and many of these make serious complaint.

On the whole the evidence is that things are much as they were 10 years ago in the male colleges, but that in the female colleges there is a distinct falling off.

We now turn to the evidence given us orally by witnesses, of whom we had a large number of very important ones, on the question of training colleges.

Mr. Sharpe from 1875 to 1885, Inspector of Male Training Colleges, in his report for 1876, summed up the performances of a candidate for admission at that time:

He was reminded that in the Education Report, 1876, pp. 685-6, he said, "I will first state briefly as a summary of the foregoing remarks what the young man of 18 years of age after an apprenticeship of five years can do. The average candidate can work the ordinary rules of arithmetic, but not problems involving rules; he can write out a proposition of Euclid by memory, but cannot apply it intelligently; he knows just enough algebra to be confused; he can parse an English sentence fairly, and has a fair knowledge of the bare facts of geography and history; he has a slight smattering of a French or Latin vocabulary; he knows the ordinary forms of school keeping. It must be allowed that a certain number are more advanced, but many pupil-teachers do not reach even this very moderate standard, Can we justly charge the certificated teachers with neglect of their apprentices? I have good reason for believing that a considerable percentage of pupil-teachers are neglected, but, on the other hand, I find that a still larger percentage receive more than the stipulated minimum of instruction. In two colleges under my own and the principal's eye, by means of slips of paper filled up by the students without signature and immediately destroyed, it was found that in each case 25 per cent of the students claimed to have received from their teachers less than the legal stipulated minimum."

But since then he states there has been a considerable rise; in 1883 he reported:

"It must be a subject for regret that the attainments of the candidates for admission to training colleges should be so low, but, on the other hand, it is a subject for congratulation that at the close of their training the general progress is so great", and he says, "Yes, as a rule, that is the average condition." His remarks in 1885 as to the practical absence of improvement in the teaching skill of candidates for admission have been quoted.

Canon Warburton, in his evidence, says of the candidates for admission Canon to training colleges, that the school management papers which they write in the course Warburton. of the admission examination are deplorably bad. He says that the relation between the head teacher and the pupil-teacher was of great value, and on being asked, "Must not a considerable deduction be made from that when it is seen how often the pupil-teacher comes out of apprenticeship with a very small amount of practical knowledge of school keeping", he says, "Yes, but I think that in,the abstract the relation is a very valuable one, and that without its producing great technical results the pupil-teacher is the better for it as a boy or girl." He also stated that the raw material delivered to the training colleges has been of a very wretched quality, and "perhaps that is the main drawback. They (the colleges)


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have to spend hours and hours in teaching many of the students to read." If we are materially to raise the work of our colleges we must materially raise the quality of the pupil-teachers who come to the colleges. And some better system of encouraging the learning element rather than the teaching element of the pupil-teachers lies at the roots of any useful proposals.

Canon Warburton, speaking of the want of education of the pupil-teacher, says - "The odd thing is that they seem to know nothing about teaching. They get lower marks for the school management paper than those who come in by open competition. The teachers to whom they were apprenticed have evidently seldom taken the trouble to give them any hint at all about the theory of education, the different systems, and the different ways of teaching subjects, and so on. That takes one rather by surprise. The authorities (of the colleges) say that they are easier to manage than those who have not been pupil-teachers, and they know more of discipline and order. They all admit that." He thinks that the candidates have shared in the general improvement in education. "Anyhow, they are not worse in that respect than they used to be."

He re-affirms the ignorance of the pupil-teachers of school methods, and says he thinks it is one of the things in which the pupil-teachership breaks down, because there is not time for the head teachers to teach this effectively.

Canon Daniel, while finding that the candidates for admission at Battersea are relatively well prepared, points out that a very large number of students in training must have been imperfectly taught. He states that during the last 10 years the quality and the state of preparedness of his students on entrance has been gradually improving. This is not quite consistent with his answer to the circular sent to the training colleges. But that answer was directed to the one point of masters presenting their pupil-teachers for South Kensington examinations, irrespective of any systematic course of scientific training, for the sake of the grants, and at the expense of their regular orderly instruction.

He frequently hears complaints that schoolmasters do not sufficiently instruct their pupil-teachers in the craft of teaching, and to the following question, "That is to say, that the master rather uses the pupil-teacher as a relief to himself in the teaching of the school than as an apprentice whom he has to form in the art of teaching?" He replied, "Yes, he does not sufficiently train him." Canon Daniel thinks the course of instruction in the training colleges might be improved by striking out some of the more elementary subjects, but that would necessitate better preparation at entry. He states of the pupil-teachers who seek to enter college, that there is a want of thoroughness in their knowledge, and he repeats that they have not been sufficiently taught and trained in the principles of teaching; they are often used as mere instruments instead of being supervised. "There must be a solid basis of education before you begin to specialise and teach men how to teach. We should be mere charlatans if we spent our time in teaching men how to teach subjects they did not know."

Dr. Graham, of Hammersmith Training College, says - "We should like to see students beginning a course of training in a far better position to take advantage of the training." He would like a three years course of training, beginning at 16 or 17; the student during the first year to be under preparatory instruction, during the second to do the work now done in two years, and the third year to be mainly teaching in the practising schools, and he thinks that this training would give the student more fully, and at an age when he is really more susceptible and more capable of learning, what he now gets as a pupil teacher, and he would be a better teacher. Dr. Graham does not think that practical skill can be acquired during apprenticeship. Pupil-teachers have not at that age the knowledge which would enable them to appreciate the teaching. He would be glad, as a general practice, to have the preparatory year of training from 17 to 18. But there are many difficulties, especially with the schools that rely on pupil-teachers as part of the effective teaching staff.

Canon Cromwell says a very large number of those who seek to enter a training college are certainly unfit for the tuition they would get there. Not many from health, principally from want of due preparation. The pupil-teachers who come to St. Mark's have not learnt to study for themselves, to concentrate their attention, to read for themselves, and to reason accurately. The general education of the pupil-teacher is very much neglected; one of the great desiderata is the increasing of the mental self-reliance of the pupil-teacher and his power of individual thought. He finds the teaching in the college handicapped by the bad state of


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preparation of the students, although at Chelsea they have rather the pick of the candidates. The standard of acquirements at the scholarship examinations might be raised. At the end of pupil-teachership, the pupil-teacher does not come out with any great stock of wise convictions about the way in which his business should be done. In school methods he follows a haphazard plan. Nevertheless, Canon Cromwell has a very strong opinion of the great advantages of the pupil-teacher course in preparing young people to be teachers; but the general education of the pupil-teacher requires to be raised. He should at least be able to explain himself decently well in a simple piece of composition. He should also know the elements of English and Algebra better than he does at present. He is not well-grounded in what he professes to know, and the result is that in the training colleges the authorities have to begin afresh almost every one of the subjects which the student profess to understand. He adds that some pupil-teachers may be unprepared, because they have missed their vocation, but a certain number have not been fully instructed by their masters.

Mr. Mansford of the Westminster Training College states that the instruction in the college is adapted to the students, but he could not say that they are well trained: he thinks the lower half are very imperfectly trained. He thinks the pupil-teacher system highly advantageous as a preparation for the college work. He states that it is difficult to say that the faults of the students, when they enter college, are mainly faults of training and not of intelligence. In many cases it is undoubtedly the fact that they have been neglected, but not in all cases. The teaching side of the pupil-teacher has in many cases been developed at the expense of the learning side.

Miss Manley, of Stockwell, finds great intellectual defects in the students on entrance; she attributes these defects to a want of proper system in their previous training.

Such being the accumulation of testimony as to the unsatisfactory and uneducated state of the students when they enter into training, the great weight of evidence is that the result of two years training is to do them a great deal of good, and that the professional training of the teacher is an essential condition of an efficient national system of education.

Before considering in what respects the existing system of training colleges may need reform or supplementing, we may review the other kinds of adult teachers recognised.

Beginning at the bottom of the scale, there is in mixed girls' and infant schools a woman over 18 years of age, and approved by the inspector, who is employed during the whole of the school hours in the general instruction of the scholars and in teaching needlework. She is accepted as equivalent to a pupil-teacher, and consequently counts on the staff for 40 children in average attendance; there were 4,659 teachers of this class employed according to the return of the Education Department, for 1886-7. She does not seem as a rule to have favourably impressed those who have seen her at work. If her services are to be continued, the least that can be required of her is that within a reasonable time, say one year of her professional recognition, she should qualify by passing the scholarship examination. It cannot be desirable that from year to year she should go on as one of the staff, dependent on the indulgence of the inspector or the unwillingness of a new inspector to put a slight on the judgment of his predecessor. It has been suggested that in many cases the age considerably exceeds 18, and that under this article infirm old women are put in charge of classes in country schools.

We next come to the ex-pupil-teacher, who is treated officially by the Department as the typical assistant teacher, that being his or her official designation; certificated teachers, whether head or assistant, being classified alike as "certificated teachers".

At present a pupil-teacher who passes the fourth year's examination, or the scholarship examination, even as low as the third class, may be recognised as an assistant teacher, and count on the school staff for 60.

The testimony is strong from many witnesses that the yearly examination of pupil-teachers is a most unsatisfactory test of efficiency. Failure to pass that examination is practically unheard of. And yet these same young persons fail at the scholarship examination to the extent of about a fourth of those who sit, those who sit being about four-fifth.s of the pupil-teachers completing their apprenticeship; those who do not sit being presumably the less qualified.

Although failure at the scholarship would exclude anyone else from becoming an assistant teacher, yet an ex-pupil-teacher who fails may fall back on the previous


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qualification of having passed the fourth year's examination satisfactorily; and, if qualified under Article 52, that is to say, if specially recommended by the inspectors on the ground of practical skill as a teacher, may, up to the age of 25, take sole charge of a school not exceeding 60 in average attendance. A pupil-teacher may pass satisfactorily, even though the pass be below "fair". The Education Department reports to us that in 1886, 425 persons who failed at the scholarship examination that year were accepted as assistants on account of their having passed the fourth year's examination as pupil-teachers; of these 63 were qualified under Article 52 as provisionally certificated teachers.

We note among the resolutions passed at a ruridecanal chapter in Somersetshire, September 1886, and recorded, page 34, No. LXXIII among other memorials and suggestions furnished to us, "That acting certificates for the employment as teachers of ex-pupil-teachers, direct from their apprenticeship, should gradually cease, and that in future all teachers should be subjected to some direct training in order that their instruction should become more 'thoughtful'."

The Durham Diocesan Board of Education, among their suggestions to us, recommended (No. 8) that some steps be taken to limit the influx of teachers into the profession, who have not served an apprenticeship and passed through a training college.

These assistant teachers or ex-pupil-teachers are a very important part of the staff of schools. They are tending to supplant the pupil-teacher, and by the Government report for 1886-7 there were 5,336 males and 12,103 females, a total of 17,439, counting as available for the instruction of 1,046,340 children, or nearly a third of all the children under instruction.

These ex-pupil-teachers vary very much in quality and efficiency. If they have been well trained in large schools under good head teachers, and with ample opportunities for study, they may have some good qualities as teachers; but, as a rule, they are those pupil-teachers who either never sat for the scholarship, or failed or passed too low to get into college. The evidence of the Clerk to the Hull school board, of the Birmingham school board, of Mr. Charles Smith, head master of St. Thomas, Charterhouse, who has had very large classes for their instruction, and of Mr. Scotson, shows that the ex-pupil-teachers employed are largely of very poor quality, intellectually, and as teachers, but they are cheap, ranging generally from a minimum of £30 or £35 for women, to £55 or £60 as a usual maximum for men, and they are less trouble than pupil-teachers.

No doubt even if it were determined ultimately to have none but trained certificated teachers, it would be many years before we could dispense with the services of the ex-pupil teachers; the only thing to be done is to make them as good as possible. We therefore recommend - First, that all ex-pupil-teachers should be required to sit for the scholarship examination the July following the expiration of their indentures, and should only be recognised as assistants provisionally, pending the result of the scholarship examination being known, and should they fail to pass high enough to entitle them to enter college, they should be disqualified at the ensuing Christmas from counting on the staff. Secondly, while many of these ex-pupil-teachers, especially women, may render useful service for two or three years without their intending permanently to follow up the profession of teacher (in many cases the expectation of marriage prevents women from giving up two years of their life to training) they should, if they fail to go to college, not be recognised beyond the age of 23, unless they pass the first year's certificate examination, and, having passed that, they should be required after not more than [two] years to pass the second year's certificate examination. Moreover their recognition should be provisional, and renewed from year to year on the report of Her Majesty's Inspector of the way they had taught their class during the school year. And, lastly, they should in no case be recognised except as assistants.

Such restrictions as these, coupled with an improved system of education of pupil-teachers, would gradually improve the quality of the ex-pupil-teachers, and do much for the advancement of education. They should, however, not count on the staff of schools for more than 50 children.

The next class of teacher is the acting teacher who passes the certificate examination. Several witnesses have proposed the abolition of this class of teacher, and the requirement of training as a condition of recognition as a certificated teacher. But such a step as this would be too severe. Several of the most interesting, able, and thoughtful teachers who came before us have not been trained, and while we recognise


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that as a general rule the trained teachers are greatly superior to the untrained, we do not think it wise to close all other avenues to the profession. Besides, the number of training colleges is at present quite insufficient to accommodate all those who would require admission if no untrained teachers wore recognised.

At the same time we think the conditions of admission might be made more stringent for untrained teachers, and there is reason to believe that if these conditions were gradually raised the acting teachers would meet them. Thus, in consequence of the Code of 1883 disqualifying teachers passing in the first year's papers from taking pupil-teachers, the great mass of the acting teachers from that time have taken the second year's papers. It would be desirable, however, having regard to the fact that teachers who are engaged in school during the day have considerable difficulties in carrying on their own studies, that all acting teachers should, be required to take the first year's papers not earlier than the Christmas year after they pass the scholarship examination, and the second year's papers not less than two years after passing the first year's examination, and further that no person be eligible for a head teachership who has not passed the second year's examination lot lower than the second division, and that acting teachers be not eligible for headships till they have got their parchments. With these restrictions the acting teachers might be left free to become certificated teachers; and, probably, the extension of facilities for training would, with the improvement of the education of pupil-teachers and the consequent attraction of a superior class of candidates into the profession, so increase the number of trained teachers without any absolute exclusion, that the interest of education would not suffer.

CHAPTER 5

TRAINING COLLEGES

We now pass to the training colleges, and the questions which present themselves are - Is the present management of them satisfactory? Are their relations with the State on a sound basis? Should there be any extension of the system either on the present lines or through day training colleges? Should the new training colleges be connected with places of higher education? Should they be managed by school boards, county boards, or any other representative public bodies? Is the strictly denominational and private character of the existing training colleges satisfactory, in view of the changed conditions of national education?

The present management of the training colleges is voluntary and mainly denominational. The burden of the cost falls principally on the nation and on the students, a very small part of the yearly cost is defrayed by the subscribers.

Of the original cost of the buildings about 30 per cent was contributed by the State and the remainder was subscribed; the exact figures are £118,627 granted by the Committee of Council and £278,842 subscribed, but since their foundation considerable additional sums have been subscribed for their enlargement and improvement. Of the yearly certified expenditure, amounting in 1886 to £166,447, £121,821, or more than 73 per cent, was met by grants from the Committee of Council on Education, £27,440, or about 16½ per cent, was paid by the students, £16,148, or less than 10 per cent, was from subscriptions, donations, and collections in churches and chapels.

The Code provides, Art. 116, 117 - A training college is an institution for boarding, lodging, and instructing students who are preparing to become certificated teachers in elementary schools. It is required to include either on its premises, or within a convenient distance, a practising school, in which the students may learn the practical exercise of their profession. No grant is made to a training college unless the Department is satisfied with the premises, management, and staff. Art. 21 provides - The authorities of each college settle their own terms of admission. The grant to colleges is subject to two limits by Art. 131. It must not exceed, (a) 75 per cent of the expenditure of the college for the year, approved by the Department, and certified in such a manner as the Department may require, (b) £50 for each male and £35 for each female Queen's scholar in residence for continuous training throughout the year for which it is being paid.


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The principal is usually a clergyman. The accommodation in 1886 was distributed in the following proportions -

[click on the image for a larger version]

In the year ending August 1886 there were in the various classes of public elementary schools the following numbers in average attendance -

per cent
Church of England1,626,23147.3
British, &c. schools252,4617.3
Board schools1,251,30736.4
Wesleyan schools129,6183.8
Roman Catholic schools178,7385.2
Total3,438,425

Thus, it appears that the proportion of accommodation in Church of England, Roman Catholic, and Wesleyan training colleges is greatly in excess of the proportion of children in the schools of the same denominations. On the other hand, while 47.3 per cent of the children in public elementary schools are in board schools. British, or other undenominational schools, there is only 19.8 per cent of the accommodation in British and undenominational training colleges.

The authorities of the Church of England, Roman Catholic, and Wesleyan training colleges state that their accommodation is only intended for members of their own churches; and though, in a few cases, others have been admitted, yet there is no conscience clause, and all are required to conform to the religious observances, and to accept the distinctive religious teaching characteristic of the various bodies.

It is alleged first that there would be a breach of faith if the Government should require as a condition of State aid the admission on equal terms of members of other communions into these colleges, and, secondly, that it would interfere with college discipline and break up the domestic character of the colleges, should they be thrown open.

As to the assertion that any modification of the conditions on which parliamentary grants should in future be given would be a breach of faith, such a contention would an effect convert the annual parliamentary vote into a charge on the consolidated fund; and the claim to a vested interest in the parliamentary grant without its being equitable for Parliament to modify its conditions, comes too late in the day in this question of elementary education, even if, on other grounds, there were anything to be said for such a proposition. For, in 1870, all schools, though previously in receipt of parliamentary grants, and though largely founded in exclusive connexion with particular denominations, were required to accept a time-table conscience clause as a condition of the continuance of annual grants; moreover, the denominational inspection which had previously been secured to them was swept away, and they became subject to inspectors, chosen irrespective of their religious opinions, and without consultation with the various religious bodies; whereas, previously, inspectors of Church of England schools were all clergymen, chosen with the concurrence of the Archbishops of Canterbury and of York, who could withdraw their approval of the inspectors. In the case of Roman Catholic schools the inspectors were Roman Catholics, and were appointed after consultation with representatives of that church.

The history of the growth of denominational training colleges is the history of a successful opposition led by the National Society, and by most of the bishops, to the establishment of an Undenominational State Training College, as proposed in 1839; as a consequence of the vehemence of that opposition, the Government gave way, and aided in the foundation and maintenance of the training colleges as they now exist. But these denominational colleges were the natural complement of a denominational system, and when Parliament established the school board system in 1870. it


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followed naturally that the question of denominational training colleges would be open to re-consideration. And, indeed, apart from any question of denominational restrictions or their abolition, the terms on which grants were made to training colleges were materially altered by Mr. Lowe's code in 1862.

In reference to this supposed moral claim to a continued parliamentary grant, equal in its proportion to the total expenditure to that now paid, we may note that, in 1851, the Reverend H. Moseley returned (Education Report, 1851-52, p. 189) for the Church of England training colleges for males, a total income of £19,243, of which £1,976 was from Government grants, or about 10 per cent; at the same time the students paid £5,791, or about 30 per cent, and voluntary contributions amounted to more than £10,000, or upwards of 50 per cent.

In the official letter of October 22, 1851, signed R. W. Lingen, addressed to the Reverend Henry Moseley, and published pp. 213-14 of the Education Report of 1851-52, we find the following passage, "Their lordships distinctly and expressly lay it down as a rule and principle for your guidance in carrying out your instructions that they require the voluntary character of these institutions to be maintained. This character is in some danger, if, in addition to the grants now made, each separate item of expenditure is made the subject of a fresh application. The present constitution of the training schools is wholly inconsistent with assuming the charge of them upon the public funds, and it is not their Lordships' desire to encourage any such anticipation."

In 1857 the present Bishop of London reported of the male Church of England training colleges, that of a total income of £37,490, £13,815 was paid by the subscribers, or 37 per cent, £20,614 was derived from Government grants, or 55 per cent. (Education Report, 1857-58, p. 719).

The Reverend F. C. Cook, inspector of female Church of England training colleges, reported in 1857 that the Government grants amounted to £11,488, fees paid by students to £6,050, and subscriptions, donations, &c. to £5,532, or about 50 per cent from Government, about 26 per cent from the students, and about 24 per cent from subscriptions, donations, &c.

He says (Education Report, 1857-58, p. 763), "These returns corroborate the opinions which I expressed last year. It is evident, upon the whoJe, the institutions are prosperous. Doubtless some difficulty is felt, and always must be felt, in keeping up the annual subscriptions, but the amount now raised ought not to be diminished. It is a small contribution considering that these institutions belong to the dioceses in which they stand, and are entirely managed by local committees. They are the property of the Church, whose principles are inculcated in the minds of all the students, and whose daughters will be educated to a great extent by mistresses trained in them."*

As to the second allegation, that the presence of young people of various denominations is incompatible with college life; we do not find that this is the case in the training colleges of the British and Foreign Society. And if we look at other institutions where students reside, of the same age as the students at training colleges, we find that no difficulty is experienced in the colleges of Oxford and Cambridge in consequence of the presence of members of various denominations in the same colleges. And among women, the colleges recently founded at Girton and Newnham are conducted on the most comprehensive principles; and Holloway College, where the Archbishop of Canterbury has accepted the post of governor, was, by the constitution of the founder, to be carefully protected from identification with any one religious body. It cannot, therefore, be considered that the existing system prevailing in training colleges is essential to the moral training and formation of character in the students. Indeed, one of the most successful training colleges of those connected with the Church of England, the Home and Colonial, has not only admitted students who are avowedly Nonconformists, but gives to those residing in London great liberty of spending their Sunday at home, and the authorities of the college are satisfied that this liberty works well.

The advocates of enforced uniformity in college life as necessary for the moral training of teachers should be in favour of the complete abolition of the acting teacher who at the age when other ex-pupil teachers go to college is allowed to go forth with perfect freedom and teach as an assistant, it may be far from home and lost in the crowded population of a large town.

*Most of the existing training colleges had been founded by 1851, and the great mass of them by 1857.


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There is no reason to believe that the students generally prefer the rigid denominational system of our training colleges. The British and Foreign colleges find a large competition for admission, and are largely filled by students who pass very high in the scholarship list, and many of them are members of the Church of England.

Canon Warburton, for several years inspector of the female training colleges gave as his evidence that the present supply of female trained teachers is quite inadequate, that there is need for more female colleges, and that they should be undenominational. He notes the exclusion from the Church training colleges of those who are not Churchwomen, and states that this brings about a conformity which is not at all desirable in order to get into the Church colleges. Similarly Miss Trevor gave evidence that at Chichester there had been Nonconformist students who after submitting to the Church discipline of the college, resumed their nonconformity on leaving college.

If the existing denominational training colleges are to be maintained as they are, and are to be largely subsidised by the State, they should bear a reasonable proportion to the denominational schools for which they were established, and the national work of training teachers should not continue to be the monopoly of irresponsible and private managers who are uncontrolled in their admission or rejection of students. The best plan for supplementing the existing colleges would be the establishment and management of colleges under local educational authorities subject to the supervision of the Education Department.

Most of the official witnesses who came before us were on the whole satisfied with the educational work done by the colleges, and we agree with them that the greatest cause of their shortcomings is to be found in the wretched state of preparation of the students at entrance, but we think with Mr. Matthew Arnold that the education in the colleges themselves is not always what it might be.

The two years, most of which should be spent in professional training are largely devoted to imparting what can only be fairly described as elementary knowledge.

Again in many cases the practising schools are not what they should be in equipment and efficiency, and are by no means model schools where the students may be shown the newest and most perfect school methods. In many colleges the appliances for teaching science are inadequate, in some the teaching itself is defective.

The principals are sometimes persons who take little part in the teaching, and have not been prepared for their work by wide experience and marked success in practical teaching. The staff are often elementary teachers, sometimes appointed immediately on the completion of their two years course of training, and, consequently, the teachers are often wanting in wide knowledge of the subjects taught, though they may have much aptitude in imparting knacks and short methods which may enable their students to pass examinations, and put their pupils through them. We need for the training of our elementary teachers that those who educate them shall have a wide knowledge of the subjects which they teach, and shall kindle intellectual enthusiasm and stimulate power of thought rather than aim merely of securing passes at an examination. No doubt, to secure truly educated rather than crammed teachers, a three years' course would be better than a two years' course. But as we are in favour of largely increasing the proportion of trained to untrained teachers, we shrink from recommending the addition of a third year at College, which would greatly add to the cost of training, and diminish the supply of teachers whom the existing colleges could turn out. We think, however, that facilities might be given for those promising students who are willing to give another year to study, to be gathered in some central place of training, probably in connection with the universities or other colleges for advanced teaching.

Canon Warburton, while bearing a high testimony to the good moral influence exercised over the students in the training colleges, states "I have always felt and expressed the feeling in successive reports that the turning them [the students] out professionally well qualified to conduct schools and teach, is the weak point of the institutions. Their technical instruction, so to speak is not satisfactory. They are not turned out so good teachers as one would hope." And in 1885 he summed up his last report on the female training colleges as follows: (Ed. Report, 1886-6, p. 442), "On taking a parting review of the whole subject of our voluntary State-aided system of training of elementary schoolmistresses, my predominant feeling is one of admiration for the zeal and energy with which the work is being carried on, mingled with a certain sense of disappointment with the intellectual


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acquirements and technical skill obtained, as the result of so much forethought, self-denial, watchfulness, and ungrudging labour on the part of all concerned in the work of the colleges. It would seem as if innate capability - the personal factor so to speak - was, after all, so much more important an element in the teachers' efficiency and success than the best of good training; it turns out to have been so much more difficult than one might have hoped to eradicate bad intellectual habits, to give larger and more liberal views, to emancipate the judgment, to cultivate the imagination, and create a longing for the discovery and attainment of truth in the case of young persons who have not, as a rule, been favourably circumstanced with reference to early training and associations. I hope to live to see a closer approximation of our training college system with the liberal culture of the universities, so that all that is best and highest in modern education may be brought within the reach of those to whom the teaching of the great mass of the children of this and coming generations will be entrusted. I have reason to believe that there would be no unwillingness to co-operate on the part of the authorities of Oxford or of Cambridge."

We are glad to give our hearty assent to the principles laid down by Canon Warburton in the above suggestions; we fully recognise that the training colleges are entitled to demand that the candidates for admission shall come to them with a more thorough education and with a greater intellectual alertness; but we think that the colleges themselves need, not a more extensive curriculum, but a more thorough and intellectual study of the matters included in the curriculum; lecturers, who shall combine a wide knowledge of their subject, with the technical ability in handling classes which is already largely studied both in the training colleges and in the elementary schools; and we think that, without ignoring the fact that the colleges exist for the purpose of training teachers and must therefore be professional in their aims and methods, it would be well if some of the narrowness of the seminary and uniformity in the type of students were corrected by contact with places of general education.

We do not recommend that the grants to the existing training colleges be abolished, nor do we think it would be wise, provided that other opportunities of liberal training are afforded to students who intend to be teachers, to force upon the managers of the present training colleges changes in their domestic arrangements which they are not willing to accept. We think, however, that no student admitted to a training college should be expelled by the authorities without being entitled to an appeal to the Education Department, which should have full power to deal with the case as may seem equitable to it. We hope that when the existing training colleges cease to enjoy their present monopoly of public aid, many of them may voluntarily widen their terms of admission, and the conditions under which students are trained by them. Their success will then depend on the efficiency of their teaching, and on their popularity with students, and with others.

We had a great deal of evidence in support of the establishment of a system of day-training colleges side by side with the existing training colleges.

The Birmingham School Board presented a memorial quoted which asks "that the system of non-residential colleges, which is permitted by the Scotch Code, " should be introduced into England, and that Government grants in aid of such institutions should be given on an equally liberal scale, and further that school boards be empowered to establish and maintain such day (or non-residential) training colleges." Mr. McCarthy states "that the Birmingham School Board were unanimous, including the vice-principal of the Saltley Training College, in supporting the memorial. It has also been supported by many bodies outside of Birmingham, including the School Boards of Leeds and Nottingham." Mr. McCarthy, who presented the memorial of the Birmingham School Board, submitted an alternative and slightly different plan of his own.

He submitted that if all teachers are to be trained as at present, whether in boarding or day colleges up to the age of 20 at least, the cost of education will be heavy, and the existing scheme contemplates no change in the pupil- teacher system. He suggests, therefore, the establishment of 12 or 13 day training colleges, to hold about 250 students each, to be established in the large towns, to be under the management of the school boards, and to be wholly supported by the State. These colleges are to be mixed, and to admit students at the age of 16, on examination. The college course is to last three years, during two of which the students will be studying at the college, and during one year they are to be half time teachers in some school in the neighbourhood. They are then to be for two years probationer teachers


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in some school within the inspector's district, and at the end of the five years they are to pass a certificate examination, in which professional subjects will have great weight. He contemplates that the students at 16 will be largely drawn from the secondary schools, though he would not exclude ordinary pupil-teachers.

Mr. McCarthy recommends his scheme as being in practical working operation in the town of Worcester, Mass., U.S.A., and he also urges that it would be a less costly method of training teachers than the present system. He considers that a day training college has the great advantage of not removing women from their homes while carrying on their education. Many of the authorities of the existing training colleges consider that this severance from the home is one of the great advantages of the training college, as enabling the authorities to form the character and improve the culture of the students. But it must be remembered that in England the present training colleges have largely to deal with students who come from homes of a humble type, and where intellectual influences are not very strong, and that Mr. McCarthy looks forward under his scheme to drawing teachers from families where education and refinement exist to a considerable extent; and in Birmingham the school board has already succeeded in recruiting its pupil-teachers largely from the middle-class, partly through the supply being mainly drawn from the grammar schools, partly through the care taken by the board in ascertaining the character of the home before accepting candidates.

Professor Bodington, principal of the Yorkshire College at Leeds, supported a scheme for the training of ex-pupil-teachers as day students at the colleges now coming into existence in various parts of England. He proposes that the professional training of the students should be conducted by the college, which would appoint a master of method, and by arrangement with the school board and other managers would use some of the board and voluntary schools as practising schools. He contemplates the training of a comparatively small number of students, 30 to 40, in connexion with his own college.

We have strong evidence from Wales urging the expediency of utilising, for the training of teachers, the colleges recently established at Aberystwyth, Bangor, and Cardiff; and Mr. Williams, the Chairman of the Cardiff School Board, and also a member of the Council of the Cardiff College, stated that the authorities of that college were prepared to make arrangements for supplying the professional as well as the general education of the students, and he contemplated the co-operation of the school board with the college.

Dr. Morrison, the principal of the Glasgow Free Church Training College, gave much valuable evidence as to the working of the university teaching in connexion with the professional preparation of a training college, and as to the effect of permitting students in training to make their own arrangements, under due supervision, for boarding and lodging.

We are of opinion that it is desirable to give expansion to our present system of training, by permitting students to lodge at home, or in lodging houses of approved character and respectability, to utilise the colleges and other places of higher instruction, which are willing to aid in the training of teachers, and to encourage the formation of educational faculties in such colleges either in conjunction with or apart from the local school board.

We think that the training of teachers should not begin so early as to interfere with their previous education, and that, as a rule, the present age of training should not be lowered.

At the same time we think that an experiment, such as the one indicated in the evidence of the Rev. E. F. M. McCarthy, might be tried; especially as the general lines of his proposal are very similar to those indicated in the thoughtful evidence of Dr. Graham, principal of Hammersmith Training College. He has established a preparatory class in his college, of students between 17 and 18, to fit ill-taught pupil-teachers for the college course. He sketches his idea of a course of training. He would admit young men between the ages of 16 and 18 into the training colleges for the first year without examination, at the end of that year he would let them begin a two years' course of training on condition of their passing an examination at the end of that [the first] year; and during the second year which would correspond to the present first year he would make them do practically the work which is now done during the two years, because it could be done then; the third year would be more particularly devoted to the practical work of teaching in the practising schools. To a certain extent this is similar to what is carried on in Prussia.


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We see no objection to the existence of more than one method of training being recognised by the Education Department, provided that the essentials of thorough education, and sound technical preparation in the principles of the art of teaching, are secured, and while we should prefer for all the wider intellectual range of thought which may be expected from contact with a university, we are of opinion that the existing system may be continued side by side with the new schemes to which we have referred.

In reference to the question of boarding or day training colleges, we are of opinion that so long as the pupil-teachers are drawn from uneducated homes, and come to college so badly prepared as they now are, the undivided influence of a good boarding-college will probably be of advantage to them, and in any case boarding arrangements will be necessary for some of the students who attend colleges at a distance from their home. But in proportion as the colleges are brought within reach of the homes of the students, and these are drawn from families of wider education, we consider that the preservation and extension of the home influence, side by side with that of the training college, will be a great advantage.

As to the government of the new training colleges, we think, without defining too minutely how they should be administered, that their government should be both educational and of a local representative character. We doubt whether the school board alone, or the local college alone, would be the best body; perhaps a council representative both of the higher education and of the school boards in large towns; and in counties where there are no large towns, a delegation of the county rating authority might be constituted, working in conjunction with representatives of the Education Department.

The introduction of these changes would, we believe, make it easy by degrees to substitute trained for untrained teachers in our schools, and would greatly improve the quality of the trained teachers themselves.

CHAPTER 6

RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION

The declared object of the formation of the Committee of Council on Education in 1839 was to promote the religious welfare as well as the intellectual education of the children attending elementary schools. In the instructions to inspectors issued in August 1840, when the Marquis of Lansdowne was Lord President, the inspectors were informed that "their Lordships are strongly of opinion that no plan of education ought to be encouraged in which intellectual instruction is not subordinate to the regulation of the thoughts and habits of the children by the doctrines and precepts of revealed religion." (Minutes, 1839-40, pp. 22 - 24.) In this policy the leaders of both the great Parliamentary parties were agreed; and for many years successive Codes provided that -

"Every school aided from the grant must be either -
(a) A school in connexion with some recognised religious denomination; or
(b) A school in which, besides secular instruction, the Scriptures are read daily from the authorised version." (Article 8, Code, 1870.)

This Article appeared for the last time in the Code of 1870. Section 97 of the Education Act of that year enacted that after March 31st, 1871, the conditions to be fulfilled in order to obtain an annual Parliamentary grant "shall not require that the school shall be in connexion with a religious denomination, or that religious instruction shall be given in the school." The Act of 1870 affirmed the principle that it is no part of the duty of the State to secure religious instruction for children attending public elementary schools.

The Ven. Archdeacon Norris, who was one of Her Majesty's inspectors from 1849 to 1864, informed us that the instructions which were put before him in 1849 required him to examine the children attending Church of England schools not only in the Holy Scriptures, but in the Church Catechism very carefully, to inquire further what were their habits in respect of private prayer and in respect of attendance at divine worship. "All this", said the witness "I was to report to my Lords of the Committee of Council on Education." These instructions, under the agreement between the Education Department and the heads of the Church of


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England, were drawn up by the Archbishops. In the instructions of 1862, when the Revised Code came into operation, the same view was taken of the primary importance of the moral and religious character of a school, and unless the religious knowledge of the children and their discipline and behaviour were satisfactory, the inspector might refuse to examine the school, or, if he did not resort to this extreme measure, he might recommend the cutting down of the grant. But it was enacted by the Act of 1,870, section 7, that it should no longer be any part of the duties of Her Majesty's inspector to inquire into any instruction on religious subjects given in schools receiving grants from Parliament, or to examine any scholar in such schools in any religious subject or book.

The Act leaves perfect freedom to the managers of denominational schools to give the most definite religious instruction before or after, or before and after, the ordinary secular work of the school. In giving this instruction they can use the catechisms and formularies of the church with which the schools are connected; but, at the wish of the parent, any child may be withdrawn from it. School boards are also left at liberty to provide religious instruction for children attending schools under their management; but, as in denominational schools, this instruction is to be given before or after - or before and after - the secular work of the school, and any children may be withdrawn from it at the wish of their parents.

A further restriction is imposed on the religious instruction given in board schools. Section 14, commonly known as the Cowper-Temple clause, prevents the introduction into a board school of any catechism or formulary which would identify the school with any particular religious denomination.

Some of the witnesses whom we examined expressed their belief that the Act of 1870 had, in various ways, tended to lessen the importance of religious teaching in the estimate of managers, teachers, and children, and to impair its efficiency. But it is clear from the evidence submitted to us that while the overwhelming majority of the school boards of the country have made large provision for the "undenominational" instruction of the children attending their schools, the Act has done nothing to lessen the power of the managers of voluntary schools to use them for the maintenance and extension of the influence of the churches with which they are associated. We have been specially impressed with the remarkable vigour with which the schools of the Church of England and the Roman Catholic Church are being worked in the interests of those two great ecclesiastical organisations.

On a review of the whole of the evidence submitted to us we have come to the conclusion that those who believe that the inculcation of religious truth in some definite doctrinal form should constitute a portion of the daily teaching of every child attending school, have no occasion to regard the results of the legislation of 1870 with dissatisfaction. To the majority of those who hold this position the day school is virtually part of the equipment of the Church, and its primary purpose is to instruct the children in religious truth and to train them in the discharge of religious duty. They believe that neither the instruction nor the training can be effectual unless it rests on definite religious doctrine, and is made part of the ordinary work of the school. Whatever apprehension they may have felt when the Act of 1870 was passed, experience has proved that their fears were illusory. The schools of the Church of England and of the Roman Catholic Church are rendering to those great ecclesiastical organisations a larger service than they ever rendered before.

(1) Since 1870 the number of children receiving definite religious instruction and training has enormously increased. In 1870 the Church of England had 6,382 schools, with accommodation for 1,365,080 children; in 1886 it had 11,864 schools, with accommodation for 2,548,673: in 1870 the average attendance was 844,334, in 1886 it had risen to 1,634,354. In 1870 the Roman Catholic Church had 350 schools, with accommodation for 101,556 children; in 1886 it had 892 schools, with accommodation for 310,233: in 1870 the average attendance was 66,066, in 1886 it had risen to 180,701. We are unable to make a similar comparison for the schools of the Wesleyan Methodists; in the returns of 1870 they were not distinguished from British schools which claim to be undenominational.

(2) The time which is appropriated to religious instruction and observances in schools connected with the Church of England has not diminished. And though, according to the evidence of the Rev. D. J. Waller, the time given to these purposes in Wesleyan schools has "certainly diminished", the witness thought that religious teaching for 30 or 40 minutes daily ought to give very satisfactory results, and


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he informed us that, taking the Wesleyan schools as a whole, about 45 minutes are spent in religions teaching and religious observances.

(3) In Church of England schools and in Roman Catholic schools the introduction of the system of diocesan inspection appears to have made the religious instruction more systematic and more thorough.

(4) The evidence submitted to us shows that very few children are withdrawn from religious instruction under clause 7 of the Act of 1870.

Those who believe in the great value of definite religious instruction in day schools may, therefore, congratulate themselves that, as compared with 1870, the number of children in denominational schools has greatly increased, and that the denominational instruction has been made more effective.

Our evidence shows that there are many who think that "undenominational" religious instruction is neither desirable nor possible, but it also shows that there are many who believe that children in public elementary schools should be instructed in the contents of the Bible - in its biographies, its parables, its miracles, its moral precepts, and the large outlines of its religious teaching - and that instruction of this kind may be given without any bias in favour of any definite ecclesiastical or doctrinal system. They believe that such instruction is acceptable to the majority of the parents, and that it is the ministers of religion, rather than the parents, who desire that the religious instruction given in day schools should be more definite. They also believe that the knowledge which the children receive from instruction of this kind is, in itself, of great value; that it exerts a powerful influence on character and conduct; and that it is of the highest importance as a preparation for the work of the Sunday school and the Churches.

While those who hold this theory of the kind of religious instruction that ought to be given in schools which are aided by Parliament, and at which children of parents associated with churches differing widely from each other in polity and creed are compelled to attend, may regret that the accommodation in board schools does not provide for a much larger proportion of the children of the country, they will regard with satisfaction many of the facts which appear in our evidence.*

(1) An enormous majority of the school boards of England and a large majority of the school boards of Wales have provided in their schools for daily prayers, for the singing of hymns, and for the "undenominational" instruction of the children in the Bible.

(2) The time appropriated to religious observances and instruction is adequate; and the school boards are solicitous that it should not be encroached upon by the secular work of their schools.

(3) Most of the larger boards and many of the smaller boards have adopted schemes of religious instruction in order to make the teaching systematic.

(4) Many of the boards have provided for the regular examination of the children in religious knowledge and the teachers are aware that importance is attached by the boards to the reports of the examiners.

(5) The evidence submitted to us shows that in the judgment of those who value religious instruction of this kind the knowledge acquired by the children is satisfactory.

In our opinion it would be a grave mistake, from the point of view of those who attach the greatest importance to the religious instruction given in day schools, if any attempt were made to disturb the settlement of 1870 by compelling all schools receiving aid from the Parliamentary grant to provide religious instruction. Any such attempt would be certain to provoke angry controversy and resolute resistance, and might end in diminishing rather than increasing the amount of the religious teaching now given in public elementary schools.

We are confirmed in this opinion by the evidence which was submitted to us by witnesses representing several Nonconformist denominations. The Rev. Dr. Bruce, of Huddersfield, chairman of the Congregational Union of England and Wales for 1888, would be satisfied to exclude religious teaching altogether from public elementary schools, and to leave all the religious teaching to the Sunday school, the parents,

*Of 3,470,509 children in average attendance at elementary schools receiving aid from the Parliamentary grant, 1,944,622 are in attendance at schools connected with the Church of England, with the Wesleyan Methodists, or with the Roman Catholic Church; and these schools obtain from the grant £1,621,486. The number of children in average attendance at board schools is 1,272,151; and these schools obtain from the grant £1,115,631. British undenominational and other schools, in which the religious instruction varies considerably, have 253,696 children in average attendance; and receive £218,588 from the Parliamentary grant.


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and the clergy. The Rev. John Atkinson, president of the Primitive Methodist Connexion, is also prepared to exclude religious teaching from public elementary schools; he does not object altogether to the reading of the Scriptures, though he "can see difficulties in the way even of admitting that". The Rev. Charles Williams, president of the Baptist Union of England and Wales (1886-87), stated that he himself and those whom he represented objected to receiving aid from the State for religious instruction; that the Baptists had declined to receive grants for their day schools before 1870, because the grants were made conditional on the giving of religious teaching; but that in 1870, he and his friends at Accrington established a school which is practically a secular school, because there is no formal religious instruction given to the children, though in cases of discipline the teachers are perfectly free to urge religious sanctions with a view to secure the practice of virtue. The Rev. Dr. Crosskey, of Birmingham, is in favour of a system of secular instruction under universal school boards.

The grounds on which these witnesses rest their objection to the provision of religious instruction in public elementary schools deriving part of their support either from a Parliamentary grant, or from rates, or from both, are of various kinds. "It seems to us", said the Rev. C. Williams, "to be contrary to the very essence of the Gospel for that Gospel to become in any way subject to the control of the State or for its propagation to depend to the least extent upon the aid of the State." The Rev. Dr. Crosskey said "Religion cannot be taught in a school like grammar and arithmetic; the children associating it with their ordinary lessons will never feel its power; the Bible suffers by being made a class book like a grammar, and the giving of information about the Bible is confounded with religious teaching. I quote from many questions, one lately asked in a religious examination: What was the special mission of the following prophets, Ahijah, Shemaiah, Micaiah? For young children to be induced to think that this is religious teaching seems to me to destroy within them the sense of what religion is." "The children receiving their religion as a task lesson have their religious impressions injured; they are punished if they do not do their proper lessons in it, and the associations with the work are all as harsh and hard as those connected with their ordinary lessons. I have myself seen children standing apart to be caned for lack of attention during Bible work. To connect children with a living church is the great thing wanted for their religious life; and they will feel less disposed to connect themselves with a church, which is really what will protect them and redeem them, when religion is made a task lesson in school than when it is relegated to the Church itself." The witness thinks that "the teachers of religion should be religious people"; that religious teaching is a matter which belongs to the Church and not to the State, directly or indirectly; that "it is most effectively given in connexion with a living Christian church"; that the churches abdicate one of the most important of their functions in declining the responsibility for teaching religion to the children of the people; and that they permit it to be done "in a far less effective way than they could do it themselves". Dr. Crosskey is not of opinion that the qualifications and training of an efficient teacher of secular subjects are identical with those which are necessary for the teaching of religion. "I believe", he said, "that the skill which is needed for religious teaching is of a special and peculiar kind; it is largely determined by the religious character of the man and his various natural aptitudes in connexion with the depth of his religious faith."

We do not understand the Nonconformist witnesses to maintain that the teachers, either under school boards or under denominational managers, are persons without religious faith; but they contend that it is impossible for boards composed of members belonging to different churches to take, account of religious qualifications in the appointment of their teachers; and that even in the appointment of teachers by denominational managers, though membership of the churches with which the schools are connected will be required, general professional qualifications are likely to take precedence of special aptitude for giving religious instruction. We are told that there was a time when a considerable number of earnest religious men and women regarded teaching as mainly a religious work; but the Ven. Archdeacon Norris doubts "whether distinctly religious men and distinctly religious women are so desirous to be teachers now as they were under the old system." And in our judgment teaching, under the present conditions of English elementary


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education, is likely to be regarded less and less as a religious "vocation" and more and more as one of the ordinary professions.

Dr. Crosskey pressed for secular schools under universal school boards, and made the following suggestion with regard to the religious teaching: "Under universal school boards the denominations would hold their schools for their own purposes, and before and after school hours would have an opportunity to arrange for definite religious instruction by religious teachers; it would be separated from the ordinary lesson work, and would be hampered by no restriction; religious men could give their whole faith in an undiluted form, and impress it upon the children's minds; and the school boards could offer rooms for a similar purpose before or after school hours." The attempt made by the Religious Education Society to carry out this scheme in Birmingham did not succeed; about the causes of its failure there are differences of opinion, which it is unnecessary to discuss. It appears, however, from the Parliamentary Returns of 1884, that about 40 of the smaller boards have at various times made arrangements of the kind that Dr. Crosskey desires; and in the answers we received to our Circular D addressed to the head teachers of voluntary and board schools, we are informed that out of 3,161 departments in which religious instruction is given daily, there are 1,062 or 33 per cent in which the religious instruction is given by "other persons as well as the teachers";* and those who believe that religious instruction might be given by "other persons" exclusively, might find some support for their contention in these figures. But we think it probable that the persons "other than the teacher" who give religious instruction in these 1,062 departments visit the schools only occasionally - rarely, perhaps, more than once or twice in the week.

We think it unnecessary, however, to discuss whether it would be possible now or desirable at any time for Parliament to determine that all schools should be secular. The witnesses to whose evidence we are now directing attention believe that the religious instruction and education of the children might safely be left to other agencies than the day school; but while they are all anxious that elementary schools receiving Parliamentary aid should be under the management of the representatives of the ratepayers, and should not be exclusively connected with particular churches, they are willing that the school board of every district should determine for itself whether or not it will make provision for religious teaching; and the Rev. C. Williams of Accrington informed us that he believed that the system of "unsectarian" teaching adopted by most of the great school boards had been generally accepted by his friends as a working compromise.

But the evidence of these witnesses indicates how strongly several Nonconformist communities would resent the proposal to make religious instruction compulsory.

Before closing this chapter we turn to the evidence which we received with regard to the relations between public elementary schools and Sunday schools.

When the Act of 1870 was passed there was a general impression that as the result of any very large extension of the provision for elementary education during the week, the attendance of children at Sunday schools was likely to diminish; and it was the belief of some of the witnesses whom we examined that a very large proportion of the children attending public elementary schools do not attend Sunday schools. The Rev. J. Gilmore stated that "all practical men know that the attendance of children in Sunday schools is not what it should be." The Rev. Dr. Aston said that "as a matter of fact, very many children who attend the day schools do not attend the Sunday schools", and that these are "the most neglected children, and the children of the worst parents." The Rev. R. B. Burges gave it as his opinion that the attendance at Sunday schools is falling off; and stated that a few years ago he collected returns from the Sunday schools in Birmingham connected with all religious denominations, and it was shown that there were 26,000 children on the books of public elementary schools in the borough who were not on the books of any Sunday school.

The accuracy and completeness of this estimate was, however, contested by another witness from Birmingham - the Rev. Dr. Crosskey - who expressed his belief, founded on inquiries made some years ago, that the percentage of children attending the board

*In the summary there is a slight discrepancy between the figures given in two different columns. The number of departments in which religions instruction is "given daily" is 3,161; but the number in which the religious instruction is given "by teacher" is 3,220. The explanation may be that in 3,220 departments religious instruction is given - but not given daily. This slight discrepancy does not affect the argument in the text.


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schools of Birmingham who also attend Sunday schools is very large; but this witness could give us no information with regard to the attendance at Sunday schools of the children attending voluntary schools in Birmingham. Evidence as to the large proportion of the children attending public elementary schools that also attend Sunday schools was given by witnesses from other parts of England. The Ven. Archdeacon Stamer, rector of Stoke-upon-Trent, said, "by far the larger proportion" of the day school children are in Sunday schools. According to the Rev. J. Nunn, "a very large number" of the children of Manchester and Lancashire generally attend Sunday schools. In Accrington, according to the Rev. C. Williams, "with the exception of the children of a few infidels (and they", he said, "are very few indeed among us), every child attends some Sunday school." In Huddersfield "the children almost invariably attend Sunday schools." "With very few exceptions" all the children that attend the board schools go to some Sunday school; and in reply to the question "do you fancy that the religious instruction of that particular class for whom an industrial school is needed, is provided for in any way at all?" the witness answered, "some of these, as a matter of fact, do go to Sunday schools". Mr. J. Bradbury, master of the Abney British School, Mossley, said that "the whole of the children" attending his school also attend the Sunday school. Mr. Mark Wilks, while of opinion that the Sunday school system is not so successful in London as in Lancashire and Yorkshire, said that not only is there a very large number of children in the London Sunday schools, but that in some parts of London there is a special effort to draw into Sunday schools children of the destitute class; and Mr. Powell, a visitor under the London board, said that in his district children who attend the day schools badly, attend the Sunday schools well, and that the very parents on whom he has to bring the force of the law in order to compel them to send their children to day schools, boast that they send their children to Sunday school regularly.

On this subject we also received evidence from the official representatives of three Sunday school associations - Mr. E. Towers, one of the honorary secretaries of the Sunday School Union; Mr. John Palmer, a representative of the Church of England Sunday School Institute; and the Rev. C. H. Kelly, secretary of the Wesleyan Methodist Sunday School Union.

Mr. Towers informed us that his colleague in the secretariat of the Sunday School Union had prepared statistics showing that the total number of scholars on the rolls of the Sunday schools in England and Wales is 5,200,000. "The Church of England Sunday schools have 2,222,000; the Wesleyan Methodists, 825,000 in round numbers; the Congregationalists, 686,000; the Baptists, 426,000; the Primitive Methodists, 369,000; the Methodist Free Church, 186,000; the Calvinistic Methodists (principally in Wales), 176,000. Then we have thirty denominations that go from 81,000 to 68,000, and 36,000 and so on. The total is, as I have said, 5,200,000." The average attendance throughout England is from 66 to 70 per cent, of the number on the registers. The witness believed that though in some parts of England a certain proportion of children and young people go to Sunday schools who are socially above the class that generally attend public elementary schools, the overwhelming majority of those who attend Sunday schools, especially in the provinces, are of the class for which the public elementary schools are provided. Mr. Palmer also stated that the great bulk of the children attending Church of England schools belong to the class who use elementary schools. He also said that "parents send their children to Sunday schools whether they are themselves connected with religious denominations or not"; that he had known cases in which parents living irreligious and immoral lives took pains to send their children to Sunday schools; and that "there is a very strong feeling existing among parents, of the lower classes particularly, that their children should receive some sort of religious instruction; they neither know nor care to know in many instances about religion themselves; but they have an idea (it may be a mere matter of sentiment) that their children should receive religious instruction." The Rev. C. H. Kelly, speaking for Wesleyan schools, said "the vast majority of our scholars come from the artisan and working class population."

Mr. Towers stated that about one-fifth of the children attending Sunday schools generally are under seven years of age, and that therefore there are in round numbers 4,000,000 Sunday school children who are over seven.


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We believe that these remarkable figures confirm the evidence of those witnesses who assured us that the great majority of the children in attendance at public elementary schools are also in attendance at Sunday schools. For an analysis and discussion of the figures we refer to a memorandum prepared and submitted to us by our colleague, Dr. Dale, and appended to this chapter.

Both Mr, Palmer, of the Church of England Sunday School Institute, and Mr. Towers, of the Sunday School Union, gave us interesting information of the methods adopted by these institutions for increasing the efficiency of Sunday schools. They issue magazines and manuals specially prepared for Sunday school teachers; notes of lessons graded for different classes; and all kinds of "Sunday school material". The Bible lessons of the Sunday School Union are laid out for seven years so as to cover the "children's Sunday school age", which the Union considers should be at least seven years. Both the Institute and the Union send out specially qualified persons to different parts of England to give normal lessons and to instruct teachers in the art of teaching. They also hold examinations for teachers. They inspect schools when requested to do so. Mr. Towers informed us that in many parts of the kingdom the teachers of schools connected with a particular congregation meet every week in a "preparation class" conducted by their minister to prepare their lessons for the following Sunday; in some cases the teachers of the schools connected with several congregations meet weekly for the same purpose. The Sunday School Union has done very much to encourage the formation of these classes in ail parts of the kingdom. The Wesleyan Methodist Sunday School Union carries on work of the same kind.

We gathered from these witnesses that the great extension of day school education since 1870 had, in various ways, favourably affected Sunday schools. Sunday school teachers are relieved of the drudgery of teaching reading, writing, and arithmetic. "The intellect of the scholars has been sharpened." There has been an "outward improvement in their character" as far as their morals, their order, and their discipline are concerned. Mr. Kelly laid emphasis on the improvements in organisation and in methods of teaching which had been introduced of late years from the day school into the Sunday school.

Mr. Kelly attaches very great value to the religious teaching given in day schools. He said: "Scripture facts are memorised better and practical moral duties are taught in the day schools by which the morals of the children are, we think, improved." He also believes that the religious teaching in day schools contributes to the formation of religious faith and the deepening of religious earnestness. He said "we can trace a considerable number of church members whose religious life has been nurtured greatly by the day schoolmasters". Mr. Palmer thinks that the religious teaching in the day school "has had a good effect in impressing scholars with the importance of religious teaching, by making it part of the regular teaching of the school". He added, "it is also important to us because it can be given on five days of the week, whereas we, as Sunday school teachers, can only devote some three hours on Sunday to it." He thinks that of late years there has been a general improvement in the religious knowledge of children attending Sunday schools; they come to the schools better grounded in the facts of the Bible, and therefore better prepared for further instruction, and this improvement has taken place in children attending all public elementary schools; the children attending church day schools during the week know more about the Prayer Book; but in Scriptural knowledge he cannot distinguish between the progress of children brought up in board schools and those brought up in voluntary schools. With regard to the higher ends of religious instruction, the witness said, "I think the work of the day school consists principally in the imparting of secular knowledge, and the special work of the Sunday school is to apply that knowledge to the heart and conscience." He values the foundations of religious knowledge which are laid in the day schools; "but", added, "without wishing to minimise the amount of good effected by the day school instruction, I think the application of religious truth is more effectively carried out in the Sunday school." On being further pressed as to whether he meant that no religious teaching is given in day schools which directly applies religious knowledge and truth to actual life, the witness replied: "I did not mean that no such instruction was given, but rather that it is better and more completely done in the Sunday school."


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Mr. Palmer also thinks that a good Sunday school teacher will in some cases be quite as competent and in some cases more successful in giving a Sunday school lesson than a "trained teacher belonging to a day school".

Mr. Towers, while recognising the intellectual and moral improvement in the children which has resulted from the extension of elementary education during recent years, does not think that "the day school teaching in public elementary schools has had the slightest influence upon them religiously". He would not exclude the Bible from public elementary schools, but he attaches no importance to the religious teaching that is given in them; he thinks that "it may do as much harm as good". He doubts even whether the mere knowledge of Scripture that is given in day schools is likely to be retained. "I have seen", said the witness, "a pupil-teacher teaching the history of Joseph with a cane in his hands, and caning the children for not giving the proper answers; that knowledge will be there all right a week or a month hence, but twelve months hence they would not remember a word of it." As a rule he did not think that the children's knowledge of Holy Scripture had improved, owing to the instruction in elementary schools. The witness attributed the superior religious influence of Sunday schools to the fact that a great many motives may lead men and women to enter the teaching profession, apart from a desire to benefit the children religiously; but this, in the overwhelming majority of cases, is the supreme motive with those who teach in Sunday schools.

We do not think that it lies within the scope of our Commission to offer any judgment on the conflict of opinion between these witnesses in respect to the value of the religious instruction given in our public elementary schools as a means of creating personal faith in the hearts of the children, and encouraging religious earnestness. On that question differences of opinion with regard to facts are rooted in deeper differences of conviction in relation to the central mysteries of the spiritual life of man. But, as throughout the whole course of our inquiry, we have had occasion to observe that the religious teaching and influence of the day school is a subject which is regarded by large numbers of persons with, perhaps, a keener and intenser interest than its relation to the enlargement and discipline of the intellect, we have thought it our duty to give a summary of this evidence.

We believe that all who care for the religious and moral welfare of the people must regard, with deep satisfaction, the extraordinary success of the Sunday schools of all churches in securing so large an attendance of scholars, notwithstanding the recent development of public elementary education. Without the aid of a compulsory law there is a larger number of scholars in the Sunday schools of England and Wales than in the public elementary schools; and the immense majority of the scholars in both descriptions of schools belong to the same class of the community. We think that great honour is due to the institutions which were represented before us for the energy with which they are endeavouring to improve the quality of Sunday school instruction. But we were especially impressed with those parts of the evidence of the Rev. C. H. Kelly and Mr. Towers, which show how large a proportion of the scholars in the Sunday schools with which they are connected are above the age at which children leave the elementary schools. The intellectual benefit which these young people secure by continuing their education for so many years alter leaving the day school is considerable. They are likely not only to preserve a large amount of the knowledge that they have acquired, but to augment it. To the moral advantage which they must derive from coming into contact every week with intelligent and kindly Christian men and women, who are not only their teachers, but their friends, we attach a still higher value. And whatever differences may exist with regard to the religious power of the religious instruction given in day schools, there is none concerning the great service which has been rendered by the religious instruction given in Sunday schools to the moral and religious life of the nation.

MEMORANDUM ON THE ATTENDANCE AT SUNDAY SCHOOLS OF CHILDREN ATTENDING PUBLIC ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. PREPARED BY R. W. DALE, LL.D

The figures submitted to the Commission by Mr. E. Towers, Mr. Palmer, and the Rev. C. H. Kelly, showing the number of scholars attending Sunday schools in England and Wales, are so remarkable as to justify and demand an analysis of


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their real significance. Those submitted by the Rev. C. H. Kelly with regard to Wesleyan Sunday schools, which are considerably in excess of the figures for Wesleyan Sunday schools given by Mr. Towers, are drawn from complete and trustworthy returns. They are from later returns than those represented in the evidence of Mr. Towers. Those submitted by Mr. Palmer, with regard to the Church of England Sunday School Institute, are, I believe, founded on returns from a majority of the schools connected with the Church of England, supplemented by an estimate for the remainder made by the officers of the Institute. The figures for other denominations have been in part compiled and in part estimated by Mr. Fountain Hartley, Mr. E. Towers' colleague in the Secretariat of the Sunday School Union. The figures cannot have the authority which belongs to the official tables, giving the number of children on the registers of our public elementary schools; but I believe that in compiling them Mr. Hartley was extremely anxious not to make his estimates excessive; and if they are substantially accurate they throw very interesting light on a question which has frequently occupied the Commission, the extent to which children attending public elementary schools also attend Sunday schools.

The following is a copy of the table used by Mr. Towers in giving his evidence:

[click on the image for a larger version]

In dealing with the figures submitted by these three witnesses, it is necessary to remember, first, that the proportion of Sunday school scholars under 7 is much less than the proportion of day scholars under that age. In public elementary schools the scholars under 7 are about one third of the total number; in Sunday schools, according to Mr. Towers, the proportion is only about one fifth. It is also necessary to remember that there are large numbers of young people in Sunday schools over 14, the age at which education in public elementary schools generally ceases. For the proportion of the scholars in Sunday schools between those two ages we have to rely on the estimates of the witnesses; and their estimates can be taken as only approximately exact.

Mr. Palmer estimated that of the 2,200,000 scholars in Church of England schools about 70 per cent are between 7 and 14, or 1,540,000.

The Rev. C. H. Kelly informed us that since 1874 there had been a very large increase of scholars over 15 in Wesleyan Sunday schools, and thought that of the whole number of scholars - 879,112 - about one fourth, or 25 per cent, are over 13. Mr. Kelly has furnished me with the elaborate official tables for 1886 on which his evidence was based. These tables summarise exact returns received by the Wesleyan Sunday School Union from the officers of the Wesleyan districts throughout Great Britain. From the total of 879,112 scholars it is necessary to deduct 7,036 for scholars in Scotland (including Shetland), leaving 872,076 for England and Wales. The tables show that of these, 203,917 are under 7, 475,534 between 7 and 15, and 192,625 above 15. The returns do not enable me to give the precise number of scholars between 7 and 14, but 30,000 is a fair estimate for those between 14 and 15; and deducting 30,000 from 475,534 - the number between 7 and 16 - the remainder - 445,534 - is a close approximation to those between 7 and 14.

In the schools connected with his own Union, and numbering 1,200,000 scholars on the register, Mr. Towers thought that one fifth were over 15, one fifth between 13 and


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15, and one fifth in the infant classes: this would show that 40 per cent are between 7 and 13, and about 50 per cent are between 7 and 14. Deducting from 1,200,000, 25,000* for scholars in Scotch Sunday schools affiliated to the London Union, there are 1,175,000 in England and Wales: 50 per cent, of these amount to 587,500.

There remain about 1,000,000 scholars in schools of other denominations to make up the total of 5,200,000 Sunday school scholars in England and Wales; taking for these the mean percentage of 60, as representing the proportion of children between 7 and 14, these denominations have 600,000 scholars between these ages. This percentage would probably be much too high for the Calvinistic Methodist schools in Wales, which number 176,981, and for the schools of the Friends, which number 26,352, which consist very largely of adults; but it would be too low for all the other schools, numbering together about 800,000.

We have, therefore, the following totals of scholars between 7 and 14 in the various descriptions of Protestant Sunday schools:

Church of England1,540,000
Wesleyan445,500
In connexion with the Sunday School Union587,500
Other Protestant denominations600,000
3,173,000

We received no evidence as to the number of scholars in Catholic Sunday schools; but I believe that in addition to what is described as "catechism" on the Sunday afternoon, and in addition to ordinary Sunday schools, the Catholic Church provides for its children and young people by means of religious confraternities and associations of various kinds. It may be assumed that for the religious instruction on Sunday of children attending Catholic day schools the Catholic Church makes adequate provision. There are, no doubt, some non-Catholic children who attend Catholic day schools, but there are also Catholic children who attend non-Catholic day schools, and these may be set off against each other. In comparing, therefore, the number of children between 7 and 14 on the registers of public elementary schools with the children of the same age - 3,173,000 - attending Protestant Sunday schools, the number attending Catholic day schools need not be counted. The total number of children between 7 and 14 on the registers of public elementary schools in England and Wales is 3,101,237; of these 157,067 are in Catholic schools; and the number in non-Catholic schools is 2,944,170. There are, therefore, 228,830 more children between 7 and 14 in the Protestant Sunday schools than in all the public elementary schools of England and Wales, excluding those which are connected with the Catholic Church.

This excess is explained by the fact that, in some parts of England, a considerable number of children attend Sunday schools who do not attend public elementary schools; how many we have no materials to determine. But after deducting any reasonable estimate of the number of such children from the total number of scholars between 7 and 14 attending Sunday schools, the number of Sunday school scholars who belong to the class for which public elementary schools are provided will remain so large as to show that the immense majority of the children on the registers of public elementary schools are also on the registers of Sunday schools. That the number of these children who do not attend Sunday schools is considerable, I do not doubt; but I believe that it has been greatly exaggerated. In London the Sunday schools seem less successful than in other parts of the kingdom in reaching the children of the great masses of the working people.

The evidence of the representatives of the three Sunday school organisations is extremely interesting as showing the large number of young people over 14 who remain under Sunday school instruction. In the Wesleyan schools, according to the official tables, there are 192,625 over 15, and, adding 30,000 for those between 14 and 15, there are 222,625 over 14. Accepting the age percentages of the witnesses for schools of other descriptions, the percentage of scholars over 14 in Church of England schools is 10 per cent - 220,000 scholars; in schools connected with the Sunday School Union 30 per cent - in round numbers, 350,000 scholars; in the

*Mr. Towers informs me that at the time the table was compiled the precise number to be deducted was 25,192.


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remaining Protestant denominations, 20 per cent - 200,000. On these estimates there are, in round numbers, 992,000 scholars in Protestant Sunday schools above the age of 14.

CHAPTER 7

MORAL TRAINING

Article 109(b) of the Code provides that in awarding the merit grant He Majesty's inspectors are to take into account the organisation and discipline of a school; and it declares that "to meet the requirements respecting discipline, the managers and teachers will be expected to satisfy the inspector that all reasonable care is taken, in the ordinary management of the school, to bring up the children in habits of punctuality, of good manners and language, of cleanliness and neatness, and also to impress upon the children the importance of cheerful obedience to duty, of consideration and respect for others, and of honour and truthfulness in word and act." This clause was introduced into the Code in 1876, when our colleague, Lord Harrowby, then Lord Sandon, was Vice-president of the Council; it disappeared from the Code in 1882, but was introduced into a note to the instructions to inspectors for that year; the clause was restored to the Code of 1883.

This article in the Code may be variously interpreted. If it means that in awarding the merit grant it is the duty of the inspector to form a judgment of his own as to whether the children have acquired the excellent moral habits which the article enumerates, it is, in our judgment, impossible for him at the annual examination to form any trustworthy judgment on the question. The "cleanliness and neatness" of the children on that day give no assurance that they are habitually cleanly and neat. That he detects no copying is no sure proof that in their ordinary conduct they are governed by a sense of honour, and are truthful in word and act. On that day the school may be orderly and the discipline excellent, and yet the children may not be generally characterised by cheerful obedience to duty. It is very unlikely that in his presence the very worst children will use bad language; children whose manners are ordinarily rough and coarse will, in his presence, be quiet and subdued; and children will be respectful to him and to their teachers in his presence, who elsewhere show no "consideration or respect for others". In "visits without notice" more may be learnt than on the day of inspection; but these visits cannot be frequent, and we believe that in many of them the whole time is occupied with inquiries of a formal kind. A witness has described these visits in the following words: "The inspector counts the number of children, examines the registers, to see that the registration is correct, and examines as well, to see that the routine is being carried out in accordance with the signed time-table."

Mr. W. Williams, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector for Wales, gave us the fullest information as to the manner in which inspectors carry out Article 109 of the Code.

56,687. Can you tell the Commission how you carry out this instruction to inspectors which requires that the inspectors should satisfy themselves about the moral condition of the schools? - We call the attention of the managers to that fact, and if we find the discipline satisfactory and the premises clean, and see the conduct of the children respectful, we conclude that it is attended to.

56,688. You do not make any special inquiry into that subject, but only take the general view, the appearance of the school on the day of inspection? - Not always; in fact sometimes the managers are not present at all at the inspection.

56,689. You are aware, no doubt, of this note. [Here the Commissioner read the extract of the Code, which we have already quoted, requiring the managers and teachers to satisfy the inspector as to the moral training.] How do the managers satisfy you on this subject? - They satisfy us mainly by training up the children in good behaviour, and we test that by the children's conduct during the examination, and by their deportment during our visits, and by the condition of the premises, inside and outside, and especially on visits without notice.

56,690. That is to say, that you think this is sufficiently met if on one given day in the year the managers satisfy you by your observation that these things are attended to; that is the only way in which you test it? - That is the only


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way in which we test it. I do not say that it is a perfectly satisfactory test, but it goes a long way. In spending four or five hours in a school, if the discipline or conduct of the children is not satisfactory, it is almost sure to show itself.
In addition to forming a judgment on what he himself sees during his visits whether annual or without notice, the inspector may learn from the managers and teachers what methods they have adopted for training the children in good moral habits, and what, in their opinion, has been their success. Nearly all the evidence that we have received both from managers and teachers is to the effect that on this subject of moral training it is not the practice of Her Majesty's inspectors to make any inquiries. It is alleged that the strain upon the inspectors in conducting the examination into the general work of the school leaves them little or no time for making these inquiries.

In our judgment the moral instruction and training of the children in our elementary schools is of paramount importance, and we believe that it is on the managers and teachers that the responsibility rests, and that unless they recognise its gravity the moral influence of the schools will be ineffective. But inspectors may remind them of this responsibility, and urge them to discharge it.

It ought not to be assumed by managers that the moral training is satisfactory because an adequate time is secured for religious teaching and religious observances. Religious teaching may be successful in giving to children a considerable knowledge of Christian doctrine and of the contents of the Bible; it may even be successful in creating devoutness of heart and the desire to live a religious life; and yet may fail in developing and instructing the conscience. It does not follow that because either a man or a child means right he will do right, or even know what it is right to do. Both men and children do many wrong things without knowing them to be wrong, and omit many grave duties through want of thought and want of knowledge. We, therefore, attach great value to definite and systematic instruction in moral duties.

Several years ago the Bristol Board passed the following regulations: "(1) That whenever the Scripture lesson supplies a suitable opportunity of teaching the evils of drunkenness by warnings, cautions, admonitions, and examples, the teachers should avail themselves of it. (2) That reading and copy-books, so far as possible, be rendered helpful in this direction. (3) That picture cards and diagrams and wall-papers bearing on the subject be part of the furniture of the schools." We were also informed that kindness to animals has been made the subject of similar regulations. "The teachers are from time to time questioned as to how they are carrying out these regulations. The Board also expect their teachers to take every opportunity afforded by the daily Scripture lesson to inculcate lessons of the highest morality." This is excellent as far as it goes; but there are other grave vices against which children need to be warned, as well as drunkenness; and other virtues of which they need to be reminded, as well as kindness to animals. It might be well to make more definite and systematic provision for teaching with regard to conduct than that which is contained in their general direction that the teachers are to "take every opportunity afforded by the daily Scripture lesson to inculcate lessons of the highest morality". And instead of expecting the teachers to take every opportunity that may be afforded by the daily Scripture lesson of inculcating the highest morality, it might be well so to arrange the lessons that the opportunity should regularly recur.

Another board in its regulations for religious and moral teaching directs its managers and teachers "to establish and maintain by all possible means a high moral tone in the schools under their charge", recites the article of the Code, which we have already quoted, and calls special attention to it. (Wiltshire, Swindon. School Board Schools (Religious Teaching), Parliamentary Return, 1884, p. 164.)

In Birmingham the teachers under the board use a handbook, containing notes of lessons on moral subjects, specially prepared for public elementary schools. The book contains outlines of lessons on duty, honesty, truthfulness, candour, honour, obedience to parents, love of home, industry, perseverance, patience, government of temper, kindness or consideration for others, courtesy and good manners, forgiveness, punctuality, order or method, painstaking and accuracy, contentment, unselfishness and self-denial, benevolence and humanity, gratitude, cheerfulness, thrift, temperance, cleanliness, modesty, courage, prudence, justice, loyalty and patriotism, support of the


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law, and several other subjects - 40 in all. The lessons are given within the hours for secular instruction.

But we believe that the most admirable system of moral instruction will have no good effect unless the teachers themselves are upright, just, and generous men and women, unselfish, patient, gentle, and affectionate in all their relations to the children; and it is with exceptional pleasure that we recall the deep impression which has been made upon us by the high moral qualities of most of the teachers whom we have examined.

The witnesses who appeared before us are, on the whole, satisfied with the moral results of our present educational system. In the judgment of the Rev. T. W. Sharpe and Canon Warburton, two of Her Majesty's Inspectors, the children generally, as far as they have the means of judging, leave the schools well-principled and conscientious, and Mr. Sharpe thinks the training is as efficient in this respect as in former years. The Rev. Prebendary Deane is of opinion that the Church schools in country parishes have raised the moral tone of the people.

Most of the teachers whom we examined assured us that the moral tone of their schools had not deteriorated, but had been maintained, and even improved, in recent years; but some of them thought that this was not to be attributed to our present system, by which they generally meant the present system of examination and payment by results, but to other causes. The evidence of the teachers as to the moral influence of the schools on the children in after life, and on the neighbourhood in which the schools are situated, was also generally favourable. Mrs. Burgwin, head mistress of Orange Street School, under the London School Board, considers that the school has been a centre of humanising influence in one of the worst parts of London, and she gave a striking sketch of the change for the better that has taken place in the neighbourhood within her own experience. Mr. W. Muscott, principal teacher of the Garsington Church of England mixed school, in the diocese of Oxford, is dissatisfied with the intellectual results of school life, but not with the moral results. Mrs. S. Knowler, mistress of a small Church of England school at Dibden, in Hampshire, is of opinion that the school exerts as good an influence on the character of children as it did 20 years ago. Mr. Horsfield, head master of St. Saviour's Church of England School, Everton, near Liverpool, with an average attendance of 340, stated that, as far as he knew, the boys, after they have left school, are good citizens and lead good lives. Mr. Conway, master of the Holy Cross (Catholic) School for Boys, Liverpool, is of opinion that the moral results of the school are good, and are extremely valuable in the very poor neighbourhood in which the school is situated; the effect of the teaching is seen in the after life of the children. Miss C. Fox, mistress of the Infant School of St. Patrick's, Manchester (Catholic), thinks that "generally the children turn out very well".

The witnesses who represented the Wesleyan Sunday School Union, and the Sunday School Union (which includes various Evangelical Nonconformist denominations), while differing as to the value of the religious instruction given in public elementary schools, whether board or voluntary, agreed in their testimony that the moral influence on the children of both descriptions of schools is excellent.

One of the witnesses, the Rev. W. J. B. Richards, D.D., a Catholic Diocesan Inspector, expressed very strong views as to the unsatisfactory nature of the moral influence exerted on the children by board schools, and expressed his belief that they will furnish a larger proportion of the criminal classes than the children educated in schools of other descriptions. The witness, however, on being asked whether he knew the proportions in which the various denominations furnished their contingents to industrial schools, said that he feared the Roman Catholics figured rather badly. This kind of attack on the moral influence of the board schools, as compared with that of denominational schools, is not infrequent; in the evidence which we have received there is nothing to confirm its truth; and we close this review of our evidence with an extract from the evidence of Mr. Herbert Birley, member of the Manchester and Salford School Boards.

In reply to a question on this subject he said, "We have no direct evidence, but I have a letter here from the rector of one of the parishes in Manchester, who has recently had a board school placed in his parish, about a year and a half ago.


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He says: 'Probably nowhere could the influence of the religious and moral teaching upon the character of children be so readily tested as in a parish like ours, because the school here is the only civilising influence. Their parents are very poor and generally very ignorant. There are no well-to-do residents to set good examples, and children are often left to follow their own sweet will, so that any change in their habits must be due in a great measure to the influence of the school. Since the opening of our schools in 1885 I have noticed a remarkable change; children whom I had noticed previously as dirty and disobedient we now find as a rule clean, obedient, and respectful. Our Sunday school is far more orderly and does its work with a great deal less friction than formerly. The change is most remarkable, and I have no doubt extends in other moral directions. My opinion is that the influence of a well-conducted day school is very great.'"

CHAPTER 8

THE CURRICULUM AND STAFF IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS

At present the curriculum in our elementary schools varies largely according to the will of the managers. In strictness all the instruction that is compulsory to secure the recognition of a school as efficient, and to entitle it to State aid, is that the children should be taught reading, writing, and arithmetic, according to the standards of the Code, and that the girls should be taught needlework.

This, the obligatory minimum curriculum of a public elementary school, is far below what can be considered as the proper range of an elementary education. By the Education Report of 1886-7, there were 2,411 departments, with 117,540 scholars in average attendance, in which no class subject was taken, and in addition there were 1,705 departments, with 141,173 children in average attendance, where the necessary class subject English had been taken, but the grant had been refused. There are about 250,000 children in schools where only one class subjected is attempted.

But though the compulsory programme of instruction in our elementary schools is thus meagre, the Education Department has for years induced managers to take up a more liberal scheme of instruction by the offer of special grants, and the principal progress in this respect was made by the Code of 1876, which introduced the payment of 2s a head on the attendance for each of two class subjects to be taught throughout the school. Managers rapidly took advantage of the opportunity offered to them, and the injurious effects of the Code of 1862, which made tie payment of the full grant dependent on the successful teaching of only a part of the former usual curriculum, were largely corrected.

The schools which fail to present their scholars for examination in the class subjects are mainly small village mixed schools, and even the number of these is diminishing both absolutely and relatively year by year.

Thus in 1883 the numbers not examined in class subjects were 158,441 out of 2,146,773 scholars in average attendance, or 7.38 per cent.
In 1884 the numbers were 124,398 out of 2,313,356, or 5.36 per cent.
In 1885 the numbers were 1 19,293 out of 2,420,560, or 4.93 per cent.
In 1886 the numbers were 117,540 out of 2,464,571, or 4.77 per cent.

When we bear in mind the poor quality of many of the teachers in the small schools, and also the fact that in some instances the inspectors discourage the teaching of class subjects in rural schools, we must conclude that it has been shown by experience that the wider curriculum, which has been almost universally adopted voluntarily, is well within the range of all schools if the managers will provide a proper staff.

We may notice that the great majority of the inspectors and others interested in education state that not only can class subjects be advantageously taught, but that the teaching of them reacts favourably upon the teaching of reading, writing, and arithmetic. Thus far the policy of the Education Department has been to require a very low obligatory minimum of teaching in our elementary schools, but by affixing money payments to extra subjects of instruction to induce the teachers and managers to extend the curriculum. Setting aside for the moment the method by which State


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aid is distributed and which is popularly known as payment by results, we will now consider what is the proper curriculum that may reasonably be required of an elementary school.

Here we would state at the outset, that we cannot expect a uniform curriculum in all schools. The large town school, properly divided into classes, and where a sufficient staff of assistants is working under a competent and well-paid head teacher, may reasonably be expected to teach more than the small village school where the teacher, aided perhaps by a monitor or two, has to go from class to class, and often leave the scholars to work by themselves while the teacher is engaged with another section of the school.

Before discussing what should be the curriculum prescribed by the State as a minimum for all schools, we must deal with that important and characteristic element in English education, the infant schools. Though a curriculum in the strictest sense is not as applicable to them as to the senior departments, yet there are certain principles to be observed and aims to be followed in these schools which should be defined by the State through the Education Department.

We have already, in our chapter on school supply, spoken of the importance and value of infant schools, and specially of the advantage of supplying ample accommodation for and encouraging the attendance of children below five years of age. As about a third of the children in the public elementary schools of the country (1,472,878 out of 4,505,825 children) are in infant schools and classes, the importance of proper methods of education and of good organisation in these departments can hardly be exaggerated, especially as the due progress of the child in the senior departments must largely depend on the intelligent and harmonious development of the faculties and the healthy formation of character in the infant school.

We desire to pay a tribute to the great improvement that has taken place in infant schools since the introduction of Mr. Mundella's Code, and we are of opinion that the principles laid down in that Code, and in the instructions to inspectors, have had an admirable effect upon the education given to infants.

We think, however, that while the classification of an infant school must inevitably, to a large extent, follow the ages of the children, it is undesirable to prescribe, as is done in Art. 106 (a) ii., that the scholars must be taught suitably to their age. These words have led some inspectors to insist unduly upon age classification, though we believe they were intended to have a different effect. We think that the classification should be suitable to the intelligence, attainments, and physical development of the children, and that words suggesting any other classification should be removed from the Code.

We agree that the children in an infant school should all be taught in such a way that when they reach the age of seven or eight they should be fitted to pass out from the infant school and to receive the systematised course of instruction of the senior school, though even in the senior school we should be glad to see the methods of instruction of the lower classes, which contain, as a rule, children up to about nine years of age, of a transitional character, largely retaining some of the special methods of the infant school and forming a transition class, though under the direction of the teacher of the senior department. In towns with large schools, junior departments may often be a convenient way of organising these intermediate classes.

We are pleased to note the introduction into the Code of simple lessons on objects and on the phenomena of nature and of common life, and of appropriate and varied occupations, as a necessary part of the teaching of an infant school. The introduction of these matters, in addition to suitable instruction in the elementary subjects, the abolition of a schedule of passes for the infants from seven to eight who are taught the work of the 1st Standard, and the freedom of classification conceded by the requirement that scholars over seven years of age must, as a rule, be examined in the 1st Standard, have all done much for the improvement of infant schools.

But we are of opinion that still further liberty might be conceded, and that the truest ideal of infant school teaching requires that, at any rate for the younger infants up to five years old, and, perhaps, for many of the infants up to six years of age, direct literary instruction should be almost entirely dispensed with. We think that with these very young children the work of the infant school should be mainly formative, and should guide the spontaneous activity of the child's nature. The varied and systematised occupations, so well known in connexion with Froebel, are of the greatest value, but we should be sorry to see these insisted upon in such a way as should lead teachers to suppose that Kindergarten is a definite subject of instruction, and not a method and spirit which should not be laid aside even in the higher departments


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of a school. We also deprecate the idea that infant schools should be mere places of orderly and systematised recreation. Children from the earliest age can take in ideas and develop much reflecting and generalising power through the concrete, especially in their conceptions of form and of number. They can also learn dexterity, accuracy, and method, and can greatly strengthen their observing faculties through the Kindergarten occupations, and through good object lessons and other means of training. But all these things require specially trained, intelligent, and sympathetic teachers, and we insist on the fact that if an infant school is to be intelligently and effectively conducted on the lines which we are suggesting, the training of infant teachers is, at the least, as important as that of the teachers of senior schools, and should have special relation to the work which they are about to undertake.

We observe with pleasure the great extension of singing by note in infant schools. In 1886-87 549,000 infants in average attendance had learnt to sing by note, against 445,000 who had only learnt to sing by ear. We attach very great importance to the teaching of singing; the children should learn both action songs and other songs, as imparting brightness and variety to the course in an infant school.

In passing from the Code to the instructions to inspectors we note with pleasure the statement, paragraph 5, "managers are at liberty to classify the scholars for the purpose of instruction in any way they think best". We should be glad to see these words transferred from the instructions to the Code. We think the instructions generally in reference to infant schools very satisfactory, but, in view of the action of some inspectors, we think the fact that the teaching of needlework to boys is optional should be more strongly emphasized.

We wish here to call attention to the time table of the infant department of the Grey stoke Place board school. City of London, approved by the Rev. T. W. Sharpe, Her Majesty's Chief Inspector for London, (Vol. I., page 540). In this time table direct literary teaching does not appear below the first two classes out of the four classes into which the school is divided.

We think it important that it should be generally made known to inspectors, some of whom are not in full sympathy with the postponement of direct literary instruction till the higher classes of an infant school, that they should not interfere directly or indirectly to press upon the teacher methods and subjects of instruction which she does not think suited to the age or mental development of the children; and that if the children are duly prepared by seven years of age for the senior school, the methods employed in the earlier classes should be deemed satisfactory.

Before leaving the subject of the curriculum and methods of infant schools we wish to refer to the valuable report lately issued by the school board for London on subjects and modes of instruction, copies of which were furnished by the school board to the Commissioners. Without pledging ourselves in detail to all the recommendations, we would testify to the great value of the report, and refer specially to the summing-up on pages 4 and 5 on the methods and objects which should be employed and pursued in infant schools.

For the small village school of not more than 60 or 70 in average attendance, we think that the curriculum for the scholars above the infant classes should include a thorough knowledge of reading, writing, and arithmetic. The children should acquire such a knowledge of their language as will enable them by the time they leave school to express themselves correctly both in speaking and in writing. They should also have acquired some familiarity with and appreciation of good composition, largely through the recitation of poetry. They should have a general knowledge of the history of their country, which might be acquired mainly through reading books. In the earlier classes the reading books should contain interesting biographies of great men and tales of heroism and noble life; in the higher classes they should read and know some popular history of their country, and especially be taught something of its present state, its relation to its colonies and dependencies, and its mode of Government, especially in those local institutions with which they are most nearly concerned. They should also have a general knowledge of geography, acquired partly through reading books of travels, partly by the constant use of maps and globes, and by illustrations drawn from the neighbourhood of the school and the county in which they live, and this general knowledge should be developed and brought into relation with the history of England and of its colonies and dependencies.

A suitable course of simple lessons in the most elementary notions of science should be given, illustrated by experiments and practical work; these would interest the children, would give variety and freshness to the school course, and would greatly stimulate their observing and reasoning faculties. Singing by note might well be a


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part of the curriculum in all schools. If properly taught it takes no longer than singing by ear. The boys in such a school should be well grounded in drawing, especially of a geometrical and industrial character, and the girls should be taught needlework. Suitable physical exercises and games should be constantly used, both for the boys and girls, and a well-chosen school, library should aid at home the love of knowledge and the mental activity which should be awakened by the school.

Such a course, even in a small school, would probably necessitate the presence of more than one teacher. But where the head teacher is really competent and well-trained, and no others should be tolerated, there will probably be found monitors or unindentured pupil teachers, who after the age of 13 will stay on, at any rate for two or three years, and whose services might be recognised in very small rural schools, and in them alone.

The evidence of Mr. Matthew Arnold shows that the difficulties of small schools and of large classes are not found insuperable on the Continent, where teachers are able single-handed to teach effectively a much larger number of subjects than are attempted in this country and with larger numbers allotted, at least in Germany, to the individual teacher. We think, however, that in these small schools the present sub-division of classes according to the existing standards is excessive, and that a division of the scholars, exclusive of the infants, into three classes, the work of each of which might represent on an average a two years' course of study, would be more satisfactory. A curriculum suited to village schools might be so framed that fuller and more accurate knowledge of the work required from the class might be expected from those working in it for a second year.

If a curriculum, such as we have described, were laid down for a village school, we should not generally be in favour of any wide departure from it by the taking up of extra subjects. At the same time where the managers are willing further to strengthen the staff, and where from the rural character of the district there are few opportunities of frequenting larger schools we think that, with the approval of the inspector, other subjects might be encouraged for the children in the highest class of the school, especially if the parents are willing to permit the hours of study to be somewhat lengthened for these elder children. Then such instruction as cookery for girls, some use of tools for boys or some teaching of the principles of agriculture, or a little mathematics, or mensuration and field surveying might be found of great advantage to the sons of farmers or of those other residents in villages who are willing to keep their children at school till 14 or 14½, and yet cannot send them to a town for their education. Where a school gives such further instruction with the approval of the inspector, some further grant might be made towards the extra cost, but this approval should be conditional on the ordinary work of the school being thoroughly well done.

In all cases it should be clearly understood that though the Government inspection is limited to the curriculum required or approved by the Education Department, yet that the right of managers to teach any other subjects they may think fit, on their own responsibility, is not interfered with. The Code is the limit of Government interference, not a limitation of the right of managers to introduce subjects of instruction.

Having described the course of teaching which we think applicable to the smaller village schools, we proceed to consider the suitable curriculum for larger schools, where the departments are subdivided.

We agree with the present requirement of the Code that where there are 20 or more children below seven years of age, they must be taught as a separate class, with a separate teacher; we think that a class of 40 infants should not only be under an adult teacher, but the teacher should be one of tested competency, and not merely approved by the inspector.

Where the elder children are more than 60 in average attendance, we are of opinion that the curriculum already described might be enforced with more fullness and thoroughness of knowledge, and where the children in a senior department exceed a hundred, a further plan of studies of a somewhat more detailed character might well be laid down.

Where a department is large enough to employ two assistant teachers, and where consequently the highest class, corresponding to the 5th, 6th, and 7th Standards, has a teacher to itself, specific subjects may be taken up and taught with advantage, and these, though not insisted upon, might well be encouraged. This principle is recognised in the present instructions to inspectors, sections 45, 46, where it is laid down that it is not desirable as a general rule that specific subjects should be attempted where the staff of the school is small, or the scholars in Standards 5-7 do not form a class large enough to justify the withdrawal of the principal teacher from the teaching


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of the rest of the school; but in large schools, and those which are in favourable circumstances, the scholars of Standard 5 and upwards may be encouraged to attempt one or more specific subjects which the managers may deem most appropriate to the industrial and other needs of the district.

Programmes of instruction suited to the various classes of schools we have indicated should be drawn up by the Department, and schemes of progressive teaching should be set forth in lieu of the present standards, and with much greater fullness of detail. At the same time we think that there should be a certain freedom of choice and possible alternative courses which managers and teachers should be permitted to follow after consultation with the inspector.

But in addition to the schools we have described, which would cover nearly all the ground of elementary instruction, the school provision would not be complete without the more systematic supply of what have been described to us as higher elementary schools. These have been established in many towns, mostly by the school boards, hut in some cases by voluntary managers. They are not uniform in type, as sometimes they include all standards, and sometimes they are limited to children in the higher standards. They also usually keep on their scholars for a year or two after passing the 7th Standard, and give a mainly scientific education in connexion with the South Kensington examinations.

These schools are an important and necessary element for the completion of the popular schools of the country. They enable the scholars, whose parents are willing to keep them at school till 14½ or 15, to get more thorough teaching than they could possibly get in the ordinary schools, where the highest class is probably made up of children in more than one year of school progress. Appliances, too, for the teaching of drawing and of science, and to some extent school workshops, can better be supplied in connexion with a few central schools than at the ordinary local schools.

A detailed account of some of these schools will be found in our chapter on technical instruction, to which and to the evidence we refer for a statement of the kind of work done in them.

We are of opinion that in any school district where the population, within a radius of two miles, amounts to 10,000, there should be such a higher elementary school, or a higher department attached to an ordinary elementary school, with a curriculum suited to children up to 14 or 15 years of age. In more populous districts these schools should be increased. In districts where from the sparseness of the population such schools or departments cannot easily be established, children should be encouraged to continue their education beyond the ordinary school curriculum by the payment of grants on the report of Her Majesty's inspector that the best arrangements have been made for their efficient instruction, having regard to the difficulties and circumstances of the case, and that they have received such instruction; such an extension of education would be of great value, not only to those who are preparing for the various industries of life, but it would also secure a better class of scholars, who in the rural schools might furnish paid monitors or pupil teachers in aid of the head teacher.

We may note that at present the curriculum of our English schools assumes either less ability in the scholars, or less teaching skill and readiness to promote education in the teachers and managers than the Scotch Code. Thus specific subjects are taught in Scotland from the 4th Standard upwards. In England now only from the 5th; and yet it will be found that the amount of work required in the various stages is no more in England than in Scotland if the two schedules be compared. Indeed some of the Scotch subjects include more matter; thus, in mathematics the Scotch Code includes algebra and Euclid, whereas in England the two subjects are divided, and if we look to the extent to which these subjects are taught in the two countries we find that in Scotland, out of 381,000 children above seven years of age in average attendance, nearly 100,000 passes in specific subjects were recorded. In England, out of 2,464,000 above seven years of age, 56,341 specific passes were recorded. Had the same number of passes proportionally been obtained in England as in Scotland there would have been 640,000 passes instead of 66,341.

Again, of 2,445,562 children in England examined in the Standards in 1885-86, 393,289 were examined in Standard V and upwards, or 16 per cent. In Scotland, of 373,838 children examined in Standards, 78,682 were examined in Standard V and upwards, or 21 per cent.

It may be noted, that as in England children over seven in infant schools are not recorded as passing, and as the children in Scotland who have passed the 6th Standard,


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and who numbered at the least more than 6,000, are also not enumerated, the disproportion in the higher standards in favour of Scotland is still greater.

It is obvious that a liberal curriculum implies, if it is to be really taught, a staff of teachers efficient in quality and sufficient in number. We have already dealt with pupil teachers and with training colleges, and with the qualifications that should be required of teachers. But apart from the qualifications of teachers, the sub-division of the school into classes makes it necessary that there should be more teachers in proportion to the scholars taught than is now the case according to the minimum of the Code.

This has been so thoroughly recognised by managers that we find the schools of the country generally have a staff 49 per cent in excess of the Code minimum, and this liberal staffing is common to all descriptions of schools, though the proportions of excess vary somewhat between one class and another. There was a very general agreement also among the witnesses who came before us that the Code requirements as to staff might be materially increased. We, therefore, have no hesitation in making a recommendation which, in nearly every case, will simply bring the Code requirements nearer to the practice of school managers.

We do not propose anything so sweeping as was suggested by some witnesses. Thus, the Rev. T. W. Sharpe said the number of a class should never exceed 40, and for the highest class in the school and for the lowest class of infants you ought not to have more than 25 to one teacher. Mr. Matthew Arnold said that with a sound system of elementary teaching a competent teacher might have a class of 50 scholars on the roll. This would be equal to not quite 45 in average attendance. Canon Daniel, Miss Manley, and others complained of the excessive size of the classes in London and the consequent exhaustion and breakdown of the teachers. Mr. Wild would be contented with classes of 50 in average attendance for an adult teacher. Mr. Grove would give 25 children to a pupil teacher, 40 to an ex-pupil teacher, and 60 to a certificated teacher. Miss Whittenbury, an infant schoolmistress with a school of 500-600 children, would be content to give each certificated assistant an average of 60 children, if the head teacher were not counted on the staff.

Miss Castle, speaking of a small mixed rural school of less than 60, said assistance is absolutely necessary, but would prefer her own monitors to an assistant. Miss Castle's monitors had passed the 7th Standard, and are, therefore, substantially junior pupil-teachers. Mr. Scotson would count an ex-pupil teacher for 40, a certificated assistant for 60, and leave the head teacher free. Evidence might be multiplied as to the need for largely reducing the number of scholars assigned to a teacher by the Code; and it is also generally admitted that the smaller the school the larger proportionally must be the staff. We are of opinion that though in large schools, with thoroughly efficient trained assistants, classes of 60 in average attendance may be satisfactorily taught, yet that classes of 50 would be far better, and that it would be more easy to educate as well as to instruct them. The smallest schools would be the better for some help afforded to the head teacher, if that help were only a paid monitor.

We recommend that henceforward a head teacher count for 40 instead of 60, that a certificated assistant count for 60 instead of 80, and an ex-pupil teacher for 50, a pupil-teacher in the third or fourth year for 30, in the second year for 20, and that candidates and first year pupil-teachers be not reckoned on the staff. As we are of opinion that the junior pupil-teachers should be largely relieved from school work for the purposes of study, we think that wherever pupil teachers are employed they should be employed in pairs, so that the senior one may mainly be used to help in school work.

If the existing staff were reckoned on the basis we have suggested, it would, in fact, supposing it to be rateably distributed, be about sufficient for the children in average attendance, and we may, therefore, suppose that the only schools in which the proposed computation would make a serious difference are those which are glaringly understaffed.

Closely connected with the question of the staff of schools is the question of special teachers, such as those referred to in Art. 98 of the Code, and of local inspectors.

We are of opinion that even if the teachers were far better qualified for their work than many of them now are, there would still be subjects, such as drawing, science, cookery, in which the services of a special instructor would be of great value, and we think that the managers of schools would be greatly aided in their management if


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they had the services of persons of scholastic experience to inspect their schools, report on the teaching, and help them to strengthen the weak places and remedy defects by anticipation, which if uncorrected might result in an unfavourable report from Her Majesty's inspector. We think that the services of such experts would be especially valuable to the managers of voluntary schools, who, as a rule, are more isolated and have less the advantage of comparing one school with another than school boards. We therefore recommend that among the various ways of aiding schools from the Government grant, help be given, not to exceed half of the salary of any such organising teachers or inspectors as may be appointed by a school board or a combination of school boards, or of voluntary managers, subject to such regulations as the Education Department may frame from time to time.

Before leaving the question of the curriculum in our elementary schools we should note one or two considerations which apply to exceptional cases.

We must first notice the certified efficient schools which are still recognised by the Department as part of the available school supply of the country.

The Annual Report of the Education Department for 1886-7, p. 259, gives 352 schools, containing 376 departments which were examined for certificates of efficiency under the Elementary Education Act, 1876, sect. 48, for the year ending August 31, 1886.

These schools had 30,597 accommodation, 13,678 scholars in average attendance, and 16,375 scholars present at the inspection. Of these departments 331 were found to be efficient, 24 conditionally efficient, and 21 not efficient.

In reference to the standard by which the inspectors are required to test these schools with a view to determining their efficiency, the department issued a circular dated 8th February 1877, which will be found in the Blue Book for 1876-7, page 249, in which it is stated "As regards the standard of instruction fixed by the rules, my Lords are aware that it is a very low one, and that it can be accepted only as a starting point for future improvement. They have taken it with very slight modifications from the test of efficiency prescribed by the instructions issued to the inspectors who, under the Act of 1870, carried out the enquiry into the general school provision of the country. It is obvious that as the object of the recognition of the new class of schools in question is to secure for children who do not attend public elementary schools, such instruction in the first four standards of the Code as will qualify them to attain standards of proficiency under the Act of 1876, enabling them to go to work, it will be the duty of the managers so to raise the character of the teaching in their schools as at least to keep pace with the standards of proficiency required in successive years by that Act as a condition of employment. My Lords must therefore expressly reserve to themselves the power to require a higher standard of instruction from time to time from those schools which are to be continued in the list of certified efficient schools."*

The standard of instruction will be found on page 251 - (b). As regards the elder children 50 per cent of the number of scholars above seven years of age in average attendance during the previous year will be individually examined in reading, writing, and elementary arithmetic; those from seven to eight in Standard I of the Code of 1870, those from eight to ten in Standard I of the Code of 1877, and those above ten in Standard II, or a higher standard of the same Code (1877).
One half of the children examined ought to pass in two subjects.
One half of the children above ten ought to pass in two subjects.
One half of the children so passing ought to pass in arithmetic.

In reference to this circular, which still remains in force, we may remark that in ordinary schools the number presented for examination slightly exceeds the average attendance. Thus the passing of half the children examined in two subjects in a certified efficient school is equal to one-sixth of the children presented passing in an ordinary school, or a percentage of passes of less than 17 per cent. For example, of 100 children in average attendance in a certified efficient school, 50 only have to be examined; only 25 of these need to pass in two subjects; these will make 50 "passes". In an ordinary school of 100 there are more than 300 passes possible, since the number examined is slightly in excess of the average attendance. When we bear in mind that 85 or 86 per cent is now the average throughout the country, this standard would seem ludicrous if it were not shameful. But moreover the recognition of the old 1st Standard, formerly applicable to children between six and seven, and the

*Note. No higher standard has been applied since then.


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requirement of no standard higher than the second, makes the whole of this test of efficiency perfectly worthless.

It may be said that very few children are affected by this circular, and by these schools, and that most of the certified efficient schools do much better than the minimum of the circular. But we are of opinion that no hamlet, however obscure and small, should he liable to the injustice of having a school such as is contemplated as possible by this circular, and that the time has come when the certified efficient schools should no longer be included in the recognised school supply of the country unless they conform in every respect to the requirements imposed upon public elementary schools, and satisfy the inspector, year by year, after a searching examination, that they come up to the standard of a good school.

In the greater part of Wales the language interposes many difficulties in the way of teaching according to a Code which is drawn up for English speaking children.

We think, in addition to agreeing with the recommendations of our colleagues as to the use to be made of the Welsh language in teaching, that the peculiarities and difficulties of the Welsh-speaking population should be continually borne in mind in conducting the Government examination, and in any modifications of the regulations which may be hereafter made by the central educational authority.

The deaf-mutes and blind are an exceptional class for whom special provision should be made, but as another Commission has been appointed to consider their case we make no recommendation in reference to them.

In districts where half-time employment prevails largely, special modifications of the curriculum should be introduced either by spreading the progress of the scholars over a longer period or by some simplification of the programme. The difficulties of half-timers will be largely met by educating them in separate departments, as has been done to a considerable extent at Bradford, and by furnishing such schools with a specially strong staff of teachers.

We are also of opinion that the circumstances of evening schools make special schemes of instruction necessary for them.

There is a question closely connected with the curriculum, and that is the due notification of any changes in it in ample time for schools to make the necessary preparations. We think the Code should every year be published and in the hands of persons interested in education for the full time that it is required to be laid before Parliament, and that no serious changes in school teaching and organisation should be required without the interposition of a reasonable time for preparation.

All extensions of the curriculum should be introduced gradually, and schools taking them up for first time should have great indulgence shown them for a year or two as to the higher stages.

CHAPTER 9

TECHNICAL INSTRUCTION*

We understand by "technical instruction" instruction in the principles and practice of domestic, commercial, agricultural, and industrial work. This instruction is given partly in schools and partly in workshops and elsewhere, and we have to consider what portion of such technical instruction can be properly and efficiently given in our elementary schools.

Such education is now largely given in our girls' schools; probably fully four hours a week are given on an average to needlework. Upwards of £44,000 was paid for its teaching in infant schools, and in the senior schools it was taken as a class subject in 6,809 departments, having an average attendance of 681,080 girls, while in 10,493

*It will he observed that there are several passages in this chapter identical with passages in the report of our colleagues.

In explanation of this we must state that this chapter is, with a few alterations, based upon the draft submitted in the first instance to the Commission by our Chairman and closely corresponds with it. That draft was, however, as will appear from the minutes of the decisions of the Commission of 29th November 1887, set aside in favour of a draft proposed by Canon Gregory.

In the latter were afterwards incorporated several detached passages, in which we concur, taken from the original chapter proposed by our Chairman, and we are of opinion that they are more in place in their original context than in the chapter adopted by the majority of our colleagues, which is in many respects animated by a different spirit; we, therefore, prefer to present these passages a second time rather than mutilate the chapter, to the unity and completeness of which they are essential.


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departments, having an average of 454,197 girls, it was paid for at 1s under Article 109 (c) of the Code. As 1,143,782 girls were in average attendance in senior departments of schools inspected during the year 1885-6, it follows that nearly all the departments in our public elementary schools satisfied the inspectors in reference to needlework instruction, and that nearly 60 per cent of all the girls in average attendance were taught according to the Schedule, and took needlework as a class subject. In addition to this, cookery is being taught in an increasing number of girls' schools. Domestic economy, which till the last few years was an obligatory specific subject in girls' schools, if specific subjects were taken at all, still holds a high place among these subjects. Drawing, which is the foundation of nearly all technical instruction, is almost entirely banished from girls' schools as a subject of examination, and the recent requirement that, if drawing is to be examined, cookery must also be taught, will probably complete the almost total exclusion from girls' schools of drawing as a subject of examination.

In boys' schools drawing has had its place in the school curriculum seriously disturbed by the recent removal of its examination and payment, first from the Science and Art Department to the Education Department, and then back again. By the former Department with which its oversight now lies, a graduated syllabus of instruction from the lowest to the highest standard has recently been put forth, which there is reason to think may lead to drawing being more systematically and satisfactorily taught, and to its gradual introduction into all those boys' schools, which are under trained teachers, or teachers that have in some other way obtained a certificate for teaching drawing. But we regret that the examination is not at present conducted in such a way as to secure that due attention is given to good methods of teaching drawing, nor is any estimate made by a competent examiner of the success and ability of the various teachers. The Commissioners on Technical Education recommended that it should be part of the necessary curriculum of all aided schools, and should be incorporated with the writing. The returns furnished in reply to our inquiries by our representatives abroad, show that in the countries of the continent, drawing is, as a rule, an essential part of the instruction given both to boys and girls in the primary schools.

Beyond drawing, with very few exceptions, nothing has been done in our elementary schools in the direction of technical instruction, so far as it consists of the training of the hand and eye. Some small attempt has been made in the Manchester Board School, held in the former Lancastrian School, to teach boys the use of tools, but neither the present nor the past chairman of that board could give us much information as to how the experiment was answering. Mr. Birley seemed to desire something very like a half-time system in which not merely handiness should be acquired, but the rudiments of a definite trade. At the same time he considers that not much can be done in the matter of handicraft, because the children are so young when they leave school. The London School Board has had some instruction given in the use of tools in the Beethoven Street school, Queen's Park Estate, Kensal New Town, which will be noticed later. This instruction was given to the sixth and seventh standard boys by the school-keeper, who is a carpenter, in a small shed or workshop put up in the playground. The auditor surcharged the board with the expenditure, though it is hard to say why; since, though the instruction was not paid for under the Code, there is nothing by law to limit the discretion of managers in giving other secular instruction, and in former days the Department used to encourage this kind of teaching by direct grants.

In reference to this instruction at the Beethoven Street School, Mr. Tate, the head master, reports of the second year's work,|| "Since I had the pleasure of submitting a report on the work of this class in June 1886, the interest in this subject, both inside and outside the schooL has increased at a rapid rate. The class which continues to be managed in the same way as last year has met 78 times, and 769 attendances have been made by the scholars, so that on the average about 10 boys have been present each lesson, or 20 boys have on the average received instruction in manual work each week. These boys have been selected entirely from the Seventh Standard, and the privilege has been confined to this, the highest standard, in the hope that the boys may be encouraged to remain at school after they have passed the Sixth Standard. Only one boy in this class has made late attendances during the year, and he has an occupation for a part of the day as a newspaper boy, and he has only

||London School Board, School Management Report for year ending March 1887.


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been late twice. The boys, after some preliminary practice in making various joints have been engaged in making specimens of the following articles, which are or may be used in the board schools. Each article is the work of one boy or of two working together. In the latter case a duller boy has been paired with one more expert.

Needlework Class - box having a tray and a lid.
Kindergarten Class - box having a tray and a lid.
Kindergarten Class - box for coloured beads, with six divisions.
Double pen trays, long enough to take 12-inch rulers.
Time-table frames, 17 in. by 12 in., with wooden back.
The operations of gluing, staining, sizing, and varnishing have each been performed by the boys.

The school-keeper, who teaches the carpentry to the class, has attended since January the lectures at the City and Guilds of London Technical Institute, South Kensington, on Saturday mornings, so that he may benefit by the methods pursued there of explaining and illustrating processes, and learn the course of work which the professor recommends. I have also joined the lectures, and I find them of the greatest value."

In Birmingham a nearer approach to a technical school is established, of which more will be said hereafter, and in Sheffield much good work has been done at the central school, which is properly a higher elementary school.

Though technical training does not exist for boys to the extent that needlework and cookery supply technical training for girls, we had a great deal of evidence as to the educative effect of science teaching in our elementary schools, and, no doubt, science, especially mathematical, mechanical, and physical science, are not only the foundations but an essential part of much technical teaching, if it is to be worth anything. We have already recommended that lessons in common objects in the lower standards leading up to a knowledge of elementary science in the higher standards should be a part of the curriculum in all schools. Great pains will have to be taken in the training colleges to secure that all teachers henceforth are duly prepared for giving this instruction; but even when this has been done, and when our teachers have nearly all had a college training, we cannot, as a rule, expect the ordinary elementary master to be necessarily a good science teacher. He has so much to do, and his attention is so distracted from science, even if he made some progress in its study at college, that he cannot be depended on for clear, vivid, and simple lectures, and for neatness and certainty in the performance of experiments; and these are qualities especially necessary in one who expounds any experimental science to such boys as attend our elementary schools. Hence the practice has sprung up in some of the larger school boards of engaging the services of a skilled lecturer or science demonstrator, who teaches the subject in the various schools in presence of the class master, who, having heard the lesson, is able to recapitulate it, and see that the boys thoroughly understand what has been taught them.

At Birmingham this system has been at work since 1880, under the school board. The demonstrator, or one of his assistants, visits each boys' and girls' department once a fortnight. He visits four departments a day, two in the morning and two in the afternoon. The class teacher is present, and in the interval between the demonstrator's visits he repeats and enforces with further illustration the subjects taught, requires written answers to the examination questions, and submits the papers to the demonstrator. Two and a half hours a fortnight are given in the schools to science, the demonstrator's lesson taking three-quarters of an hour. The boys are taught mechanics, or elementary natural philosophy, the girls, domestic economy, considered as the application of chemistry and physiology to the explanation of the matters of home life. In a few departments a second specific subject is taken; with the boys, electricity and magnetism; with the girls, animal physiology. In all boys' and girls' schools this scientific teaching is given to all above the Fourth Standard. The total cost of the staff of demonstrators and assistants, &c. is £985 12s. The efficiency of the teaching is testified to by Professor Poynting, professor of physics at Mason's College, Birmingham, whose report Dr. Crosskey quotes as follows: After mentioning that he has examined for four years, and after giving detailed comments on the kind of work done, he says: "My experience, I think, fully justifies the opinion that the science teaching is most valuable, the training


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of the boys giving results which I should never have supposed possible before I began to examine." The total number of children under instruction under the Birmingham School Board is 2,700 boys in mechanics, and 550 in magnetism and electricity, 2,200 girls in domestic economy, and 100 in animal physiology; and the percentage of passes in the examinations by Her Majesty's Inspector is 88.5. Dr. Crosskey also states that the masters of the schools find that this instruction in science conduces to general intelligence, and improves the general work of the school, and believes that the foundation laid in the elementary school prepares the way for the advanced work done at the Midland Institute. This scientific instruction is found in Birmingham to be desirable, not merely as the foundation of technical training, but also as a part of general education, a subject with which we have already dealt.

The Birmingham School Board contend, in reference to this scientific teaching, that if it is to be properly appreciated and encouraged, the examination on behalf of the Government should be mainly oral, and not written, and other witnesses insist on the need of thorough competence on the part of the examiner. Dr. Crosskey would stimulate this teaching of science by payment, not so much for results, as towards the salary of the special demonstrator.

In Birmingham there is what is called the special Seventh Standard school. This is, to a certain extent, a technical school; none are admitted till they have passed the Sixth Standard, and it is laid out for a three years' course, one year in the Seventh Standard and two years working in connexion with South Kensington. The subjects taught are reading, writing, and arithmetic according to the Code; mathematics, plane geometry, and projection, machine construction and drawing, magnetism and electricity, theoretical and practical chemistry, freehand drawing, and the manipulation of wood-working tools. These subjects are not universally taught to all the scholars; they are divided into three divisions, machine construction, chemistry, and electricity. The hours of work during the week, 30, are divided as follows:

In the machine construction division, mathematics 12 hours; projection 5 hours; machine construction 4 hours: electricity 5 hours; freehand drawing 2 hours; workshop 2 hours.

In the chemistry division, mathematics 12 hours; projection 4 hours; theoretical chemistry 6 hours; practical chemistry 4 hours; freehand 2 hours; workshop 2 hours.

In the electricity division, mathematics 12 hours, projection 4 hours; theoretical chemistry 5 hours; electricity 5 hours; freehand 2 hours; workshop 2 hours.

In the second year the scholars spend three hours in the workshop, 1½ hours during the school time and 1½ hours in the evening. The object of the workshop instruction is to teach the meaning, nature, and use of workshop tools, and to give manipulative skill in their employment, together with information regarding the principles of tools and the properties of the materials used. The schoolroom is connected with the workshop, and a practical mechanic is employed, who is engaged to give workshop instruction, and who supplies the head master with specimens of work, which are explained by the latter in the drawing room. The head master explains the connexion of the parts one with another, teaches the scholars to make a drawing to scale, and shows the required views of the model under examination. The scholar goes to the workshop and makes an article from the drawing to scale; this completed, he measures it, and makes a second drawing of it, still working to scale. It should be noted that the time table given only applies to those who have passed the Seventh Standard. Boys working in the Seventh Standard are required, in consequence of an agreement with the Department, to give 20 hours a week to the three R's. This restriction is said to hamper the free and efficient working of the school.

Mr. Hance, the clerk to the school board for Liverpool, also gave evidence in reference to the teaching of science by a circulating demonstrator. This plan was introduced by the Liverpool board as early as 1876. It was first suggested by Col. Donelly, of the Science and Art Department, and its main outlines were settled under his and Professor Huxley's advice. The subjects chosen were elementary physics for boys, and domestic economy for girls. The results appear to be less thorough in Liverpool than in Birmingham, for last year out of 1,214 boys presented


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in mechanics 68 per cent passed, of 906 girls presented in domestic economy 63 per cent passed. The Liverpool board, like the Birmingham board, lay great stress on the importance of the examination being oral, and they consider that, with the wider use of oral examination, we might return to the Fourth Standard for the beginning of specific subjects. Dr. Olive Lodge, Professor of Physics in the Liverpool University College, gives a very favourable report on the attainments of the boys whom he examined.

We observe that Mr. Hance, the Clerk of the Liverpool School Board, while in favour of introducing manual employments in the nature of specific subjects into boys' schools, is hardly prepared to call what he wants by so ambitious a name as technical training.

The School Board for London has more recently adopted the same plan of circulating demonstrators for science, though not on so large a scale, having regard to the number of children in their schools. A demonstrator was appointed about three years ago to work in the East End of London; he had under his supervision and instruction upwards of 2,000 boys studying mechanics. The work proved so successful that the board has appointed three more demonstrators. The Chairman of the London School Board gives evidence strongly in favour of the plan; and Mr. Wilks, for several years chairman of the school management committee of the London School Board, supports strongly the same opinion, with this reservation, that he considers this scientific instruction, when given only in the upper standards, to be incomplete, as lacking continuousness, and not growing sufficiently out of what has gone before.

The last report of Mr. Grieve, science demonstrator to the School Board for London, is published in the yearly report of the School Management Committee for the year ending March 1887, page 31. He gives the following questions set by one of Her Majesty's Inspectors on paper to the Fifth Standard, that is to boys ranging, as a rule, between 11 and 12:

Question 1. Impenetrability and elasticity do not apply to atoms. Explain this, and give illustrations.
Question 2. In what bodies may you say that molecular attraction is balanced by the repulsive force of heat?
Question 3. There is a force which keeps solid bodies from falling to powder, and another force which is the cause of their breaking into particles. What are these forces?
Question 4. A nail driven into a piece of wood is not a case of penetrability. Explain this.
Question 5. Compressibility is due to the approach of the molecules. It is a proof of porosity. Explain the words in italics.
Question 6. What do you understand by (1) molecular attraction; (2) chemical affinity?
Question 7. There are two kinds of forces to be found. Explain this, and give examples.
The demonstrator comments on the disappointment resulting from such a style of examination on paper to boys of the age mentioned, and suggests that Standard V should be examined orally. He quotes from the Code, "That instruction in the science subjects shall be given mainly by experiment and illustration. If these subjects are taught to children by definition and verbal description instead of making them exercise their own powers of observation, they will be worthless as means of education", and he adds, "I have therefore felt it my duty to call attention to this matter lest, after all, the teaching of the subject might in the end develop into a cram". At the present time (March 1887) he says, there are 2,201 boys under instruction in the 20 schools, 1,168 from the Tower Hamlets division, and 1,033 from the Hackney division. Pieces of apparatus similar to that used in the experiments continue to be made by the boys attending the classes. At Teesdale Street, Hackney, one of the managers has shown great interest in the subject by offering money prizes to the boys who should make the best model of pieces of apparatus used in the demonstration, and a great desire has been expressed in several other schools for the establishment of workshops where boys showing an aptitude for the use of tools might have the opportunity of constructing pieces of apparatus for themselves.


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In Leeds the board has a science demonstrator and an assistant, who teach at their central higher grade school and at 15 other schools.

But in spite of these scattered efforts, on the whole it appears that hardly anything is done in this country in the way of workshop instruction for boys, and little in linear drawing, still less in that scientific education which is the foundation and most essential part of such technical instruction as can be given in the school.

There are a few higher grade elementary schools where a considerable number of boys stay on beyond the Seventh Standard. The three principal ones brought under our notice were the Deansgate Central School of the Manchester School Board, concerning which the evidence of Mr. Scotson, the head-master, is full of interest, and which is also dealt with in the evidence of Mr. Nunn, the present, and Mr. Herbert Birley, the late, chairman of the Manchester School Board; St. Thomas', Charterhouse, Church of England School, whose head-master, Mr. Charles Smith, gave evidence; and the Sheffield Central School, referred to in the evidence of the Rev. J. Gilmore, chairman of the Sheffield School Board. These and similar schools keep boys after they have passed the Seventh Standard and instruct them in science, earning grants from the Science and Art Department, and there is a tendency to increase their number; but they are not as yet at all an important element in our national system of education, though many years ago they were recognised as needed, and were established in some few cases, as will be found in the Rev. D. J. Stewart's evidence, where reference is made to a school established at Bishop Wearmouth, and noticed by him in his report of 1854, with the following curriculum:

"Subjects of instruction: reading, writing, English grammar, history, geography; the elements of geology, arithmetic (pure and commercial), the principles of book- keeping, geometry, mechanics, and mechanism, the elements of chemistry and vocal music," and in addition to that there was a higher course, for which a higher fee was charged.

Some persons think that the principles of agriculture might well be taught in our rural schools. Sometimes something is done by means of school gardens to interest the boys; and among the specific subjects recognised in the Code are the principles of agriculture. Sir Patrick Keenan, the Resident Commissioner of Education for Ireland, informed us that farms are attached to 70 of the Irish primary schools, and that the number is likely to increase. We had, however, no evidence except from Sir Patrick Keenan to show how far the teaching of this subject by the schoolmaster could be made a fitting preparation for practical agriculture.

Meantime we have much evidence to show that on the continent great efforts are being made to give a more extended elementary education, and to lead up through the elementary schools to technical instruction. Sir Philip Magnus, one of the members of the Commission on technical education, described not only what was done in higher elementary schools, but also in ordinary elementary schools abroad. There is so much evidence in the report of that Commission on the activity of continental governments, and on their liberality in this direction, that we need not repeat at length what is already recorded. There is much condensed information on this subject in the evidence of Mr. H. S. Cunynghame, and there is no doubt that if their practice is to be any guide to us, they are all extensively engaged in developing this side of their national system.

We think it right, however, to call attention to the fact that if we except the system of Slöjd, in Sweden, and the manual instruction in some French schools, there is, according to the reports of our representatives abroad, no workshop instruction in any of the continental elementary schools, and the omission of its introduction in countries like Prussia, Saxony, and Switzerland, in which elementary education is so well understood and so advanced, would indicate that the results of its introduction into our own elementary schools ought to be carefully watched, for the present at any rate, and that it should not be allowed to thrust aside the older and well tried branches of technical instruction, and least of all, drawing. Workshop instruction will be given with the greatest advantage in the higher elementary schools where the scholars are trained first to make accurate drawings of the objects which they afterwards execute in the proper materials.

Some persons are opposed to all such expansion of elementary education, on the ground that there is a danger of our entering on the field of secondary education which has not as yet been recognised in this country as a matter of national concern and


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obligation. It does not lie within the scope of this Commission to consider secondary education, except so far as it is directly connected with primary education. But we are naturally called upon to form an opinion as to what are the true limits of elementary education, and how far technical education falls within it.

No doubt the commencement of all knowledge is elementary, and even secondary schools must have elementary classes. The true distinction in our judgment between primary and secondary education is the probable age at which the systematic instruction of the scholar is likely to cease. For ordinary elementary schools, and for the great mass of the scholars, the curriculum should be one which can be completed by the time a scholar reaches the age of 14; though even in connexion with a strictly elementary school system, a somewhat higher type of instruction is needed in night schools or continuation schools, to enable those youths of 15 and 16, who are earning their living, to acquire, if they are willing, something more of culture and of thorough knowledge than was possible in the elementary day school. The law has made the age of 13 the ordinary age at which compulsory attendance at school ceases, and has fixed the limit of 14 as the ordinary higher limit of school attendance in the day school by fixing 14 as the normal lower limit of age for the night school, and by naming the age of 14 in the definition of "a child" in the Act of 1876. There are, however, a few scholars whose ordinary day school education might properly be extended for about one year more. Such are especially boys and girls who intend to be pupil-teachers, whose minimum age of apprenticeship must be 14 years completed, and who will often be 14½ or 15 years of age when the engagement commences, especially since the Department has introduced the alternative plan of dating indentures from the 1st January as well as from the school year. There are also many of the more well-to-do class who use the elementary schools, such as clerks, shopkeepers, farmers, foremen, overlookers, warehousemen, to say nothing of still poorer persons with promising children, who gladly make an effort to secure for their children an extra year's schooling, and who are entitled to ask that the educational system of the country shall, as far as possible, co-operate with their wise desire. Without discussing the question of higher elementary schools generally, there is no doubt that a school like the Birmingham Seventh Standard school, or the Sheffield Central School, if well conducted must be of the greatest value to the more intelligent artizans and to the trade and industry of the town and district, and similar technical schools for the lower ranks of the commercial classes would be as valuable as those for manufacturers. In the commercial technical school we should desire book-keeping, shorthand, French and German, business letter writing, precis writing, and a knowledge of commercial geography to be added to a literary knowledge of the English language. Such an education, continued up to the age of 15 in special schools, would naturally carry forward and complete the school life of the picked children in the elementary schools of our large commercial towns.

But in discussing the introduction of this special and technical instruction care must be taken not to introduce it too soon in school life, lest the general instruction should be interfered with. The Birmingham board have fixed the passing of the Sixth Standard as the lower limit for entrance into their special school. Manchester and Sheffield have not been as strictly exclusive, and in many towns, schools pass under the name of higher elementary merely because they charge a 9d fee, and consequently get scholars of a rather richer class than the average school population. Whether our existing school system and the ordinary curriculum of the Code is the wisest is a separate question, but whatever the ordinary course of instruction ought to be, it should be carried so far as to secure the thorough grounding of the scholar before he is encouraged to take up a more special course which might encroach on the time needed for this general education. It is, however, urged by many persons, that without giving anything like technical instruction to the lower classes of the schools we might early in school life accustom boys to the use of their hands, and introduce some work for them which should bear some relation to the needlework and cookery of the girls. It is said that much has been done in the infant schools by means of the kindergarten occupations to educate the hand and eye, and develop the whole nature of the child, and it is a pity that from seven years old the boys should lose all this and be limited from that time till they leave school to a merely literary education. If drawing, and especially drawing to scale, and from models, were made a necessary part of the school curriculum, as it is in the educated countries of the continent, this object would be obtained to some extent, and such drawing should be required in any alteration of our Code. The evidence of the witnesses who came before us,


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so far as they spoke on the subject of drawing, was practically unanimous in its favour as one of the subjects in our elementary course.

But beyond drawing and elementary science there is a wish among many that some practical instruction in industries and the use of tools such as we have described should enter into the school curriculum. In the 10 counties to which our Circular A was sent to managers and to school boards, out of 3,759 voluntary managers who returned answers, 770 expressed a wish there should be some training in industry or the use of tools, and of 385 school boards in the same counties 122 were favourable. Nor would it be fair to conclude that those who did not express themselves favourable were hostile, for many might be unwilling to commit themselves on a subject they had not fully considered. In the case of the circulars sent to head teachers, 2,529 schools sent answers, and 711 head teachers, or 28 per cent, approved of teaching industries or the use of tools. It is evident from these returns that if it were thought desirable to recognise or encourage this kind of teaching, there are a great many among those actively engaged, either in managing, or in teaching our elementary schools, who are favourable to it. But there are several difficulties in the way. First of all, who is to teach - is it to be the teacher, or a mechanic? In most cases the teacher is unable to teach from not knowing how to handle tools, the mechanic from not knowing how to manage children.

In Sweden the system of Slöjd, which is being largely introduced, and which aims at developing handiness and accuracy through the use of tools, is taught by the teachers outside of the regular school hours as a voluntary subject, for which they are paid extra, and they learn it at a special training college. In France the manual instruction is given by a mechanic.

Whatever instruction of this kind is to be given in our schools, it would not be applicable to boys under 10 years of age; there would, therefore, be at least three years during which any manual activity to vary their instruction and relax the mental strain must be sought otherwise than by the use of tools. This object, however, might be attained by judicious systematized science teaching, in which the children should be associated in preparing specimens, helping to make models illustrating their geography lessons, and so forth. The evidence of Mr. Balchin, and the specimens of flowers neatly fastened on paper by the boys working in Standard III, and produced by him to the Commission, show how easily the subjects of the Code can be adapted to this education in handiness and dexterity. The value of awakening the interest and enlisting the activity of the boys in association with the work of the teacher is illustrated by the example quoted by Mr. Mark Wilks of the master, who, having some of the roughest and most neglected boys in London to deal with, taught them modelling, and showed them in clay and plaster how rivers carved out valleys.

All these methods, of immense value educationally, require many conditions which are not supplied by the average schools of today. They require suitable and roomy school premises, where some sort of mechanical work, if it be merely the preparation of clay geographical models, can be done. They require a staff numerically sufficient, so that the children may have individual attention and individual sympathy; and they require teachers with imagination, enthusiasm, and a liberal view of their profession, not mechanical drudges who, after four years' pupil teachership, become assistants, without, perhaps, having heard one really intellectual lesson in all their lives. And they require inspectors with time enough to see and appreciate intelligent methods of school teaching. And it would be necessary that on each district inspector's staff there should be at least one person largely imbued with the scientific spirit, and not exclusively educated in the classical and literary culture of our old universities.

Assuming that our elementary schools generally were able to give us such results of teaching as have been here indicated, technical schools taking the scholars after they had passed the Sixth Standard might with great advantage be founded in urban districts with a course calculated to last about three years. But it is certain that these technical schools should not be schools in which the pupils should be in any sense apprentices of the trade they intend hereafter to follow. The training in such a school should be mainly scientific and intellectual, though handiness should be encouraged, and the scholars should be instructed in the principles of the machines among which and with which they will work; but for real training in any trade there is no doubt that in England, with our highly organised industry, the workshop is the only proper school. It is important that these technical or scientific higher


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elementary schools be conducted with the advice of practical men interested in the industrial prosperity of the country; and it would be unwise to lay down any very fixed and hard rules beforehand, as different localities have different needs; and, while we are in the experimental stage, it is well to work in many directions and by many methods. In any case, a large amount of drawing, practical work in the laboratory, the study of science through the concrete, and the continual reference backwards and forwards from the industrial application to the scientific principle, and vice versâ, will secure that the minds of the students are kept in close relation to the realities of the industrial life in which they are to engage.

Such a system of higher elementary or technical schools, as we have here sketched out, would be the development and completion of the ordinary primary school course. In the case of promising children from elementary schools, who are helped on by scholarships to higher schools, it might be desirable that they should leave the elementary school at 11 or 12, and adjust themselves early in life to the curriculum and methods of the secondary school. But the higher elementary school would satisfy the wants of an entirely different class from those who desire really secondary education. Secondary education is for those who will be under continuous instruction, at any rate, till 16 or 18, whether they go on afterwards to higher university education or not; whereas this higher elementary education is intended to teach more thoroughly those who mast begin to earn their living, and at any rate begin to learn their trade, at 14 or 15 years of age. It is therefore really for scholars in the last two or three years of elementary school life that provision is needed for developing elementary education by higher elementary schools, partly on the literary, but more especially on the scientific side. This object can best be attained by grouping elder scholars at a few centres, instead of leaving those who are most anxious to be well taught, to be neglected in a number of schools containing all the standards, and where their very ability and industry make it safe to neglect them for the more backward and the duller scholars. The establishment of such centres will aid the introduction of a practical and scientific spirit into the higher classes of our ordinary elementary boys' schools which, in urban districts have, perhaps, a tendency at present to too literary a character, and lead the children too exclusively to the contemplation of a clerk's life as the object of their youthful ambition.

We think it important to call attention to the evidence of numerous witnesses who appeared before us, as well as to the evidence given before the Technical Commission, all of which points to the much greater benefit which would be derived by our national industries from the existing widespread organisation of science and art classes and other technical classes in connection with the Science and Art Department and the City and Guilds of London Technical Institute, if a greater number of the young people who leave our elementary schools were better prepared to take advantage of them. Incapable as they often are of making or even understanding a simple mechanical drawing, ignorant of the laws of nature, not knowing the meaning of the simplest mathematical formula, our apprentices are in too many cases unable to profit by the opportunities for technical instruction which would otherwise be abundantly at their disposal, and this is an additional argument, if any such be required, for the more general introduction of drawing, and of sound, though elementary instruction in science into our elementary schools.

We believe that the Technical Education Act of 1887 for Scotland, will tend to the development of technical instruction in that portion of Great Britain, and it is difficult to conceive that similar powers to those which it confers will not at an early date be extended to the local authorities of England and Ireland, the tax-payers of which divisions of the Empire contribute to the fund out of which the grants to Scotch schools will be paid. As the provisions of the Scotch Act are not confined, and those of any English or Irish Bill are not likely to be limited, to elementary instruction with which alone we are authorised to deal, it is difficult for us to make suggestions as to the lines on which the latter should be drawn; but we hope that if it should become law, the term "elementary technical education" will be interpreted by the Education and Science and Art Departments in a sense sufficiently wide to cover elementary commercial, and agricultural, as well as industrial education, and so as not to exclude such general instruction as will tend to render the minds of the scholars readily receptive of the more directly technical instruction. On the other hand, it will be important to take care that the contributions of the State are not frittered away for the benefit of so-called science teachers in grants to disjointed technical classes. Security must be taken by the Department that a well considered scheme of


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instruction, varying, of course, with the needs of the locality, shall be followed as a condition of Government aid.

It will, of course, be only just that the managers of voluntary schools should continue to be at liberty to avail themselves as readily as they now do of the grants to be made by the Science and Art Department for technical instruction. The experience of science and art classes shows that, once buildings are provided, and to the erection of these the grants of the Science and Art Department might be more liberal, the payments on passes and the fees of the students are almost, if not quite, sufficient to cover the cost of science schools, and this will probably be found to be the case, even to a greater degree as to technical subjects, since the latter will appeal more directly to the sympathies of the students.

CHAPTER 10

EVENING CLASSES AND CONTINUATION SCHOOLS

However great may be the excellence of our day school system, and however regularly children may attend, it is obvious that if all intellectual influences cease at the age of 13, or earlier, the scholars must soon forget much of what they have learnt.

We have had a great deal of evidence complaining of the evanescent character of the knowledge acquired in the day school. This is attributed by most of the witnesses to the character of the teaching which prevails under the existing system of payment by results, and to the early age at which scholars leave school. There is no doubt that the latter is the principal reason. Many children never go beyond the Fourth Standard, and a large number never reach that standard even at 12½ or 13 years of age. We think that in their wish to improve the curriculum, and the methods of instruction and examination, some of the witnesses have exaggerated the unsatisfactory character of the present teaching. For evidence on the other side showing the good effect of our present education, where the most is made of it, we quote the remarks of our colleague, Mr. Alderson, in his report for 1881 (Education Report, 1881-2, p. 184). He says, "Is the instruction given in our elementary schools under the present system durable or fleeting? Does it wear well? Much of it cannot be otherwise than evanescent, owing to the early withdrawal of children from school. It is not by its failure to reach defaulters that a system of instruction is to be judged, but by the effect produced on those who give it a fair trial, pass through all its stages, and have sucked out all the advantage it can yield. Scholars who have passed the Sixth Standard are in this position; it is a matter therefore of much interest and of much moment to learn how, when the curtain falls in school, they stand. Is their school-gained knowledge of an abiding sort? Have they retained it, and are they striving to retain it? By the kindness of the teachers in my district I have been enabled to trace a goodly number of them beyond the door of the elementary school. Here is the account of them; it will brighten the page of a tedious report. Out of 1,136 scholars who left school after passing in or above the Sixth Standard, 59 have passed on to higher grade schools, 7 by scholarships, and 52 by fee; 161 have obtained posts by examination, 8 failed in obtaining posts; 175 are keeping up their instruction by attendance at evening classes; 721 are returned as engaged in employment for which sound elementary instruction is indispensable. I hope that the significance of these facts will not be lost upon parents who are apt to remove their children from school the moment the law permits. The Sixth Standard is yearly becoming more and more a stepping stone to higher education, and an avenue to clerical employment in offices and shops. To leave school before passing it is to forfeit many good chances in life."

While giving their full weight to the above important remarks, we must note, first, that they relate to the Marylebone Division of London, a well-to-do district in which the children remain in school to a later age than in the poorer industrial districts, and, secondly, the ascertained fact that very few of the children in our schools pass the Sixth Standard. In 1886, 2,445,562 children were presented in the standards. Of these about 128,000 were presented in the Sixth and Seventh Standards. Had the


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children generally gone through the complete elementary course, we might hope that between a fifth and a sixth should be presented above the Fifth Standard, or from 400,000 to 500,000 children; and even allowing for backwardness, change of school, and other impediments, it would be a moderate aspiration to look forward to a tenth of all the scholars reaching the Sixth Standard; that would give 244,000 scholars in that standard instead of 103,000. At present the great drop in the scholars takes place after the passing of the Fourth Standard. About 455,000 scholars were presented in that standard, and only 265,000 in the fifth. It is clear that even for those who pass the Sixth Standard it is necessary that their education should be continued, either by their taking up an employment which demands the exercise of the literary powers they have acquired, or by attendance at evening schools where they can build on the foundation laid in the day school. More than 15 per cent of the scholars reported on by Mr. Alderson were continuing their education in this way, and probably, if our elementary system were fully developed and made thoroughly efficient, we might hope to see some 25 per cent of our best scholars demanding the aid of these continuation schools.

The systematising of science and art classes, the expansion of mechanics' institutes and other places of education, such as the Polytechnic, the evening classes at the Finsbury College of the City and Guilds of London Institute, the Midland Institute in Birmingham, and other similar places of instruction, will supply the needs of this class of student, who may soon be equal to from 2½ to 3 per cent of the scholars in our senior departments, or about 70,000 pupils from our elementary schools, in addition to other students.

But besides these picked scholars there are and will be for many years the great mass of the ordinary boys and girls who leave school without having obtained the full benefit of a good elementary education, and for whom a humbler evening school is needed, which will aim, not so much at building up a higher edifice of knowledge, as at preserving the perishable and scanty accumulation from being swept away by the inroads of continuous and especially of unskilled labour. And along with these younger scholars there is another class whom we should be glad to see encouraged, and who are now absolutely discouraged by the regulations of the Department - the students who are more than 21 years of age. Those who have to do with evening schools will all agree that these scholars who wish to overtake the deficiencies of the past should be welcomed as much as any.

It is often difficult to secure for evening schools the services of those most fitted by training and education to act as teachers. We do not think it desirable that the head teacher of the day school should be required to undertake the charge of the evening school. This additional duty, though not forbidden, should be rather discouraged. In towns and populous places active young assistant teachers may well undertake this duty, and we desire to point out that successful work in the evening school can rarely be expected without the superintendence of a professional skilled teacher. Another source from which the evening school staff may possibly be recruited is the large number of trained teachers who have left the profession. At the same time we would still rely to a certain extent upon the aid of volunteers, which has been given liberally in the past, and will, we hope, continue to be given as freely in the future.

The question whether compulsion should be applied to attendance in evening schools has been raised by many witnesses, and their evidence is very conflicting. The chief, but by no means the only difficulty in the way of enforcing attendance at evening schools seems to be the impossibility of establishing an obligatory system of such schools throughout the country. On the whole, we are of opinion that attendance at evening schools should be voluntary, though we should not object to a limited amount of compulsion up to the age of 16 in the cases of those scholars who have not reached the Sixth Standard in the day school. We think that the general extension of evening schools, coupled with liberty of localities to adapt their curriculum to the wants of the district, and a greater amount of encouragement by grants not dependent on individual examination, will do more than compulsion to popularise and extend evening school instruction.

We would refer to the evidence of Miss Castle for a practical account of the work we wish to see encouraged, especially in our villages. We must note, however, that in those rural districts where the population is scattered many witnesses see serious objections to the attendance of girls at evening schools. Possibly, while the winter is the usual season for evening schools, and should continue so for boys, evening schools for girls might be held in the summer in these thinly peopled districts.


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The importance of evening continuation schools in their bearing upon the physical and moral well-being of the people was strongly pressed upon us. We have carefully considered this aspect of the question, as we agree that the results of an educational system cannot be deemed satisfactory if the moral effects of school discipline are lost. or if the knowledge gained at school fails to create a desire for higher intellectual interests and nobler pleasures, which are a safeguard against degrading and vicious habits. One great defect in the present educational arrangements is that in the factory districts many scholars qualify by examination for total exemption before they can be admitted to full-time employment in the factory. This break in school life is a fruitful source of moral evil.

Evidence has been submitted to us with regard to grave moral perils surrounding working lads and girls in the evening hours, arising from the conditions and circumstances of their life, which evening school might obviate, whilst at the same time it might directly aid their healthy physical and mental growth. It was urged upon us that children of 14 years of age and upwards, who are engaged for 10 hours a day in a factory or workshop, have a natural desire for relaxation, and for a refreshing exercise of body and mind. At present, in large towns these young people find their play and excitement in the streets, where they are exposed to seductive temptations, and there are circumstances which aggravate the evils which arise therefrom. We are told of the decay of the apprenticeship system, and the consequent loss of the personal authority and care of the master over his apprentice, and also of the relaxation of parental control over children as soon as they begin to earn wages. It seems, therefore, necessary that some other form of influence and discipline should be provided, in an attractive form, in the evening school. We have also borne in mind that the present minute division of labour, and the consequent monotony and fatigue from unceasing work at one detail of manufacture, the overcrowding and ill-ventilation, in some cases, of workshops, and the pressure of a long day's work on weakly bodies, combine to stimulate excessively the desire for amusement, which must be considered in any system of evening schools, as if the desire be not satisfied in a reasonable and healthy way, it leads to improvident, frivolous, and even vicious habits which cause rapid deterioration in the physique and morale of the people.

The education given in the evening school should accordingly have regard to the whole nature and circumstances of those who attend them. We, therefore, recommend that in re-organising the evening school system the following points should be kept in view:

(1) The desire and need of young people for healthy physical exercises should be recognised. A system of calisthenics and musical drill would give healthful training to the body, would be likely to attract scholars, would provide the outlet to physical energies, which educators know to be necessary to adolescent youth, and would further impart moral discipline, and train the scholars in habits of order and obedience.

(2) The methods and subjects of instruction should be such as will awaken the interest of the pupils and give them pleasure in the pursuit of knowledge rather than cram them with information merely committed to memory. For this purpose the teaching should be mainly oral, and be given in connexion with real objects, and should in many cases have a direct bearing on the pupils' own lives and employments. By these means the faculty of observation will be cultivated and developed, and an increased interest will be aroused in the duties of life.

(3) The education, so far as it bears directly upon the daily work of the scholars, both in its intellectual and practical sides, should be, if only in an elementary sense, technical. One way in which the interest of the majority of scholars can be secured is by making clear the benefit they derive from learning. The dwarfing effects of an excessive division of labour will be lessened, and the intelligence and skill applied to manual work will both give the worker a greater pleasure in it and inspire a worthy ambition to excel. In addition to drawing, art hand-work has also been suggested as likely to prove most attractive to both boys and girls, who are greatly interested in what they do with their own hands. By these means scholars could be trained to dexterity of hand, accuracy of sight and touch, and to the perception and enjoyment of neat workmanship and of beautiful form.

(4) The course of reading should be such as to fill the minds and imaginations of the pupils with noble examples of duty, and music should be taught so as to elevate the taste and prepare the scholars to enjoy, in their home-life and


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elsewhere, the pure pleasure which song can impart. It should also be remembered that some scholars attending evening schools desire, not so much the systematic continuation of their education as to supplement some special deficiency of which they are conscious. Thus, some will wish to improve their handwriting, others their knowledge of accounts; some their power of correct composition and grammatical expression, while lads intending to be mechanics want to learn drawing and practical geometry.
We are of opinion that the present Code is not adapted to the needs of evening schools, and we recommend that the conditions on which grants are made to such schools, while requiring serious and thorough teaching, should be entirely re-arranged on the principles we have suggested, so as to give the needed encouragement to those who would gladly conduct these schools.

Evening schools have been declining for many years, though there has been a certain revival during the year 1887. The number of scholars is, however, still very trifling compared with what the importance of their function demands. While we think that the State, through the Education Department, should help them as much as possible, and while the local machinery of school boards should also be much more directed to their improvement and extension, we are of opinion that this is a branch of education in which we must endeavour very largely to enlist voluntary activity and co-operation.

CHAPTER 11

GOVERNMENT INSPECTORS AND GOVERNMENT EXAMINATIONS

We pass from the schools and their teachers to their inspection on behalf of the Government, which contributes so large a part of their yearly income.

At present the inspectors, apart from two of them whose special duty it is to inspect the training colleges, are divided into four grades.

The country is mapped out into ten large districts, over each of which is set a chief inspector, who in addition to the general superintendence of his district, has also a special district in which he performs the ordinary duties of inspector. In two instances the chief inspectors (Rev. D. J. Stewart and Mr. S. N. Stokes), are ordinary inspectors under the supervision of another chief inspector.

Under the chief inspector there is a staff of ordinary inspectors, each of whom, as a rule, has a district which he inspects; there were in 1887, according to the Report of the Education Department, 103 of these ordinary inspectors.

Working under the district inspectors, and generally with them, are 35 sub-inspectors, a grade first created in 1882; these officers, promoted from the inspectors' assistants, do the same work as the inspectors in the inspection of schools, though subject to the review and supervision of the inspectors.

Under these again are the inspectors' assistants, of whom there are 152; these are appointed from the ranks of elementary teachers. They must be between the ages of 30 and 35 at the time of their appointment, and they have a commencing salary of £150, rising to £300 a year. They must have been head teachers who have passed in the first division at the certificate examination, and a preference is given to those who have taken a University degree.

The duties of the inspectors, sub-inspectors, and inspectors' assistants are to inspect and examine the schools, the final responsibility resting with the inspector who endorses the parchments of the teachers, writes the report, and awards the merit grant upon the school. In fact, inspectors often act largely upon the reports and information furnished them by their subordinates.

In addition to the work of inspecting schools, the yearly examinations of the pupil-teachers have to be conducted, and their papers looked over; much of this devolves on the inspectors' assistants. The scholarship papers and the examination papers for the teacher's certificate have to be marked. This is mainly done by the inspectors and sub-inspectors. The inspector is the person responsible for advising the department on all questions connected with his district, such as the need of further school provision, or any delicate question which may arise relating to teachers or to managers.


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Hitherto, though the ranks of the inspectorate up to the grade of sub-inspector, are recruited from the elementary teachers, yet inspectors are appointed from without, and high University success has been looked to as a qualification rather than scholastic experience or intimate acquaintance with elementary schools.

It is a little difficult to separate the question of the government examination from the method of paying the government grant with which it has so long been associated. But it is well to consider the question "What form of inspection and examination will best secure the efficiency of the school?" apart from the question "How should the Government grant be awarded?"

We are of opinion that the examination of the work of the school, which should take place yearly, should be a searching one, and we think that every child present in the school on the day of examination should be liable to be examined.

The Code has drawn a distinction between class and individual examination. Many of the criticisms directed against individual examination apply to the value attached to the percentage of passes in the standard examinations. In our opinion class examination must include the examination, not necessarily of every individual, but of a very large proportion of the individuals in the class, if it is to be thorough and effective; and we believe that good head teachers of large schools in examining the work of their assistants would not be satisfied without examining every scholar in their respective classes.

We notice two faults found with the present examinations by inspectors, the one that they use written instead of oral examinations too low down in the school, and thereby, especially in regard to science teaching, fail to conduct a good examination, and indirectly hamper the teaching by forcing the teacher to work in anticipation of an unsuitable test. The second, that the inspectors are sometimes ignorant of the subjects in which they have to examine, and consequently cram the subject themselves and conduct the examination mechanically and unintelligently. We are of opinion thi.it both these faults need correction. We think that the examination, at least up to and including the present 4th Standard, should be mainly oral, and framed with a view to ascertaining what the children have been taught and how they have learnt it, rather than be an independent examination in the subject from the point of view of the examiner, which may be very different from that of the teacher. As to the want of familiarity with certain subjects on the part of inspectors, we think that this fault would be remedied if they were required to be familiar not only with the elementary knowledge taught in our schools, but also with the way in which that knowledge should be presented to the children, that is that they should be practically conversant with elementary school work.

We think that the inspector, after he has examined a school, should draw up a report, which should set forth in detail the progress of the school, class by class, in the various subjects. The obligation to make a report in detail is a great safeguard against a hasty or negligent examination.

But in addition to the work of examination, which we do not wish to undervalue, there is the work of inspection, to which we attach very great importance. The object of this is to ascertain the value of the work, and the possibility of improving it rather than to take stock of the results of instruction. Here comes in the duty of making allowance for all the circumstances which affect the work of the school.

In conducting the inspection the inspector will be a spectator and director rather than an active participator in the conduct of the school. He will hear the various teachers give their lessons in accordance with the method they have practised through the year, and he may ask them to recapitulate a particular part of the work, or may test in some other way the teacher's competence. He will observe the discipline and conduct of the scholars under the instruction of their ordinary teacher. He will see from the copy books and exercise books, from the notes of lessons, and from the log book, how the school has been managed from day to day, and from all the slight indications which he will gather from these various sources he will sum up his impression of the school as a whole, and of the various teachers in it.

In order to do this well, it is clear that he must be a man who thoroughly understands school keeping, and that he may have this skill he must either have been a teacher himself, and a successful one, or must have been long so familiar with schools as to have acquired professional aptitude.

But these professional qualifications are not all that are needed in an inspector. A pleasant manner and sympathy with children are essential if the children are to do justice to themselves, and if the school is to display itself freely and naturally to his observation. He must also have tact and judgment in dealing with school boards


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and other managers, and he must be a man of wide and liberal education and cultivation, or he will not be able to check the tendency to cram which will always follow where a teacher knows but little of the subject he has to teach.

To secure such an inspector we are of opinion that no man should be appointed who has not had successful experience as a teacher, though not necessarily in elementary schools. On the contrary, we think that valuable inspectors might be drawn from the masters of secondary schools. But if so drawn they should, either in training colleges or in elementary schools, serve an apprenticeship in the methods and subjects which are most important in the elementary schools which they are to inspect. At the same time, we are of opinion that the career of the inspectorate should be open throughout to elementary teachers. Many of them are already cultivated men, and have taken University degrees, and we believe that if the career of the inspectorate were frankly thrown open to them a further inducement to men of wide education to become teachers in elementary schools would be held out.

But we think that the present commencing salary is too low to attract the best men to the post of inspector's assistant. We should be glad to see the commencing salary raised to 200/. a year, and the limits of age range from 25 to 40. But there is no reason why a successful schoolmaster or board inspector should not be at once made a sub-inspector if his experience and attainments fit him for the post.

Much has been said of visits without notice, and many witnesses attach great importance to these visits as means of improving the schools. We regard these visits as valuable, and wish to see them more frequent, and we feel with reference to the pupil-teachers and probationers that the inspectors would have a better chance of judging of their progress and efficiency if they could drop into the school and observe their work as they were going through the day's routine. We are inclined, however, to look to the local inspectors, who would be the servants of the managers, to improve the organisation of the school rather than to Her Majesty's Inspectors.

We cannot quite compare the duties of inspectors on the Continent with what is done under our own system. On the Continent the schools, as a rule, are State institutions, and there is one management and one inspection. In England, the managers, whether board or voluntary, are somewhat independent bodies, aided by the State, but not absolutely under it. In the case of inefficient teachers, the final sanction of removal rests with the managers, not with the Government, and, therefore, it is of special importance that the officer of the managers should have an intimate familiarity with the way in which the school is conducted. If there were a proper organisation of district boards of sufficient area and population, including in the word associations of voluntary school managers, all of which had their inspectors, and could remove inefficient teachers, strengthen the staff, and supply at once all needful material, the function of the State as to inspection might almost disappear, and as to examination even might be much reduced. It is the extreme isolation and want of technical knowledge of so many managers which gives such prominence in England to the need of State inspection and examination.

It is sometimes said that teachers chafe at inspection, and are jealous of the interference which results from the visits of an inspector, but we believe that where the inspector is himself an experienced teacher, understanding and sympathising with the difficulties that belong to school keeping, he will be found preeminently a helper rather than a mere critic, and that his wider knowledge and useful advice will make his visits thoroughly welcome.

Much has been said as to the importance of securing uniformity in the standard of examination throughout the country. Some witnesses say that it is not yet accomplished, on the other hand it has been urged that we ought not to expect uniformity of result under unequal and diverse conditions. We think that the quality of education to be secured to the children should be as far as possible equal, and that we ought not to be satisfied with a lower standard in the country than in the town, in small schools than in large schools. But we have already pointed out that we think the fullness of the curriculum might be varied with the size and capabilities of the school. And we think that the inability of country children, as such, to learn as easily as town children, has often been exaggerated. There are advantages and disadvantages on both sides, but we think the chief disadvantage of the country child is not his own want of power of learning, but the necessary smallness of the schools, and the low salaries of the teachers, which result in most of the ablest teachers seeking town appointments. But there are plenty of excellent schools, even small ones, in the country which prove that such schools, if well managed and well equipped, can do thoroughly good work.


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We are of opinion that the recent organisation of the inspectorate, with a chief inspector in each district, has tended to secure uniformity of standard; and that the local conferences which are now held among inspectors of a chief inspector's district, where questions relating to the Code are submitted to them for discussion, are a valuable feature in the present administration of the Education Acts. We should be glad to see educational conferences held under the guidance of the inspector, or at any rate with his participation, where managers, school officers, teachers and others interested in education might discuss educational questions.

We think it would be a good thing if the chief inspector had no special district of his own in which he does the work of an ordinary inspector, or at any rate, that it should be so small that the mass of his time should be expended in visiting and inspecting throughout all the districts under his oversight.

We are of opinion that in promoting inspector's assistants, sub-inspectors, and inspectors, the Education Department should be guided by their opinion of the merit of their officers, and not by seniority. It is specially important that chief inspectors should be men in their full vigour and in full sympathy with the newest progress in educational work.

CHAPTER 12

THE PARLIAMENTARY GRANTS

The subject of the Parliamentary grant has been closely connected with the method of Government examination.

We have already described the duties of Government inspectors and the method of Government inspection and examination, and in what way we think that a suitable curriculum with due recognition of local diversities and of the possibilities of education in various classes of schools might best be provided, The present method of distributing the Government grant, popularly known as payment by results, has been criticised with more energy than almost any other part of our existing system; the teachers are very generally hostile to it, especially in its present method of application, where a part of the grant is the result of individual passes of scholars, and leads to an exaggerated importance being attached to a high percentage of passes as a test of the excellence of a school. But many teachers and others, among whom we may mention Mr. Matthew Arnold and Mr. Mark Wilks, are opposed to the system in principle, and would see State aid distributed on some entirely different method.

In reference to payment by results, we must notice that many of the attacks against our present system were directed against that part of it which applies to the standard subjects, and which makes the payment follow closely the percentage of success calculated on individual passes. There was also a great deal of objection made to the merit grant as unfairly ticketing schools, and leading to heart-burning and jealousy, and to undue striving after success by mechanical methods of teaching.

It is well to review briefly the evidence on this much debated and burning question. The Secretary of the Education Department, Mr. Cumin, said of the merit grant that he thought it an excellent idea, that upon the whole it had been successful, and he also approves of payment by results, though he would be willing to examine by sample, and not necessarily each child in the school.

Passing to the inspectors, the Rev. T. W. Sharpe says that the merit grant encourages the cultivation of intelligence; as to payment by results, he says, "It has had both good and bad effects, but I think that the good have greatly preponderated", and he says that its abandonment would lower the general standard. Canon Warburton thought that the system of payment by results had done a vast amount of good, and was absolutely necessary. He thought it would be rash to say whether the time is ripe for a little relaxation, he would be glad to be rid of the standards, but does not think the time for it has come. He admits that individual examination is possible without payment for individual results, but doubts if it would be done. He thought the merit grant worked well, but he said it had produced a great deal of rivalry, ambition, and emulation.


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Mr. J. G. Fitch said that on the whole the present methods of testing results and assessing grants are the most satisfactory, but he would abolish the present examination for Standards 1 and 2. As to the merit grant, he is satisfied with the direction in which it is working, though it has not quite realised all the hopes entertained of it. In infant schools he would like more gradations of it.

Mr. Graves, inspector for West Somerset, said that the principle of the merit grant was good, and on the whole the grant had worked well, but there has been much heart-burning, and it would be better to have five degrees. As to payment on results, it must be retained in some form, but there might be an increase of the fixed grant.

Mr. Harrison, Her Majesty's Inspector at Liverpool, objects to the merit grant, as invidious to the teachers and a hateful task to the inspectors, but if it continues he would distribute it over the subjects; as to payment by results, he would abolish the payment on individual examination in Standards 1 and 2, but would keep it above those standards.

Mr. H. B. Oakley agrees with the principle of the merit grant, but teachers generally dislike it; he would therefore distribute the merit grant among the subjects; keeping the principle of payment by results, he would pay for the standard subjects like class subjects, and abolish the schedule of passes for Standards 1 and 2, retaining it above those standards. In infant schools he would have five instead of three grades of merit.

Among the inspectors more or less opposed to payment by results, Mr. Matthew Arnold said that the system is injurious to instruction, and has a bad effect on the teachers and on the children. He was here speaking especially of the standard examination; he would prefer a system of class examination "with a carefully prepared body of teachers, and with a carefully drawn up plan of instruction, but we have not that". But Mr. Matthew Arnold would give the grant according to the general inspection of the whole tone of the school, and the character of the teaching, though he objected to the word "tone", and said he would thoroughly examine the whole school. He also disapproved of the merit grant. Mr. Arnold, however, would prefer that the bulk of the charge for maintaining elementary schools should fall upon local management and be under local supervision.

The Rev. D. J, Stewart, also, is not favourable to payment by results; he thinks it lowers the quality and extent of the teaching. He proposes modifications in the merit grant, such as a "very good" and "very fair" stage between "excellent" and "good", and between "good" and "fair".

Mr. E. H. Brodie was inclined to give up the merit grant. If continued, he would break it up and distribute it among subjects. As to payment by results, he would keep it in principle, but give a rather larger grant on average attendance on condition the school was well equipped, well staffed, and generally well looked after.

Mr. McKenzie, sub-inspector, objects to the merit grant, and to payment by results; the latter, he says, lowers the standard of education.

Mr. Martin, sub-inspector for Marylebone, would pay varying sums according to the merit of the school after a thorough examination, but he would not call the varying sums a merit grant, for he objects to the terms excellent, &c., as misleading. He objects to pricing different subjects of instruction, and would pay one lump grant.

The Rev. F. Synge sees difficulties in the merit grant, and would rather have two grades, "good" and "fair"; as to payment by results, he says, that great progress has been made under the system, but he would be glad to see it changed; he has not thought out any substitute, but some system of payment by results must be retained at the lower end of the scale. There is a very large class of boards and of teachers who always wish to do as little as possible; the power of the purse is the only power for these, but good schools might be free to work for the sake of good work, and for the honour of good work. He would have no schedule of passes, but examine the school by the method of class examination.

Lord Lingen, who was Secretary to the Education Department at the time of Mr. Lowe's code, doubted the thoroughness of the individual examination under any sanction less stringent than the dependence of the payment on the individual pass.


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and he does not think that the objections raised are of a nature to condemn the system.

Mr. Robert Wild, head master of a large London board school, condemned payments by results very strongly. He would have no part of the grant dependent on the examination. He would confide the education of a district to a public authority, such as a county board, who should be represented in various districts by local managers, or some of its own members. He would raise the funds from the parents, the parish, the county, and the Government.

Mr. Baxendale, head master of a British school in Bradford, was also strongly against the merit grant and payment by results .

Mr. Grove, head master of All Souls', Langham Place school, was against the merit grant, and opposed in toto to payment by results; no money, he said, should depend on any examination.

Mr. W. B. Adams, head master of the Fleet Road board school, London, gave doubtful evidence as to the merit grant; as to payment by results, he thinks Parliament must look for returns in the way of results if it pays money, but thinks the present system defective. He objects to a priced list of subjects, but approves of the standard examination and schedule up to and including Standard V; above that he would make the organisation and teaching of a school freer. He preferred the present system to that in force before 1862.

Miss Whittenbury, the head mistress of a large infant school under the London school board said the system of payment by results is wrong; it tends to neglecting and keeping back clever children. She thinks the grant to a school should vary according to the inspector's judgment of its excellence. Thus, it appears, she rather objects to the present method than to the principle.

Mr. Powell, head master of a rural Church of England school in Bedfordshire, objects to the merit grant as depending on the objectionable principle of individual passes, and, while he would retain individual examination, would make the grant depend on the average standard attained by each class.

Mr. Clark, head master of a mixed board school at Pensnett, near Dudley, said that the merit grant is an unmitigated abomination. He would abolish payment by results, but does not think it practicable. He would not allow thoroughly inefficient schools to get the same grant as efficient ones.

Mr. Charles Smith, of St. Thomas' Church of England school. Charterhouse, objects to the merit grant. He says individual examination is necessary as a test, but no notice should be taken of individual passes. He prefers a varying maintenance grant to the present system, but for this, more responsible management is required in voluntary schools.

Mrs. Burgwin, head mistress of the girls' department, Orange Street board school, Southwark, is opposed to the merit grant. As to payment by results, she would retain individual examination, but not pay for it. There would be no difficulty in basing the grant on the class as the unit. Below Standard 4 children should be examined in class.

Mr. Holdsworth, head master of a Wesleyan school at Newcastle, approves of the object of the merit grant, but thinks it has failed to a great extent, and hesitates to express approval of it.

Mr. Muscott, of Garsington Church of England school, near Oxford, approves of the object, but not quite of the working of the merit grant; as to payment by results, he would have a larger proportion fixed, and a less proportion variable.

Mrs. Knowler, head mistress of Dibden school, Hampshire, says that payment by results presses hard on such schools as hers.

Miss Napper, head mistress of a small village school with 59 average, got the excellent merit grant, and approves of payment by results.

Miss Neath, head mistress of a school of 58 average, does not like the system of payment by results.

Miss Castle, who has a small school in Sussex, said that to do away with the system would lessen the interest taken in dull children, and the teachers would let them slip through, but she thought the individual examination and consequent payment led to shifts and evasions on the part of the teachers, and that the whole system is also to blame. She added, the loss by the abolition of payment by


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results would be greater than the gain. It is best, so far as the children are concerned.

Mr. S. B. Tait, formerly a teacher, and now inspector to the Huddersfield school board, said of the merit grant that it had produced more intelligent work, but it had increased the anxiety of the teachers. He said that the grant in Huddersfield is given for quality of work, not for percentage of passes. He would distribute the merit grant among the subjects; as to "payment by results", he would pay for the standard subjects in the same way as for the class subjects.

Mr. Newbold, formerly a teacher of a public elementary school, and now engaged in private tuition, said that the conception of the merit grant was excellent, but the purpose had been defeated in administration. As to payment by results, he would make the class, and not the individual, the unit in estimating the grant. Individual examination is desirable. If the payment on individual examination were very small, it might have a beneficial result.

Mr. Ridgway, head master of the Stavely Works boys' school, was in favour of the merit grant.

Mr. Horsfield, of St. Saviour's school, Everton, was in favour of the merit grant. If payment by results were done away with, the dull children would not be pressed so much.

Mr. Bradbury, head master of a large half-time school at Mossley, was fairly satisfied with the present system of payment by results in default of a better, but he would give more liberty of classification, and he disliked pricing subjects, a method which leads teachers to consider what subjects will pay and what subjects will not pay.

Mr. Scotson, of the Deansgate higher board school, Deansgate, Manchester, would abolish the merit grant, and return to the method of paying before 1862. He would abolish payment on individual results of examination, and pay as is now done for the class subjects. He looked to the publication of the reports in the district for inducing teachers to work well. He approved of the appeal to the emulation of teachers by official praise or blame, but not of money rewards. He does not absolutely object to payment by results of any sort; a better school ought to be able to earn a better grant. If payment by results were largely superseded, he would prescribe a curriculum which should be liberal, not less than is now taught in an ordinary good school. His feeling is in the direction of making drawing compulsory in all schools for girls as well as for boys. If payment by results were superseded, he would require further guarantees from voluntary schools.

Mr. Fish, head master of a Church of England school in Durham, considered the system of payment by results unsound in principle, but was not prepared to suggest another system. He would prefer class examination in all subjects, though examination in dictation and arithmetic must necessarily be individual.

Mr. Balchin, head master of the Nunhead Passage board school, London, would approve of the merit grant, subject to some slight modifications. Individual payments almost entirely destroy the value of scientific instruction. Payment on individual examination is good for mechanical subjects.

Mr. C. Twiss, head master of a school in Warrington, is not satisfied with the assessment of the merit grant. He thinks there must be payment by results. It has not improved the really good schools, but has stimulated the inferior ones.

The Rev. J. Duncan, Secretary to the National Society, objected to the payments on the results of individual examination, and preferred the system before 1862 to the present, but he said "there must be some system of payment by results".

The Rev. W. J. B. Richards, D.D., Roman Catholic diocesan inspector, presumes that payment by results is the only way in which payments can be made. He would not return to the system in force prior to 1862. The merit grant might be good if given solely in reference to the good conduct of a school.

Archdeacon Sir Lovelace Stamer, the chairman of the Stoke-upon-Trent school board, thought that individual examination could not be given up, and that payment by results must continue, but less should be paid on results, and the fixed grant should be larger.


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The Rev. W. D. Parish, formerly a diocesan inspector in Sussex, said he had no recommendation to make as to payment by results of individual examination.

Prebendary Richards would prefer payment by the results of class rather than of individual examination in standards.

Mrs. Fielden, of Todmorden, would do away with the merit grant entirely. She would give apportioned payments for excellence in separate subjects of instruction. After a grant of 10s or 12s for fair work all round she would give 1s each for real excellence in such subjects as reading, arithmetic, needlework, singing, and writing.

Lady Stevenson, a manager of London board schools, would do away with payment on results of individual examination. When asked how she would have a guarantee for the efficiency of the teaching in a voluntary school, she said, "I am convinced that after a time the voluntary schools will have to be done away with". She says, there must be some check so long as a Government grant is given to voluntary schools, to see that they are well taught.

Canon Wingfield, rector of Welwyn, objects to payment by results, but he says that if the examination is not satisfactory, he would reduce the annual grant to the school.

The Rev. J. R. Diggle, chairman of the London School Board, said that the principle of the merit grant is good, and the want of uniformity might be remedied; it obviates the mechanical system of payment by results. He is in favour of payment by results, and thinks that if the three R's were examined as class subjects, a large number of children would escape without knowing anything at all about them.

Dr. Crosskey, of the Birmingham school board, objects to the merit grant because it is not given for real merit, and keeps inferior schools alive at the expense of the good ones; the character of the education, the healthfulness of the buildings, &c., should be considered, and not the pecuniary difficulties of the managers. In making his award, the inspector pays no attention to overcrowding, sanitary arrangements, and the supply of books and apparatus. He does not consider payment by results a good method of aiding schools, but if it is abolished, very emphatic educational tests would have to be applied.

Mr. E. N. Buxton, late chairman of the London School Board, considers that some portion of the grant should depend on results.

Mr. Hance, clerk to the Liverpool school board, says would rather not retain the merit grant; but if it is retained he thinks that it should be distributed, among the subjects. "Some payment dependent on results is probably necessary to the full efficiency of State aided education under the conditions which obtain in this country where so large a proportion of the education is supplied by private firms, if I may so say - but I think that under the existing system the principle is carried to excess".

The Rev. B. F. M. McCarthy, vice-president of the Birmingham school board, is thoroughly opposed on educational grounds to payment by results, and proposed a scheme of elaborate grading according to equipment and curriculum, by which payments fixed for each class, but varying with the category of the school, should be made.

Canon McNeile, chairman of the Liverpool School Managers Committee, dislikes the system of payment by results, but does not see how the system of payment for individual examination could be abolished altogether.

The Rev. J. Gilmore, chairman of the Sheffield school board objects to the present system as cram instead of education, but he would not abolish payment by results altogether.

Mr. James Hanson, vice-chairman of the Bradford school board objects strongly to the system of payment by results. He thinks the method of class examination would materially lessen the evils. He thinks Government must take means to ascertain that the purpose for which they give their subsidy is accomplished, and that the existence of voluntary schools increases the difficulty of the question.

Mr. O'Donoghue, clerk to the Hull school board, would do away with the merit grant, as no grant should depend largely on opinion only, unaided by any uniformity of standard. He is in favour of payment by results, and prefers the individual examination.


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The Rev. Joseph Nunn, chairman of the Manchester school board, objects to the merit grant; it favours the board schools because they have the advantage of a board inspector, moreover the board schools have the help of the rates. There should be a system of payment by results, but more largely supplemented than at present by fixed payments. He would retain individual examination.

Mr. Wright, the inspector of the Bristol school board, was opposed to payment by results of individual examination. He would have the grant mainly a capitation grant, with a small grant dependent on class examination.

Mr. Lee, clerk to the Leeds school board, thinks the merit grant not well administered at present; he would distribute it over subjects; as to payment by results, less should depend on individual examination, which should be limited to Class 3 and upwards.

Mr. H. Birley, formerly chairman of the Manchester school board, and still chairman of the Salford school board, criticised the merit grant, but considered payment by results the only true guarantee the State can have of efficiency, and that every child receives an education. He says the system would work well if managers took more pecuniary responsibility for their schools.

The Rev. Prebendary A. M. Deane said that the system of payment by results as the basis of the grant is good. He thinks that 5s a head might depend on individual examination.

Mr. Mark Wilks strongly condemns payment by results, but thinks universal board schools a necessary preliminary to reform.

The Rev. John Menet, formerly principal of Hockerill training college, and Mr. John Nickal, inspector of the London School Board, were not favourable to the present system of payment by results.

This is an abridgement of the principal observations offered to us on the operation of the plan introduced by Mr. Lowe, and still subsisting, though with many important modifications of detail, which for shortness we have agreed to call "Payment by results". It appears from this summary that the large majority of witnesses, while criticising the present system from various points of view, are of opinion that the Parliamentary grant paid to schools must vary to some extent with the ascertained efficiency of the school as tested by Government inspection, at any rate so long as our system of popular education continues so largely under voluntary management.

The conclusion which Dr. Dale and Mr. Heller, reached on this question was expressed by an amendment moved by Dr. Dale on a passage in the chapter on the Parliamentary grant in the report of the Commission, which will be found appended as a note to the end of this chapter.

But we were unable to get any suggestions as to any alternative scheme which should make the grant entirely independent of the merit of the school as tested by the Government inspector, and reported on by him.

Indeed, Mr. Wilks, who was perhaps the most emphatic of any of the witnesses in his condemnation of payment by results, could only look forward to a system of universal board schools as the means of getting adequate security for good teaching under another system of public aid. Having prefaced what he had to urge on this point by the statement that the establishment of universal board schools is an essential condition of his evidence, he stated "Payment by results has worked out the most disastrous consequences, intellectual and moral, in our schools." "Payment by results destroys the spirit of education."

Others of those who advocated the abolition of payment by results recognised the necessity, if uniform grants are substituted, of setting up some responsible body of management which should have sufficient power over all schools to see that they are thoroughly efficient.

It is urged by the opponents of payment by results that in no country in Europe, except our own, has this system of public support been adopted. But it may be noticed that in no country but our own are volunteers allowed, so to speak, to contract with the nation for the supply of national education. Where the schools are under the management of a responsible public body, whether the State as a whole as in France, or the locality under State supervision as in Germany, Holland, Switzerland Italy, and other countries, the schools are part of the National establishments, and under very different guarantees from those which would subsist in this country if all voluntary managers were practically secure of a fixed subsidy irrespective of their own contributions and of the efficiency of their schools.


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We are, therefore, forced to the conclusion that the State itself must at present take due precautions to see that its contribution is made in aid of local effort, and not in substitution for it, and that if that aid is given liberally it shall be given for real educational work.

And while we largely agree with Mr. Matthew Arnold, that well, framed curricula, with full and graduated schemes of instruction, thoroughly trained teachers in sufficient numbers, and careful inspection by experts, would, if education were under local responsible management, and mainly supported by local resources, be the most satisfactory guarantees of educational efficiency, yet we think that under the present conditions it is not practicable to recommend to Parliament any other method to secure efficiency than that which provides that to some extent the grant shall vary with the reported efficiency of the school.

We shall discuss hereafter more fully the burden of the cost, but we may mention here that the proportion of the whole cost borne by the State and by the parents has steadily and largely increased in the last 10 years, while the burden on voluntary subscribers has largely diminished, and we think it essential that those who claim the whole management should be responsible for half the cost. So long as the present system is allowed to continue, we think that the grant should not be so variable as very seriously to cripple the resources of the school by its diminution, nor should the range be so limited as to offer but slight inducement to efficiency. Possibly if of the total Government grant two-thirds were fixed and one-third were variable, a due proportion would be preserved between the stagnation of a fixed grant and the lottery of unlimited variation. We would, however, retain the present power, under Article 115, of fining a school for grave faults of discipline or instruction. This power is very rarely used. The total amount so deducted in 1886-7 was about £3,420 on a total sum of £2,986,747.

How the variable portion of the grant should be distributed is a question of detail rather for the Department than for us. We wish, however, to state that we consider the present mode of distributing the standard grant unsatisfactory for the reasons generally urged against it by many witnesses. But while teachers find fault with the mechanical effect of the schedule of passes in the standard subjects, they resent the freedom which some of them call the caprice of the inspector in awarding the merit grant. It has been suggested by several witnesses that if the successive rises were more numerous, schools would not feel that ticketing which causes so much heartburning and emulation; an inspector who should award sums ranging from 1s to 7s according to the impression left on his mind after a careful examination, would not cause the same mortification as one who labelled a school "good" instead of "excellent", or "fair" instead of "good".

We are of opinion that if the variable portion of the grant be distributed in one lump sum by the inspector upon his view of the work of the school as a whole, balancing the points of excellence against those where the work is only fair, even though the name of merit grant were suppressed, and though the gradations were more numerous, the substance of the present merit grant would remain, and both teachers and managers would feel that their freedom of action was unduly put in subjection to the personal preferences and ideas of the inspector. Again, if the presumption were that a certain sum were to be awarded by the inspector, unless he felt bound to make certain deductions from that sum for distinct and serious failures in some part of the teaching, there would be a danger that the average of ordinary efficiency would become the standard for the maximum grant, and managers who hitherto have been specially liberal in the quality and number of their staff, and in securing the best school appliances would get less aid than formerly. The objection to what has been called a priced list of subjects held good when schools were bribed to adopt a reasonable curriculum by payment for piece work, but where a full curriculum is prescribed, we see no objection to the managers and teachers realising distinctly that neglect of any part of it will entail pecuniary loss, and that similarly special efficiency will result in larger pecuniary means. Such a system resembles the present method of paying for the class subjects which is the one which has given most satisfaction or least dissatisfaction, but we feel that in adjusting the details of a Government scheme of payments we cannot undertake to make specific recommendations. We would, however, say this, that small village schools, if properly supported from local resources, and duly teaching the prescribed curriculum, should be treated with special liberality, and that the larger town schools with an extended curriculum should also, so far as the extended curriculum increases


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their cost receive additional State aid to meet additional local contributions. Indeed, so long as the essential principle is maintained that the grant from the Treasury shall not exceed the local resources, we have no apprehension that mischief will arise from its increase. The returns collected by us prove that the small voluntary village schools are more liberally supported than the voluntary schools in towns, and we believe, with Prebendary Roe, that country managers, as a body, do not ask for further aid to relieve their own pockets, but to improve the condition of their schools, which must be exceptionally costly per head.

These grants and their probable extension should be borne in mind in estimating what is a reasonable capitation grant to be awarded on behalf of the scholars in attendance. We should be glad to see a considerable part of the grant awarded for conditions of efficiency, such as adequate staff, premises, school, and material, leaving much less than at present dependent on the report of the examination of the scholars.

To sum up the conclusions of this chapter, we are of opinion that the most satisfactory means of securing efficiency in our elementary schools would be the organisation of our national education under local representative management over areas of sufficient extent, subject to State inspection, which should rather aim at securing that the local authorities did their duty, than at testing minutely the results of instruction throughout the school. We look to the establishment of such a system as the best means of escaping from the injurious effects of the present system. But we recognise that as long as so large a proportion of the schools of the country are under private and isolated management, it is impracticable to propose to Parliament any scheme for the awarding of State aid that does not take into account the results of the work of the school as shown by the annual examination and inspection. In the meantime we are of opinion that the system of varying payments might be so administered as to cause much less friction, and to interfere less with satisfactory methods of teaching than it does now.

We recommend that the present method of assessing payment on the standard subjects be discontinued.

We are in favour of a larger portion of the grant being fixed, subject to the condition that greater guarantees of efficiency be secured in the shape of well built, well equipped premises, and a liberal staff of well qualified teachers, with curricula suited to the size of the school, and the possibilities of the locality.

We also recommend that more money be paid to provide the means of instruction, such as grants for the teaching of cookery, for the services of science demonstrators, special drawing teachers, organising masters, local inspectors, suitable means of instructing the pupil-teachers, &c.

As to the remainder of the capitation grant, which is variable, we recommend that while no inducement be offered to a school to go beyond a suitable curriculum for the sake of special grants, the variable grant be apportioned among the various subjects of instruction, so as to reward efficiency wherever the inspector recognises it; and especially that the inspector look rather to the quality of the work done by the scholars than to the high percentage of scholars who show some knowledge, in estimating the merit of the teaching.

We recommend strongly that where the size of the school makes it reasonable that a fuller curriculum should be taught, more aid should be given to meet corresponding efforts on the part of the managers.

We recommend special aid to small village schools which must be exceptionally costly, and which need a specially strong staff of teachers in proportion to the number of scholars.

And we recommend, in order to distribute State aid in proportion to the need of the school, and the poverty of the scholars, that the capitation grant shall increase with the lowness of the fee, and diminish with the raising of the fee above the average of the country.

NOTE BY DR. DALE AND MR. HELLER UPON PAYMENT BY RESULTS
(See page 331)

"On a review of the whole evidence, we have come to the conclusion that the system of payment by results, introduced into the Code of 1862, and retained with various modifications in all subsequent Codes, has done very much to discourage and counteract the efforts of those who have endeavoured to improve the quality of elementary education. It has had a tendency to induce managers and teachers to disregard, what should be one of their chief objects, the creation of intellectual


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interest and activity in the children, and to adopt methods of instruction which will secure the mere mechanical accuracy that renders certain the attaining of a 'pass'. It, therefore, leads to the degradation of the teaching; the minimum of knowledge necessary for the dullest scholar, in order to secure the payment of the grant, determines the maximum of the teaching given to the brightest scholars in the class; the children with the least active minds receive a disproportionate amount of the teacher's time and attention, and are unduly pressed; the children with the most active minds who would profit most by the best, most careful, and most thorough teaching, are neglected; and, as the result, the knowledge acquired by the dull children is mechanical and formal; the knowledge acquired by the clever children is superficial; in both cases it is likely soon to be forgotten. An attempt to remedy these great and obvious evils was made by the introduction of the merit grant in 1882; but the evidence does not show that the grant has secured its object. We do not mean to affirm that in all schools the system has produced these grave evils, but that the tendency of the system has been to produce them. There are many managers and many teachers who have resisted, and successfully resisted, the strong inducements to sacrifice the educational interests of the children for the sake of obtaining a high percentage of 'passes' and a high grant; but there' are many who have been unable to resist; and it is one of the worst effects of the system that even to those who have a genuine educational zeal, and are prepared to make great sacrifices for the improvement of their schools, it suggests a false educational aim.

"We also think that the system exerts a prejudicial effect on the educational requirements of the Code. These requirements are naturally and inevitably regarded by teachers as determining the limits of the instruction which it is necessary for them to give; but under a system of payment by results, the requirements of the Code are necessarily restricted to the amount of knowledge which it is reasonable to demand from the great mass of the children.

"The system also affects very seriously the work of the inspector. It tends to make him a mere examiner, and to deprive the managers and teachers of the assistance which they ought to derive from the suggestions of a man having large educational experience and high educational authority on their methods of organisation, teaching, and discipline. While we do not desire that the schools should cease to be examined, we think it of the highest importance that they should be more frequently inspected. It is also our impression that though the relations between inspectors and schools are on the whole satisfactory, these relations would be still more cordial, and the general influence exerted by inspectors would be still more wholesome, if managers and teachers were not compelled to regard the distribution of money grants as one of the chief parts of the inspector's duties.

"It is apparent that the system of payment by results is regarded by the general body of teachers with dissatisfaction, and by large numbers of them with resentment. The grounds of their opposition to it are set out at great length in their evidence. The most distinguished and efficient teachers are as strongly opposed to it as the teachers who might be supposed to object to it on grounds of self-interest. Indeed, of all the complaints that are made against the system, one of the gravest rests on the allegation that it often secures more than they deserve to those who teach badly, and less than they deserve to those who teach well. Since the efficiency of all schools must largely depend upon the cheerfulness and heartiness and enthusiasm of the teachers, we are of opinion that the discontent with which the system of payment by results is regarded, and has long been regarded, by the great majority of the teachers who are working under it, is a strong additional reason for abandoning it."

CHAPTER 13

COMPULSION

Among the changes introduced by the Act of 1870 into English elementary education, the power of enforcing attendance was one of the most novel.

There had, indeed, been a certain amount of educational compulsion in force before that date through the Factory Acts, and the Act of 1870 did not directly assume the responsibility of enforcing compulsion. But it enabled the people in school board districts, through their representatives the school boards, to frame byelaws for compelling attendance at school.


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The principal school boards, and many of the smaller ones, took advantage of this power, but the range of compulsion varied greatly. It was, however, proved that public opinion was ripe for imposing a legal obligation on parents to educate their children, and the Elementary Education Act, 1876, enacted (section 4), "it shall be the duty of the parent of every child to cause such child to receive efficient elementary instruction in reading, writing, and arithmetic, and, if such parent fail to perform such duty, he shall be liable to such orders and penalties as are prescribed by this Act."

Section 5 prohibited the employment of a child under 10 years of age, and only permitted a child upwards of 10 years of age to be employed if he had passed the prescribed standard, which is now the Fourth, or had made a certain specified number of attendances year by year at an efficient school.

This Act raised the age during which a child may be subject to compulsory education to 14, and it enabled such a child to be the subject of a school attendance order if the parent habitually and without reasonable excuse neglected his education, or if the child was found habitually wandering, or not under proper control, or in the company of rogues, vagabonds, disorderly persons, or reputed criminals. And disregard of such a school attendance order may result in sending the child to an industrial school.

This Act created authorities, called school attendance committees, throughout the country, where school boards did not exist, for the purpose of enforcing the provisions of the Act, and with discretionary power to make byelaws for school attendance like school boards.

In boroughs the school attendance committee is appointed by the town council. In Poor Law unions the guardians appoint the school attendance committee, but they could not make byelaws for a parish, except on the requisition of the parish (section 21).

Urban sanitary districts other than boroughs, if co-extensive with one or more parishes, and having not less than 5,000 inhabitants, might appoint a school attendance committee, and oust the authority of the guardians of the poor (section 33).

The effect of this Act was to create a general obligation of education throughout the country, and to furnish machinery by which gross and habitual violation of this duty could be corrected. It also put indirect pressure on parents to educate their children by a universal prohibition of employment of children under 10, and by the further prohibition of more than half-time employment for the great majority of children between 10 and 13, and of many children between 13 and 14. It also created the local optional power to enforce attendance at school throughout the country.

Under this Act there was a great extension of byelaws for compulsory attendance, but they were not universal, and they were not and are not uniform.

The Elementary Education Act, 1880, provided (section 2) that the Education Department might make byelaws for those districts which had not made them for themselves.

Under this Act byelaws for compulsory attendance have become universal.

The third section of this Act did away with the initiative of the parish before the school attendance committee of a union could make byelaws for that parish.

The Report of the Education Department for 1880-1, p. xxvi., shows that on the passing of this Act 450 out of 2,000 school boards, 20 out of 109 borough school attendance committees, 7 out of 67 urban school attendance committees, were without compulsory byelaws. Of 584 unions having school attendance committees, 275 were enforcing byelaws in one or more parishes, but only 15 were enforcing byelaws in all their parishes.

It appears that when byelaws became universal in 1880, out of 544 unions, 403 adopted the Fourth Standard, and 141 the Fifth Standard for total exemption.

Ninety unions adopted the Second Standard, 370 the Third, and 69 the Fourth, for partial exemption.

The Education Department proceeded to frame byelaws for those authorities which had failed to enact them for themselves; and in the byelaws framed by the Department Standards V and III were prescribed as the standards for total and for partial exemption.

Before the passing of the Act of 1880, 1,421 school boards, with 12,605,453 population, and 398 school attendance committees, with 3,665,705 population, had compulsory byelaws. In 1881 there were 2,051 school boards, with 13,318,492 population, and 761 school attendance committees, with 9,393,774 population, having compulsory byelaws. These are the figures of the census of 1871, the figures of


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1881 being, of course, not at that time accessible. They represent the whole country under the operation of byelaws.

As the old byelaws enacted before 1880 may still remain in force, there is even now a great variation and irregularity in the extent of obligatory school attendance, even among closely neighbouring places; sometimes within the same town, if it is not a municipal borough, or a local board having a separate attendance committee. This is commented on in the Education Report of 1881-2, pp. xxix-xxxi, and illustrations will be found in the returns to our Circular A.

It will naturally be asked, what has been the effect of the introduction of legal compulsion upon the attendance of children at school and upon their education?

Some witnesses state that its influence has not been wholly good. They say that the existence of a limited legal obligation has in some cases tended to supersede the old feeling of a moral obligation; that children are now not sent to school before five years of age, where formerly they might have been sent earlier; and that, as soon as a child has passed the standard for total exemption, he is withdrawn from school, so that the age of leaving school is said to be earlier than formerly.

It is possible that this statement may be correct in some few cases, but we do not believe that the influence described is at all general.

In considering the question of children leaving as soon as they have passed, say, the Fourth Standard, we must remember that many children are now in school of a class who formerly escaped school altogether, and it is not reasonable to compare the action of their parents in seeking to take advantage of their labour with the action of those who formerly voluntarily sent their children to school. Any comparison as to duration of school life and appreciation of education must always be guarded by the remembrance that we are dealing now with many children who were never dealt with before.

Again, there is evidence that in some rural districts, the standard of exemption is kept low, and steps are taken to get the children out of school, not by the parents from resentment at compulsion, but by employers and others in authority, who do not wish to lose their supply of child labour. The raising of the fee after the Fourth Standard is said to be sometimes for this express purpose.

Again, as to the earlier age of leaving, there is no doubt that children are much more advanced educationally in regard to their age, than was the case 10 or 15 years ago; children were then kept at school till 14 doing work which they now master at 12, and the schools have not now the number of overgrown dunces that were formerly to be found in them.

All these things must be considered before we conclude that the age of leaving school is earlier than it was formerly.

The figures furnished by the Education Department do not confirm this contention.

Thus Table 18, in the Report of the Education Department, 1886-7 (p. 258), shows that of the total population under 15, which was 8,555,893, 4,553,751 were on the roll of inspected schools, or 53.2 per cent. The children on the roll between 13 and 15 were 16.3 per cent of all the children in the country of those ages.

In 1876 (see Table 13 of the Education Report, 1876-7 (p. 382)), the total population under 15 years of age was 7,364,399, of whom 2,943,774 or 40 per cent, were on the roll of inspected schools. The children between 13 and 15 on the roll constituted 10.2 per cent of all the children between 13 and 15 in the country. If the children between 13 and 15 on the roll had increased in the same proportion as the whole number of the children on the roll of inspected schools of all ages, they would have only increased by about 34 per cent, but they have actually increased nearly 60 per cent.

In certain districts there may be a disposition prematurely to remove children from school in order to put them to work, but this is in no way due to the dislike to compulsion, but is the fault of the low legal minimum of compulsion in certain districts.

Taking the country throughout, we are of opinion, that, during the last 10 years, there has not merely been a great increase in the number of children under instruction, but a considerable prolongation of the duration of school life.

But there is another criticism urged against our present compulsory system by many witnesses, namely, that, owing to the laxity with which it is carried out, it is ineffective.

We fully admit that the present system is very lax, and cannot for a moment be compared with the real compulsory enforcement of school attendance in Germany, and in some other parts of Europe, where it has entered into the habits of the people,


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so as to secure a regularity of attendance which seems to our teachers and managers quite ideal.

We admit that in many cases the school attendance committees, largely composed of farmers, are not very forward either in appointing or in duly paying school attendance officers, and that their sympathy with education is not always very earnest.

We admit that the small rural boards are very reluctant to summon their neighbours for not sending their children to school, and that not unfrequently members of the board may be offenders against the law by employing children who should be at school.

We agree with the complaint so general from the witnesses, and in the answers to our circulars, that school attendance committees and school boards are constantly discouraged by the action of magistrates, who frequently refuse to convict, or who inflict nominal penalties when the law has been plainly and frequently broken. We think moreover, that stipendiary magistrates have often disregarded the law quite as much as the unpaid justices, especially in London.

We also think that the substitution of distress warrants for committal has enabled the magistrates to put further difficulties in the way of the local educational authority, and we think that the pressure on the time of the magistrates in London has necessarily forced them so to restrict the number of school board summonses as to enable inveterate offenders to defy the law.

But in making all these admissions we feel that the fact must be borne in mind that educational compulsion is a new thing, and that it was necessary to work it cautiously and tentatively. Any apparent harshness would have raised an outcry which would have resulted in greater injury to the cause of education than the gain from speedy and frequent convictions of the class of persons who are most commonly summoned for breaches of the byelaws.

We are, of course, anxious that all, and especially the most neglected, should get the full benefit of a good education, but it must be remembered that the section of society against whom compulsion is directly applied is but a small minority of the whole community, possibly not more than 5 per cent, certainly not more than 10 per cent, though in certain parts of our large towns they may be far more numerous. These people are often idle, and given to drink, and generally on the verge of misery, if not of starvation, and severe punishment applied to them causes the public to think more of their misery than of the causes which have led to that misery.

While, therefore, we hope that school boards, school attendance committees and magistrates will remember that it is their duty to enforce the law, and that to educate the young is the greatest security for relieving and removing the pauperism and the degradation which are now blots on our society, yet we look rather to the growth of public opinion in favour of education, than to increased legal penalties for securing regular attendance at our schools.

Moreover, it must not be supposed that the law of compulsory attendance is inoperative because it is rarely enforced, and even then not always effectively. We believe that a vast amount has been done, in consequence of the existence of the compulsory byelaws, to induce parents, by persuasion and warning, to send their children regularly to school. Members of school boards, managers, and attendance officers and others, have all helped in the work. We are satisfied that the attendance officers have, as a rule, shown much tact and consideration, and in their house to house visitations have had very great influence in persuading and inducing parents to perform their duty to their children. We think that the employment of well selected and adequately paid attendance officers has been a powerful influence, which has often made the appeal to the magistrate unnecessary, and their knowledge of the means and condition of the people makes them useful and efficient helpers in determining who are fit subjects for help, where fees may well be remitted, and where the strict letter of the law as to compulsory attendance may be waived on the ground of extreme necessity in the home.

For the great mass of the community, the knowledge that it is a legal duty to educate their children secures, on the whole, a willing compliance and an increasing effort to send the children regularly, even at the expense of some inconvenience and pecuniary loss to the family.

When we remember the great tax that has been put upon the poor, by preventing them from supplementing their wages by the early labour of their children, and when we remember with what cheerfulness this necessary restriction on their former liberty has been accepted, we see how powerful is the moral force of a law, and where the


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law is in harmony with sound judgment, how seldom its coercive sanctions need be invoked.

In reference to the question of school attendance, we wish to record our strong opinion, that though summonses and fines may be necessary for a few, to be followed up, it may be, by the truant school and the industrial school, yet we believe that the progress which has been effected in the last 15 years has been only rendered possible by the liberal supply of good school buildings, easily accessible, at moderate fees, and by the great improvement in the teaching and curriculum. These improvements have satisfied parents that if they are deprived of the labour of their children they are getting that which is fully worth the sacrifice. It is to the still further supply of good well equipped school premises, with a liberal staff" of high principled and efficient teachers, and a curriculum well conceived and adequately taught, that we look, in the first instance for the further growth in numbers, in regularity and in punctuality of our school population.

We hope, also, that our recommendations as to inspection and examination will help to make the schools more attractive.

But while making due allowance for the reluctance of magistrates hitherto adequately to enforce the law, we think the time has come when the law should be strengthened, and magistrates should be required to give effect to the law. Not only in the evidence which we took orally, but in the memorials which will be found in our appendix, there is ample proof that school boards and school attendance committees are often fined themselves when they put the law in force against offenders. They have to pay in many cases the cost of the summons and other official charges; and then the offender is fined some nominal penalty.

We think that a second or further offence within a certain time should result in an increased penalty.

Magistrates are unfit judges of the amount of education that a child is receiving. Where a child is under instruction, otherwise than in a public elementary or other certified efficient school, it should be lawful to require such child to present himself for examination at a public elementary school near where he lives, and if such child fails to satisfy Her Majesty's Inspector that he is under efficient instruction, it should be evidence that he is not efficiently instructed.

We think that the substitution of distress warrants for the power of committal is cumbrous, dilatory, and costly. It has worked injuriously to the parents themselves, while it has certainly adversely affected the working of the compulsory laws.

As to industrial schools, we think that their educational side should be further developed, and we agree with the Commission which lately inquired into them, that their educational work should be inspected by the Education Department.

But the ordinary industrial school, while suitable, perhaps, to cases which are on the verge of crime, involves too long a detention to be applicable to many cases where boys are wild and masterful, but may be corrected by a short application of sharp discipline. For such cases as these, we think that truant schools, such as the London and other school boards have established, have been very useful. The power of sending a boy back to such a school is useful in the back ground, but the permanent detention of a boy for five years, is a needlessly costly, and elaborate remedy for what is sometimes nothing but an excess of ill-directed energy. Day industrial schools have been worked successfully in some towns, and attempt to deal with specially difficult cases.

We think the time has come, when throughout the country no child should be allowed to leave school unless it be under very exceptional circumstances, to be specially considered by the educational authority, under the age of 13; and, we think that no half-time should be allowed till a child is at least 11 years of age, and has advanced in instruction up to the attainments of the present Third Standard, to be raised in two or three years to the Fourth Standard, and even then half-time should not be a matter of right, but should depend on the child being necessarily and beneficially employed.

It would be very undesirable if the raising of the standard of compulsory education generally should be accompanied by any local lowering of the standard.

We may refer to the evidence from Huddersfield, showing the great advantage that has resulted there from fixing the Sixth Standard as the measure of instruction for total exemption from school attendance.

No child should be allowed to leave school before 14, unless he or she is profitably employed either at home or at work. Much evidence was given to us of the mischievous


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effect upon character of setting big boys free from the discipline of school when they were not employed, but idled about the town or village.

We are not here dealing with the question of educational authorities, but we think that those whose duty it is to enforce compulsion, should act over an area much larger than the parish, as the invidiousness of ordering prosecutions would thereby be diminished, and we think that the districts proposed to be created by the Local Government Bill would be suitable units for this purpose; but their action might possibly be subject to inspection by the county authorities, who should require the attendance to be effectively and seriously enforced.

CHAPTER 14

SCHOOL MANAGEMENT

COMPARISON OF BOARD AND VOLUNTARY SCHOOLS

Under the existing school system of the country, whereby the only security for efficiency as regards the large majority of elementary schools, is the government inspection, and by which the State leaves the widest discretion to the managers of the separate schools, who in many cases are single persons, it is of great importance to consider whether any further precautions should be taken to secure that the schools so largely aided, and to which the mass of the children can be compelled to go, be efficiently and fairly managed.

In reference to the denominational question, we do not consider that the conscience clause, which merely enables a parent to use the school as a secular school, is an adequate security for fair play and religious impartiality in the management. Even if the conscience clause were largely used, there would be ample room, through the selection of teachers, and through the methods of instruction, to influence the whole spirit of the school. But this predominance of denominationalism in our national system must continue so long as the majority of the people of the country are willing to delegate the duty of public education to volunteers mainly influenced by denominational zeal.

While not interfering with the private management of voluntary schools, we are strongly of opinion that the report of the government inspector on the school should be made known throughout the district. Most of the parents are not only in humble circumstances, but are also not fully able to observe from the progress of their children the relative educational advantages of the various schools in their neighbourhood. We believe that the publication of the government reports would not only give much useful information to the district, of which many parents would avail themselves, but in the case of a somewhat inefficient school, would exercise a useful pressure on the managers and prove a great incentive to improvement.

Again, we are of opinion that the accounts of all schools receiving public money should be equally thoroughly audited, and the same rules of legality applied to their expenditure. The circular issued by the Huddersfield Church School Association, and entitled "Hints on Article 114 of the new Code", shows the temptations to which voluntary managers are exposed so to arrange their accounts as to obtain the maximum government grant, above 17s 6d, while evading some of the conditions on which that grant is awarded.

We quote the following paragraphs:

Extracts from Hints circulated by the Huddersfield and Saddleworth Church Day School Association

5. As much as possible the scholars should be encouraged to purchase their own school requisites, either of the managers or their deputy, the head teacher. The amount returned from the sale of school material may be reckoned as income.


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6. In like manner all sewing materials used in the school should be provided by the managers, who could recoup themselves by a sale of the children's work at the end of the school year.

8. All accounts for the purchase of school materials should be paid in full, and the discounts received should be entered as items of income.

9. A small sum should be charged for the use of the rooms in the case of all classes, meetings, or entertainments held on the premises after the ordinary school hours, and even the Sunday school might be charged a small rent.

10. Where the managers provide a residence for the teachers, the latter should pay a rent for the same, and their salaries should be correspondingly increased.

11. All necessary work performed gratuitously on behalf of the school, or gifts in kind, should be paid for and the amounts returned as donations. This is not applicable in the case of paid officers of the school. (Minutes of Evidence, Vol. 3, Q. 46,560).

In some cases, when a school is built, the building is vested nominally in some third person, without a trust deed, and then the managers are charged such a rent as will enable the school to escape the limitations which prevent the grant exceeding 17s 6d a head, the nominal owner repaying as a subscription what he has nominally received as rent. This appears to be common in the Roman Catholic schools of Bradford and other places, where large sums are set down as rent of building, and yet these schools while apparently rented at considerable sums are rated at nominal values.

Thus, the managers of St. Mary Roman Catholic school, Bradford, stated in their school accounts of 1884, submitted to the inspector, that they pay £258 6s 8d rent. In 1885 they entered £250 rent, and in 1886 £200. The managers of St. Patrick's Roman Catholic school, Bradford, enter £260 rent, and other similar instances might be quoted.

In the absence of an efficient audit and of full publicity of accounts, it is possible to charge an apparently high salary as paid to the teacher, and to enter on the side of the receipts a subscription to the school representing the difference between the real and the nominal salary. It is said that teachers have sometimes signed receipts for salaries larger than they have received. If managers are tempted to commit such frauds, they may easily, while the accounts remain unpublished and unaudited, deceive the inspector, who has little time or inclination to examine the accounts minutely. We desire not merely that the accounts of voluntary schools should be subject to an independent public audit, but we think they should also be made public in the locality.

The fees should be fair and uniform, and should include all school charges such as books, &c., and should be approved by the Department for voluntary schools like the fees in board schools.

We have also in our recommendations on the curriculum indicated how far the State should take securities for adequacy of teaching in all schools. The practice of farming schools to the teacher is in our judgment fatal to efficiency and honest management. Any school in which, owing to the smallness or absence of subscriptions, the teacher is made to depend for his salary entirely or mainly on the fees and the grant, is in danger of suffering from the evils which result from farming schools. These are, amongst others, undue pressure on the children, the tendency to get rid of stupid and irregular children, the prominence of cram, and of striving rather for examination results than for thorough education; the undue reduction of the staff, and the inadequate salaries, especially of assistants and pupil teachers.

Nothing short of public responsible management of our schools, by representative bodies drawn from a sufficiently large district, will in our opinion completely remove the dangers we have indicated, but we think they may be reduced, if the measures we have suggested be adopted and strenuously enforced by the inspectors.

Comparisons are often made between the management of board and voluntary schools, and many witnesses lay stress on what they believe to be the greater interest taken in their schools by voluntary managers.

There is no doubt that if the results of government inspection are a fair test of the efficiency of schools the board schools are much more efficient than the voluntary schools. Taking the infant schools and the senior schools separately, in both cases the board schools, whether judged by the assessment of merit by the inspector, or by the results of examination in standard, class, and specific subjects, are distinctly superior to the voluntary schools.


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Thus in the statistical tables giving the results of examination for the last year 1886-7, the following results appear in the case of infant schools:

BOARD SCHOOLS

Infants

Average attendance -

172,761Excellent41.6 per cent
196,601Good47.4 per cent
41,323Fair10 per cent
3,912No merit grant1 per cent

VOLUNTARY SCHOOLS

Infants

Average attendance -

160,019Excellent25.8 per cent
323,719Good52.2 per cent
122,215Fair19.7 per cent
13,764No merit grant2.3 per cent

In the case of senior scholars, the following table gives these results:

BOARD SCHOOLS

Senior Departments

Average attendance -

301,458Excellent83.3 per cent
485,270Good53.6 per cent
104,078Fair11.5 per cent
15,021No merit grant1.6 per cent

VOLUNTARY SCHOOLS

Senior Departments

Average attendance -

337,118Excellent20.9 per cent
857,357Good53.3 per cent
357,314Fair22.2 per cent
57,249No merit grant3.6 per cent

The average grant per head in board infant schools, was more than 15s 4d. The average grant per head in voluntary infant schools was 14s 6d. In the senior departments the board schools earned nearly 19s a head, and the voluntary schools nearly 17s 7d a head.

If the returns of the Education Department are examined in detail, it will be found that this superiority of results of instruction in board schools runs generally through the returns. Thus the passes in the standard examination are more numerous; class subjects are more generally taken, and are more successfully taught. Singing by note is more prevalent. Drawing is much more generally taught; and a much larger proportion of the scholars have been under instruction in practical cookery and have passed in specific subjects. This higher range of teaching is the natural result of the better means employed, the staff being more numerous in proportion to the scholars, of a higher quality, and as a rule, better paid. It is evident from these facts that school boards generally have been characterised by a desire to improve education, and not to manage their schools with a view to the lowest possible cost regardless of the efficiency of the instruction.

But it is urged that this is owing to two reasons; first, that the boards are not hampered by want of money, and that if voluntary managers had as much money they would produce as good results; and, secondly, it is said that the board schools


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being, as a rule, larger, are bound to be better than the voluntary, especially the church schools, which are, many of them, small rural schools.

In reference to these observations, it is undoubtedly true that, as a rule, large schools are more efficient than small schools, and that the board schools, as a class, enjoy that advantage over the voluntary schools, and this is a reason why we must look to the extension of the board school system for an improvement of our education. If we organise our school instruction on the denominational plan, we shall be forced to multiply small schools in the interest of various denominations, where one united school would answer far better the general needs of the district.

As to the question of cost. Here too it is quite true that if our National education is to be efficient, it must be paid for with liberality. If we are to attract good teachers the salaries must not be lower than the wages of an artizan. We must train our teachers for their work, we must have classes of moderate size, and the school material and buildings must be thoroughly adapted to their purpose. All this will cost money, and if the public are to find the money, the public must have the management. It cannot be said that the school boards generally are spending more than is needed to secure their work being properly done. Indeed in many places the boards show themselves extremely sensitive to criticism as to expense, and at every election it is apparent that the question of expenditure is one to which the electors pay close attention.

We believe that, even apart from the questions of large schools and the power of levying money by rate, school boards are more likely to prove efficient than voluntary managers. In the first place, school boards generally have several schools to manage, and we are of opinion that the areas of school boards should be so extended that no board should exist with only one or two schools under it. Boards with several schools to manage are educated by their work. The comparison of one school with another makes them more conscious of the shortcomings of their less efficient schools, and sets before them a standard of higher excellence. On the other hand, while some voluntary managers perform an admirable work in an admirable spirit, there are many schools where the management falls officially into the hands of unfit persons possessing no practical knowledge of their duties, and yet there is no power to remove or supersede them, and the school may suffer for a lifetime. If a bad board is elected, the ratepayers can put the matter right in three years, and we believe that we may trust the electors, as a rule, though not incapable of making mistakes, to be ready and willing to correct them.

But it is the small rural boards which are generally picked out by the witnesses who favour the voluntary system as the specially inefficient bodies whose mistakes and incompetence make it necessary to preserve the voluntary system, especially in the country; and no doubt prima facie we might expect such boards not to do their work well. They have, as a rule, been formed either where there had been such want of interest in education that no efficient school existed at their formation, or they represent the indifference and abdication of voluntary managers who have turned their schools over to a board. The rate has generally been heavy in these rural parishes, and the farmers, who are largely represented on these boards, have not the reputation of being very ready to increase the rates.

But when we turn to the summary compiled for us in 30 poor law unions having a population of 1,031,901, we find, taking the schools with an attendance of less than 100, and there were 474 voluntary schools, with 27,094 average attendance, or an average of 57 each. These schools earned 16s 0¾d grant per head, and cost 39s 11¾d per head. In the same districts there were 91 board schools having 5,721 average attendance, or 63 each on an average. These earned 16s 3½d grant per head, and cost 39s 1d per head. These figures are taken on the schools whose returns are for 12 months.

It should be noted that a larger proportion of the voluntary schools than of the board schools get the special grant of £10 or £15, and if that were deducted from both sides it would show that the grant, as dependent on examination is still higher in board schools, as compared with voluntary schools, than is shown in the table.

If we take all the board and voluntary schools having less than 100 attendance in these 30 unions we find that the percentage of passes was 79 in voluntary schools and 83 in board schools. Ten per cent of the voluntary schools were refused any merit grant, and five per cent of the board schools; while 11 per cent of the board schools were assessed excellent against eight per cent,of the voluntary schools; 23½ per cent of the voluntary schools took no class subjects, 18½ per cent of the board


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schools took no class subjects; and the other detailed statements show a similar superiority in the board schools though they cost 10d per head less.

If we pass to the larger schools, those with 100 and upwards, in these poor law unions we find again that the board schools cost slightly less than the voluntary schools; their average size is 258 as against 225 for the voluntary schools; and their results of examination show better work; thus the passes were 87 per cent against 84, the "excellents" were 27 per cent against 16 per cent, no merit grant was awarded to one per cent as against five per cent, and the grant earned was 17s 0½d against 16s 5¾d.

If instead of comparing departments, we were to take the children under instruction in the board and voluntary schools in these selected unions, it would be found that a much larger proportion of children in board schools are well taught than in voluntary schools, owing to the larger number of children in each department, there being a greater proportion of large schools under board than under voluntary management. Mr. Healing giving evidence as to Essex, says that he would prefer a board in a village, as owing to its command of funds it can be more efficient.

But further, it is alleged by some witnesses that the board schools are judged by a stricter standard than the voluntary schools, and that the inspectors out of compassion for the limited means and inconvenient premises which hamper many voluntary teachers, either consciously or unconsciously award grants to them more liberally than they would do in the case of a board where the command of the rates takes away any excuse for short-handed staff or insufficient equipment.

The inspectors and the advocates of voluntary schools who came before us, denied that there was any such inequality in the standard of examination. But it is hardly denied, and it certainly is the case, that as to buildings, playground, offices, lighting, furniture and all the other material equipment of the school, the inspectors while steadily pressing for a higher standard of accommodation, are obliged in the case of voluntary schools to put up with much less than they consider desirable.

In reference to accommodation, the Code itself permits children to be crowded in a voluntary school up to the limit of eight feet per child in average attendance, while ten feet are required in the senior departments of board schools; and we have already given references to a large number of passages from the blue book in which inspectors complain of bad structures, absence of playground, bad lighting, bad furniture, unsanitary offices, want of class rooms, and other hindrances to school work. We may note Mr. Blakiston's statement (Blue Book, 1886-7, p. 270), "against these evils (of unsatisfactory benches and desks), we wage perpetual war, but are constantly met with the plea of want of funds". The silence of inspectors is no proof of the satisfactory state of school premises. Thus we have called attention in detail to the bad character of the school provision of Stockport. Yet Mr. Lomax, in his official report (Blue Book, 1886-7, p. 293), says, "in no part of this district (Stockport) is there a deficiency of school accommodation".

Mr. Vertue reports (1886-7, p. 320), of the Newton Abbot district - "Neither the ventilation, cleaning nor lighting has received the attention it deserves, and I am sure that badly lighted and ventilated and dirty rooms have been and are still in this district serious obstacles to the progress of the children."

But though this inferiority in premises and appliances is generally recognised, yet in the case of voluntary schools, an indulgent estimate of the work done often leads to a higher merit grant than is due, because, although the managers have neglected their duty, the inspector is forced by his sympathy with the teacher to disregard any real standard of excellence. We quite recognise that exceptional difficulties in a school justify exceptional treatment by the inspector, if managers and teachers have done their best to overcome these difficulties; but where the school is allowed to suffer on account of the poverty or indifference of managers, it is not the duty of the inspector to give State aid, not in furtherance of, but in substitution for local effort.

As illustrations of the way in which the merit grant is awarded to some voluntary schools, we give the following cases extracted from the returns in answer to our Circular B, and from the portfolios at the Education Department: At Sheffield, the Moorfields national school, according to the return furnished in answer to our circular, presented 109 children, passed 61 per cent, obtained one shilling for the second class subject, and failed to get any grant for English, but was awarded the "fair" merit


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grant. The inspector, in his report of 1884, thus refers to the infant school. "In so dark and cheerless a room, infants are quite out of place, they have no gallery, no low flat desks, no suitable low-backed seats, no proper apparatus, no books"; he recommends a grant on account of the work of the teacher.

Sheffield Ellesmere Road Wesleyan school, girls' department, with 220 average attendance passed in 1885 66 per cent and got the reduced grant of one shilling for English, and two shillings for needlework. The "fair" merit grant was awarded. The inspector says - "The teachers of this school are sadly hampered by having to handle so many girls in one large room. The talkative habits, however, noticed last year have been to a great extent overcome. Had more intelligent methods been employed, better results would have followed. As it is, needlework has so much improved as to justify the recommendation of the higher grant; but the oral examination in English revealed such mechanical teaching as to unfit that subject for the higher grant. Pains have been taken with reading and handwriting. The faults noticed in the former may be traced to the impossibility of teaching the subject thoroughly to such large groups in one large room. The defective attainments in all their subjects of the fourth standard indicate not only incompetency on the part of their teacher, but lack of supervision on the part of the head mistress. Mental arithmetic throughout the school has been very badly taught. More suitable reading matter should be supplied. It is hoped that the managers will see their way shortly to providing class-rooms and an approach less likely to cause disaster in case of panic, than the narrow stone staircase now used." The accommodation of this school is one room 56 by 30 feet, and two so called class-rooms, one 20 by 8 feet, the other 13 by 8 feet, or a nominal accommodation for 264 at eight feet per child. After this report in 1885, fifteen years after the passing of the Education Act, we find in 1886 the remark - "It is hoped by next year a safer exit in case of panic will have been supplied". The school accounts show £105 10s charged for rent, of which the Sunday school repays £52 10s credited as income; there are no voluntary contributions, and the fees are 39 children at 3d, 146 at 4d, 37 at 5d, 38 at 6d.

The Sheffield St. Catherine Roman Catholic school presented 146 children, and passed 71 per cent, and attempted no class subject. It was assessed as "fair".

In the case of the Sheffield Surrey Street Roman Catholic school, in 1885, 188 boys were presented and 77 per cent passed. Of 179 girls presented 66 per cent passed, each of the departments was assessed good by the inspector. In 1886 the girls' department was again assessed "good", and the inspector remarks - "The girls are in very good order, but their attainments, though somewhat in advance of last year in elementary subjects, are still far from good. Writing and arithmetic require increased attention, and intelligence should be more developed, especially in the lower part of the school. Needlework and singing deserve commendation. For English, the ignorance of the subject matter of the recitations forbids the recommendation of the higher grant. It is to be hoped that the efforts of the present teacher to amend these deficiencies, of which she is well aware, will be supported by the supply of an efficient staff. Two only of the present staff are able to render real help. The good merit grant is again recommended, still, as last year, rather in recognition of the difficulties than of the actual deserts of the school. It is hoped funds will be forthcoming to make the room brighter and more cheerful."

Sheffield, St. Luke, Church of England, Dyer's Hill boys' school, presented 113 for examination, passed 57 per cent, failed to get any grant for English, and took no other class subject, and was assessed "fair".

Sheffield, St. Luke, Hollycroft, Church of England school, presented 128 children, passed 59 per cent, and was awarded the "fair" merit grant.

In Accrington, St. Andrew's, Hyndburn Street National school passed 64 per cent, and failed in both class subjects, and was assessed "fair".

In Ashton-under-Lyne, St. James' National school passed 74 per cent and failed in both class Subjects, and was assessed "fair".

In Glossop, the old Glossop Wesleyan school passing 65 per cent of the scholars presented, was assessed "fair".


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In York, St. Paul's Foundry, passing 63 per cent and not attempting any class subjects, was assessed "fair". This report, says - "Steps towards providing a permanent and suitable building for this rapidly increasing district should be taken with as little delay as possible." In October 1883, the report said, "Seeing the rapid increase of population in the neighbourhood, it will be necessary shortly to erect a more substantial and commodious building." The report for February 1886 condemns the building and teaching in the strongest terms. But there is not yet a school board formed in York, though the department has made repeated representations as to the inadequate school supply of the town.

In Derby, the Parliament Street Wesley an school, in 1884, presented 155 scholars, and passed 66 per cent., and attempted one class subject unsuccessfully. This school was assessed " fair. ' It was conducted without any voluntary subscriptions, the fees range from 2d to 5d, and the average fee is 13s a year. The whole school has 216 in average attendance. The staff was, head (untrained), salary £107; one ex-pupil-teacher, £40; two pupil-teachers at £14 and £12; an assistant under Article 84, £20. The total cost of school maintenance was £1 3s 6d per scholar.

The 1884 Report of the girls' department of St. Luke's Church of England school, Derby, says - "Discipline and order fairly good. The spelling and arithmetic are in an unsatisfactory state, English and needlework good, grammar pretty fair. I recommend the merit grant of "fair" with great hesitation, and I only recommend it because I feel that the mistress has worked very hard in her school, the crowded state of which (I called attention to it last year without any result being produced) renders it impossible for her to conduct her school properly. The managers should either provide additional accommodation or admit fewer children." The accommodation of this school at 8 square feet was 252, the yearly average 226. The school passed 68 per cent out of 247 girls presented. As a contrast to this the girls' department at the Nun Street board school, Derby, where 214 girls were presented and 84 per cent passed, and 2s was paid for English and a second class subject paid for, and 26 girls were taught cookery, the merit grant of "fair" was also awarded.

In St. Mary's Roman Catholic boys' school, Bradford, in 1884, the inspector awarded the excellent grant to the boys, because it is a new school, though he says, "the children have passed a fairly good examination in elementary subjects". In the girls' school he awards the merit grant of "good", though he says, "the children have passed a fair examination in elementary subjects". They passed 75 per cent.

At St. Anne's Roman Catholic school, Bradford, in 1884, the registers had been tampered with in the girls' school, and consequently a deduction of one-tenth was made from the grant. In the following year, 1885, though the inspector reports that the offices of both girls' and infant departments were found filthy, and though the registers of the infant school were incorrect, and a serious caution was addressed to the managers, both departments were assessed "good". The managers of this school in answer to our circular complain that the Code is too exacting. This school, with 357 average, returned no voluntary contributions, and cost £1 10s 8d a head.

At St. Peter's Roman Catholic school, Bradford, the inspector, in 1884, awarded the "good" merit grant. In his report he says, "the results of the examination are barely fair, the grants recommended are larger than the actual results would justify".

At Sheffield, the Brunswick Wesleyan school, in 1885, with 65 per cent of passes, and failing in English and geography, got the "fair" merit grant. In the inspectors' report we find the following remarks: "The 1s for needlework is recommended by a stretch of leniency. The structural defects pointed out in the last report still exist. [The class rooms too small to be of much value, tempt the teachers to overcrowd them." - Quotation from report of 1884.] This mixed school had 471 average attendance. In 1884 rates, taxes, and insurance are entered at £150; in 1885 rent is entered at £75 and no rates; in 1886 rent and fuel are entered at £100, and no rates are charged; in 1887 the rent charged is £70.

At Liverpool Christ Church national school we have an instance of a voluntary school held year after year in premises which violate the requirements of the Education Department. In 1885 the inspector says, "the schoolroom, which is underground, is most depressing"; in 1886 he writes of "the depressing conditions in which the work of a school in ill-lit underground premises must necessarily be carried on". In 1887 the inspector remarks that the school "continues to be taught in gloomy underground premises."


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At Sheffield, St. Luke's Church of England school, the inspector gives the "fair" merit grant to a school passing 58 per cent and obtaining the 1s class grant in each subject. He writes in his report: "For lack of good methods and attendance the results are far from what could be wished; the staff is insufficient." 162 were presented; the staff was head and one assistant.

In the cases where no quotations are made from the reports of the inspector, those reports have been examined, but they do not remove the impression of bad instruction conveyed by the scheduled results.

These specific instances of grants awarded in excess of the merit of the schools, and where the schools deserved a serious fine for bad instruction rather than any merit grant, are illustrated by some general evidence of inspectors. Thus, the Rev. C. Johnstone, the chief inspector of the south-western division of England, and himself in charge of the Chippenham division, in which there are few board schools, says (Blue Book, 1886-87, p. 324), "The percentage in reading is a high one, and seems to imply that there is little room or necessity for improvement. But the reading that passes is not necessarily good reading. The testimony of inspectors. I believe, is uniform that the reading is not satisfactory. My own experience points distinctly in the same direction, and I have no hesitation in saying that the standard for a pass in this subject ought to be raised, and that, as a body, we have been satisfied with too little. ... Each inspector is compelled to judge for himself; he has no set standard before him, and he frames one out of what he finds in the different schools he visits. Where all around is low his standard becomes low also; he is conscious of it himself, and he laments it, but he says, 'these children are all very much alike; they can none of them indeed read properly, and as the Code implies they ought to read, but if I pluck one I must pluck all.' And so in fear of too great sternness he errs on the side of leniency and lets all through. In this way, and not by any intrinsic excellence, is the high percentage of passes in reading accounted for, &c."

Mr. Johnstone, in his report for 1886 (p. 337), further speaks of the inspectors suffering all schools to drift towards the common sink of "good". He says, "If a merit grant is to exist, it should have its distinctions, but probably the truth is that these distinctions are productive of heart burnings and anxieties, and that inspectors apply the palliative by a levelling upwards of all whom their indulgence can crowd into the class of good."

A few lines further Mr. Johnstone speaks of the "struggling village school, with only the clergyman to care for it; with no funds, and often an indifferent teacher, and an irregular attendance of indifferent scholars. The inspector who arrives is in a dilemma. He must either refuse the grant and perhaps crush the school, or he must recommend the grant for work which he knows falls infinitely short of the standard laid down for him in the Code. He chooses, probably, the more merciful part, and from that hour he perpetuates bad teaching by rewarding imperfect effort."

The same south-western division was reported on by our colleague, Mr. Alderson, in 1884, as chief inspector. After describing the character of the district, and stating (p. 243) that the presumption is against the antecedent probability of elementary education being seen at its best in the south-western division, he states (p. 244), "The great preponderance of accommodation is to be found in voluntary schools." Noticing, on page 249, the proportions of fair, good, and excellent assessments, and the relatively large number of "good" reports, he says, "A school which is more than 'fair', but less than 'good' is placed, as a rule, in the latter category." And he further says, "that the mark 'excellent' has been given to infant schools, he is inclined to think, too freely." And again, he says, "that the percentage of 60 excellent or good infant schools and classes seems to him in excess of their real merit." Speaking of the schools which take no class subjects, principally in the Salisbury, Bournemouth, and Newton Abbot districts, he notes that the proportion to all schools of 12.7 per cent strikes him as somewhat large.

Mr. Harrison, Her Majesty's Inspector at Liverpool, stated in his evidence before us that he was more indulgent to schools working under difficulties in awarding the merit grant, and that the difficulties of the school might perhaps unconsciously affect one's judgment in other matters.

Mr. Synge, the inspector for part of Norfolk, states that the standard of instruction is kept down to some extent for fear of causing a loss of income to the schools, since if the grant falls below a certain point the people (i.e., the managers) would have nothing to depend upon. This must mean voluntary managers, as school boards always have the rates to depend upon.


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We may refer to the evidence of Mr. Mackenzie to show that inspectors in consideration of the financial difficulties of schools, award grants in excess of the real educational work done. He says, "The present standard is very low, and when it is known how much depends upon the examination, there is a tendency to accept a very low minimum. This we find especially the case in reading, and even in writing and arithmetic. I am often astonished at the kind of work that passes for 'good', and still more so with the class subjects." He states that the small village schools, which are extremely bad, are judged with more indulgence than their merit would justify; and he further says that sometimes schools are treated indulgently on account of their difficulties, while the difficulties have not been surmounted.

In 1877, when the work of the school boards was in its infancy, when board schools were far less well built and arranged than at present, and when the board schools recently opened were filled with ignorant children in the lower standards, Mr. Alderson spoke thus of the relative merits of the board and the voluntary system in the school board division of Marylebone (Blue Book, 1877-78, page 401), "The board school has the advantage of being entirely detached from the machinery of the parish. It can be conducted with a more single eye to learning. In voluntary schools it not unfrequently happens that an incompetent or superannuated teacher is sustained in office because he has been or is so useful in the parish, and so much respected there. Thus a sort of ' vested interest ' grows up in the post of teacher, which is often a hindrance to progress. Then the management of the board school is more uniformly careful and vigilant than that of the voluntary school. The management of voluntary schools of the best class is equally good, probably superior, but in many of the less efficient ones signs of apathy and indifference on the part of the managers may be discerned. I am far from claiming for inspectors an unerring judgment, but it is impossible not to notice as an almost new experience how sensitively the board school vibrates, go to say, to the touch of official criticism. The Government report undergoes a rigorous scrutiny, the figures of the teachers' salaries depend (too exclusively, I think) on the percentage of passes. [Note, the teachers of the School Board for London are now paid fixed salaries.] Each entry upon a certificate is scanned and weighed, and may seriously affect the prospects of the holder. In the best voluntary schools the same alertness is visible, but not in all. The report is sometimes regarded as a mere formality for announcing the amount of the grant; no action is taken upon it when adverse; the incapable teacher remains, and the record of his incapacity fills a corner of the school portfolio. Another advantage of the board school is the higher standard of school accommodation which it has introduced, an illustration of this will suffice. I was not myself aware, or rather I did not realise, how defective the lighting of many voluntary schools was until I came to compare them with the airy, brightly-lit chambers of the board school. This has led to the improvement of the light in several voluntary schools. Of the school work in board schools, a marked feature, due, of course, to their superior teaching power, is superior nicety. A first standard prepared by a certificated teacher is very different from a first standard prepared by a raw monitor; but then an equally marked feature in school board instruction in its present stage is its limited range. It will be a surprise to many who have credited the London School Board with au over ambitious programme, to learn that elementary school work nicely executed is at present the 'note' of their operations in Marylebone."

Mr. Alderson goes on to point out that at that time only 16 per cent of the children presented were above the third standard in board schools, compared with 30 per cent in voluntary schools.

The evidence of Mr. Martin shows the relative efficiency of board schools and voluntary schools in Marylebone ten years after the above remarks of Mr. Alderson. We find in 1886 that 37.5 per cent of the board schools and 14.5 per cent of the voluntary schools were classed excellent, five per cent of the board schools and 24.8 per cent of the voluntary schools fell to fair, no board schools and 2.7 per cent of the voluntary schools were refused any merit grant. Of the pupil-teachers 30 per cent of the board and 3.1 per cent of the voluntary passed well and earned 60s, 37.8 per cent of the board and 64.2 per cent of the voluntary earned nothing, but it must be noticed that these figures fail to show the full superiority of the board pupil-teachers, because the London School Board does not seal the indentures with its candidates till at the earliest the close of the first year, and, therefore, a very large number of the board pupil-teachers earned nothing, not because they passed badly,


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but because the Department refuses to pay on pupil-teachers for the year's examination at which they are admitted to apprenticeship.

We may refer to the results of the answers to our Circular B to managers of voluntary schools and to boards, as proving in other large towns how greatly superior is the work of the school board. Thus, in Liverpool, of the board schools 46.8 per cent were rated excellent, 49.4 per cent good, 3.8 per cent fair, and to none was the merit grant refused. Of the voluntary schools in the same town 10.5 per cent were rated excellent, 60.5 per cent good, 27.3 per cent fair. To 1.7 per cent the merit grant was refused.

In Sheffield 21.1 per cent of the board schools and 4.4 per cent of the voluntary schools were rated excellent. In Leicester the extraordinary proportion of 75.7 per cent of the board schools were rated excellent, and 16 per cent of the voluntary schools. In very few of the large towns are the voluntary schools abreast of or superior to the board schools as judged by the reports of the inspectors.

We think, therefore, that we are justified in concluding that school board management, by securing a sufficient area of collective supervision, by its command of sufficient funds for the due maintenance of schools, and by its greater facilities for building schools large enough to secure efficient organisation is more able to promote national education than the voluntary system; that already the results of board school teaching are proved to be distinctly superior to the education provided in voluntary schools, that there is evidence to show that the standard of educational efficiency is kept down out of tenderness to the want of means of voluntary schools, and that a lower standard is applied to them, avowedly in the matter of school buildings and furniture, and also to some extent in the estimating of the results of examination.

CHAPTER 15

COST OF PUBLIC ELEMENTARY EDUCATION

The cost of our elementary education is defrayed mainly from three sources.

1. The fees paid by the parents, amounting to about 10s 6d head.
2. The grant from the State, amounting to about 17s a head.
3. (a) The subscriptions in voluntary schools, amounting to about 6s 9d a head.
(b) The rates in board schools, amounting to about 18s 6d a head.
The gross cost per head in voluntary schools was £1 16s 6d, in board schools, £2 5s.

Many questions arise on these figures and on the distribution of the cost.

Many persons demand that fees should be abolished, though no definite scheme has been put before us showing how and at whose cost this is to be done.

We are not agreed in principle on the question whether school fees should form one of the sources of income for a national compulsory system of elementary education.

But having regard to the fact that the larger part of the education of the country is in the hands of voluntary managers (more than 63 per cent), it becomes a practical question how it would be possible, consistently with the continuance of the voluntary source of school supply, which we all agree will continue largely to contribute to our public elementary school system, to introduce any subsidy either from local or national sources to make good the deficiency of income which would result from the abolition of fees generally. The first question is, should the loss be made good from local or from national sources?

As it is always thought more popular and more easy to assail the Treasury than to put new burdens on the ratepayers, probably there would be found more advocates for charging the proposed subsidy on the Imperial Exchequer than on the rates.

But, assuming this to be granted, on what principle should the subsidy be based?

It would clearly not be equitable to give no help, or very little, to the managers who are educating the poorest, at the lowest fees and at the highest cost to themselves, and it would be unreasonable to give a very large public subsidy to the parents who, by paying 9d a week and even more, have shown that they are comparatively well-off. We are therefore thrown back on the idea that an average subsidy from the State,


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approximately equal to the present fee income, say 10s a head on the average attendance, should be given to all schools alike.

But if this grant were made to the low-feed and free schools security would have to be taken that the money was used in improving the education, and not in relieving the pockets of the voluntary subscribers or the local ratepayers, and conditions of increased efficiency would have to be enforced on these schools for the poor which might prove a matter of some intricacy to settle in detail.

On the other hand, the schools charging a fee of 6d and upwards, having 3.75 per cent of all the children under instruction, or nearly 169,000, would lose an income of at least 12s per child per annum, and the schools charging a fee of 4d to 6d, having 18 per cent of all the children, or nearly 585,000 children on the roll, would lose 5s a child per annum of income. The bulk of these children paying the higher fees are in voluntary schools, and a much larger proportion of the whole than in board schools.

Now, however undesirable it may be that the better education of children in elementary schools should be coupled with a heavier charge on the parents, and however much some of us may desire the extension of the board school system, for this reason among others, that it would make the liberality of the school curriculum more independent of higher fees, yet we must all of us recognise that it is better that there should be good schools, even though they be maintained by higher fees, than that their efficiency should be seriously crippled by cutting off a material part of their income. And no one can doubt that the mass of high-feed voluntary schools, if deprived of their fee income and contracted in their resources by a loss of from 5s to 12s, or possibly more than a pound a head, would be unable to raise so great a deficiency by subscriptions, and would be forced to lower their salaries, reduce the amount and quality of their staff, and generally injure their education. At any rate, while we have a right to expect some substantial effort of a local character, either voluntary or from the rates to meet the liberal grants of the National Exchequer, it would not be wise too absolutely to contract their present resources. And even in the case of school boards it is doubtful whether the higher elementary schools which have been founded with so great advantage would have been as warmly supported by the people if the power to charge high fees had not lightened the burden on the ratepayers.

We are therefore compelled in the interest of education to conclude that no practical scheme of free education compatible with the continuance of the voluntary system has presented itself to us.

But stopping short of the recommendation of free education there is no doubt that there are substantial grievances coupled with the present fee system, and that a refusal to sweep away that system makes it the more imperative on us to reduce its practical hardships to a minimum. And in dealing with the fee question we have to consider two classes - the average poor for whom a reasonable fee is required, and the specially poor for whom free education is necessary.

And first to deal with the average poor. In the case of school boards the intervention of the Education Department is necessary before a board school fee can be finally settled and become legal. The Department has used its right of interfering in the settlement of the fee as much in the direction of insisting upon a high fee as of securing a low one. We think that the duty of the Department is to secure that the fee shall not be beyond the means of the parents, but if a school board proposes a low fee, they are the elected representatives of the ratepayers on whom the loss will fall, and the Department should not interfere for the purpose of raising the fee.

Secondly, we think that in no case should the fee be raised with the standard in which the child is working. The sound principle on which a fee should be settled is the ability of the parent to pay, and an increase of fee as the child gets higher in school has a bad influence and tends to drive the child prematurely to work. Indeed, we had evidence that the fee is raised in this way sometimes with that express intention.

The returns from managers of voluntary schools in answer to our Circular A are very interesting as illustrating the evil result of raising the fee by age or standard. Of the counties to which Circular A. was sent, three - Lancashire, Durham, and Stafford - are populous and manufacturing, and the labouring population in those counties may generally be supposed to be better off than in the seven remaining counties: Berks, Leigh of Devon, Dorset, Gloucester, Kent, Leicester, Lincoln. The three first-mentioned counties are the three counties in which the majority of the schools raise their fees according


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to age or standard, and not according to the means of parents or number in the family. The proportion being -

Age or StandardMeans of Parents
or No. in Family
Durham18029
Lancashire1,260217
Staffordshire203141
1,643, 81%387, 19%

In the remaining seven counties the following were the figures -

By age or standard, 481, 25 per cent, by means of parents or number in the family, 1,410, 75 per cent.

In answer to the query, are the fees paid with or without difficulty, in the first three counties the numbers are -

Without difficultyWith difficulty
Lancashire842308
Durham191154
Stafford214116
1,247, 68%578, 32%

In the seven other counties the answers are, without difficulty 1,680, or 86 per cent: with difficulty 274, or 14 per cent.

It certainly cannot be supposed that the poor in such counties as Berks, Devon, and Dorset would find it easier to pay fees than in Lancashire, Staffordshire, and Durham.

Thirdly, we think that the fee should cover all the cost of the schooling, and that extra charges for books and school material are objectionable, as are special charges for special extra subjects taught. The curriculum of a public elementary school should be suitable to the children attending it; and class distinctions should not be introduced in the school, nor should there be a danger that the poorer scholars will be neglected for the select few, who receive special instruction at an extra charge.

These rules should apply to all schools, voluntary as well as board. In many parts of the country the voluntary schools have a monopoly of the school supply. In all parts they are reckoned as part of the school supply available for all. It is right therefore that the fee should not be capricious. We should not permit higher fees to be charged for backward boys, or irregular boys, or insubordinate boys - practices which exist at present, though to what extent it is hard to say, as these matters seldom come to light.

There is, however, a common and growing practice in many voluntary schools of raising the fees and then making a return of a part as a reward for regular and punctual attendance. This method seems to be a very convenient and effective one in the interest of school discipline and punctuality, but it cannot be accepted as satisfactory as it amounts to a new fine imposed on irregularity, not by the magistrate, but by the managers, and must fall most heavily on the poorest who unavoidably are most in danger of sending their children irregularly to school.

We think, therefore, that in all public elementary schools the fee should be approved by the Department, whose duty shall be to secure that it is not in excess of the power of the generality of the parents in the neighbourhood to pay. This fee should be uniform throughout a department, and not rise by class or standard, though there may be a reduction for the number in the family. It should cover all school charges, and where the school is the only one, or the other schools with lower fees are full, it should have a prescribed maximum of a moderate amount.

Passing now to those who should be exempt from fees. The action of the guardians cannot on the whole, according to the evidence before us, be considered satisfactory.

In the first place it should be the duty of the guardians to pay the fees of all children, whether under five or past the standard for exemption, whose parents wish to send them to school and who are otherwise fit subjects for aid.

Secondly, in the case of outdoor paupers, the guardians should pay all fees direct to the managers of the school, and not give a lump sum to the parent to include fees.

Thirdly, if the guardians retain the duty of paying fees, they should entertain applications at places convenient to the applicants and away from the workhouse, and


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especially in rural districts they should make arrangements in the different villages for hearing applications.

But the guardians have not generally given satisfaction in the discharge of this duty, and there is among many a feeling that it should be transferred to school boards. A majority, however, of managers have answered our circular adversely to this proposal, and though this may be owing partly to their ignorance of school boards, and their unwillingness to promote their formation, yet we think, having regard to the strong feeling that existed in reference to the 25th clause of the Act of 1870, that it would be unwise to re-open that topic of contention. But we are of opinion that facilities should be given whereby poor parents may obtain the payment of moderate school fees for their children in voluntary as well as in board schools without any association with ideas of pauperism.

Facilities might also be given to managers by a re-adjustment of the grant which would make it easier for them, in suitable cases, to remit the fees of poor children in their schools.

It is a hardship, not to say a scandal, that the largest share of public support should now go to those who need it the least, and who make the least effort to deserve it by corresponding contributions on their own part. The large high-fee'd schools of the towns, which are admittedly the easiest to maintain in a state of efficiency, and which often cost the managers nothing or next to nothing, receive very high grants; on the other hand, the struggling village school, or the school working among the poorest people in our large towns, with low fees and comparatively liberal contributions from rates or subscriptions, owing to the difficulties of teaching earns a low grant. It would not be desirable, so long as the State is not in favour of a general policy of free schools, to pay the managers such a subsidy as would make them indifferent whether they collected fees or not, but we think that where the conditions of the neighbourhood make the managers think low fees expedient they should be recouped a pari of the necessary loss; this would enable them more easily not only to acquiesce in a general low fee, but to remit the fees to those who either temporarily or permanently are unable to pay them.

We suggest that in all schools where the fee income for the year is between 9s and 10s a head, the fixed grant shall be augmented by sixpence a head, and be increased sixpence for each shilling diminution of fee income, and on the other hand, that schools receiving from 11s to 12s a head from fees should be subject to a diminution of sixpence on the fixed grant, and should be diminished an additional sixpence for each increase of 1s on fee income up to £1 a head from fees, where the diminution should cease.

Such a re-adjustment of the grant would do much to maintain the small village schools and the large schools in the poorer districts of our towns, where a missionary work is carried on among the most difficult children. We recommend further that school boards have full power if they see fit, without any check from the Education Department, to make some or all of their schools free schools. They are not likely to do so largely, on account of the cost it would entail on the ratepayers, but it would be well they should have that liberty, as the financial loss only affects their constituents.

In connection with the question of free schools, we must consider the case of those very poor children who come to school unfed and who not only need free education, but should be fed if they are to be enabled to benefit by the instruction of the school.

Free halfpenny and penny dinners have been supplied of late years in many schools, and there is no doubt that the regular feeding of the poor children in schools is a great aid to their regular attendance and to their progress in their studies.

We consider this question apart from the other question, whether self-supporting dinners might not well be organised by managers, both in country districts, where children come from great distances, and in towns where the parents have gone out to work and the children cannot go home to dinner. Such a system of self-supporting dinners must often be of great use, and we trust that managers will provide them where they are satisfied that they are needed.

But the free dinner or free breakfast opens a much wider question, and brings the administrators of education in contact with the problems and the work of those, who either as guardians of the poor or as charitable persons, relieve the destitute or succour the indigent.

Some have thought that day industrial schools are the best way of helping these very poor children. But while day industrial schools may be a way of reclaiming children whose surroundings are not merely miserable but degrading, there are many


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cases of extreme poverty where the children should not be forced into any associations which must have a humiliating or even a contaminating character.

While we recognise that the misery which prevails in many parts of our great towns is a serious hindrance to the education of large numbers of children, and cordially acknowledge the value of the relief which is afforded by free or cheap dinners, we cannot ignore the fact that where food is given freely on a large scale, there must be a tendency to neglect safeguards of investigation, and to diminish the self-supporting efforts which are the greatest protection of the poor against their permanent depression.

Much is done quietly now in the way of feeding the hungry and clothing the naked by managers, teachers, and school board visitors in the poorest districts.

Sometimes sewing clubs are formed in the schools, where the girls who are better off bring clothes and make and mend them for their poorer fellow scholars, and nothing can be better for the character of all than such mutual help. We cannot doubt that in our large towns there are hundreds, and in London thousands, who need nearly daily food as well as free schooling. But seeing the dangers of collective action and its certain indirect evils, we make no recommendation on this subject.

The second main source of income in elementary schools, and far the largest in amount for the whole country and for the voluntary schools, is the Government grant.

Before 1870 the average Government grant was less than 10s a head, but when the Education Act was passed the Government, as has been before mentioned, in order to give a better opportunity for the voluntary schools to hold their own, enacted that the grant might amount to not more than one half of the total expenditure of the managers, and subject to that condition to a possible maximum of 15s, which maximum was afterwards removed. The grant rose steadily, and after the Act of 1876 it rose rapidly, while the fees also rose, but subscriptions fell off, the managers being enabled in an increasing measure to conduct their schools by the help of the fees and the grant.

It is now urged by a very great number of witnesses that the obligation to find one-half of the cost of school management from local resources, as a condition of receiving more than 17s 6d from the Government grant, should be relaxed or repealed. It is only of late years that this cry has been very loud, as it is only since the increased grants made payable by Mr. Mundella's Code that it has become a practical thing for any large number of schools to earn even as much as 17s 6d. But undoubtedly at the present time a considerable number of large schools can earn 17s 6d, and more than 17s 6d, with comparative ease; especially if they have small or no infant departments attached to them.

The claim of the managers sounds plausible when they say, "Under a system of payment by results you should pay us all we earn". Their attitude is that of contractors with the Government for scholastic results, and they contend that if they deliver so many good passes, so many class subjects, and so on through a priced catalogue of educational items, the Treasury has nothing to do but to add up the bill and give a cheque for the amount.

But this description of their relations with managers has never been accepted by the Government nor by the law, as expressed by Parliament. The law is a provision for State assistance in aid of local effort, and the local effort down to 1876 was always an essential condition of State aid. The relaxation of the obligation of the local sources of income to equal the Government grant which was made in 1876 cannot be taken as an argument why all securities for local contribution should be swept away. Nor has the Government ever admitted, even at the time of the promulgation of Mr. Lowe's Code, that their system of payment was one for results in the sense in which it is now urged as a reason for removing the obligation to furnish local funds for education.

At page xiii of the Education Report of 1874-75, issued by the Duke of Richmond and Viscount Sandon, occurs the following important passage: "By the changes in the Code, which will come into operation next year, we hope to check the practice of withholding children from individual examination who are qualified for it by attendance, and to secure that due attention is paid to branches of instruction beyond the standard course, which have recently been neglected by school managers and teachers on the insufficient ground that no special grants were offered by the Code for their encouragement. The spirit, and even the letter, of the instructions to the inspectors, issued in September 1862, after the introduction of the Revised Code, appear to have been strangely forgotten, for we find in those instructions the following passage [Report, 1862-63, page xviii]: 'The grant to be made to


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each school depends, as it has ever done, upon the school's whole character and work. The grant is offered for attendance in a school with which the inspector is satisfied. If he is wholly dissatisfied, and if the reasons of such dissatisfaction are confirmed, no grant is made.' ' You will judge every school by the same standard that you have hitherto used, as regards its religious, moral, and intellectual merits. The examination under Article 48 (i.e. by standards) does not supersede this judgment, but presupposes it. That article does not prescribe that if thus much is done a grant shall be paid, but unless thus much is done no grant shall be paid. It does not exclude the inspection of each school by a highly educated public officer, but it fortifies this general test by individual examination. If you keep these distinctions steadily in view, you will see how little the scope of your duties is changed.'"

No doubt there has been a tendency year by year to forget the standing conditions of efficiency required by the Code, as requisite for the payment of a grant, such as suitable premises, appliances, proper staff, honesty in the management and conduct of the school, and to look more to the special tests applied on the day of inspection which determine the exact amount of the grant to be paid. It seems to us that the tone and attitude assumed by so many managers towards the question of the 17s 6d limit is one of the most serious facts we have to consider in reference to the question whether steps should not be taken to dissociate the grant paid from this mechanical assessment of scheduled results. The very managers who clamour for the repeal of the 17s 6d limit in a great number of instances ask for the abolition of payment by results; not seeing that the repeal of the 17s 6d limit would intensify the idea that these scheduled results of examination are the things for which the Government pays, and not rough and ready tests, by which it ascertains whether the State aid offered to local effort is really deserved.

Many of the managers and teachers who oppose the 17s 6d rule also complain of over-pressure, but nothing is more likely to produce over-pressure, and nothing has more contributed to such over-pressure as exists than the mechanical forcing of a large number of children to get through the examination, when the whole equipment of the school is regulated by the greatest parsimony, and the fees and the grant are the principal if not the sole sources of support. Managers who contribute little or nothing to the yearly maintenance of the school are not in a position to insist on rational management, nor can they control or check the teacher. He must be at liberty to arrange the school, not for the welfare of the children, but so as to secure a maximum of school income. Hence the curriculum is arranged with a view to what will pay. The staff is kept down, or at any rate assistants are engaged at starvation wages, while a vigorous teacher is often engaged at a considerable salary, who drives the school rather than teaches it, and practically pits his intelligence against that of the inspector, so as to produce the best paper result on the day of inspection.

One witness, who was very full of criticism of the working of the Code, having a school with 140 half-timers and an average of 350 to 360, and 476 children on the roll, told us that he worked the school with six assistants, mainly ex-pupil teachers, all women; he teaches English and geography all through the school, and presents the girls in needlework to earn a shilling on that subject. There are no subscriptions. The ten assistants get - one £60, three £45 each, one £35, and one £30, and the head master gets £30 fixed, a third of the grant, a third of the pence and the night school money. It is not surprising that in this school the religious instruction is neglected before the examination, and that in the opinion of the head master the clerical managers know it.

In this school, where the head master received a salary of £275 9s, besides the night school grant, the demoralising effects of what is practically a farmed school, though the fact was denied by the witness, are plainly apparent. No wonder complaint is made of over-pressure, where with such poorly paid assistants, and with a large number of half-timers, the girls are made to take two class subjects in addition to the needlework, and the head teacher has the inducement of a large but uncertain salary to crowd his time table up to the 17s 6d limit. Who can doubt that if that limit were withdrawn in such a school as we are referring to, an attempt would be made to wring 18s or 19s grant out of the children without any improvement of the staff at the expense of the managers.

The Code, the inspector, everything is blamed except the greed of those who wish to manage and conduct schools at no cost to themselves, and practically for private profit.


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In reference to the 17s 6d limit it may be noticed that Mr. Birley in his evidence stated that a school in Manchester for boys, girls, and infants, fairly managed, should cost 30s a year; at this rate 17s 6d would be nearly three-fifths of the entire cost, certainly an ample sum for the central fund to pay, and the alleged growth of cost of school management cannot be urged in Lancashire in support of the relaxation or abrogation of the present law if this evidence be generally correct. We are of opinion that whatever may be the fate of the 17s 6d limit, we are, in all cases, entitled to expect a substantial amount of local contribution as a condition of State assistance.

Assuming that the share of the cost of elementary schools borne by the Treasury is already sufficient, and we may note that some witnesses, such as Lord Lingen, consider it excessive, it is urged by a few witnesses and by several memorials that the pressure on voluntary schools is too great, and that they should be entitled or enabled to obtain aid from the local rates.

The majority of the witnesses who appeared on behalf of the denominational schools expressed their apprehension that local aid from the rates must involve local control by the ratepayers, and apart from other considerations the majority of the advocates of the denominational system are not willing to give up their power of managing their schools in consideration of a subsidy from the rates.

But in considering the question of the burden on subscribers we must examine whether that burden is really excessive.

The annual returns of the Education Department from 1869 to 1886 show that voluntary schools as a whole cost the subscribers 6s 9d per child in 1886 as compared with 7s 3d in 1869, while the parents are paying 11s 2d as compared with 8s 4d in 1869 and the taxpayers contributed public aid to these voluntary managers to the amount of 16s 10d per child in 1886 as compared with 9s 7d per child in 1869. Thus it does not appear that the complaint of the friends of the voluntary system is justified, or that the burden on them has been increased unreasonably.

But some advocates of voluntary schools put forward the claim that if they furnish gratuitous and voluntary management, they are entitled to throw the whole burden of maintenance upon the parents and upon the public resources, whether local or national. Such a pretension seems to us inconsistent both with reason and with justice. Already it appears that through the irresponsible power of taxation by raising the fees, the burden on the parents has been increased in voluntary schools by 2s 10d per child in average attendance.

While we recognise the fairness of increasing State aid in proportion to the poverty of the parents, and the consequent increased pressure on the funds of the managers, and therefore recommend that the State grant should vary with the fee income of the school, we cannot recognise the propriety of aiding by large grants schools in which the voluntary subscriptions are little or nothing. As to the proposal to aid voluntary schools from the rates, this matter was considered in 1870. The original Bill empowered school boards, if they thought fit, to aid voluntary schools, subject to the obligation that they must aid all or none. But it was felt that it was inexpedient to raise the burning controversies that must necessarily accompany such a proposal; that part of the Bill was abandoned, and in lieu of it the aid of the Treasury was enlarged to a grant not exceeding half the total income, nor 15s a head. Both of these limits have since then been relaxed.

There are two great difficulties which seem to us to make any proposal of aid from the rates to denominational schools impracticable even if it were politically expedient.

First, there is the religious difficulty of directly subsidising schools where varying theological dogmas are taught, and where the teachers are limited to distinct denominations.

Secondly, there is the still greater difficulty of giving local aid without local control. The State has the fullest power of regulating the conditions on which its aid is given, and from year to year the ministry, subject to the check of the House of Commons, can vary or put an end to its payments.

But if aid were given by the locality it must be either optional or compulsory. If optional, we should see revived in every school district the old Church rate controversy, and the managers of voluntary schools would hardly wish to depend upon so uncertain and so unpopular a means of support. If compulsory, it would be necessary to give the local contributors, that is the ratepayers, that power of management which the present managers consider the chief advantage for which they are willing to bear the burden of their voluntary contributions.


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Some have suggested a definite capitation grant from local sources to be paid over to all voluntary schools. If this were done, then the schools which have no subscriptions would enjoy a surplus; the schools where subscriptions exist would probably see their subscriptions fall off; it is not likely that permanently the income of the schools would be augmented, but merely that the burden would be shifted from those who now bear it to the public.

In a rural parish, where at present there is no board school, it is not to be expected that the ratepayers would accept the burden, and not have the same voice as in an adjoining parish where there is a school board. So, too, in towns it is impossible that the ratepayers would be willing to bear the cost of the schools and not participate in their management.

If the schools were partially transferred so that an attempt at some kind of mixed management were set up, there would very soon be a claim that the managers of schools intended for the use of all, and maintained at the cost of all, should not exclude as teachers all but the members of one church.

If we look at the evidence we see that witnesses who would have no objection on principle to the establishment of a denominational system at the public cost shrank from the practical consequences of proposing such a plan.

The following references to the evidence are worthy of attention on this point:

Mr. Allies, on behalf of the Roman Catholic body, states: "If our schools are supported by rates I dread their falling pro tanto under the power of the ratepayers. ... I have great dread of assistance from the rates for that reason. There is more difficulty in our country, because the theological feeling enters so largely into the minds of the people, and I cannot imagine but that the ratepayers would always be stirring up opposition to this, and would fix upon this or that thing taught in this or that school, whether ours or somebody else's, and would say, 'We have to pay for this, and we do not believe in anything of the kind.' I do not see very well how to meet that jealousy."

In answer to the analogy of industrial schools and reformatories, he says, "I can conceive that to be possible certainly. ... My trust in the ratepayers is very small indeed at present. There must be a great change, I think, in the feelings of the people to make such a scheme as your Eminence mentions act well. It is possible, I think, certainly. I have a very great distrust of the ratepayers."

Mr. Allies says further that he has no scheme for making public assistance given to board and voluntary schools equal, and that he has considered a scheme of exemption from rates, and does not like it, and that his dread of receiving from the rates is great.

The Rev. J. Duncan, Secretary to the National Society, while desiring more public aid for voluntary schools, thinks that help from the Consolidated Fund is more feasible than from the rates. He does not see any reason in principle why the supporters of denominational schools should be called upon to give subscriptions. He sees nothing unreasonable in the recognition and support of voluntary management by State funds in the total absence of voluntary contributions. Mr. Duncan, however, states, that he has no sympathy with the schools that are supported without any subscriptions.

Sir Lovelace Stamer is opposed to giving aid to the voluntary schools from the rates; he says, "putting the voluntary schools on the rates would involve the loss of their independence of management; I foresee that at once, and I would much sooner that we should face our own difficulties and keep our own independent management."

The Rev. Canon Wingfield sees no objection to voluntary schools receiving a small portion of their support from the local rates, but adds that that could not be done without involving some control on the part of the ratepayers, and he thinks that such aid would be a step towards universal school boards.

The Rev. Joseph Diggle, Chairman of the London School Board, says, "I do not see personally how you can throw more upon the rates without giving the people who pay the rates control over the expenditure of the money."

The Rev. Canon McNeile thinks that aid from the rates would imply interference from the school board.

Mr. Herbert Birley is of opinion that if the voluntary schools get aid from the rates their managers will lose the control of them.

The Rev. Prebendary Deane is opposed to any plan for aiding voluntary schools out of the rates.


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Mr. J. A. Brooke of Huddersfield, Chairman of the Huddersfield and Saddleworth Church Day School Association, says that he should not advise voluntary schools getting aid from the rates.

Mr. Brodie, Her Majesty's Inspector in Worcestershire, considers that if voluntary schools are aided from the rates they must eventually become board schools.

On the other hand Lord Lingen and Mr. Cumin both gave evidence in favour of decentralising the administration and support of elementary education and contemplated a closer connexion between the ratepayers and their representatives and the denominational schools.

Lord Lingen considers that the proportion of the whole cost now borne by the National Exchequer is excessive, and he lays the chief blame on the Act of 1876, which so long as the grant does not exceed 17s 6d a head, permits it to exceed one-half of the total yearly cost of maintenance. Lord Lingen states that he would never permit the Government grant to exceed the amount raised from other sources, and he would also wish to have a fixed maximum of 15s per scholar, though he would prefer a fixed maximum on population. Lord Lingen, while conceding a maximum State grant of one-half, would prefer a maximum of one-third. He would hand over the Government grant in a lump to some local education authority administering a considerable area, which would not only have wide discretion in the distribution of the Parliamentary grant, but would have power to make terms with the voluntary schools and subsidise them out of the rates. He has not elaborated any details of his scheme, but he proposes to repeal the 14th or Cowper-Temple clause of the Act of 1870, and he seems to suppose that the repeal of this clause would enable the local educational authority to subsidise denominational schools. He seems here to confuse between the power to maintain denominational schools and the power to aid schools not under the management of the school board, two entirely different things. His scheme, though a mere sketch, implies very extensive changes in the present law, and leaves a great deal to free negotiation in the various localities between the various managers of voluntary schools and the representatives of the ratepayers.

Lord Lingen brings the vigilant economy of an ex-Secretary of the Treasury to bear against the tendency to increase the burden on the Exchequer. Mr. Cumin brings the grievances of an overworked secretary to the Education Department to bear from other motives in the same direction: the decentralisation of our educational machinery, and the throwing more responsibility and more power on local authorities. Mr. Cumin also proposes to repeal the Cowper-Temple clause, and he also is somewhat obscure in his evidence as to whether he contemplates the subsidising of denominational schools under voluntary management, which has nothing to do with that clause, or the establishment of denominational board schools. He seems from some of his answers to contemplate both results. He says, in answer to the question, "Do you seriously believe that a school board in a county such as you contemplate would set up in a populous district a Wesleyan school, a Church of England school, and a Roman Catholic school, and appoint a Wesleyan teacher in one, a Roman Catholic teacher in another, and a Church of England in a third?" (Answer) "I do not see why they should not", and he seems to contemplate that the voluntary schools would be transferred to the boards, keeping their denominational character, but lacking their denominational management, and yet he contemplates the former managers retaining the appointment of the teachers, and the settlement of the curriculum and the fees, and of the salary of the head teacher. On the whole it appears that, though Mr. Cumin made in some parts of his evidence considerable concessions of power on paper to the voluntary managers, yet what he expects is that the effect of his proposed system would be to put an end to all the voluntary schools, and he speaks of his scheme as the application of the Scotch system to England. We are of opinion that the large changes opened up by the evidence of Lord Lingen and Mr. Cumin, of which aid from the rates to denominational teaching forms only a small part, would not be acceptable to the mass of voluntary managers who value highly their present direct relations with the Education Department, and while we dissent from their views we think that the consideration of so extensive a revolution must be consequent on any new scheme of local self-government that may pass into law.

There is a class of schools which specially need and deserve aid from the Parliamentary grant - the small village schools.


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These were recognised by the Act of 1876, and a special grant of £10 or £15 is given where the population within two miles, and solely dependent on the school, is below 300 or 200. This grant, however, is not coupled with any special requirement of efficiency. We are of opinion that these village schools need further aid. The test of population is a difficult one to apply. The population is not necessarily that of the parish or township, and the inspector is forced largely to rely on the statement of the managers as to the number of inhabitants within the prescribed distance. We are of opinion that where there is an isolated school with no school nearer than two miles by the nearest road, that school is needed for the local population; and if the average attendance is below 100, the school requires special aid to be carried on efficiently. At the same time, we think that the alternative between £10 and nothing is too abrupt, and we should be glad to see a grant paid to all such isolated schools where the attendance is below 100, increasing by 6s 8d for each child by which the attendance falls below 100 up to a maximum grant of £20. At the same time we think that the Department is entitled to attach certain conditions of efficiency to this grant, such as the existence in all cases of a certificated head teacher of experience and efficiency at a minimum salary of £60, and the requirement of a proper curriculum, such as we have already indicated. The employment of provisionally certificated teachers, and the limitation of teaching to the three standard subjects, are found almost exclusively in these small village schools, and we think that while we may justly claim for our agricultural population a fuller measure of instruction, schools of this class should receive further aid to meet their special difficulties and cost. We refer to the evidence of Prebendary Roe on this subject. He has made a most careful examination of village schools in the county of Somerset, and his evidence is of great value. He states that the managers generally express their willingness to improve their staff if they have further aid from the Treasury, and he considers it fair to couple further requirements as to staff with an augmented grant. In these small rural schools Prebendary Roe found that in populations below 200 where the £15 grant is given, the burden on subscribers was 16s a head on the average attendance. In populations from 200 to 300 where the extra grant of £10 is made, and the infants are paid for as senior children, the subscribers found 12s.2d a head on the average attendance. In districts with a population over 300, and not more than 500, and therefore receiving no special grant, the burden on subscribers was 14s 10d, and in districts where the population is from 500 to 600, the cost of the schools to the subscribers was 10s 3d a head. Taking all the Church schools in the parishes with less than 600 population, Prebendary Roe finds the burden on subscribers 12s 11d a head in 151 schools averaging 48 scholars each.

The local effort of subscribers here compares very favourably with what is done in the large towns, where nevertheless the State aid from grants is highest, and where higher fees are obtained from the parents. Thus, in Liverpool 47,936 children in average attendance in voluntary schools were maintained by voluntary contributions amounting to £6,436, or about 2s 8d a head. In Manchester 27,735 children cost £7,735 in voluntary subscriptions, or 5s 7d a head. In Burnley 7,006 children in average attendance cost the subscribers £1,114, or about 3s 2d a head. In Preston 14,085 children cost £2,821, or 4s. a head. In Oldham 12,853 cost the subscribers £757, or 1s 2d a head. In Stockport 8,776 children cost the subscribers £600, or about 1s 4d. In Birmingham 21,704 cost the subscribers £4,581, or nearly 4s 3d a head.*

We think that these facts show that without any absolute increase of the Parliamentary grant it might be redistributed in such a way as to aid local effort, and meet special difficulties in thinly-peopled districts more than it does now.

CHAPTER 16

LOCAL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL AUTHORITIES

We have now examined the history and growth of elementary education since 1870. We have noticed how far the present school supply can be considered sufficient in quantity and satisfactory in quality. We have reviewed our present staff of teachers

*Return to Circular B.


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and the existing modes of preparation and training which are applied to them, the curriculum, the inspection, and the relative merits of board and of voluntary schools.

We now turn to the question - how should our elementary schools be managed.

Many witnesses, mainly advocates of the voluntary system, have given evidence as to the advantages resulting to education from the rivalry between the two systems working side by side. Mr. Brooke, of Huddersfield, stated that he believed if voluntary schools ceased to exist the ratepayers would look exclusively to economy in the management of the board schools, and that sectarian emulation contributes now to secure efficiency in the management of board schools. The Rev. J. Duncan, Secretary to the National Society, spoke of the advantage to the secular instruction of the competition between board and voluntary schools, and said that if the voluntary schools ceased to exist side by side with board schools a great stimulus to efficiency would be withdrawn. Mr. Duncan states that the existence of a board school near a voluntary school tends to raise the standard of the expenditure and instruction in the voluntary school, and again, he states that in regard to school work, and particularly to religious instruction, he has no doubt that the competition is good, and that there is rivalry in good work, he further states that the effect of the rivalry is most felt where the two systems are working side by side, and is mainly, though not exclusively, felt in towns where there are school boards, and is reduced to its minimum in the rural districts.

Many other witnesses speak to the same effect.

We are of opinion that though undoubtedly the existence of two different systems leads to much jealousy and friction, and often mixes the consideration of educational questions with denominational struggles, yet that this countervailing advantage does undoubtedly exist to some extent, that the denominational system is forced where it is brought in comparison with the school board system to justify its existence by redoubled efforts after efficiency, and the success which may attend such efforts has been remarkably shown by what has been accomplished for the Church of England schools in Huddersfield through the association described in Mr. Brooke's interesting evidence.

We are of opinion that, having regard to the share in national education now taken by voluntary bodies, it would not be a practical proposal to transfer the whole maintenance and management of all our elementary schools to public representative bodies. At the same time we feel bound to call attention to the serious evidence of Mr. Mark Wilks, a member of the School Board for London. He says, "The working of these two systems together in London, the voluntary school system and the board school system, has been disastrous. It was thought that we should work in all respects very harmoniously. It has ended in producing a friction that is doing harm to the children of London, that is to say, it is stopping progress, as friction very often does It has been more expensive. ... The education of the children has been delayed unwarrantably. ... The quality of education in our schools is kept down to a large extent by this system of rivalry. I meet a great many men who are managers of board schools, and who are managers of these board schools, not so much to promote a generous and liberal education in those schools, as that they say, 'You must keep these schools down to the level of a neighbouring very poor denominational school.'" Mr. Wilks' conclusion is, "I say that it would be better that we should come to have one system all through London."

Other evidence shows that the board schools suffer from the election of a board more anxious to protect the supposed interests of the voluntary schools than to promote the efficiency of the board schools. Thus the evidence of Mr. Palgrave shows that at Great Yarmouth the education in the board schools has fallen short of what it might have been, and that the school supply has for years been inadequate, and the fees have been levied so as to injure school attendance, the majority of the board having been elected by the supporters of the denominational system.

And at Stoke-upon-Trent, Archdeacon Sir Lovelace Stamer, for many years chairman of the board, gave evidence that he was employing trained assistants in his own school, while the board relied mainly on ex-pupil teachers. The curriculum in the board schools, moreover, was much narrower than is desirable in such a district as the Potteries. Sir Lovelace Stamer had a higher "church" school with a fee of 6d, but the board has no such school, and drawing is not taught in any of the board schools, though it was formerly taught in two of them.

We have no doubt that the conflicting interests of the voluntary and board systems have led very generally to the election of members of school boards sometimes of the


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majority, whose policy and action have considered first the supposed interest of voluntary schools, and, secondly, the full development of the education of the district.

We are also of opinion that it is the absence of responsible public management, drawing adequately upon local resources, that forces us to acquiesce in the present unsatisfactory method of determining the distribution of the money given from Imperial funds in aid of local effort.

But if the vested interests of the supporters of existing voluntary schools compel us to acquiesce in this state of things, we are of opinion that large numbers of people living in districts where at present no school boards exist, have suffered severely in their educational interests, by the non-existence among them of that educational competition, the value of which is fully recognised by advocates of denominational education in school board districts.

Not only is the educational efficiency of the schools likely to suffer where there are no board schools, not only are the buildings often of an obsolete and unsatisfactory, not to say of an unsanitary description, but playgrounds are often non-existent or too small to be of any real use; the furniture is inconvenient and unsuitable, the curriculum is narrowed, the fees are fixed by an irresponsible authority, and are apt to be higher than in similar districts under school boards; and the nomination of the teacher is mainly in the hands of the clergy of the Established Church; and the large body of Nonconformists, who are principally to be found among those using elementary schools, have to submit to a school system permeated by the influence of an unsympathetic, and often hostile, church organisation, and in the management of these schools they have no voice, though they furnish compulsorily a large part of the scholars in attendance.

The Act of 1870 called into existence for the first time a large number of elementary schools, which are under the management of boards elected by all the ratepayers in the several school districts, but it also gave a strong impulse to the creation of schools of the older type which are in the hands of private and, in many respects, irresponsible managers.

The prolonged existence, side by side, of schools of both descriptions is sometimes spoken of as a part of the compromise of 1870; as though all parties had accepted it as a final and satisfactory solution of some of the most difficult and perplexing questions which have to be considered in any attempt to construct a system of national elementary education. But it is clear that the Act of 1870 was never accepted as a satisfactory settlement of these questions by large bodies of Your Majesty's subjects who were specially interested in the education of the children of the great masses of the people. The politicians who had led a great popular agitation for the establishment of a national system of unsectarian education to be administered by public representative bodies, rejected it and recorded their rejection both in and out of Parliament in every form that was available to them. The Nonconformist bodies also rejected it, and in January 1872 a conference was held at Manchester, to which 2,500 delegates were appointed, of whom 1,865 were present, representing Nonconformist churches and organisations, by which the settlement of 1870 was condemned.

Among the most remarkable of the resolutions condemnatory of the Act were those passed by a large and powerful committee especially appointed by the Wesleyan Conference in 1872 to consider the question of primary education, which were laid before us by one of our witnesses.* The report of this committee was adopted by the Conference of 1873, which passed the following resolution on the subject: "The Conference adopts the Report of the Special Committee on Primary Education appointed by the last Conference. In adopting this report the Conference expresses its regret that the essential parts of the recommendations of the Committee have not been adopted by the Government in their measure for the amendment of the Elementary Education Act, 1870, and records its deliberate conviction that in justice to the interests of national education in the broadest sense, and to the different religious denominations of the country, school boards should be established everywhere, and an undenominational school placed within reasonable distance of every family."

The existing dissatisfaction of Nonconformists with our educational system was expressed in resolutions recently passed by a large number of Nonconformist organisations, and submitted to us by one of the witnesses who appeared before us, and by many other resolutions which have been sent to the

*See Chapter on Nonconformist Grievances.


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Commission during the course of our inquiry. The general demand of these resolutions is that "all public elementary schools receiving parliamentary grants should be placed under the direct control of the representatives of the ratepayers." There are various reasons assigned for this strong opposition to what is commonly described as the denominational system.

The large majority of the public elementary schools, which are not under the management of school boards, are regarded and administered by their managers as part of the equipment and organisation of the several churches with which they are associated; and their primary purpose is to instruct the children in the faith of the churches to which their managers belong. But there are large numbers of persons who believe that to identify the public elementary schools of the country with different churches, and to commit a large part of the control of the education that is given in them to the clergy of these churches, is certain to prolong and embitter social and religious divisions, and to prejudice the unity of the national life. They hold that national education is pre-eminently a national work, and should not be subjected to any sectional or sectarian predominance. But under the present system the work is to a large extent taken out of the hands of the nation to be placed in the hands of ecclesiastical organisations in proportion as they are wealthy, and willing to purchase the right to administer the grants voted by Parliament and to control the education of the people.

The system is objected to by many on constitutional grounds, because, contrary to the recognised principles of administration in this and in all countries where representative government exists, it commits large sums of money, raised by general taxation, to the control of private persons who are neither nominated by the Crown nor elected by the people; and in this particular application of public money there is this additional aggravation, that while the money is drawn from taxpayers of all shades of religious opinion it is placed at the disposal of school managers who avowedly conduct schools described as public, and largely supported by the money which they receive from the State, and from the fees fixed by their unchecked discretion, and levied upon scholars who are compelled to attend, for the maintenance and propagation of the distinctive dogmas of the several ecclesiastical organisations of which they are members and ministers. It is alleged that at a time when Parliament is considering the best means of extending and improving the institutions which entrust to the people the conduct of their own affairs, it seems especially incongruous to strengthen a system which excludes the people from a right to share in the management of what must be regarded as one of the most momentous of all their affairs - the education of their children. Moreover, we have received evidence showing that among Nonconformists of all descriptions the system is regarded with deep resentment as inconsistent with the elementary principles of religious liberty, and as inflicting on themselves, in large districts of country, grave hardships and injustice.

But the special Nonconformist grievance is dealt with in a separate chapter of this report, and we dwell at present on the political objection to confiding the mass of our national education to private managers, who have special denominational interests to which they attach the highest importance, whereas we ought as widely as possible to interest the whole community in the administration of popular education, with a sole view to its greater efficiency, and its more complete correspondence with the wishes and feelings of the majority of those who use it, always showing the most scrupulous regard for the views of any local minority. We, therefore, think that even though the existing system be so widely established that it cannot be superseded where it exists, yet that in the development of the future the policy of the country should be directed towards the extension of a popular and comprehensive system not of one privately managed and based on sectarian differences.

We recommend, therefore, that for the purposes of school supply, small country parishes should be consolidated, and the smaller school boards united; and that, provided the areas of administration are sufficiently large, where there are at present no school boards, there should be a competent local representative authority, to whom should be entrusted the supply and management of any additional schools required. We also think that the demand formulated by the Wesleyan Methodist body in 1872 is a reasonable one, that there should either be a board school or other undenominational school within reach of all the population. This provision would be nothing but equitable if the claim of the denominational bodies to retain their schools under independent private management, with very large aid from the State, is to continue to be supported.


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In reference to the mode of election of school boards we are of opinion that the present cumulative vote is an unsatisfactory mode of securing proportional representation.

Some of its defects might be remedied by other forms of proportional representation, but it is questionable whether the election of school boards should be conducted otherwise than other local elections for administrative bodies are conducted.

Proportional representation, especially as it works through the cumulative vote, tends to the representation of small cliques, and often puts upon a board a person unsuitable and positively objectionable to the mass of the community, who is nevertheless able to use his position on the board for the purpose of obstructing business, and discrediting its character by unseemly disturbance. The cumulative vote, or any system of proportional representation, operates as a direct invitation to conduct school board elections on sectarian lines.

The present system, by compelling a contest to take place throughout the whole of the school district, either entails a heavy cost, both on the ratepayers and on the candidates, or leads to compulsory compromises in order to avoid that expense. In some towns the knowledge that a contest will inevitably lead to sectarian animosities also operates so as to induce leading men to arrange a compromise list.

We are of opinion that the larger towns should be divided into wards, returning not more than five members each, and if any form of proportional representation be retained, believe that the single transferable vote is preferable to the present cumulative vote.

If school boards should be formed in rural districts of a considerably larger area than the parish, which is our recommendation, we think that the local element should be considered in any scheme of representation.

The question has been raised whether school boards should be superseded by some other local authorities to be created either under the Bill now before Parliament, or by some future legislation.

We are of opinion that it is premature to consider this question, and that no suggestion should be entertained as to the possible superseding of school boards, at any rate until the country has had a considerable experience of the working of the new local bodies proposed to be created.

CHAPTER 17

COMPLAINTS OF THE ADVOCATES OF DENOMINATIONAL SCHOOLS

In the course of our inquiry many witnesses appeared who specially represented the interests, and the point of view of the advocates of denominational schools, and they made numerous complaints against the existing system.

First as to the school supply, many of them complained that owing to the prior right of school boards to supply deficiencies of accommodation, the various church organisations may be prevented from building schools suitable to the wants of the members of their denominations, or at any rate they may be excluded from a share in annual grants.

The representatives of the National Society, and of church school managers, the Rev. David Waller, a Wesleyan, and several Roman Catholic witnesses, among them Mr. Allies, the secretary of their Poor School committee, all urged this grievance.

We have already stated that the Act of 1870, undoubtedly put upon school boards the responsibility, and the duty of supplying for the future all school accommodation needed in their districts.

But, partly from reluctance to spend the ratepayers' money, school boards have generally been ready and willing to welcome any extension of the voluntary school provision. There have, however, been some cases, where either because they had already built schools and did not wish to see the attendance diminished, and the consequent cost of management increased, or because they considered board schools better and more suitable to the district, they have opposed the admission of new voluntary schools to annual grants. These cases have not been numerous. Indeed, compared with the large addition to the voluntary school accommodation since 1870, they have been extremely few; for voluntary schools have increased between 1870 and 1886, from 1,878,000 to 3,438,000 places, an increase of 1,560,000 places. The


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Appendix to our first volume, pages 525-7, shows the cases dealt with as to unnecessary schools, page 527, giving those where annual grants have been refused in school board districts. The whole number in this list is small, only 51 schools, some of these are board schools, and several have been admitted afterwards to the receipt of annual grants. But, though, practically throughout nearly all the country, full freedom of expansion has been enjoyed by the advocates of voluntary schools, yet a few exceptional cases of refusal, and the fear that in future other refusals might be experienced, have led to a great deal of agitation, and to a strongly expressed feeling of grievance, and it is urged that there should either be full liberty to promoters of voluntary schools to obtain annual grants, or at any rate, that the Education Department should consider the religious needs of the population, or of any section of it, in deciding on the suitability, and consequently on the necessity, of the proposed school provision.

The word "suitable" is one that appears in the Act of 1870. In section 5, it is enacted "there shall be provided for every school district a sufficient amount of accommodation in public elementary schools (as hereinafter defined), available for all the children resident in such district, for whose elementary education efficient and suitable provision is not otherwise made", and in section 8 the Education Department is required to procure returns as to the amount of public school accommodation required in a district, and "after such inquiry, if any, as they think necessary, shall consider whether any, and what public school accommodation is required for such district, and in so doing they shall take into consideration every school, whether public elementary or not, and whether actually situated in the district or not which in their opinion gives, or will when completed, give efficient elementary education to, and is or will when completed, be suitable for the children of such district."

This word has led to a great deal of controversy, and its interpretation is connected with one of the matters which has caused as much irritation as almost any other in the administration of the Act, especially coupled with the fact that as the law has imposed on school boards the duty of supplying all the deficiencies of accommodation (under section 98, of the Act of 1870) the Education Department has been in the habit of consulting school boards when a new voluntary school in their district applies for annual grants, as to whether the school is needed or not, and when the board has supplied, or is willing to supply the deficiency, the department has refused to admit the new school to annual grants. A typical case of the grievance is that of the Dan y Graig Roman Catholic school, within the district of the Swansea school board. There was a local Roman Catholic child population in that immediate neighbourhood of about 90 children, and of these, some 55 were attending the board school. Canon Wilson, the Roman Catholic priest, was anxious to build a Roman Catholic school for their accommodation, and he commenced operations in November 1883. In the following January he wrote to the Education Department sending the plans, and asking for recognition of his school. The Department answered that before annual grants could be promised, the school board must be consulted, and on February 21, 1884, on receipt of the plans, they stated that the plans were approved of for 195 places, but that no annual grant could be promised, and that they must invite the opinion of the school board. About this time or before June in that year, the school board for Swansea sent an application and plans to the Department for an enlargement of their own school, and on June 7, the Department informed Canon Wilson that they had assented to the proposal of the school board. The Roman Catholic school was finished in July, and opened in August 1884, and was inspected and recognised as an efficient school on April 1, 1885, but repeated applications to be admitted to the receipt of annual grants have been refused by the Department on the ground that the school is unnecessary, the Swansea board having supplied all the places needed for the accommodation of that district; though on the day of inspection there were 181 children in attendance at the Dan y Graig Roman Catholic school. Now it is urged by the Roman Catholic body that this case is covered by the word "suitable" in the Act of 1870. It is urged by them that they have a strong objection to mixed schools, that they desire religious as well as secular education, and that the only religious education they can recognise is that in their own faith. Without, therefore, discussing the point whether in the absence of a Roman Catholic school, it is consistent with their conscientious belief to attend a Non-Catholic school for secular instruction, they insist, that where the choice is open to them between a Roman Catholic and another school, it becomes vital to them to attend their own school, which is the suitable one, and the other, even if suitable before will become unsuitable. They, therefore, urge that even where there is an ample supply of school


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places numerically, they should be allowed to provide a school of their own and be admitted to annual grants. It must be admitted that the Education Department from the time of Mr. Forster, immediately after the passing of the Act of 1870, has contended down to the present day, that every public elementary school having a conscience clause was ipso facto suitable to all, no matter what their religious opinions. In this sense a Protestant or board school is suitable for Roman Catholics, and a Roman Catholic school, even conducted by Nuns or by Christian brothers, is suitable to the extremest Protestant, the Jew, or the Freethinker.

It is obvious that board schools being under the management of the representatives of the inhabitants, must be managed suitably to the majority of the population where they exist, but minorities consisting of persons as Mr. Forster described them, of strong religious convictions, by which it is clear he meant of strong and distinctive religious convictions, may not find themselves suitably accommodated in board schools, or in any schools except those of their own persuasions. No doubt the law only imposes the obligation of building schools in the case of a school board, but it would seem equitable where in all ordinary understanding of the word the people for whom the schools exist show that they do not consider them suitable, by frequenting others, that the State should not exclude these schools if efficient, from annual grants.

We agree with the Rev. W. J. B. Richards, Roman Catholic diocesan inspector of schools, that the conscience clause is not of much use as a protection. We think that it is in the management of the school, and in the appointment of the teachers that the true securities for fair play and freedom from the danger of proselytism are to be found.

The cases will be rare where schools will be built and frequented from a repugnance to the type of teaching given in board schools. The mass of the Protestant population of this country do not desire to see the minor differences among the various denominations emphasised in the day schools. Where the management is moderate and conciliatory, we find that parents choose their school largely by its neighbourhood, by its efficiency, by its pleasantness, by its cheapness, sometimes by its dearness and consequent exclusiveness. The one exception is the Roman Catholics. They are unwilling to go to other schools, when they can have their own, and their schools are rarely used, and mainly for want of other accommodation by Protestants. Other bodies may build schools in connexion with their church organisations, but their efforts will not necessarily be responded to by members of the congregations, but no one doubts that the Roman Catholic parents, whether in deference to their priests or by their own preference, do their best to frequent the schools of their own church. It would be well if Parliament should recognise this fact, and should give, as in Scotland, a wider meaning to the word suitability. The same principle would apply where school boards are desirous of building on account of the great pressure on their schools and their popularity. Where the parents show that they consider the board schools most suitable, the boards should not be restrained from building in the interest of some voluntary school which has remained for years half empty, unpopular, and often structurally and educationally inefficient and unsuitable.

We must point out that the liberty of establishing distinctive and denominational schools under private and largely under clerical management, is a fair concession to minorities where the general school system is popular and representative, but the circumstances are materially altered if this liberty to found exclusive schools prevents the mass of the people from having the control of the management and the appointment of the teachers in the schools to which they are by law forced to send their children.

There are other circumstances that render a school unsuitable to a section of the population who otherwise would use it, besides the marked denominational character of its management. Among them may be mentioned the demand of a fee disproportionate to the means of the majority of the parents. The Education Department recognises that a high fee may render a certain school not fully available for the population among which it is placed, and the words of the fifth section of the Act of 1870, "available for all the children resident in such district, &c.", have been so construed as to enable the Department to affirm that if the only school has an excessive fee it will not be considered available for all the children in the district. These distinctions of language are not very important. So long as it is recognised that there may be a need of further school provision in spite of the existence of a sufficient number of places in some kind of public elementary school or other, it matters little


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whether the reason for the need be found in calling the existing accommodation not available or not suitable.

Another complaint which is commonly made against school boards is that they have built excessively, and thereby closed efficient voluntary schools by their competition. The phrase commonly used is that the school board system was intended to supplement, but that it has been used to supplant the voluntary system; that not only have schools been needlessly multiplied, but that the increase of cost has told severely upon the managers of voluntary schools who have had increased claims made on them for subscriptions in spite of the promise made in 1870 that the cost should be lightened to them by an increase in the Parliamentary grant.

We had one or two specific allegations of over building by boards to the prejudice of voluntary schools, which we were able more or less to test.

The Rev. J. Gilmore, Chairman of the Sheffield school board, who is also the manager of several voluntary schools in Sheffield, in which he states that there are no voluntary subscriptions made, two complaints. He said, in reference to a school opened by the Sheffield board, "We proved by figures and statistics to the Education Department that there were in existing efficient elementary schools, within half a mile radius, 1,500 vacant places", and notwithstanding that the school board of Sheffield was allowed to build this large school for 850 children. Mr. Gilmore states that school accommodation should be provided for one-sixth of the population; at that rate, the population in Sheffield in 1886 being estimated by the Registrar-General at 310,957, there should be nearly 52,000 school places. The Education Department's statistics for 1884-85 furnished to us for our Return B, showed a little more than 47,000 places of all kinds; and the reports of Her Majesty's Inspector showed that much of this accommodation is unsuitable and unavailable. Our returns show that in the Sheffield voluntary schools, out of 74 principal rooms, there are 38 above 25 feet in width, the widest being 57 feet; and out of 125 class-rooms, there are 41 less than 14 feet wide, the narrowest being 7 feet wide, and there are six under 10 feet high.

Mr. Gilmore rested his objection to the building of a board school in Sheffield on the existence of vacant places in existing public elementary schools, but he afterwards stated that whether the voluntary schools are full or empty, there ought to be places for one sixth of the population. He further admitted that vacant places in Roman Catholic schools are not suitable for Protestant children, and that schools with high fees are not suitable, so that it cannot reasonably be expected that their vacant places should be filled.

The school which, according to Mr. Gilmore, the Chairman of the Sheffield board, ought not to have been built in Sheffield, had been open a fortnight when he gave his evidence, and was already full, having 860 accommodation, and about as many on the roll. He complained, however, that it had been filled by partially emptying other schools, drawing 250 children from St. Matthias, 150 from St. Barnabas Church of England school, from St. Mary's 42, and from the Brunswick Wesleyan school 27, from a second St. Barnabas school 44, and from the surrounding board schools 204. But according to Mr. Gilmore's evidence some of these board schools were permitted by the department to be overcrowded temporarily, pending the opening of the new school, and were, therefore, bound to part with some of their scholars when that event took place.

The Brunswick Wesleyan school appears by the Education Report of 1886-87, to have had a nominal accommodation of 1,030, and a yearly average of 630, thus accounting for 400 of the 1,500 vacant places. We have already referred to the Government examination of the school, and the report of Her Majesty's Inspector in the year 1885, which complains of the bad teaching, the unremedied structural defects, and the class rooms too small to be of much value, which tempt the teachers to overcrowd them. In the year 1886 no merit grant was awarded to this school. The main room is 57 by 57 feet. There are two class rooms each 9 feet wide.

St. Barnabas, Alderson Road, national school, had 143 scholars in average attendance, and 237 places according to the Education Report, 1886-87, or 94 vacant places, but the principal room is 49½ feet by 33, and supplies 206 places at 8 square feet per child. If this room were measured at 10 feet, and the width beyond 24 feet excluded from the calculation, it would hold less than 120.

In St. Barnabas, Cecil Road, with accommodation for 546, and 359 average, or 187 vacant places, the main room is 60 feet by 30, that is, it accommodates 225 children at 8 feet per child. At 10 feet per child, and excluding the space beyond 24 feet in width, it accommodates 144 children. The infant school has a room 62 feet by 30.


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St. Matthias, stated by Mr. Gilmore to be the best school in Sheffield, had 853 accommodation, and by the Blue Book of 1886-87, returned 748 average attendance, or nominally 105 vacant places. In this school the principal room in the boys' department is 65 feet by 36 feet. In the girl's department it is 45 feet by 36 feet. In the infant school there are two class rooms each 13 feet 10 inches wide.

In St. Matthias school, the fees in the boys' department are 4d, 5d, 6d, and 9d a week, according to standard, and subjects taught; in the girls' department 4d, 5d, and 6d.

St. Mary's, Hermitage Street, Church of England school, had 926 accommodation, and 582 average, or nominally 344 vacant places. The fees in this school, are, boys 4d, 5d, 6d, according to class.

In the Brunswick Wesleyan school the fee is 3d. 1st Standard, 4d 2nd, 5d 3rd, 6d. 4-5-6-7 Standards.

Of the 1,500 vacant places alleged by Mr. Gilmore as a reason against building this Sheffield board school, 1,100 were in the schools he mentioned. We have shown the character of the nominal accommodation, and in some cases the fee of these schools, and also the fact that Sheffield generally, though a town where the working class is a preponderating element of the population, has school places, reckoning all these bad buildings at 8 feet per child, for less than one-sixth of the population.

The second case of improper building of a school by a board, complained of by Mr. Gilmore, was at Hull. He says, "When I had charge of St. Philip's national schools at Hull, about nine years ago, the Hull board determined to build schools within a few yards of those old national schools. I then represented the matter to the Education Department, and did all I possibly could to stop it. It seemed that Her Majesty's Inspector had given his consent, and the consequence was that the Education Department did not wish to withdraw, but to effect some sort of compromise in the matter; and the result was that the national school, Trippett, or St. Philip's, was closed just as soon as the board school was opened. The new school was not more than half filled at the time; there was no necessity whatever in that case for the board to build schools so near to the existing efficient national schools; the board school was the Charterhouse Laue board school."

Mr. Gilmore stated that when the Hull school board built this school there was accommodation in the neighbourhood for more than a sixth of the population, and that the board school was just across the street from a large national school. It appears that this took place in spite of Mr. Gilmore, in 1879, when the Duke of Richmond was President, and Lord George Hamilton, Vice-President of the Education Department.

We had the advantage of hearing Mr. O'Donoghue, the clerk of the Hull school board, a few days after Mr. Gilmore gave his evidence. He stated that owing to the great pressure for want of schools, the Hull school board has been even too careful in delaying to supply the necessary accommodation, and that the fear of trenching upon denominational schools had kept the board from fully discharging their own duty in the matter of school supply. Mr. Stevelly, Her Majesty's Inspector for Hull, reports in 1879, the date of Mr. Gilmore's complaint, that 24,500 children should be in attendance, and the whole accommodation was for 21,727 scholars. He states that it is difficult to choose sites without coming near existing schools. In reference to the special case of the Trippett school, complained of by Mr. Gilmore, Mr. O'Donoghue said that the school was closed, but not as a result of the opening of the board school. It was closed before the opening of the board school, and the managers asked the board if they would take the master in connexion with that school. "I should say that the master had farmed the school - it was a very weak inefficient school ... the master said he could not pay an assistant master, which would have involved an expense of £70 a year with the off chance of getting enough children to fill the school." After the boys' department at the Trippett school was closed, the average attendance of girls and infants in the following year was higher than the previous attendance of all these departments.

The board school though near this church school had its entrance in another street, so that the entrances were a considerable distance apart.

Another case of alleged over-building was brought before us in reference to the London school board.

That board projected and built a school for 1,200 children in Upper Kennington Lane, Lambeth. There was great opposition to the building of the school by the clergy and others interested in the neighbouring voluntary schools, but at length


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the school was built. The present school board for London asked the present Education Department to allow them not to open the girls' and infants' departments; this application was, however, refused, and the school was opened and filled immediately.

Some facts and figures in reference to this school will be found in Appendix D, XVI, of our Second Report. The official letter from the board shows that after building Upper Kennington Lane school and another school (since abandoned), there would be a deficiency in the district of 238 places, reckoning every voluntary school-place in the district as fully available, though 598 of these places were, in the judgment of the board, unavailable. In 1886, the figures of children scheduled by the board show a deficiency of 906 places after building the school in Upper Kennington Lane. The dimensions of the rooms and fees of the various voluntary schools are shown in a table at page 1,043.

No doubt individual instances may be found where some particular voluntary school has fallen off in attendance after the opening of a board school in the neighbourhood, and considering that there are many schools bad in premises, management, staff, and teaching, it would be strange if some had not suffered when parents had a chance of sending their children to a thoroughly efficient and well equipped school. But if we examine the facts broadly, we shall find that the growth of the board school system has accompanied a great improvement and expansion of the voluntary schools.

The pledge given by the Government in 1870, that the board system was to supplement and not to supplant the voluntary system, has been kept, and more than kept.

Apart from the text of the Act, the spirit in which it was conceived may be found expressed in the words of Mr. Forster in his introductory speech when he stated "We must take care not to destroy the existing system in introducing a new one. In solving this problem, there must be consistently with the attainment of our object the least possible expenditure of public money, the utmost endeavour not to injure existing and efficient schools, and the most careful absence of all encouragement to parents to neglect their children. I trust I have taken the House thus far with me. Our object is to complete the present voluntary system, and fill up gaps, sparing the public money where it can be done without, preserving as much as we can the assistance of the parents, and welcoming as much as we rightly can the co-operation and aid of those benevolent men who desire to assist their neighbours." That welcoming of voluntary aid was not only applicable to the then existing voluntary schools, it was intended and enacted that a period should remain open during which the denominational friends of education should be invited and encouraged to supply the need of schools. In the same speech Mr. Forster said as to the supply of new schools, "Now, here for a time, we shall test the voluntary zeal of the district. Not only do we not neglect voluntary help, but on the condition of respecting the rights of parents and the rights of conscience, we welcome it. To see then whether voluntary help will be forthcoming, we give a year. We think we ought to give enough of time to test the zeal and willingness of any volunteers who may be disposed to help, but we ought not to give longer time, because we cannot afford to wait. If that zeal, if that willingness, does not come forward to supply the schools that are required, then the children must no longer remain untaught, and the State must step in." The Bill went through considerable changes of detail during its passage through the House of Commons, but on the third reading, Mr. Gladstone, the Prime Minister, made a memorable speech in answer to Mr. Miall, in which he spoke in very much the same tone about the Bill. He said (page 507, Report of Education Debates): "It was with us an absolute necessity, a necessity of honour and a necessity of policy, to respect and to favour the educational establishments and machinery we found existing in the country. It was impossible for us to join in the language or to adopt the tone which was conscientiously and consistently taken by some members of the House who look upon these voluntary schools having generally a denominational character as admirable passing expedients, fit indeed to be tolerated for a time, deserving all credit on account of the motives which led to their foundation, but wholly unsatisfactory as to their main purpose, and therefore to be supplanted by something they think better. That is a perfectly fair and intelligible theory for any gentleman to entertain, but I am quite sure it will be felt that it has never been the theory of the Government." Sir John Packington in the same debate, after one or two small criticisms of detail, stated that he accepted the measure with thankfulness and joy, and, indeed the general conclusion which may be gathered from the debates is, that the Government, with the aid of the Conservative party, fully carried out this


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policy of cordial recognition of the existing voluntary system, in opposition to the strong and repeated attacks of the more advanced section of their own supporters.

But it was never intended or understood that this favourable treatment of voluntary schools should relieve them of the obligation to make some exertions and to submit to some personal sacrifices on behalf of a system, which enabled them, with considerable State aid and a large measure of administrative freedom, to retain the monopoly of the education of many districts, and to be strongly protected in their existing rights in those places where school extension under boards should prove necessary. Nor was it intended to prevent the growth of school boards and the gradual and voluntary transfer of existing schools to representative bodies. On the contrary, we find that in the debate on the second reading, Mr. Forster in answer to Mr. Dixon (page 42, Ed. Debates Report) said, "I was glad, however, to hear my hon. friend expressing his belief that under the provisions of the Bill, school boards would quickly become universal, and compulsory attendance insisted upon, because I agree with him in entertaining the hope that the effect of the Bill will be that school boards will be established throughout the country, and that in a short time attendance at school will be rendered compulsory." And again in the debate of the 20th June, on the motion that the Speaker leave the chair on the recommitted Bill, Mr. Forster urged in favour of the new proposals of the Government, "The school boards will come into operation more speedily, and they will work more cheaply, and these are two reasons why their number should be increased, rather than diminished." And on June 27, in the debate on Mr. Walter's amendment in favour of universal school boards which he moved avowedly for the purpose of facilitating the transfer of voluntary schools to boards, Mr. Forster said that "He had always looked forward to many of the existing voluntary schools being willing to transfer themselves to school boards, and he hoped that that would be the case."

But where voluntary managers have been willing to continue their schools, let us consider what has been the effect of the Act of 1870, and of its administration by the Education Department.

Before 1870 it used to be estimated that the average yearly cost of school maintenance was about 30s per child in average attendance, roughly divided into equal parts between the fees, the grant, and the voluntary subscriptions. (The appended table gives, omitting fractions of a penny, the income per head from fees, grant, and voluntary subscriptions, and the total income in Church of England schools from 1865 to 1886).

CHURCH OF ENGLAND SCHOOLS

INCOME PER CHILD: AVERAGE ATTENDANCE

[click on the image for a larger version]

The Government in 1870 promised that aided schools might in future earn a further grant so as to make the proportion that the grant might bear to the whole income a possible maximum of one half, and a possible amount, subject to that limitation, of 15s a head. The restriction as to the grant not exceeding half the total income was imposed by section 97 of the Act, its augmentation was determined in the Code. Some friends of the voluntary school system urged that parliamentary security should be given them for the augmentation, but it was felt that the solemn pledges of a Government associated with legislation of such importance were a sufficient guarantee, and on the advice of Mr. Disraeli, no legislative enactment was pressed for.


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It may here be noticed that in 1876 a further concession was made to school managers by the removal of the parliamentary obligation that other sources of income must equal the grant in all cases where the grant did not exceed 17s 6d, and at the same time the conditions of public aid were so altered under the vice-presidency of Lord Sandon, as to largely increase the grants which might be earned on the adoption of a more liberal curriculum. But it was never intended in 1870 that schools should be maintained without local contributions. Mr. Gladstone, on the 24th June, in the debate on the recommitted Bill, said: "We shall take care that under no circumstances shall the public grants be allowed so to operate as entirely to supply, together with school pence the sum necessary to support those [voluntary] schools, and there shall always remain a void which must be filled up by free private contributions, and without which, failing other sources of assistance, these schools would no longer deserve the character of voluntary." As a matter of fact, even in 1870, there were a few high-feed schools which were self-supporting by means of the fees, and of the grant; and since then, the raising of the fees and of the Government grant, has greatly increased their number; but such a state of things was never contemplated as normal, or intended to be the financial basis of our national system.

Under these conditions of increased financial support, and with their prior right on the school constituency carefully protected from school board competition, both by the natural reluctance of the boards to spend money, and by the action of the department, where boards have been anxious to push the erection of schools; what has been the career of the voluntary schools, and can it be said that as a system the board system has been false to the honourable pledge given in Parliament, and has superseded the voluntary schools?

A time of grace was extended to voluntary effort, which by the statement of the Earl de Grey, then President of the Council, made in his speech on the second reading in the House of Lords, practically gave a period of from 18 months to two years "before the door will be closed against voluntary exertion". It was therefore contemplated that after that date, the further supply of school provision was to be practically entirely in the hands of the boards, but if we take the year 1874, as fixing the period up to which this vested right of expansion was operative for the growth of the voluntary system, what are the facts since that date?

In the schools inspected in 1874, voluntary accommodation was 2,626,000 school places; the average number on the roll was 2,277,000, and the average attendance was 1,540,000 children. In 1886 in round numbers the accommodation was 3,443,000 places, the average number on the roll was 2,867,000, and the average attendance 2,187,000, an increase of 817,000 accommodation, 590,000 on the roll, and 647,000 average attendance; while the board schools in the same time have increased from 245,000 accommodation, 221,000 on the roll, and 138,000 in average attendance, to 1,692,000 accommodation, 1,638,000 on the roll, and 1,251,000 in average attendance. But so far from the board schools having emptied the voluntary schools, the latter are fuller now than they were in 1874, the average attendance being 63.5 per cent of the accommodation, whereas it was 58.6 per cent of the accommodation in 1874. The voluntary schools which in 1874 had accommodation for 65.4 per cent of the estimated child population needing school places, had in 1886 accommodation for 73.6 per cent of the estimated child population, and if we look to the number on the roll, we find that in 1874, 57.7 per cent of the child population was on the roll of voluntary schools, and in 1886, 61.7 per cent of the child population was on the roll of the voluntary schools inspected during the year. So far, therefore from the school boards having superseded or supplanted the voluntary schools, it is evident that both together have been labouring, the one in discharge of a Parliamentary duty, the other as a self-imposed task in overtaking the lamentable deficiency of school provision and school attendance which disgraced the country before 1870.

And so far from the strain on the resources of voluntary subscribers having been increased, the table of subscriptions, fees, and grant, which we have given for Church schools, shows that the income from voluntary subscriptions is 2s 3d a head, or nearly 25 per cent less than it was in 1876 when Lord Sandon's Act materially increased the grant, and relieved managers from the obligation in all cases of finding half the income of the school.

In the case of other voluntary schools, the voluntary subscriptions are lower than in the case of Church of England schools. Thus, the Wesleyans in 1886, with 130,088 scholars, derived £15,691, or 2s 5d a head from voluntary contributions.


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In 1878, the first year when their returns were separated from British schools, their subscriptions yielded 3s 1d a head.

The British schools in 1886, with 258,396 scholars in average attendance, had an income from subscriptions of £74,694, or 5s 9d a head. In 1878 their subscriptions yielded 6s 10d a head. The Roman Catholic schools derived 7s 2d a head from subscriptions in 1886, and 9s 5d a head in 1876.

But some of the advocates of voluntary schools complain that the lightness of their subscriptions is no refutation of the reality of their grievance, because, in addition to subscribing to their own schools, they have to pay rates for the support of the board schools, thus maintaining a system they dislike, and crippling, so far, their means of maintaining their own schools; and some of them ask that they may be excused from payment of the school rate to the extent to which they subscribe to their own schools.

As to the grievance of contributing to a system they dislike, that is inseparable from the fact that the maintenance of schools has been made a public duty charged on public funds. No man is allowed to take credit for his expenditure in private charity in diminution of the poor rate. If the proposal to allow deduction of subscriptions to voluntary schools from the school board rate were allowed, that would be in practice maintaining all schools, denominational and others, from the rates. The proposal, even if it were theoretically reasonable, is not a practical one. As to the further complaint that people who pay rates are unwilling to subscribe any longer to voluntary schools, this merely shows that there is no keen desire on the part of such people for the maintenance of denominational schools. Indeed, to a large extent voluntary schools are now maintained, not from religious zeal, but from fear of a heavier charge if a school board were established, and it is the commonest appeal to subscribers that it is cheaper for them to maintain the existing schools than to suffer them to be closed or handed over to a school board. It must be remembered that the title these denominational schools claim, is that of voluntary. They are maintained, not in obedience to a legal obligation, but because their supporters declare their wish for something which the State declines to give, namely, the maintenance of distinct denominational teaching and the control and management of the schools, including the power of appointing and dismissing the teachers. These are very important powers, and it is not unreasonable that those who wish to preserve them should bear some material part of the cost of securing them. It must be remembered, too, that there are other incidental advantages secured to the churches by their denominational schools. Thus, an organist and choir master could often not be secured unless the salary of schoolmaster were added to the small sum that the church body is able to pay for these ecclesiastical services. It is common to require the teacher of the day school to teach in the Sunday school. The Sunday school, which is held in the day school, has the building kept in repair out of the funds of the day school. All these advantages are of great value and should be paid for.

Indeed, most of the witnesses who spoke on behalf of the voluntary schools, admitted that there should be voluntary subscriptions, and the few who did not admit this, thought it unlikely that Parliament would allow private management to continue if all the school funds were derived from public grants, or taxation of the parents.

Another grievance urged by the friends of voluntary schools is the levying rates on school buildings.

No doubt the policy of the law has for many years been against exceptions to rating, and exemption from rating is, pro tanto, a subsidy from the ratepayers.

We think, however, considering that in public elementary schools there can by law be no profit made by the managers, that it would be equitable that public elementary schools in premises conveyed by a trust deed free for the purposes of education, should be exempt from rating.

It is obvious, as Mr. W. S. Daglish, the representative of the North of England Voluntary Schools Federation said, who came specially to complain of the grievance of rating school buildings, that buildings for which a rent is paid, should be rated.

Another complaint of the advocates of voluntary schools is the hardship upon poor persons who use the voluntary schools in the matter of the payment of fees.

The school boards have power to remit fees, and very generally use that power; but voluntary managers state that their poverty makes it difficult for them to sacrifice that source of income, and they are thus obliged to send the poor to the guardians to obtain the payment of the school fee. This has a tendency to pauperise, or at any rate to


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humiliate the parent, and, moreover, the guardians are apt to be very grudging in their readiness to pay the fees for the poor who are not paupers.

We desire here to repeat the opinion which we have already expressed in the chapter on the cost of elementary education that the poor are fairly entitled to free schooling, whether in a board or a voluntary school, and that it is right that, if necessary, a moderate fee should be paid for them by some public authority, to the managers of the schools attended by the children. We think it undesirable to associate this aid with the idea of pauperism, and it is deserving of consideration whether the district councils proposed under the Bill now before Parliament should not have this duty entrusted to them.

In that case we think it should be their duty to pay the fees both for children who are under the age of compulsion, and for those who may be exempt from the obligation of school attendance, if their parents or guardians are willing to prolong their education.

Some witnesses complained of the excellence of board schools and of the keen competition from which the supporters of voluntary schools suffered, owing to the better premises, better staff, and more liberal curriculum of the board schools. Thus, Mr. T. W. Allies, secretary of the Catholic Poor School Committee, after describing the enormous advantage which the school boards have over voluntary schools, on account of the power of levying a rate, says that the school boards "supply themselves with everything they need, including excellent and well furnished buildings, complete apparatus, and skilful teachers (most of all, perhaps, teachers) at practically any cost they like to impose upon the people. We, on the other hand, are deprived of all those advantages, and I have felt most acutely in the last 15 years the perpetual disadvantage under which we lie. It has hardly, perhaps, come into full action till about the last five years; but now it is every year more and more apparent, and it is so great, that it seems to me that it will ultimately destroy the voluntary schools if it is carried on in the same ratio as it is now." He fears that the board schools will become the normal standard of education. His remedy is in some way to prevent the enormous predominance of wealth from public sources which the board schools have at their command as against voluntary schools. He accuses the school boards of increasing the cost and extending the range of education for the purpose of driving the voluntary schools to destruction. He says of the board schools, "I only see magnificent buildings, which, when I compare them with some of those which we are obliged to use, fill me with a feeling of discomfort. I see palaces raised where we can only raise very humble buildings, and I feel the effect of that upon the parents. They say of the board schools: 'We see everything we want here, spacious rooms, &c., &c.' If we go to our own schools there is very small accommodation in comparison. All that is done I say by an act of injustice." And he says, "I think that the moral and intellectual results may be disadvantageously operated upon by bad buildings"; and he goes on to repeat that the educational superiority of board school teaching is only at its commencement. He says, "The educational results as to the sixth and seventh standards are a good deal superior in board schools, and I am afraid that superiority will go on increasing. That is produced by the great wealth that they have at their command." He says, "The board schools are carrying out further and further their attempt to give a first-rate education and they are making all education much more costly than it was"; and he says, "The school boards wish to be the sole schools in the country. They wish, that as a lever for democratic power; all the education should be in the hands of schools that are maintained upon their principles; that is to say, detaching religion from the whole system of education." Mr. Allies says, I object to [school boards] giving in those schools an education which does not properly belong to the children of the parents in their actual condition."

The Rev. W. J. B. Richards, who has been a diocesan inspector of Roman Catholic schools for 16 years, was also called as a witness on behalf of the Roman Catholics. He complained that the competition of the school board made it harder for the Roman Catholics to work their schools. Thus, he said that the higher salaries paid to teachers by the London school board made the Roman Catholic teachers dissatisfied with comparatively small salaries; and he says that the London school board furnishes all their schools as perfectly as it is possible to furnish them, and that causes unpleasant contrasts to be made. He also complains that the better instruction given to pupil teachers and the relief from some of the


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hours of teaching in school given by the London school board places the board pupil teachers at an enormous advantage when sitting for the scholarship examination compared with their pupil teachers. He does not blame the London school board for their liberal salaries; nevertheless the contrast makes the Roman Catholic teachers discontented.

Mr. James Murray, head master of the St. Francis Xavier Roman Catholic school at Liverpool, gave similar evidence as to the low salaries of Roman Catholic teachers compared with the salaries paid by school boards, and as to the badness of the Roman Catholic school buildings compared with board schools. Mr. L. Conway, head master of Holy Cross Roman Catholic school, Liverpool, also spoke of his school suffering from insufficient salaries paid to teachers owing to the poverty of the managers, and he mentions the badness of their buildings. He also objects to the system which allows the school board and does not allow them to have prizes for regular attendance. He thinks prizes should be found for them out of public money.

The Roman Catholic body being, as a rule, poorer than the other voluntary school managers, make their complaints as to want of means more emphatically, and they also feel most keenly the question of exclusive denominational teaching as of high importance, but the same complaints may be found in the evidence of Church of England managers and other advocates of denominational schools.

The various circulars we sent out gave full opportunity for those who received them to make any criticisms on the present law, the Code and its administration; on the whole, considering the amount of agitation there has been, and the fact that in many cases organisations suggested answers making complaint against various parts of our system, it is remarkable to how large an extent the Acts, the Code, and its administration have given satisfaction.

Circular A received 3,759 answers from managers of voluntary schools to the first question: "Is there anything in the Education Acts which hinders the satisfactory education in your school?" 764, or 20 per cent, answered by complaints of the Acts. Two-thirds of the managers find the Code suited to the children; one-third make criticisms; 62 per cent are satisfied with the administration of the Code; 27 per cent are not satisfied; 11 per cent make no reply to the questions; 46 per cent of the voluntary managers are satisfied; and 48 per cent are dissatisfied with the encouragement given by the State to moral training.

Question 9 in Circular B, "Have you any observations to make on the working of the Education Acts and the Code?" has drawn out many complaints of the hardships of voluntary schools, but many more answers contain no complaint. These answers, however, have not been tabulated.

When complaints are made, they are often not deserving of any very great attention.

In the case of Circular B, it has been possible to illustrate by the condition of the school the reasonableness of the complaints of the managers.

In Bradford, 29 voluntary school managers answered our Circular B. From these answers we make the following extracts:

The managers of St. Cuthbert Roman Catholic school complain "too much is expected from the class of children who come to this school, as the parents are poor, &c." The merit grant was refused to this school; the grant for English was refused; the percentage of passes was 53; the average attendance at the school was 176; the cost £1 7s 10d a head. The fee is said to be paid, in most cases, without difficulty.

The answer from the Reverend Canon Motler, manager of St. Joseph's Roman Catholic school complains of unfair working of the Act, and unequal competition of board schools. The accounts of this school show that it was worked without any subscriptions. It received the excellent merit grant, though English and Geography were only paid for at 1s each.

St. Thomas Church of England school, Bradford, complained that "the Acts are being so worked as to crush out voluntary schools steadily, but surely." This school had an average of 214 scholars, and £28 6s 8d voluntary subscriptions out of a total income of £266 7s 10d, or about 2s 8d a head; the fees were £133; the cost per head was £1 8s 4d; the percentage of passes was 53; no class subjects were attempted, and the merit grant was refused.

St. Paul's Church of England school, Manningham, complained that "the Act or Acts are made to act prejudicially to the interests of denominational schools." This school, with 437 average attendance, drew £18 1s 11d of its income from voluntary subscriptions, or about 10d a head, and £397 from fees, or more than 18s a head, and £360 from grant; thus, 2.2 per cent of the whole income was furnished by the


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voluntary managers. The school is in three departments, and they all got the fair merit grant.

The managers of Bankfoot Bradford national school complain of the injustice of being rated, but make no return of the amount. The school has 254 accommodation, and 238 average. As Manningham St. Paul's school, with 693 accommodation, returns a total payment for rates of five shillings and two pence, it is not likely that the burden on Bankfoot can be very oppressive. The Bankfoot managers also complain that the board schools are worked to supplant the voluntary schools; that there are too many inspectors who have fanciful and useless crotchets.

In this school the voluntary subscriptions are £8 out of an income of £368, or 8d a head, and 2.2 per cent, of the income.

The cost per head is £1 10s 4d. The merit grant was refused to the senior department, which passed 70 per cent.

St. Mary, Laister Dyke, Church of England school, asks for more liberal grants to enable denominational schools to continue which are in danger of closing. This school, with 190 average, has no voluntary contributions, and spends £1 8s 9d a head in school maintenance. The senior department got the fair merit grant. No merit grant was given to the infant class.

St. Anne's Roman Catholic school complains that the code is too exacting for the class of children attending. This school, with 357 average attendance, had no voluntary subscriptions, and cost £1 10s 8d a head. The girls' department got no merit grant on account of tampering with the registers.

The managers of Holy Trinity, Bradford, say that voluntary schools ought to draw their fair share from the rate.

This school, with 798 scholars on the roll, and 588 average, received £507 15s of Government grant, £373 from school pence, and had no voluntary contributions.

Thirteen schools out of 29 made no observations on the working of the Act and code, and, therefore, presumably, were satisfied.

We are of opinion with reference to these and similar complaints, that it is unreasonable for voluntary managers to object to the progress of education because their limited means do not allow them to keep up with it. Voluntary management implies voluntary effort, and if the effort is inadequate, there is no duty imposed on them to maintain their schools, which are now a much lighter burden to voluntary managers than they were 10 years ago.

CHAPTER 18

THE GRIEVANCES OF NONCONFORMISTS

In a previous chapter of this Report we have pointed out that the Education Act of 1870 was constructed on the principle that it is no part of the duty of the State to secure religious instruction for children attending public elementary schools. School managers may, if they please, provide religious instruction, but since 1870 the connexion of a school with some religious denomination, or the provision of religious instruction has ceased to be one of the conditions of obtaining a share of the Parliamentary grant. Nor, since the passing of the Act, has it been the duty of Her Majesty's inspectors to inquire into any religious instruction that may be given in schools receiving grants.

Liberty, as we have said, is left to school managers to provide what religious instruction they please; but this liberty is restricted by clause 7 of the Act, which insists that in public elementary schools -

The time or times during which any religious observance is practised or instruction in religious subjects is given at any meeting of the school shall be either at the beginning or the end, or at the beginning and the end of such meeting, and shall be inserted in a time-table to be approved by the Education Department, and to be kept permanently and conspicuously affixed in every schoolroom, and any scholar may be withdrawn by his parents from such observance or instruction without forfeiting any of the other benefits of the school.

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In the same clause it is also enacted that -

It shall not be required as a condition of any child being admitted into or continuing in the school that he shall attend or abstain from attending any Sunday school or any place of religious worship, or that he shall attend any religious observance or any instruction in religious subjects in the school or elsewhere, from which observance or instruction he may be withdrawn by his parent, or that he shall, if withdrawn by his parent, attend the school on any day exclusively set apart for religious observance by the religious body to which his parent belongs.
According to the theory of the Act of 1870, it is for the secular instruction only that the grant is given. During the hours of secular instruction the leaching is to be free from any religious bias, and parents have the legal right to withdraw their children from any religious instruction and observances which they disapprove.

The question whether the public elementary school accommodation in any school district is adequate to its requirements is therefore determined without regard to the churches with which any of the schools may be connected, or the religious preferences of the parents for whose children the schools are provided.

It is the view of the Legislature, according to the high authority of Mr. P. Cumin, that a public elementary school connected with any denomination is "suitable" for the children of every other denomination. The Catholic parent, so it is assumed, can without difficulty withdraw his child, who is attending a Church of England school, from the instruction that is given from the English Bible and the Church Catechism during the first three-quarters of an hour after the school opens; and it is also assumed that during the two hours given to secular subjects there will be nothing in the teaching or in the general spirit and tone of the school to impair the child's faith in the Catholic Church. The parent who is attached to the English Church may, under the same protection, send his child to a Catholic school.

The compulsory law is worked on these assumptions. If there is only one public elementary school within reach of a child's home, the parent who can make no other provision for his child's education is compelled, under legal penalties, to send his child to that school, however widely his own religious faith may differ from the religious faith which the school was established and is maintained to promote.

It was our duty to inquire whether the provisions of the Act of 1870 for securing the rights of parents are effective; and on this question we have received evidence from a large number of witnesses.

All the evidence goes to show that the conscience clause of the Act of 1870 is very rarely violated. In other words, children are not refused admission into Church, Catholic, or Wesleyan day schools because they refuse to attend Church, Catholic, or Wesleyan Sunday schools; they are not compelled to receive the religious instruction in day schools if their parents ask that they may be withdrawn from it, and religious instruction and religious observances are not permitted to interrupt the secular work of the schools; but, according to the requirement of section 7 of the Act, are restricted to the beginning or the end. or the beginning and the end, of the school hours.

The definite cases submitted to us in proof of its alleged violation were very few. Mr. T. Snape, who holds several important official positions in connexion with the United Methodist Free Churches, informed us that "at Kidlington, in the Oxford (United Free Methodist) Circuit, in 1884, several boys were flogged for absenting themselves half a day (from a Church of England day school) to attend the treat given by the Free Methodist Sunday school. Our minister", he continued, "wrote to Mr. Mundella, who was then Vice-President of the Council, on the subject, and the matter was brought to the notice of the House of Commons. Mr. Mundella instituted inquiries, and the master and managers were reproved by the Department. Obstacles had also been put in the way on former occasions to prevent the scholars attending similar treats." But it does not appear to us that cases of this kind, however reprehensible, are violations of the conscience clause. The parents of the children who stayed away from the day school at Kidlington to attend the Sunday school treat of the United Methodist Free Church had not withdrawn their children from the religious instruction of the school, nor could they allege that the day of the treat was, in the words of the Act, "a day exclusively set apart for religious observance" by the religious body to which they belonged; and therefore the managers and teachers of the day school were perfectly within their legal right in requiring the children to attend school on that day. When the master


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flogged the children he used his legal right unwisely and ungenerously, and incurred the reproof of the Department; but if he had violated the conscience clause the Department might have suspended the grant.

Mr. Snape cited another case, "The son of the station-master at Worleston (in Cheshire) attended the National School on week-days and the Free Methodist School on Sundays. The father, disapproving of the religious instruction given in the day school, availed himself of the conscience clause to withdraw his son during the time the religious instruction was given. In consequence the boy was excluded from the secular instruction; but Mr. Mundella, who was then Vice-President of the Council, upon receiving a representation of the facts, directed that the boy must be re-admitted, or the grant would not be continued." This was a definite violation of the law, and was remedied under threat of the withdrawal of the grant.

The witness, after stating that the boy was re-admitted, went on to say that "because of the circumstances attending his withdrawal and compulsory re-admission, influence was exercised with the railway superintendent in Chester to get the father removed from his position as station-master at Worleston. This removal was about to be carried out, but, through the intervention of the Rev. Thomas Naylor, the Tree Methodist minister of the Crewe circuit, the facts were placed before the railway authorities, and the superintendent then cancelled the notice of removal." But whatever influence may have been exercised in order to remove the station-master from his post was clearly no violation of any clause in the Act of 1870; the demands of the conscience clause were satisfied when the child was re-admitted into the school.

The other witnesses who appeared before us as representatives of certain Nonconformist denominations which, as the witnesses alleged, have cause of complaint against our existing educational system did not insist that the conscience clause is violated; it was their contention that in large districts the present provisions of the law, even when they are not violated, offer no adequate protection to the religious liberty of Nonconformist parents - a contention which is illustrated by the cases already quoted from the evidence of Mr. Snape. According to these witnesses the important question is not whether the law is violated, but whether it is effective.

The Reverend Robert Bruce, M.A., D.D., has been a Congregational Minister at Huddersfield for 33 years: he was for three years Vice-Chairman of the Huddersfield School Board, and since retiring from the vice-chairmanship has been Chairman of the School Management and General Purposes Committee. Dr. Bruce is also Chairman for 1888 of the Congregational Union of England and Wales. He informed us that in connexion with the Congregational denomination there are, in England and Wales, 4,315 churches and branches, and about 3,500 ministers and missionaries. He does not think that the conscience clause is effective, "because in so many cases children go and learn religious doctrines which neither they nor their parents understand or believe." When asked how it is that the parents do not avail themselves of the power to claim exemption, the witness replied: "I am afraid that in many instances it is owing to the indifference of the parents; in other instances the parents are probably ignorant of the existence of the clause; it is very seldom seen; I do not remember having seen the clause myself. And, then, from the dependent position of many of the parents, small shopkeepers, or persons employed by rich masters belonging in the main to the predominant church, they are afraid to risk boycotting of some sort. Then, sometimes the child might be marked, and suffer in some way, both educationally and socially, by being made an exception; the parents naturally prefer the happiness and comfort of the children, and they take the risk of children learning doctrines which they do not believe in order to have the chance of correcting the errors themselves." Dr. Bruce thinks that the conscience clause is an ineffective protection in board schools as well as in voluntary schools, only "the board school is forbidden to use any church formulary, and therefore it has a natural conscience clause which the other has not." The witness informed us that a member of the Huddersfield School Board withdrew a daughter of his own from the religious instruction given in the board school at which she attended, but "the head mistress went to the gentleman and said that she felt so much for the poor child sitting by herself in a class-room, miserable, while the others were in school, that she asked him, for the child's sake, to let the child come in, and she came in." The father was strongly opposed even to what Dr. Bruce described as the "mild form of religious instruction" given in the Huddersfield board schools.


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Dr. Bruce believes that managers of denominational schools endeavour to carry out the conscience clause according to the letter, and in the main according to the spirit; but he thinks that there is no doubt that the spirit is sometimes violated. Prizes or treats are given "to those children who conform to the religion of the school"; by which the witness subsequently explained that he meant that they are given to children attending the day school who also attend the Sunday school of the same church; and if prizes are Sunday school prizes he thought that they should be given at a time when only Sunday school children are present. In other ways children not attending the Sunday school are made to occupy a humiliating or disagreeable position, and the impression is given that it is "a shabby thing" for parents to send their children to a day school and not to send them to the same place on Sunday. "This has been done", the witness said, "in our own town." The witness also thought that if membership of a clothing club or a sick club is confined to those children attending a day school who are also in the Sunday school of the same church, the club money should not be collected in the day school. The club becomes a temptation to the parents of poor children.

Mr. Thomas Snape, of Liverpool and Widnes, stated that the religious connexion which he represented (the United Methodist Free Churches) numbers in the home districts, excluding the Colonies and foreign countries, 1,353 congregations. The persons attached to these churches belong largely to the classes for which public elementary schools are provided. The witness claimed to have a large knowledge of the opinions both of the ministers and members of the United Methodist Free Churches in different parts of England on educational questions. He thinks that in districts where there is only a Church of England school within reach of the children of members of the United Methodist Free Churches, the conscience clause, instead of being an effective protection of their religious liberty, is "practically inoperative". It was within the knowledge of the witness that members of these churches in many parts of England do not avail themselves of the conscience clause for two reasons: "In the first place, they are afraid of losing their employment; and, secondly, they believe, truly or falsely, that the children who have been withdrawn from religious instruction are not treated kindly. The unkindness sometimes comes from the teachers, and sometimes from their fellow scholars. The parents do not care to have their children regarded as heretics." The witness also stated that parents have ground of complaint, even if they do not withdraw their children from the religious instruction. "A half-holiday and treat may be given to the day school children, who also attend the Church Sunday School; but the children who attend the Methodist Sunday School, while they have the holiday, are excluded from the treat. Rewards may be given to one set of children, from which the other set is excluded; and a sick fund may be established in a day school the benefits of which are confined to the children who also attend the Sunday school. Complaints of this kind are made from many parts of the country." The resentment provoked among the Free Methodists by what they regard as the unfair and unjust position in which their children are placed was described as "sometimes very strong and bitter." In this connexion the witness mentioned the case, which we have already quoted, of several boys who were flogged for absenting themselves half a day from a church day school, in order to attend the treat given by the Free Methodist Sunday School.

The Primitive Methodist Connexion which has in England and Wales rather more than 5,000 churches, and about 180,000 persons in church membership, and close upon half a million attendants at public worship, was represented before the Commission by its president, the Rev. John Atkinson. Mr. Atkinson stated that the Primitive Methodists belong exclusively to the working classes, and that practically they have no support from the wealthy; that they had reached the heedless, the shiftless, and the helpless, and had succeeded in carrying a higher life into hundreds and thousands of homes which were before neglected. The whole of the ministers of the Connexion are drawn from the working classes, and remain in the most intimate relations with them. He informed us that the commencing salary of a Primitive Methodist minister is £50 a year; that at the end of 10 years it might reach £100 or £110; and that the highest salary of any minister in the Connexion is about £150 a year. The witness further stated that about one-half of the churches of the Primitive Methodist Connexion are in districts where


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there is no school board; that a very large number of them are in rural districts; and that, as a matter of necessity, the children attend the day schools of the Church of England. The fact that the children of Primitive Methodists attend church schools is no proof that the parents value the religious instruction that is given in them; and the witness stated that the teaching of the Church Catechism, on the doctrine of baptism for instance, does not correspond with the religious belief of the Primitive Methodists; and yet the children are taught the Catechism. There are other grounds on which the religious instruction given in Church of England schools is objectionable to witness, but as the information which reached him came through children, he was unable to rest his complaints on his own personal knowledge; but the children state "that they are cautioned against attending Dissenting places of worship, and it is impressed upon them that to attend these places is very wrong"; complaints of this kind are made in many parts of England where Primitive Methodist churches are found. The Secretary of the Connexional Sunday School Union, in answer to the inquiries of witness, had informed him that "from various parts of the country he receives information from time to time that the children attending the day schools are influenced in the direction of separating themselves" from the Primitive Methodist Connexion. These complaints came to the secretary in his official capacity, and from many parts of England; he named the counties of Stafford, Derby, York, Norfolk, Berks, Gloucester, Monmouth, Middlesex, Herts, Kent, Surrey, Chester, Worcester, Durham, Cambridge, Dorset, and Northumberland. The conscience clause, as far as the witness knew, is inoperative in the schools at which the children of Primitive Methodists attend. The principal reason why Primitive Methodists do not avail themselves of its protection is "their fear of incurring the displeasure of their superiors in the neighbourhood, and imperilling their employment." In many parts of England this is the reason which prevents parents from taking advantage of the conscience clause. The witness was cross-examined with regard to the statements of children attending Church of England schools, that they were cautioned against attending Dissenting worship.

44,578. Do you think that if the Commission wished to go into this question further, and to have evidence before them which they could sift, you could produce any cases which they might examine into? - I think I could.

44,579. Of course we could not expect children to be brought here, but, as I understand, the children complain to the parents, and the parents to your ministers? - Yes.

44,580. I do not mean that we should ever think of bringing the children to cross-examine them here, but supposing that we wished to test the matter, and asked any of your ministers if they would come and state upon their own authority that they have had such complaints from parents in their districts, do you think that any ministers would attend here to say so? - Yes, I think they would. Although, perhaps, in some instances they would scarcely feel at liberty to divulge the names of the parents, still the ministers would attend and state what had been told to them.

4,581. I am not saying anything about the individual names of parents or children; but supposing that the Commission wished to test this matter they might obtain the statements of individual ministers who would depose to what you have now stated? - Yes.

The general impression of the witness with regard to the consideration that is shown to the children of Primitive Methodists attending Church of England day schools is given in the following extract from a later part of his cross-examination:
44,584. My experience of the clergy of the Church would be that they would rather shrink from teaching the Catechism unless to children whom they believe to be members of the Church of England; do you confirm me in that? - No.

44,585. For instance, no clergyman, I hope I may say, but, at any rate, no clergyman worthy of his calling, would wilfully teach a child which had not been baptised to speak about what vows he had made at his baptism? - All the children of our people are baptised.

44,586. Then, of course, that particular point would not arise; but, speaking generally, do you not think that the majority of the managers of Church schools


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would wish to respect the religious feelings of the parents of their children? - I cannot say that my experience would lead me to admit that.

44,587. You would not go as far as that? - No.

The Baptist denomination, which has 2,892 chapels in England and 607 in Wales, was represented among the witnesses who appeared before us by the Rev. Charles Williams, of Accrington, President of the Baptist Union of England and Wales, April, 1886 - April, 1887. The witness stated that by far the larger number of places of worship connected with the Baptist denomination are in villages: that in Buckinghamshire, for instance, which he had recently visited two or three times, out of a total of 78 Baptist chapels, at least from 60 to 65 are in small villages. He further stated that during the year that he was President of the Baptist Union he travelled over a great part of England; that he had made a visitation to villages, a special feature of his year's work as President; that he had come very largely into contact with the members of the Baptist village churches; and that in nearly every instance when he visited a village he asked about the state of education, as he was interested in the general work of day schools. The witness informed us that in the villages which he had visited, and which, of course, were only villages in which there are Baptist chapels, he thought that generally there were more children connected with the Nonconformist Sunday Schools than with the Church of England Sunday Schools, "which would seem to imply that denominationally the Nonconformists certainly have the greater number of children." At Mursley, in Buckinghamshire, for example, with a population of 300, the Baptist Sunday School had 65 scholars and the Church of England Sunday School about 30. At Newton Longville, in the same neighbourhood, with a population of 480, two Nonconformist Sunday Schools contain just about twice the number that attend the Church of England school. In the judgment of the witness the presence of the majority of the children in Nonconformist Sunday Schools indicates the religious preferences of the parents; they send their children to the National schools during the week, of necessity, because there is no other school within reach. The witness, however, stated that scholars remain in Baptist Sunday Schools for a considerable time after the age at which they leave the Sunday schools of the Church of England. Mr. Williams and those whom he represents do not regard the conscience clause as an efficient protection for the children. "Whether", he said, "the parents are right in the impression in every instance I cannot say, but the representation made to me is this: That if they were to claim the protection of the conscience clause it would expose their children to considerable inconvenience, and some parents, much against their will, instruct their children to attend the religious instruction given in Church of England schools as a less evil than being marked off and exposed to annoyance in consequence." He had been assured by his friends in the villages which he had visited that if the children were withdrawn from the religious instruction in Church schools both children and parents would suffer annoyance. When asked how it was that a man who has sufficient strength of conscientious conviction to go to a Nonconformist chapel on Sunday, and to send his children to a Nonconformist Sunday School could not make up his mind to claim the protection his conscience demands on weekdays, the witness answered: "The only reason why he cannot make up his mind is this - the other fact has now been accepted, and a man, to the credit of all parties I say it, is thought nothing the worse of because he goes to chapel; but this is a new thing, this option given by the conscience clause, and it is very seldom used from the impression that I speak of, an impression that may not be well founded, and which I regret quite as much as anyone." Again, "Going to chapel has been accepted now as one of the conditions that clergymen must reckon with in their conduct of parochial affairs, whereas within the school the clergyman thinks, and I think properly, that he is the principal manager, and that his will, therefore, should go for more there than in the village at large." When asked whether it was mainly from the clergyman that the annoyance came, and not from the people generally, Mr. Williams replied: "I should not like to say that. I daresay there is a fear of offending the clergyman; but then, if the clergyman should be offended, it is just as likely that some ladies of the parish, or that some gentlemen of the parish, would look with disfavour upon the party who withdraws his children from religious instruction." The witness was reminded that he had declined to produce instances in proof of his allegation that parents were afraid to avail themselves of the conscience clause because of the


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annoyance which might come to themselves and their children; and it was put to him that if the parents themselves refused to appear before the Commission through fear of the consequences, Nonconformist ministers could come and say that certain parents had complained to them that in their case the conscience clause was of no value. He replied: "Supposing that a minister came here to do that and gave you facts, as I have no doubt that he would be asked to give facts with all the particulars, that would be known; he himself in his particular village or town would be regarded with ill-will in consequence, and the parents of such scholars would be exposed to the disfavour of those whose good-will they value, and whose help sometimes to them is very welcome."

The Rev. Dr. Crosskey, who, since 1870, has been one of the honorary secretaries of the Central Nonconformist Committee (Birmingham), said that in his belief the conscience clause is ineffective; there are large numbers of parents who know nothing about it, and though, no doubt, Nonconformist ministers might, if they chose, diffuse the information wherever there are Nonconformist parents, speaking for himself, he is unwilling at present to press poor people to take advantage of the clause; his unwillingness arises from the fact that in many parts of England the poor themselves are afraid that if they did they would incur the displeasure of powerful people in the neighbourhood on whom they largely depend. He also thought that the separation of Nonconformist children from others in the school places them in a position extremely painful to a sensitive child; and for that reason he had never pressed Nonconformists in towns to take advantage of the clause; and to his knowledge parents are unwilling that their children should be what they call "black sheep". Further, in the belief of the witness, an effective conscience clause would prevent everything in the management of a school that could be an inducement either to the parents or to the children attending it to leave their own church in order to become adherents of the church with which the school is connected; and no degree of liberality on the part of the managers of a school in which all the teachers are members of the English Church can prevent the school from being a powerful influence in favour of drawing the children of Nonconformists into the Establishment. The clause, in the judgment of the witness, leaves unchecked some of the most powerful means of attracting Nonconformist children into the Church of England.

We received further evidence on this point from Mr. T. Smyth, who was elected to attend as a witness by the London Trades Council on behalf of the various trades connected with that body. Mr. Smyth informed us that he was living in Chelsea at the time he appeared before us; but that he had worked at his trade as a plasterer in different parts of London, and in different parts of the country; that he had taken trouble to ascertain the views on the subject of elementary instruction for their children held by the men with whom he worked; and he described his evidence "as the general outcome" of his "conversation with all these men at different times from the first starting of the Act". Throughout his whole evidence he claimed to represent the general opinion of working men, the parents of children attending public elementary schools, on the subjects into which it was our business to inquire. He corroborated the testimony of other witnesses to the effect that there is no appreciable number of boys who are withdrawn under the conscience clause from religious instruction. Any boy that was withdrawn would be "a singular exception". Many men preferred that their children should go to board schools rather than voluntary schools because the religious instruction in board schools is not specific. Some men whom he knew had removed from Pimlico because there was no board school within reach to which they could send their children; some had had to send their children to board schools in the districts surrounding Pimlico. The conscience clause did not meet the case. The following extract from his evidence contains Mr. Smyth's explanation of its inadequacy:

52,256. As a matter of fact, it is so very unworkable. If parents have to claim exemption for their children, it is in a manner making martyrs of them in a school of that character (a school belonging to a religious denomination;), and they would rather put up with religious instruction that they did not agree with than go to the trouble of doing anything.

52,257. Do you contend that any child attending a voluntary school in Pimlico (some of the schools of which are very large), and claiming the conscience clause, would be made a martyr of? - I feel so.


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52,258. In what way would he be made a martyr of? - He would be removed out of the class; he would be marked off and put aside; he would be in a manner pointed at, and pointed out as a boy different from the rest.
Even in board schools Mr. Smyth thinks that the conscience clause does not work satisfactorily. He instanced the case of a child of his own who attended Cook's Ground School, which is under the London School Board. The boy was "put to religious instruction, or religious instruction was offered to be given. I sent and asked that he should be withdrawn from that religious instruction, and I will tell you what happened. There was a demur about doing so, and i had a consultation with the schoolmaster about it; I sent my wife also to ask about it, and the result of all the negotiations was that the boy was put up at one end of the room by himself in front of all the school; while they were being given religious instruction he had to stand there." On the election of Mr. Firth, as a member of the London School Board for Chelsea, Mr. Smyth obtained a pledge from him to take action in order to secure a redress of this grievance, and the witness informed us that he believed that after Mr. Firth's election the board found a separate room for boys withdrawn from religious instruction, and appointed teachers to take charge of them. Definite provision, however, had been made by a resolution of the London School Board, passed July 26th, 1871, that "During the time of religious teaching or religious observance, any children withdrawn from such teaching or observance shall receive separate instruction in secular subjects." [Parliamentary Return, 1884.]

But Her Majesty's inspectors are of the opinion that the conscience clause is effective.

The Rev. D. J. Stewart, whose original appointment dates from the year 1850, and who, when he appeared before us, had been one of the chief inspectors for about 12 years, in reply to the question, "Have you reason to believe that the conscience clause is effective?" answered, "I should think it quite so." This statement, however, receives useful illustration from subsequent replies of the same witness.

3973. Can you tell us what it 'effects'? - Perfect protection for the child and the child's parents.

3974. But, as I understand, you have rarely seen a child protected by it? - I said that I had rarely seen a child withdrawn.

3975. "Will you explain how it is effective if it protects no child? - I have never seen any cases of difficulty about the religious instruction given to children.

3976. But a provision to be effective must 'effect' something? - Yes.

3978. Would you not rather say that it is inoperative than that it is effective, if it is never put into operation? - I should not say that.

The Rev. T. W. Sharpe, who was first appointed as one of Her Majesty's inspectors in 1857, and has been one of the chief inspectors since 1875, was also examined on this subject. He had never had any complaints that the conscience clause is violated. Mr. Sharpe was subsequently asked whether such complaints on the part of parents were likely to reach the inspectors, and he said: "The ordinary process would be to complain to the Education Department direct, and the complaint would be remitted to the inspector, who would inquire into the case at once." In answer to a further inquiry whether poor parents, especially in rural districts, are likely to find access to the Education Department, Mr. Sharpe replied, "I have often said that I cannot find courage for all the cowards that exist." There is one other point in connexion with the conscience clause on which the judgment of an inspector of Mr. Sharpe's eminence is important, and we give it at length.
6751. Should you regard it as a violation of the conscience clause if children attending the National School and also attending the Church Sunday School were charged lower fees than children who attended the National School but did not attend the Church Sunday School? - I think it would be better to charge uniform fees without respect to any religious denomination.

6752. Should you regard it as a violation of the conscience clause? - The words of the Act do not put that into the conscience clause, and, therefore, I should not.

6753. Managers can do that without bringing themselves within reach of the law? - So far as I know they can.

Mr. Brodie, another of Her Majesty's inspectors, has "no reason to believe" that "there is any grievance rankling in the minds of Nonconformist parents, though they


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have not complained of it, through having to send their children to the church schools in the country districts." He had "never heard" of the grievance. Mr. James McKenzie, a sub-inspector, who is attached to the Education Office, and is sent to visit schools on emergencies, has never heard that any class of Nonconformists thought it "a hardship that children should be sent to schools of a denomination other than their own". He has "circulated over 23 districts in England", and never heard of the grievance; but he has had cases brought under his notice occasionally where "Jews or Roman Catholics were attending the parish schools", and these have been pointed out to him as showing how amicably they worked.

Mr. Fitch, however, who was first appointed inspector in 1863, became one of the chief inspectors in 1877, and is now inspector of the training colleges for mistresses, gave evidence which indicates that, although it would be the duty of an inspector to interfere if he were informed that the conscience clause has been violated, it lies beyond his province to inquire whether the conscience clause is effective. The following passages are extracted from Mr. Fitch's evidence: 57,798. I think you have said that you have not come across, in your own experience, cases of grievance tending to show the inefficiency of the working of the conscience clause as a protection to parents from having their children taught religious doctrines when they disapprove of them? - No, I have heard a great many complaints, but I have not been able to verify them, and my experience does not justify me in saying much about it.

57,799. From what class of persons have those complaints come?- Specially from Nonconformists, who have said that in a village where there is only a church school their children went to the school and received instruction in the Catechism and in the Liturgy, which they did not care about, and that they themselves were too much afraid of the influence of the squire and the parson to exercise their undoubted right of withdrawing their children. That is very often said, and one knows enough of human nature to believe that that is a very likely thing to happen, but I have not verified the evidence.

57,800. Are the persons from whom you hear this persons who are personally acquainted with the working of the school, or do they merely repeat the current opinion of their body? - That sort of thing has often been told me by very trustworthy people who have lived in small country places where there is only one school, or who in other ways have been cognisant of the working of the denominational school in their neighbourhood.

57,801. We have heard a good many statements from persons occupying that position, and they have especially emanated from ministers of Nonconformist bodies, but we have not had, I think, an equal number of statements of the same kind from persons cognisant with the actual working of the school; is it your opinion that the parents themselves feel this, or that the persons of the religious denominations, to which the parents are supposed to belong, feel it most? - I could give you nothing but opinion; I could not give you what is really evidence on that point. The kind of statements that you refer to have been repeatedly made in my hearing, but 1 cannot say that I have gone to the parents and sought to verify them; I have felt that to be rather out of my proper province."

The name of Mr. Fitch, who was at one time the Principal of an undenominational training college, is well known to large numbers of Nonconformists; and for that reason he may have been more likely to hear of Nonconformist "grievances" than those of Her Majesty's inspectors whose evidence we previously quoted.

We received a considerable amount of evidence on this subject from representatives of educational societies connected with the Church of England, the Wesleyan Methodists, and the Roman Catholic Church. The Rev. Canon Willes, Rector of Monk Sherborne, Basingstoke, Secretary of the Board of Education for Leicestershire, and for many years Chairman of the School Attendance Committee for Lutterworth, assured us that no complaints of the infraction of the conscience clause had ever reached him; and expressed his belief that the grievance of Nonconformists, who believe that if they availed themselves of the conscience clause they would suffer great social disadvantage is "purely imaginary". But in the Lutterworth Union, in which, with the exception of one board school, all the schools are Church of England schools, the conscience clause is practically inoperative. According to the estimate of this witness one-fourth of the children attending the Church of England day schools during the week attend the


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Dissenting schools on Sunday; but out of 29,000 day scholars only 12 were withdrawn from the diocesan inspection.

47,169. Then the fact is that these children who are largely attending Dissenting schools present themselves for examination in the Church of England theology? - If you put the question in another way, I would say that they present themselves for the examination in the religious instruction given in our schools.

47,170. Which includes the Church Catechism? - As a matter of course; unless they are specially withdrawn from it.

The Rev. James Duncan, who has been Secretary of the National Society since 1870, gave it as his opinion that the conscience clause is found to be effective. But this witness also gave evidence which shows that of more than 2,000,000 children on the registers of Church of England schools only 2,200 are withdrawn from the whole of the religious instruction, and only 5,690 from any part of it - 7,890 in all. The partial withdrawals are, in the opinion of the witness, from the Catechism.

The Rev. David J. Waller, Secretary to the Wesleyan Education Committee, informed us that very few children are withdrawn from the religious instruction given in Wesleyan schools. "Teachers of 20 or 30 years' standing have never had one single case of withdrawal. Some three or four teachers have stated that occasionally a few Roman Catholic children have been withdrawn, and sometimes the Jews have requested that their children might not be taught the New Testament; but they are very anxious that they should be instructed in the Old Testament Scriptures. In many of our schools, which are attended by Roman Catholics, Jews, and others, there is no case of withdrawal; and in one of our schools, a very large one, where about one-third of the children are Jews, there is no case of withdrawal. If any do withdraw in any way it is by coming late." The attention of the witness having been recalled to his statement that the children of Roman Catholics and of Jews were not withdrawn from the religious instruction given in Wesleyan schools, he was asked some questions concerning the character of this instruction.

7226. You give them Christian instruction? - Yes, we give them Christian instruction.

7227. And Protestant instruction? - Yes, we give them Protestant instruction.

In Mr. Waller's judgment the conscience clause is "effective" and is a security "that the conscientious scruples of the parent are not interfered with". He admitted, however, that, considering how few children are withdrawn from religious instruction in any of the schools of the Kingdom, the clause might be described as "inoperative". As Secretary of the Wesleyan Education Committee the witness sometimes received complaints of the violation of the conscience clause, into which it was his business to inquire; he found that the great majority of cases were of a kind that "would break down altogether if brought under the notice of their Lordships"; but he added that "frequently there has been some amount of ground for the complaint, which has been forwarded." There was pressure brought to bear on the parents out of school to send the children to the Church Sunday School. While the witness regarded the conscience clause as effective, he thought that the clause could not interfere with certain influences which may occasionally be brought to bear in various ways outside the schools. ... The parents of the children may be visited, and the thought may be pressed upon them that, going to the day school, they ought to go to the Sunday school of a particular denomination; and there may be charitable gifts and other things which no conscience clause can ever prevent. I do not see how they can be prevented."

The Rev. Charles Henry Kelly, Secretary of the Wesleyan Methodist Sunday School Union, confirmed Mr. Waller's testimony as to the efforts sometimes made to dissuade children attending Church day schools from attending Wesleyan Sunday Schools. Complaints had reached him "occasionally", even in "recent years". When complaints of this kind reached him he sometimes took steps to appeal to the Department, "but", he said, "it is not always wise; sometimes the parents are very poor people, and in villages they dare not say too much." Such cases occurred "almost entirely" in villages. The witness did not think that there is "any great system of persecution": the cases complained of "arise chiefly from individuals". He thought that "it would be very hard to pass


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a law which would secure that everyone would do right", and he looked to a healthier state of public opinion as the great security. Mr. Allies, Secretary to the Catholic Poor School Committee, stated that "there are a great number of non-Catholic children" in Catholic schools "by the pure choice of their parents", there being no sort of attraction held out either by the teachers or managers; but he had never heard of a case in which a child was withdrawn from the religious instruction. The witness, however, was not able to say positively that there were no cases of withdrawal.

We also examined a large number of the managers of Church of England schools, and they were unanimous in their judgment that the conscience clause is effective, and that Nonconformists have no ground of complaint. The Rev. W. Aston, LL.D., for example, the Vicar of St. Thomas's, Bradford, has never heard of Nonconformists who say that they cannot avail themselves of the conscience clause. But the same witness informed us that he did not remember a single instance in which any Nonconformist claimed its protection. The Rev. R. B. Burges, Vicar of St. Paul's, Birmingham, had never known an instance in the whole of his experience in which a parent had shrunk from taking advantage of the conscience clause through fear of incurring damage or loss. He also informed us that in church schools "the religious teaching" is "very acceptable" to the people, adding, "During the twenty years that I have been in Birmingham there have not been more than six children who have asked to be excused from religious teaching in my large schools, where we have nearly 1,200 children, and we have had children of Jews and others."

The masters and mistresses of Church of England schools are of the same opinion in reference to the effectiveness of the conscience clause as the managers. Mr. Muscott, the principal teacher of the Garsington Church of England School, near Oxford, has children of Dissenters in his school. The religious teaching is given according to the diocesan syllabus; it occupies three-quarters of an hour daily; and the children are examined by the diocesan inspector. No children are withdrawn from this examination, and Dissenting parents make no complaints. Miss Charlotte Neath is mistress of a National School near Maidstone; the conscience clause "is in the school, but nobody troubles about it". There are Dissenters in the parish, "but they do not withdraw their children, and they do not object to their learning the Catechism." Mr. Edwin Mr. Edwin Horsfield is head-master of St. Saviour's School, Everton, near Liverpool, Horsfield. which has an average attendance of 340. Not more than half of the children are members of the Church of England. There is ample liberty to withdraw the children from the religious teaching; and the conscience clause is strictly observed. But as far as the witness could recollect only two or three had been withdrawn during the eight years and a half that he had been head-master. The witness stated that his religious teaching is "of a distinctly denominational character"; that he instructs the children in the principles of the Church of England. But as far as he had been able to judge he did not think that this instruction had a tendency to make them Church of England people. Mr. E. Stevens, master of the Hartlip Endowed School, Kent (Church of England public elementary school), stated that there are a great many Dissenters in the parish; that there is no other school; that the Bible is read and explained on three days a week, and the Prayer Book and Catechism on the other two days; that the Dissenters do not make the "slightest" objection, and that no child is withdrawn from the religious teaching.

It also appears that very few children are withdrawn from the religious instruction given in denominational schools not connected with the Church of England. Mr. J. H. Devonshire, headmaster of Mintern Street Wesleyan School, Hoxton, informed us that in his school there had been only one case during the last seven years in which a parent had availed himself of the conscience clause. "The father", said the witness, "was not extremely anxious for the child to be withdrawn; but I said, that if he at all wished it, he had better have him withdrawn." The father is a Roman Catholic. There are prayers in the school every day, and the Bible is read three days a week. Mr. Holdsworth, master of the Clarence Street Wesleyan School at Newcastle-on-Tyne - 313 on the books - informed us that religious instruction is given in his school on every morning, except Friday, from 9 o'clock


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to 9.45. He never had a withdrawal. The children are not all from Wesleyan families. Some of them are children of Unitarian parents, and some the children of Jews. In one case the witness told a Jewish child that he might stay out of the class when a lesson out of the New Testament was to be read, but the child brought his Bible and read with the other children; "he said that his father did not mind it at all". The father was described as not "a religiously indifferent Jew", but as "really an earnest religious Jew". The witness thought that the father would not have permitted the child to receive the religious instruction if he had thought that it was likely to make the child a Christian. He inferred, from the father's refusal to protect his child by the conscience clause, that he could keep his child right by means of the Jewish school to which the child was sent on Thursday afternoons, and his own private instruction.

Miss Fox, mistress in the infant school of St. Patrick's, Manchester (Roman Catholic), had never had any children withdrawn from the religious instruction; indeed, if she had ever had a child of another religion than the Catholic religion she did not know it. She thinks that a great number of the parents do not know of the existence of the conscience clause.

That very many parents do not know that they have the right to withdraw their children from the religious instruction given in public elementary schools is also the opinion of Mr. J. E. Powell, who is a visitor under the London School Board. Mr. Powell served an apprenticeship as a bookbinder, and is Secretary of the Bookbinders' and Machine Rulers' and Consolidated Union for the Metropolis, and appeared before us as one of the witnesses appointed by the Trades' Council. He hears no complaints of the violation of the conscience clause either in board schools or voluntary schools. The conscience clause, according to this witness, "works very smoothly". When asked "Does it work at all?" the witness answered, "That is perhaps the better way of putting it. It works so smoothly that no one knows of its existence so far as my immediate locality is concerned." "It is not operative? - It is unknown; it is as dead as anything else." "Dead things do not work smoothly, do they? - It is never alluded to."

Our summary of the evidence which we received on this question would be incomplete if we did not add that Her Majesty's inspector, the Rev. D. J. Stewart, thinks that even where the conscience clause has never been put in force by the actual withdrawal of a child, "it may have had an indirect effect" on the kind of religious teaching given in the school. We also note with satisfaction that the Rev. W. D. Parish, Vicar of Selmeston, Sussex, and formerly a diocesan inspector, stated, that in his school care would be taken not to allow a child to answer questions in the Catechism which its parents might object to its answering, or which it could not answer truthfully. The Rev. Prebendary Roe, Rector of Poyntington, Somerset, and a diocesan inspector, made a still broader statement, and informed us that "in (church) schools where there is anything like a large proportion of Nonconformists, the beginning of the Catechism is almost invariably left out."

In estimating the value or the evidence submitted to us by Her Majesty's inspectors on the efficiency of the conscience clause, we attach great importance to the statement of Mr. Fitch, which we have already quoted. If in small country places an inspector is informed that Nonconformists are "too much afraid of the influence of the squire and the parson to exercise their undoubted right of withdrawing their children" from "instruction in the Catechism and in the Liturgy", it is no part of his duty to visit the parents in order to verify these complaints; this in Mr. Fitch's judgment "would be rather out of (his) proper province". The inspector has discharged his duty if he reports to the Department any violation of the law by teachers or managers in those cases in which parents have exercised their right to withdraw their children from religious instruction which they disapprove; it is not his business to discover whether for any reason the parents are afraid to exercise their right. He visits the schools, not the parents; it is not his duty to visit them. But if he is to learn whether Nonconformist parents regard it as a grievance that their children who attend Church of England schools are taught the Church Catechism, and receive instruction in the Prayer Book, it is only from the parents he can learn it; and the parents are the only persons who can tell him why they do not avail themselves of the conscience clause. We do not, therefore, think that the large


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amount of evidence given by Her Majesty's inspectors in support of the efficiency of the conscience clause has much weight. They have no means of forming a judgment on its efficiency.

Nor does it seem to us that on this question much weight is to be attached to the evidence of the representatives of educational societies connected with the churches which sustain denominational schools, or to the evidence of the managers and teachers of such schools. If the important question had been, whether the conscience clause is often or ever violated, the evidence of these witnesses would have been valuable. The secretaries and other representatives of the great educational societies could have informed us whether the schools with which they are severally associated had ever been called to account for violating the clause; and if any of the managers or teachers who appeared before us had violated it themselves, we have no doubt that they would have acknowledged the violation. But the real question on which we desired assistance was not whether the clause is violated, but whether it is effective; and the clergyman of a country parish is not likely to know whether the Nonconformists, whose children attend his school, are too much afraid of the influence of the Church in the neighbourhood to use the conscience clause; nor on this question is it likely that the Secretary of the National Society will have any information. And if, as some witnesses allege, parents decline to withdraw their children from religious instruction, which they disapprove - not from any dread of losing employment or incurring any annoyance themselves - but because they fear that the children would suffer some disadvantage in the school, they are not likely to communicate their fears to the teachers.

On the other hand, we think that great weight attaches to the evidence of Mr. T. Smyth, a working man, who was selected to appear before us by the London Trades' Council, and to the evidence of the witnesses who, on the ground of personal knowledge and official position, claimed to be the representatives of various Nonconformist denominations. It was very apparent that Mr. Smyth had a large knowledge of the opinions of working men, the fathers of the children attending public elementary schools; and the force of his evidence was not lessened by any other witness who appeared before us having the same knowledge as himself. On the question why it is that large numbers of Nonconformists whose children attend Church of England schools do not withdraw them from the religious instruction. Nonconformist ministers have better means of being well-informed than any other witnesses whom we examined.

On a review of the whole question, we have come to the conclusion that the conscience clause, though rarely violated, is wholly ineffective; and that the protection it is supposed to offer to parents whose children are attending schools where the religious instruction is contrary to their own religious belief is illusory.

According to the figures furnished us by the Rev. J. Duncan, out of 2,000,000 children attending Church of England schools, less than 8,000 are withdrawn from the religious instruction. No exact statements were given to us as to how many are withdrawn in schools of other descriptions; but all the witnesses agreed that the number is extremely small. In forming a judgment on these figures it is necessary to remember that a very considerable proportion of the parents of the scholars attending public elementary schools know and care very little about the characteristic doctrines and observances of different churches, and have no anxiety that their children should receive one kind of religious instruction rather than another; very many would be quite contented if they received no religious instruction at all. These may be dismissed from consideration. But from the evidence which has come before us, even if we had no other sources of information, it is certain that large numbers of the working classes have strong religious preferences. The Rev. J. Atkinson, for example, informed us that the Primitive Methodists have more than 5,000 churches in England and Wales, with attendance numbering close upon half a million. These churches with their ministers, Sunday schools, missions at home and abroad, and other church institutions are supported by the contributions of the working classes; they have practically no support from the wealthy. Other Nonconformist communities have to rely to a considerable extent, though not so exclusively, upon the contributions of the same classes of the community. That the working people contribute so largely to the support of Nonconformist churches is a decisive proof of the strength of their religious convictions. And yet it is certain from the evidence submitted to us by school managers and teachers, as well as by the Nonconformist ministers, that large numbers of the members of Nonconformist churches and congregations send their children to Church of England day schools without claiming the protection of


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the conscience clause. A Baptist parent who believes that infant baptism is invalid, and contrary to the mind of Christ, and that, even when the rite is administered to adults it conveys no grace, sends his child to a day school during the week, where he is taught that by baptism an infant is "made a member of Christ, a child of God, and an inheritor of the kingdom of Heaven". Primitive Methodists, Congregationalists, and other Nonconformists who baptise infants, regard the teaching of the Church of England on the efficacy of baptism, and on some other subjects with strong hostility; and yet their children receive religious instruction in Church of England day schools. This becomes the more remarkable, when we remember, that if a child attends school from the time he is seven to the time he is thirteen, a whole year of his school-time is spent in taking part in religious observances and receiving instruction in religion. It might have been assumed - we believe that it was assumed when the Act of 1870 was passed - that parents who object to the religious instruction given in schools to which they send their children would avail themselves of the conscience clause. But it is demonstrated, by the evidence which has reached us from all kinds of sources, that the clause is practically inoperative. About the reasons which make it inoperative there are differences of opinion, but we believe that the evidence sustains the following conclusions:

1. To large numbers of parents the existence of the right to withdraw their children from the religious instruction is unknown. The Act of 1870 requires that a copy of the regulations in the seventh section, popularly described as the conscience clause, "shall be conspicuously put up" in every public elementary school. But comparatively few parents have occasion to visit the schools; when they do visit them it is on business connected with their children, and they are very unlikely to read an extract from an Act of Parliament even if they happen to be near that part of the wall of the room where it is exhibited. The children, for the most part, are likely neither to read nor to understand it. Mr. Fitch informed us that parents who are indifferent to "specific religious instruction" accept it for their children "as a necessary condition of the school life". We believe that this is also true of large numbers of parents who have definite religious convictions, and whose religious convictions are out of harmony with the religious instruction which their children are receiving at school.

2. Some parents who know of the existence of the clause are unwilling to appeal to it, because they fear that children who are withdrawn from religious instruction will be regarded with some disfavour by the teachers and managers, and may have to endure petty annoyances as "black sheep" from their fellow-scholars. Parents may also fear that to isolate a child from any part of the school life may have an unhealthy influence on the child's character.

3. In the rural districts of England the social ascendancy of the clergy and of the adherents of the Church of England creates a serious apprehension on the part of Nonconformists that, if they withdraw their children from religious teaching given in a Church of England school, both they and their children are likely to suffer annoyance and loss.

4. Some parents feel that, since the clergyman and his friends contribute to the support of the school in which their children are educated, there would be something dishonourable in withdrawing their children from the religious instruction, for the sake of which the school is maintained. As one of our witnesses put it, the impression may be given to the parents that it is "a shabby thing to send their children to a day school, and not to the same Sunday school"; and it would seem still more "shabby" to withdraw the child from the religious instruction given in the day school itself. This kind of feeling was suggested in an answer given by Mr. Fitch when under examination. It had been put to him that, instead of the present conscience clause, which requires the parent to ask that his child should receive no religious instruction, another might be adopted under which "special religious instruction" should be given to those children only whose parents requested it. This is the practice of the Liverpool School Board. Mr. Fitch objected to the change. He did not see the hardship of requiring the parent to make the objection; "he is sufficiently protected by the existing law, " and he is availing himself to a great extent of the subscriptions and of the religious supervision, and of all the moral influences with which voluntary managers try to surround the schools. I think it is very reasonable that, unless he makes special objection, his child should share with others in instruction." We think that the knowledge that "he is availing himself to a great extent of the subscriptions" of the managers of a church school prevents many a Nonconformist


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parent from availing himself of the right - which Mr. Fitch would not desire to take away - of withdrawing his children from religious instruction which he disapproves. It should be remembered, however, that under our present educational system large numbers of Nonconformist parents are compelled by law to send their children to schools supported in part by the subscriptions of members of the Church of England.

There was another serious grievance urged by Nonconformist witnesses. The Rev. J. Atkinson stated that, owing to our present organisation of education, there are large districts in the country in which young people who are members of Primitive Methodist churches cannot enter the teaching profession unless they separate them- selves from the Primitive Methodist Connexion, and become members of the Church of England. The Rev. Dr. Crosskey also complained that, in large districts of the country, the children of Nonconformists generally are excluded from the teaching profession unless they become members of the Church of England. In explanation of this statement the witness said,

In many agricultural districts, where the population is very sparse, there can be only one school. In others, where the population, though more numerous, is still inconsiderable, there ought to be only one school. Two schools, near to each other, with only 60 or 70 children in each, would be less efficient than one school with 120 or 130 children in it. As a matter of fact, in such districts there is, in a very large number of cases, no public elementary school except that which is connected with the Church of England. For example, in the diocese of Oxford, consisting of the three counties of Oxon, Berks, and Bucks, there were, in 1885, the following denominational public schools:

Church of England, National, Parochial, and Endowed Schools604
Roman Catholic12
Wesleyan13
Total629

But only 72 board and 34 British schools. But in the villages and smaller towns there are large numbers of Nonconformists. If they are to enter the teaching profession under present conditions they must become pupil-teachers. They cannot be sent away to a distance from home to be apprenticed in a board school; and their only way into the profession is through the church school in their neighbourhood. This school is expressly maintained for educating children in the principles of the English Church. The managers have a clear right to refuse to appoint a teacher, whether pupil-teacher, head-master, or assistant, who declines to promote the object for which the school exists. They, therefore, decline to appoint Dissenters as pupil-teachers, and, if a Dissenting young person wishes to enter the teaching profession in these districts, he is obliged, in the first instance, to conform.

The witness, having alleged a case in which a monitor, who did her work with considerable credit, was dismissed from a National School when the managers discovered that she was a Nonconformist, went on to say that the conscience clause "gives no relief in such districts (districts in which there are only church schools). It is professedly for the protection of scholars, not of teachers; and, from the nature of the case, it is impossible that any conscience clause should open a denominational school to teachers of another faith."

It was also urged by some Nonconformist witnesses that Nonconformist pupil-teachers who have been trained in board schools find it difficult to obtain entrance into a training college, as most of the training colleges are in connexion with the Church of England; but we have dealt with the whole question of training colleges in another chapter, and need not recur to it here.

As to the reality of the general, though not, perhaps, universal, exclusion of Nonconformists from appointments as pupil-teachers in Church of England schools there is no dispute. And, since it is also proved by our evidence that there are large districts of country in which schools connected with the Church of England are the only schools accessible to the population, it is apparent that, throughout these districts, the entrance into the teaching profession is practically closed against Nonconformists. The grievance, in our opinion, is a very serious one, and calls for a prompt and efficient remedy.

The complete remedy proposed by many Nonconformists for the two principal grievances with which we have dealt in this chapter - (1) the inefficiency of the conscience clause, as the result of which children are compelled by law to attend schools where they receive religious instruction which their parents disapprove; and


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(2) the exclusion of young persons connected with the Nonconformist churches in large districts of England from entrance into the teaching profession - is that all public elementary schools receiving parliamentary grants should be placed under the direct control of the representatives of the ratepayers. This proposal in substance is supported in a large number of resolutions passed by Nonconformist Associations representing various Nonconformist denominations, and laid on our table by Dr. Crosskey. Memorials have also been sent to the Commission, some of which appear in our Appendix, in which the representatives of important Nonconformist communities express a strong desire for the general establishment of schools under the management of representatives of the ratepayers.

But in a Resolution adopted at a meeting of the General Committee of the Congregational Union of England and Wales, held on January 17th, 1888, there occurs the following passage, which suggests a more moderate and more practicable remedy: "The Committee renews its protest against the compulsory attendance of the children of Nonconformists at schools conducted in the interests of the Church of England or other denominations, and affirms the necessity of providing, in all parts of the kingdom, elementary schools under the control of the representatives of the public, and free from sectarian influence in regard to both management and teaching." (Appendix No. 26, pp. 15, 16.) In this Resolution it is not affirmed that all grants to denominational schools should be withdrawn, but that schools "under the control of the representatives of the public, and free from sectarian influence", shall be provided "in all parts of the kingdom".

This is substantially the recommendation adopted by the Wesleyan Methodist Conference in 1873. In December, 1872, a special committee appointed by the Conference to consider the education question met in London and passed the following Resolution: "That this Committee, while resolving to maintain in full vigour and efficiency our connexional day schools and training colleges, is of opinion that, due regard being had to existing interests, future legislation for primary education at the public cost should provide for such education only on the principle of unsectarian schools under the school board." The Committee recommended "the division of the whole country into school districts, and the formation of school boards in every district, and that in every school district one or two board schools, under undenominational management and Government inspection, should be so placed, as that as far as possible at least one such school should not be further distant than three miles from any family in the district." In the summer of 1873 the Conference resolved as follows: "The Conference adopts the Report of the Special Committee on Primary Education appointed by the last Conference. In adopting this Report the Conference expresses its regret that the essential recommendations of the Committee have not been adopted by the Government in their measure for the amendment of the Elementary Education Act of 1870, and records its deliberate conviction that, in justice to the interests of national education in the broadest sense, and to the different religious denominations of the country, school boards should be established everywhere, and an undenominational school placed within reasonable distance of every family."

This proposal seems to us reasonable and just. In districts where there can be only one efficient school, that school should be under public management, and ought not to be used as an agency for maintaining the religious faith of any particular denomination.

If this proposal were adopted, the present exclusion from the teaching profession of young persons living in country districts, and belonging to Nonconformist denominations, would cease.

But we do not propose that religious instruction should be excluded from board schools, and as in districts where there is only a board school, the religious instruction may be unacceptable to many of the parents, a conscience clause will still be necessary. It will also be necessary in other districts where there are schools of several kinds; for the religious teaching given in all of them may, to some parents, be unsatisfactory, and therefore we think it necessary that the conscience clause should be made more effective.

We therefore recommend -

That a plain printed statement, in a form to be drawn up by the Department, should be placed in the hands of the parent of every child attending any public elementary school in which any part of the school time is appropriated to religious observances and instruction, informing him that, if he wishes it, the child can be


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withdrawn from these observances and this instruction, and that the withdrawal will subject the child to no disadvantage.

That in schools where there is a class-room and more than one teacher, the time-table shall provide, during the hour appropriated to religious observances and instruction, for the secular instruction of children withdrawn from them.

That in schools where there is no class-room or only one teacher, children withdrawn from the religious observances and instruction shall not be required to attend till the time for secular instruction begins, and shall be dismissed when it is over.

That no child shall be charged a higher fee because it does not attend the Sunday school connected with the day school; or because it does not receive the religious instruction given in the day school.

NOTE TO CHAPTER ON GRIEVANCES OF NONCONFORMISTS

While we accept the statements contained in this chapter as an accurate expression of a grievance keenly felt by many Nonconformists, and assent to the recommendation for increasing the efficiency of the conscience clause, we desire to record our opinion that the smallness of the number of persons who have availed themselves of it, is due partly to the fairness with which the religious instruction has been conducted by the great majority of the teachers, and that many of the parents care comparatively little about the precise religious shade of the teaching, so long as they can obtain a good practical education for their children.

We are further of opinion that no conscience clause, however stringent, and however largely used, would meet the case of those whose grievances are stated in this chapter, and that nothing short of popular representative management will secure that the teaching shall be thoroughly satisfactory to the community for whom any school should be maintained.

THOMAS EDMUND HELLER.
E. LYULPH STANLEY.

CHAPTER 19

ON VARIOUS SYSTEMS OF EDUCATION ON THE CONTINENT, IN SOME OF OUR COLONIES, AND IN THE UNITED STATES

We have received answers to a schedule of questions from a large number of Foreign countries, and from many of our Colonies, and from some of the states of the United States.

An examination of the returns from the European countries shows that education is compulsory in nearly all.

It is not compulsory in Holland and in Belgium; and in Italy it is said to be compulsory only between the ages of 6 and 9.

In other countries, education, as a rule, is compulsory up to the age of 14; though, in Bavaria and in France, compulsion ceases at 13, and in Hungary at 12.

The usual age at which compulsion begins is 6. In Prussia it may begin at 5. In Sweden, Neuchâtel, Vaud, and Wurtemberg, it begins at 7, and in Norway at 8.

In reference to the question of fees, education is generally free. Thus, in France, Norway, Sweden, Geneva, Neuchâtel, Ticino, Vaud, Zurich, education is free.

In Austria it is free, except in Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia; in Italy it is free, but in some communes an entrance fee is charged of from 2s 8d to 8s 4d. In Bavaria, education is generally free, some communes charge 2s 6d a head a year. In Belgium, 499,699 scholars are free, 89,105 pay fees. In Hungary, parents pay 3s 8d a year. In Prussia, by the constitution, the schools should be free, but the practice varies. Where fees are charged, they cover 12 per cent of the cost.

In Berne the schools are generally free, but 1s 8d a year may be charged. In Holland, there is a mixed system; some schools are free, in some fees are charged.


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In Wurtemberg the schools are rarely free. In the country the fees are 2s a year; in the larger towns they go up to 3s 6d a year. In Saxony there are fees, ranging in the country districts from ¾d to 1¾d a week, in towns from 12s to 25s or 36s a year, according to place and grade of school. In Dresden the elementary school fees are 2½d to 3¾d a week.

As to schools being under public management or not, in Austria all the schools receiving public support are under public management.

In Bavaria, the system is a state system, and the schools are maintained from public funds.

In Belgium, 429,724 children were in the communal schools, and 170,725 pupils in the schools under voluntary management accepted by the communes.

In France there were 3,453,071 children in 1886, in public schools, and 1,067,857 in schools under private or voluntary management.

In Holland there are returned 373,265 children in public schools, and 134,172 children in private or voluntary schools.

In Hungary, figures are only given for the public schools.

In Italy there are returned 1,914,400 children in public, and 172,304 children in private schools.

In Norway nearly all the children are in public schools.

In Prussia, out of 4,725,210 children, 4,339,729 are returned in public schools.

In Saxony nearly all the children are in public schools.

In Sweden the same is the case.

In the Swiss Cantons and in Wurtemberg, the mass of the children are in public schools.

France, Holland, and Belgium are the three countries in which a large number of children are in schools not under public management. In France and in Holland the voluntary schools are not only voluntary in their management, but also in their resources. In Belgium the schools nominally voluntary may, under recent legislation, be subsidized by the commune.

As to religious instruction in the public schools, it is not given in France, in Holland, and in Italy (but in Italy religious instruction may be given, if asked for, outside of school hours). In Geneva and Neuchâtel the instruction is secular. In Berne and Zurich religious instruction is given. In Vaud religious teaching is said to be given from a historical point of view. In Ticino, religious instruction is not compulsory, but in all the schools of the canton the priest of the parish teaches the catechism of the Roman Catholic church in the ordinary school hours.

In Belgium the communes may give religious teaching at the commencement or at the end of the school hours, but children are exempted at the request of their parents from attending such instruction.

In Austria the religious teaching is under the supervision of the church authorities.

In Bavaria religious instruction is part of the curriculum, and is given by the parish priest.

In Holland the school premises may be used, out of school hours, for religious instruction, and in 1885, 620 school premises were used for that purpose.

In Hungary religious instruction is given according to the denomination, the members of the denomination providing it.

In Norway the evangelic Lutheran religion is taught.

In Prussia religious instruction is compulsory.

In Saxony religion is taught to Protestants by the master, in Catholic schools by the priest.

In Sweden religion is taught, but children of parents who profess a foreign faith may be exempted.

In Wurtemberg, we are told that a third of the whole school time is devoted to religious instruction.

The hours of work vary frequently with the ages of the children, and, in some countries, there is a difference between summer and winter; as a whole, the hours are probably not longer than ours, but they are distributed differently, and appear by these reports to be often much shorter for the young, and longer for the highest classes; the number of days in the year during which the school is open, does not seem to differ much from our practice.

There is a practice in some foreign countries, in the interest of economy, to make many village schools half-time schools, so that the single master may teach in relays as many as 100 scholars.


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Classes are large in many of the countries that have made returns. Thus, in Austria, the law assigns 80 scholars on the roll to one teacher. In Belgium the aim is to have a teacher to 50 or 60 scholars, but there are still cases where he has a class of 70, 80, or even more children.

In France the maximum is 50.

In Holland the law fixes the class of a teacher at 40.

In Hungary the law says not more than 80; practice gives 64 or 65 pupils to a teacher.

In Italy by law the classes are of 60, or even 70 scholars; in practice the superior classes are of 25, the lower classes 50 or 60.

In Norway the classes in towns may not exceed 60; there is no law for the rural districts.

In Prussia the classes are generally of 80 scholars. The law of 1883 has assigned, in towns, 54 scholars to one teacher, 73 to a teacher where there are two teachers, 64 to a teacher where there are several classes; in the country, 73, 78, and 85, according as there are one, two, or several teachers.

In Saxony there may not be more than 60, 40, or 30 scholars in one class in the three ranks of schools respectively. One teacher may not have more than two classes.

In Sweden there is no law as to the size of a class; the number generally taught simultaneously is 30 in a primary school and 40 in an elementary school.

In Berne the legal maximum is 80; in practice the number varies from 30 to 70.

In Geneva the legal maximum is 50; in practice there are never fewer than 40.

In Ticino the law lays down 60; in practice the classes run from 20 to 55.

In Vaud the maximum is 60; in practice the classes range from 45 to 50.

In Zurich the law permits 100 to a teacher; 80 is rarely exceeded in actual practice.

In Wurtemberg, where there are more than 90 scholars, there must be two teachers.

As to juvenile labour, no child in Germany may be employed under 12 in manufactories or other paid labour; from 12 to 14 children may work six hours a day, but must be instructed in school three hours a day.

There is said to be no half time in Belgium.

In France no child under 15 may be admitted to work in a factory or workshop more than six hours a day, unless he has a certificate that he has acquired sufficient primary instruction.

In Holland there is said to be no half-time law.

In Hungary no child under 12 can be employed in any handicraft or factory.

In Italy no child may work till nine years old, nor underground till 10 years old. After these ages a medical certificate of physical fitness is required. Children from 9 to 12 may not be made to work more than eight hours a day.

In Norway there is no half time.

In Switzerland children under 14 may not work in factories.

We may generally say that the curriculum in most European countries is fuller than the present legal requirements in England, but not fuller than that which we have recommended. Of course the value of a curriculum depends largely on the care and thoroughness with which it is taught. Drawing is very commonly compulsory for both sexes, and the curriculum of a school of several classes is generally fuller than that of the small one class school of rural districts. The scholars seem generally to be promoted by classes once a year.

The teachers are always adults. In Holland, where there seems to be an exception, the pupil-teachers are not reckoned on the staff, but used as apprentices to be taught.

The practice as to mixed schools varies. In France, as far as possible, the sexes are separate; in Italy they must be separate; in Holland, Prussia, Austria, many schools are mixed; in Hungary they are separate; generally the larger schools in the towns on the Continent are separate.

As a rule, the teachers are trained. The training colleges are places of special professional education, and most of the students have previously been educated in secondary schools. In France the students are boarded in the training colleges. In Germany, both systems of day students and of boarders exist; generally, neither system has the preponderance. In Germany the great mass of the teachers, even for girls and for mixed schools in the country, are men.

There is everywhere a public system of secondary education, rarely gratuitous, but always very cheap.

In summing up the impression made by the Continental returns, we may say that abroad, as a rule, the State interferes more directly, and is more responsible for


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the curriculum, the organization, and the inspection of the schools than in England. It trains the teachers, who are civil servants, and it bears the bulk of the cost; though, in saying the State, we must be understood as including in the term the locality. France is the country in which the central authority interferes most directly and pays most liberally; elsewhere, nearly all the cost falls on the commune and on the province or district.

In many of the countries of the Continent, education has long been recognised as a matter of national concern and of public enforcement, and, therefore, the obligation of educating their children has been more deeply impressed on parents. The range of education too, has been wider, and the training of teachers has been more thorough and scientific than in this country. Foreign countries, moreover, have relied on adult and on trained teachers for the work of teaching; whereas, in England, the great expansion of education in the last 18 years has led our authorities to be rather indulgent in dispensing with full qualifications in those whom they have recognised as teachers.

But we may fairly hope and require that, now that we have got beyond the stage of rapid expansion, and have more settled conditions of educational work, we may set a higher standard of performance before us. It is not fair to test by its results a system under which the first generation of children educated under the Act of 1870 is only now entering upon active life. Till lately, the board schools and the newly-opened voluntary schools have been filled with children who had not previously been under any systematic school discipline, though they may from time to time have drifted from school to school. With a more liberal curriculum and an improved staff of teachers - the latter, perhaps, the most urgent need of our present education - we may look to 10 years hence to show that, though late in the race, we may overtake and go beyond those whose longer established and more fully organised system we have examined.

If we turn from the Continent to the English speaking communities, whether in our colonies or in the United States, though we find generally a very keen desire to promote popular education, and large sums of public money expended for that purpose, yet the methods and organisation of public education differ materially from those prevailing in the continental countries, of whose educational systems we have made the above short summary.

As to compulsion, education is said to be compulsory in British Columbia from 7 to 12; in Ontario from 7 to 13; in Prince Edward Island from 8 to 13; in South Australia from 7 to 13; and in Tasmania from 7 to 13, It is compulsory for the districts that choose to adopt compulsion in New Zealand and in Nova Scotia; in the former from 7 to 13, in the latter from 7 to 12. In Manitoba it is said to be universally compulsory, but it has never been necessary to enforce the law. In Quebec, Queensland, and the Cape of Good Hope, school attendance is not compulsory. It may be noticed that where attendance is compulsory, a very short attendance satisfies the law. In the United States we are told that school attendance is not compulsory, in Alabama. Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Dakota, Iowa, and Missouri; it is compulsory in California, Idaho, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington Territory, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, Montana, Nebraska, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. In these States, from 12 weeks to 4 months attendance seems to satisfy the law, and no doubt compulsion is not a very serious thing in many parts of these States.

In reference to the payment of fees, the rule is for schools to be free; this is the case in all the States of the United States making returns. In our own colonies, schools are free in British Columbia, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Manitoba. In Quebec a school fee is levied on all children of school age, whether they go to school or not, so that this is rather a poll tax proportioned to the number of children of school age, than a school fee. At the Cape of Good Hope, and in South Australia and Tasmania there are school fees. In Tasmania the fees are heavy, amounting to 9d a week for a single child.

Practically throughout the colonies the school system is a public one, and voluntary schools under private management are not aided, except to some slight extent at the Cape of Good Hope. In some of the colonies a small proportion of scholars attending voluntary schools is returned. The highest is in Tasmania, where there are nearly 16,000 children in the State schools, and nearly 5,500 children in voluntary schools. In the United States the system throughout is a public system of schools, locally managed by elected bodies.


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As to religious instruction, the system in the United States is in most cases returned as one of secular schools. In some cases the penalties for breaking the law are severe. Thus in Illinois any appropriation or grant of any school fund in aid of any church or sectarian purpose is prohibited under penalty of double the amount, and imprisonment for not less than one month or more than 12 months.

In Montana all sectarian publications are prohibited, and if any sectarian or denominational doctrine be taught, the school forfeits its right to any portion of the county school money. It may be noted that though the teaching in Dakota is said to be secular, the Bible may be read for ten minutes without comment.

In the district of Columbia, short devotional exercises of a non-sectarian character are used for opening the schools, though the schools give none but secular instruction. In Maine the schools give general religious but not sectarian teaching. In Michigan, it is stated that public schools do give religious instruction, but the answers to the other questions seem to show that "not" has been omitted by a clerical error, and that the schools of Michigan only give secular instruction. In New Hampshire, teachers are required to give religious teaching in their schools, but it must be non-sectarian. In New Jersey the Lord's prayer is recited, and a portion of scripture is read without comment. In Rhode Island, South Carolina, and Vermont, the schools are secular, but the Bible is read without comment, and the Lord's prayer is commonly used. In Virginia the State does not require religious teaching, but teachers usually give moral and religious but not sectarian instruction.

In our colonies the schools are as a rule described as secular, but in British Columbia though no religious instruction is given, the Lord's Prayer may be used in opening and closing school, upon the permission of the board of trustees. In New Brunswick the trustees may use the school house after school hours for religious instruction, and advantage is in some instances taken of this option; the teachers are required to instruct the children in the principles of christian morality.

In New Zealand, where the school teaching is secular, the building may be used out of school hours for religious instruction, by permission of the school committee.

In Ontario there is permissive religious teaching; and the instructions of the Education Department prescribe that the religious exercises should be conducted without haste, and with the utmost reverence and decorum.

In Quebec and in Manitoba the schools are divided into Catholic and Protestant. In Quebec, in Catholic schools, the Catholic catechism is taught. In Protestant schools, scripture history, and the gospels are taught, and the schools are opened with Bible reading and prayer. In Manitoba a somewhat similar plan exists. There the board of education is divided into a Protestant and Catholic section. In Tasmania, ministers of religion are allowed to instruct during a stated period of half-an-hour morning and afternoon.

In the United States, and in our colonies the sexes are very generally mixed in the schools, and as a rule, the children are taught by adults.

The sparseness of the population, and the newness of most of these countries, with the rapidity of their development and the popular nature of their institutions, make the organisation of their school system less methodical and less exact than on the Continent. The art of teaching and the systematic training of teachers, have been more studied and more exactly enforced on the Continent with its highly organised bureaucratic system than in the English speaking communities which we have reviewed. But the tendency to free schools limited to secular teaching under popular local control, is very marked in the states and provinces where the English race is expanding, and is free from the institutions inherited from the past which exist in the mother country.

All these conclusions we humbly submit to Your Majesty in the hope that they may tend to the further improvement of National Education, the development and extension of which by State aid and under public direction have been almost entirely included within the limits of Your Majesty's long and happy reign.

(Signed)
E. LYULPH STANLEY.
R. W. DALE.
THOMAS EDMUND HELLER.*
HENRY RICHARD.
GEORGE SHIPTON.
*Subject to the reservation bearing his signature.


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RESERVATION

While signing this report, I desire to record my strong conviction that it would not be desirable to interfere with the right of the teacher to give religious and moral instruction, but that he should be at liberty at all times to support moral lessons by references to religious sanctions. The experience of the past shows that, as a rule, teachers are persons to whom this liberty may be safely granted, and that they make the religious teaching of children a basis for moral training, rather than a means of dogmatic or sectarian teaching. I also think that if the teacher ceased to be regarded as a centre of religious and moral influence, his power of governing his school would be weakened, and his professional status would be degraded.

I agree with the majority of the Commission in thinking it desirable, in the interests of education, that some scheme of retiring pensions should be devised for teachers in elementary schools. I think, however, that the maximum amount of the supplementary pension which they recommend (£15) is too low, and should be substantially increased. I further think that the conditions laid down in Art. 134 of the Code should be so modified as to include in their operation all who were pupil teachers before August 1862, and completely to fulfil the promises contained in the Minutes of Council dated December 21st, 1846, and August 6th, 1851.

I desire to recommend that the practice of making annual endorsements on the parchment certificates of teachers should at once be abolished, and I am of opinion that the irregularities and evils connected with the practice which were disclosed by the evidence fully justify such a recommendation.

I am further of opinion that greater security should be given to the teacher in respect of his "tenure of office". I think that no certificated teacher who properly performs his duty, and is of good moral character, should be liable to dismissal at the instance of an individual manager, or because he declines to undertake duties not connected with the school. As the Education Department practically approves the appointment of teachers, it might be advisable to give the Department some veto in cases of tyrannical, capricious, or improper dismissal, if it be appealed to by the teacher aggrieved.

THOMAS EDMUND HELLER.





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[These pages, which contain a Summary of the Statistical Report and a List of the Recorded Divisions of the Commission, are not included here. Readers who wish to see them will find the full report on the Internet Archive website.]


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APPENDIX

I

INSTRUCTIONS ISSUED TO HER MAJESTY'S INSPECTORS UNDER THE CODE OF 1882

(VICE-PRESIDENT THE RIGHT HON. A. G. MUNDELLA)

(1) EXAMINATION AND INSPECTION OF SCHOOLS GENERALLY

Circular No. 212.
Education Department, Whitehall,
9th August 1882.

SIR,

The changes which have recently been introduced into the Code, and the proposed re-organisation of the work of inspection, entail a review of the instructions given in some previous circulars for the guidance of Inspectors in their inspection and examination of schools.

2. Before entering into details of principles and methods of examination, my Lords would especially call your attention to the general principle, that all hurry or undue haste on the day of examination is incompatible with the proper discharge of your main duty - that of ascertaining, verifying, and reporting the facts on which the parliamentary grant is administered. Their Lordships gladly acknowledge the great courtesy, patience, and industry with which the Inspectors have, as a body, discharged the difficult duty of collecting the numerous particulars required for an accurate judgment of each scholar's work in detail, and of the school as a whole. But instances have occurred in which managers have complained of unpunctuality, haste, and impatience, and of a want of due consideration in the treatment of teachers and scholars. It may be fairly inferred that such complaints would not arise if sufficient time were given to each inspection. An early attendance at the school is absolutely indispensable, not only on account of the greater length of time available for work, but in the interests of the children, who are far more capable of sustained exertion in the early part of the day. A hurried inspection probably necessitates some evils, which are much to be deprecated - the attempt to do two things at once, e.g., to give out dictation or sums while hearing the reading of another class; keeping classes unemployed instead of dismissing them to play; retaining children in school in the dinner hour and thereby not allowing sufficient time for the meal; prolonging the examination to a late hour in the afternoon; and embarrassing young scholars by want of clearness in dictation or in asking questions.

3. It is not necessary in this circular to enter into minute details as to the rules to be observed in examining schools. It may be expected that practical uniformity will be obtained by the arrangements recently made for conference and agreement on the part of the senior Inspectors, whose duty it will be to see that the rules approved by the Department are uniformly observed by the district Inspectors in their respective divisions. My Lords do not propose to interfere with the methods by which each Inspector may prefer to arrive at results, but will expect that the standard obtained by the mutual agreement of the senior Inspectors and approved by their Lordships shall be faithfully observed in each district. For this purpose occasional conferences will be held in each division with a view to compare sums set and passages dictated in each standard, questions asked in class or specific subjects, and the methods and results of inspection generally. Uniformity of standard will also be further secured by the proposed special training of all Inspectors who may hereafter be appointed.

4. Appeals from the reports and recommendations of Inspectors have not been frequent in the past and will probably be even less frequent in future, when a uniform standard of examination is applied throughout the districts. But if any complaint of real or apparent hardship should be laid before the Department, the case will be referred by their Lordships to the senior Inspector of the division for personal inquiry and report, wherever the facts alleged seem to justify such a reference.

5. Under Article 106 of the Code the entire grant to an infant school or class will be computed on the average attendance, and not as heretofore, in part, on the number of children present on the day of inspection and on the number of passes obtained in the standard examination. The children, apparently above six, should, however, be individually examined, and a sufficient number of the others to satisfy you that the elements of reading, writing, and arithmetic are properly taught. The Code assumes that, besides suitable instruction in these elements, and in needlework and singing, a good infant school should provide a regular course of simple conversational lessons on objects and on the facts of natural history, and a proper variety of physical exercises and interesting employments. In the best schools the list of collective lessons is prepared by the head teacher three months in advance, and is entered in the log-book. The managers of a school in two or three departments are at liberty to place the scholars of the First Standard - usually between seven and eight years of age - either in the infant department or with the older children; but when the former plan is preferred, the course of lessons should include simple recitation and lessons in geography or elementary science to correspond to the class-subjects intended to be taken up in the boys' or girls' school. It should be borne in mind that it is of little service to adopt the "gifts" and mechanical occupations of the Kindergarten unless they are so used as to furnish real training in accuracy of hand and eye, in intelligence, and in obedience.

6. An infant school or class may be deemed "Fair" when more than half of the scholars examined proved to have been satisfactorily taught in reading, writing, and arithmetic; when discipline and singing are fairly good; and when one of the requirements specified under (2) and (3) in Article 106b*, is fairly fulfilled. When both of these requirements are fairly fulfilled; when not less than three-fourths pass the individual examination well; and when discipline and singing are satisfactory, the mark "Good" should be awarded. A school or department should not be called "Excellent" unless all three requirements of the Article are thoroughly well satisfied. No merit grant should be given in any case in which the infant class is left in the sole charge of a monitor. The time-table should show what portion of the daily instruction is given by the head or some other adult teacher.

7. The Code requires that in all standards higher than the second, three reading books shall be provided. More than three sets of books are not necessary in any standard; an ordinary reading book will provide a sufficient amount of good literature for exercises in the art of reading and for all the purposes of teaching "English" if taken as a class subject; in the third and higher standards the second reading book will be a historical reader; the third book will be a geographical or scientific reader to correspond to the second class subject. In schools in which no second class subject is taken, the third book may be like the first, an ordinary reader. In Standards I and II two ordinary reading books may be used, unless the managers prefer that the second book should be a geographical or scientific reader, to suit the second class subject. In Standards V, VI, and VII books of extracts from standard authors may be taken, though such works as Robinson Crusoe, voyages and travels, or biographies of eminent men (if of suitable length) are to be preferred. In Standards VI and VII a single play of Shakespeare, or a single book of one of Milton's longer poems, or a selection of extracts from either poet equal in length to the foregoing, may be accepted. As a rule, ordinary text-books or manuals should not be accepted as readers.

8. In Standards I and II intelligent reading will probably suffice to justify a pass without much examination into the matter of the book; but it should be considered a grave fault if children have been allowed to read the same lesson so often as to learn it by heart, and to repeat it without any but occasional glimpses at the book. The mechanical difficulties of reading, which are to be found in the shorter words of irregular notation, should be mastered before the Third Standard is reached. As a general rule, but especially in the lower standards, the examiner should be careful rather to ask

*Art. 106(b) "A merit grant of 2s, 4s, or 6s, if the Inspector reports the school or class to be fair, good, or excellent, allowing for the special circumstances of the case and having regard to the provision made for (1) suitable instruction in the elementary subjects, (2) simple lessons on objects and on the phenomena of nature and of common life, and (3) appropriate and varied occupations."


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for the meaning of short sentences and phrases than to require explanations of single words by definitions or synonyms.

9. In Standard I the writing exercises should, as a rule, be done on slates, and should be regarded chiefly as a test of handwriting, i.e., of the child's power of making and combining script letters (small and capital), and accurately transcribing print. My Lords do not pledge themselves to any particular style of writing or method of teaching it, but it should at least be bold and legible, and the text adopted should be sufficiently large to show that the child is acquainted with the proper forms and proportions of letters. In dictation none but the easiest and most familiar words, and those chiefly monosyllables, should be given out, and a pass should not be withheld if six out of the prescribed ten are correctly spelt and written. In Standard II the exercises should be on slates, security for writing on paper being provided by the exhibition of copybooks. The same qualities of writing should be required as in Standard I, but greater importance should be attached to evenness and uniformity, and to proper spaces between the words. Capitals should be required to be put without direction after full stops and at the beginning of proper names. The passage for dictation should be carefully selected as being of average difficulty, and free from puzzling words. As children may generally be expected to pass easily in the mechanical art of writing in this stage, five mistakes in spelling ought, as a rule - if the passage selected be sufficiently easy - to involve a failure. In Standard III, and those above it, the examination should always be on paper. Greater readiness should be expected in writing, but two or three words only should be dictated at once. As a rule more than four errors in spelling should involve failure, but if the handwriting be very fair, and not more than four errors in spelling occur in the six lines, the child should pass. Correct spelling should not in any case obtain a pass if the writing is below fair. In Standard IV, and those above it, writing should be running, free, and symmetrical, as well as legible and clear. If poetry is selected for dictation, the scholars should be made clearly to understand before beginning to write where each line commences and ends. A pass should not be withheld if the writing is fair, and the errors in spelling do not exceed three.

10. In Standard V the passage selected for writing from memory should be an anecdote occupying from 10 to 15 lines of ordinary length, and containing some sufficiently obvious point, or simple moral. The passage may, if the teacher desires, be read aloud by him. Neither accuracy in spelling nor excellence in writing should secure a pass, unless the exercise is an intelligent reproduction of the story. The writing exercise prescribed for Standard V may be altogether, and must be to a certain extent, an effort of memory: that for Standard VI is the earliest exercise in composition required in the Code as part of the writing exercise; and no child ought to pass who does not show the power to put together in grammatical language, correctly expressed, and, if required, in the form of a letter, a few simple observations on some easy subject of common and familiar experience. In Standard VII in order to warrant a pass the theme should exhibit something more of structural character and arrangement, the sense should be clear, the expressions fairly well chosen, and the writing, spelling, and grammar free from ordinary faults.

11. In all cases, where a dictation exercise is given, the teacher may be permitted, if he desires, to read the passage over to the children before it is dictated by the inspector. In Welsh speaking districts the teacher may be allowed to give out the whole of the dictation.

12. Little change has been made in Schedule I in regard to the requirements under the head of Arithmetic. You will probably continue the usual practice of setting, in all standards above the first, four sums, of which not more than one should be a problem, and of permitting a scholar to pass who has two correct answers. Right method and arrangement, and good figures may excuse slight error in one of the answers. In Standard V the "rule of three by the method of unity" has been prescribed in order to avoid at that stage the difficulties of the theory of proportion, and to suggest a simpler method of solving ordinary problems by a combination of the four simple and compound rules. But if the answers are correct, and have been intelligently worked by either method, you will of course accept them.

13. Mental arithmetic is a new requirement, but is not intended to form an addition to the individual examination for the purpose of recording the "passes" in the Schedule. It is a class exercise, and may often be satisfactorily tested by requiring the teacher of the class to give a few questions in your presence, and by adding at discretion some questions of your own. The object of this exercise is to encourage dexterity, quickness, and accuracy in dealing with figures, and to anticipate, by means of rapid and varied oral practice with small numbers, the longer problems which have afterwards to be worked out in writing. It is obvious that this general object cannot be attained if the exercises are confined to a few rules for computing "dozens" and "scores", such as are often supposed to be specially suited for mental calculation. Practice should be given in all the ordinary processes of arithmetic, e.g., in Standard I addition, subtraction, and multiplication, with numbers up to 50 and money up to 2s: in Standard II all the four rules, with numbers up to 144, and with money to 10s: in Standard III easy reductions: and in Standard IV simple exercises in fractions founded on the multiplication table, and on the aliquot parts of £1, of a yard, and of a pound avoirdupois. It is often found a help in calculation if the dimensions of the schoolroom, the playground, and the desks, and the weight of a few familiar objects are accurately known and recorded, and occasionally referred to as standards of measurement.

14. In reporting on the subjects of grammar, geography, and history, you have been required hitherto simply to state whether the whole grant ought to be awarded or disallowed. You will, in future, report whether a grant should be made, and if so, whether the results of the instruction are "fair" or "good". The mode of examining is left to your discretion, and may be usefully varied from year to year. It is often advisable to invite the teacher of the class to put a few questions in order that you may know what plan he has adopted before proceeding to propose questions of your own. In standards above the third the knowledge of the scholars may sometimes be tested by written answers which you will carry home and examine; but you will generally be able to satisfy yourself by means of oral questions addressed separately to a sufficient number of the scholars whether the class has been properly taught. The quality of the answers, as well as the number, will have to be considered, and the knowledge of the subject should be fairly distributed throughout the various standards. But, subject to these considerations, it is a safe general rule that the result maybe marked "good" when three-fourths of those examined are found to have been well taught, and "fair" when one-half of them prove to have been so taught. If this latter condition be not fulfilled, no grant should be recommended under Article 109f.

15. Both in class and in specific subjects the Code permits a certain liberty of choice to managers, and it is no part of your duty to restrict this liberty. But if your advice is asked, it will be well in giving it to have regard to the special qualifications of the teacher, and to the opportunities and means at hand for scientific or other instruction. Other conditions being equal, any teacher will be likely to teach best the particular subject of which he knows most, and in which he takes the strongest interest.

16. When the numbers in the upper division of the school, as defined in Article 109f. iii, do not exceed 30 at the beginning of the school year, the children of that division may be treated as one class for instruction in class subjects. When the numbers exceed 30, the upper division should be divided into two groups at least. The grouping of standards is intended to work as follows: Supposing the 4th and 5th Standards to form one group, and the 6th and 7th another, the former group will be required to take the work of the 4th and 5th Standards in alternate years, the latter, that of the 6th and 7th Standards in alternate years. If the four standards - IV-VII - are placed in one group, they will take the subjects of each standard in turn.

17. The examination in this subject is not, as you will observe, limited to technical grammar, although parsing and analysis still form an important part of the requirements. The general object of lessons in English should be to enlarge the learner's vocabulary, and to make him familiar with the meaning, the structure, the grammatical and logical relations, and the right use of words. Elementary exercises of this kind have an important practical bearing on everything else which a child learns. The recitation of a few verses of poetry


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has been prescribed in every standard, and it will be the duty of the teacher to submit to you for approval on the day of inspection a list of the pieces chosen for the ensuing year. It is not necessary that the required number of lines should be taken from one poem; they may be made up from two or more, provided that each extract learned by heart has a completeness and value of its own, and is understood in relation of the story or description of which it forms a part. The extracts should be simple enough to be pleasing and intelligible to children, yet in Standard III and upwards sufficiently advanced to furnish material for thought and explanation, to improve the taste, and to add to the scholar's store of words. In testing the memory lesson, it may suffice to call on a few of the children - not less than one-fourth in each class - to recite each a few lines in succession, and occasionally it may be useful to require the verses to be written down from recollection.

18. From the first, the teaching of English should be supplemented by simple exercises in composition: e.g., when a word is defined, the scholar should be called on to use it in a sentence of his own; when a grammatical principle is explained, he should be asked to frame a sentence, showing how it is to be applied: and examples of the way in which adjectives are formed from nouns, or nouns from verbs, by the addition of syllables, should be supplied or selected by the scholars themselves. Mere instruction in the terminology of grammar, unless followed up by practical exercises in the use of language, yields very unsatisfactory results.

19. The Code recognises as the means of instruction in geography and elementary science, reading books, oral lessons, and visible illustrations. But it does not prescribe the exact proportions in which these means should be employed for each standard, and for each subject. Those proportions should be determined partly by the special plans and aptitude of the teacher, and partly by other considerations. In Standards I and II it will not be necessary for you to insist on the use of a reading book, if provision is made for meeting the requirements of the Code by a systematic course of collective lessons, of which the heads are duly entered in the log-book. The best reading books for higher standards are those which are descriptive and explanatory, are well written, and suitably illustrated, and contain a sufficient amount and variety of interesting matter. When these conditions are fulfilled, and the reading lessons are so supplemented by good oral teaching, as to enable the scholars to pass the prescribed examination well, the requirements of the Code will be satisfied, even though the course of lessons in the reading book does not correspond, in all respects, to the year's work of a particular standard.

20. In teaching geography, good maps, both of the county and of the parish, or immediate neighbourhood in which the school is situated, should be affixed to the walls, and the exact distances of a few near and familiar places should be known. It is useful to mark on the floor of the schoolroom the meridian line, in order that the points of the compass should be known in relation to the school itself, as well as on a map.

21. The full grant for singing is not now to be claimed unless the scholars are so taught as to be able to "sing by note". You will be furnished in subsequent instructions with some simple testing exercises, by which to determine whether this condition has been properly fulfilled. The regulations under which a grant has hitherto been given for singing will still apply in cases in which the children have been taught by ear only. A list of six or eight pieces should be presented, from which you will select one or more, in order to judge whether the children have been "satisfactorily taught" or not.

22. It will be seen that considerable reductions have been made in the amount of work required in needlework, and that the obligatory parts of Schedule III now contain no more work than can be fairly mastered by any girls' school in which four hours weekly have been devoted to this subject. If any school fails to earn the grant, it will probably be found that such failure is due to bad teaching in the lower standards, or that the subject has not been taught (as all the other subjects are taught, and as needlework should be taught) to classes as well as to individuals.

23. No just progress can be made in the general teaching of needlework in a school without effective simultaneous teaching throughout the classes, and it will be the duty of the Inspector specially to inquire into the needlework of infants, and of the lowest standards in other schools.

24. Where any uniform failure in the teaching of these classes occurs, you will report, even when a grant is not claimed for needlework, that the subject is not properly taught; and it may be well to point out to the managers that a few specimens of garments from the best children do not compensate for imperfect teaching in the lower classes.

25. You will in all cases, as heretofore, examine the articles which the children have made during the year; and will satisfy yourself of the genuineness of the specimens by requiring some of the scholars to perform a simple exercise on the day of examination, whether a grant is claimed for needlework under Art. 109c or not. In order to ascertain that the teaching has been in accordance with the schedule, it will be needful to require a sufficient number of the scholars in two or more standards to work specimens of sewing or knitting in your presence. Detailed rules for the conduct of this part of the examination will be found in Appendix I. When needlework is selected as a class subject, you will not recommend the higher grant of 2s unless the results of the teaching are clearly "good". The lower grant of 1s may be obtained by the same degree of proficiency as will be required for the grant of 1s under Art. 109c.

26. You will observe that specific subjects cannot be taken up before a scholar has passed the 4th Standard; and that English, geography, including physical geography, history, and elementary science are recognised as class subjects. If these subjects are simply and thoroughly taught, the scholars will form those habits of exact observation, reasoning and statement, which are needed for the intelligent conduct of life. In ordinary circumstances the scheme of elementary education as now laid down by the Code may be considered complete without the addition of specific subjects. It is not desirable, as a general rule, that specific subjects should be attempted where the staff of the school is small, or the scholars in Standards V-VII do not form a class large enough to justify the withdrawal of the principal teacher from the teaching of the rest of the school: in this latter case they would derive more benefit by being grouped with the 4th Standard for class subjects. The pecuniary loss entailed by the exclusion of a few boys from the study of specific subjects will be abundantly compensated by the greater success in other subjects, and especially by the higher merit grant reserved for more thorough teaching generally.

27. In large schools, however, and those which are in favourable circumstances, the scholars of Standard V and upwards may be encouraged to attempt one or more specific subjects, which the managers may deem most appropriate to the industrial and other needs of the district. It is not the intention of my Lords to encourage a pretentious or unreal pursuit of higher studies, or to encroach in any way on the province of secondary education. The course suited to an elementary school is practically determined by the age limit of 14 years; and may properly include whatever subjects can be effectively taught within that limit. It may be hoped that, year by year, a larger proportion of the children will remain in the elementary schools until the age of 14; and a scholar who has attended regularly and possesses fair ability may reasonably be expected to acquire in that time not only a good knowledge of reading, writing, and arithmetic, of English, and of geography, but also enough of the rudiments of two higher subjects to furnish a stable foundation for further improvement either by his own exertion, or in a secondary school.

28. In cases in which it is proposed to teach specific subjects, it will be desirable for you to ascertain that the teacher has given proof of his fitness to teach them by having acquitted himself creditably at a training college or at some other public examination. You will often find that these subjects are most thoroughly taught when a special teacher is engaged by a group of schools to give instruction in such subjects once or twice a week, his teaching being supplemented in the intervals by the teachers of the school. You will judge of all schemes of elementary science which may be submitted to you for approval by their applicability to the school stay of the bulk of scholars, remembering that the whole course of study is primarily designed for those children who go to labour after they have reached the full time standard.

29. There is no graver or more difficult task imposed upon Her Majesty's Inspectors by the amended Code than that of assessing the merit grant. Your own experience must often have led you to conclude that


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the full value of a school's work is not accurately measured by the results of individual examination, as tabulated in a schedule; and that two schools, in which the ratio of "passes" attained is the same, often differ materially in the quality of those passes, and in general efficiency as places of education. It is in order that these differences may be duly recognised in calculating the grant that my Lords have caused the award of a substantial part of that sum to be dependent on the estimate you form of the merit of the school as a whole. Article 109b specifies three particulars: (1) the organisation and discipline; (2) the intelligence employed in instruction; and (3) the general quality of the work, especially in elementary subjects. Thus the award of the merit grant will be the result of several factors of judgment. The quality as well as the number of the passes will necessarily rank as the most important of these factors; but inferences derived from them alone may be modified by taking into account the skill and spirit of the teaching, the neatness of the schoolroom and its appliances, the accuracy and trustworthiness of the registers, the fitness of the classification in regard to age and capacity, the behaviour of the children, especially their honesty under examination, and the interest they evince in their work. The Code also instructs you to make reasonable allowance for "special circumstances". A shifting, scattered, very poor, or ignorant population; any circumstance which makes regular attendance exceptionally difficult; failure of health, or unforeseen changes among the teaching staff, will necessarily and rightly affect your judgment. It is needful, however, in all such cases, to have regard not only to the existence of special difficulties, but also to the degree of success with which those difficulties have been overcome.

30. From bad or unsatisfactory schools it is manifest that the merit grant should be withheld altogether. The cases which you dealt with under Article 32b of the former Code, and in which a deduction of one or more tenths was made for "faults of instruction or discipline", or in which you have not recommended the grant for "discipline and organisation", would, of course, fall under this head. Other cases will occur which are not serious enough to justify actual deduction; but in which you observe that there is a preponderance of indifferent passes, preventible disorder, dulness, or irregularity; or that the teacher is satisfied with a low standard of duty. To schools of this class no merit grant should be awarded. But a school of humble aims, which passes only a moderately successful examination, may properly be designated "Fair", if its work is conscientiously done, and is sound as far it goes; and if the school is free from any conspicuous fault.

31. Generally, a school may be expected to receive the mark "Good", when both the number and the quality of the passes are satisfactory; when the scholars pass well in such class subjects as are taken up; and when the organisation, discipline, tone, and general intelligence are such as to deserve commendation.

32. It is the intention of their Lordships that the mark "Excellent" should be reserved for cases of distinguished merit. A thoroughly good school in favourable conditions is characterised by cheerful and yet exact discipline, maintained without harshness and without noisy demonstration of authority. Its premises are cleanly and well-ordered; its time-table provides a proper variety of mental employment and of physical exercise; its organisation is such as to distribute the teaching power judiciously, and to secure for every scholar - whether he is likely to bring credit to the school by examination or not - a fair share of instruction and of attention. The teaching is animated and interesting, and yet thorough and accurate. The reading is fluent, careful, and expressive, and the children are helped by questioning and explanation to follow the meaning of what they read. Arithmetic is so taught as to enable the scholars not only to obtain correct answers to sums, but also to understand the reason of the processes employed. If higher subjects are attempted, the lessons are not confined to memory work and to the learning of technical terms, but are designed to give a clear knowledge of facts, and to train the learner in the practice of thinking and observing. Besides fulfilling these conditions, which are all expressed or implied in the Code, such a school seeks by other means to be of service to the children who attend it. It provides for the upper classes a regular system of home-exercises, and arrangements for correcting them expeditiously and thoroughly. Where circumstances permit, it has also its lending library, its savings bank, and an orderly collection of simple objects and apparatus adapted to illustrate the school lessons, and formed in part by the co-operation of the scholars themselves. Above all, its teaching and discipline are such as to exert a right influence on the manners, the conduct, and the character of the children, to awaken in them a love of reading, and such an interest in their own mental improvement as may reasonably be expected to last beyond the period of school life.*

33. It is hardly to be expected that any one school will completely satisfy all these conditions, and it is impossible that in the course of a single visit of inspection your attention should be directed to so many particulars. But it will be well to keep all of them in view in forming your own standard of what the best schools should aim at: and my Lords do not wish the mark "excellent" to be given to any school which falls short of that standard in any important respects, or which is not, in some of them at least, entitled to special praise.

34. The responsibility of recommending the merit grant will in every case rest upon the Inspector, and should not be delegated to an assistant. My Lords do not require that you should state in fuller detail than you think desirable in your report on a school, your reason for designating it as "fair", "good", or "excellent"; but in all cases in which you recommend that the grant should be withheld, the grounds on which you do so should be briefly stated for the information and guidance of the managers.

35. My Lords regret to receive frequent complaints of the excessive use of corporal punishment in schools, and of its occasional infliction by assistants and pupil-teachers, and even by managers. The subject is one on which your own observation is necessarily incomplete, since children are not likely to be punished in your presence on the day of inspection. But you will not fail in your intercourse with teachers and managers to impress upon them that the more thoroughly a teacher is qualified for his position, by skill, character, and personal influence, the less necessary it is for him to resort to corporal chastisement at all. When, however, the necessity arises, the punishment should be administered by the head teacher; and an entry of the fact should, in their Lordships' opinion, be made in the log-book.

36. In view of the fact that the grant made to a school is mainly calculated on the average attendance, accurate registration of admission, progress, and attendance continues to be of essential importance, and will require special care on the part of managers and watchfulness on your own. In Appendix II you will find a revised edition of the official rules, which have been long in force for the proper keeping of registers, and it will be well to call the special attention of managers and teachers, especially in new schools, to the details set forth in that Appendix.

37. It must be clearly understood that irregularity of attendance, unless it is produced by some of the causes which constitute a reasonable excuse for absence, cannot be accepted as an excuse for the want of progress of any scholar. It has now become the interest of all concerned in the pecuniary results of the annual examination to increase the average yearly attendance by diminishing daily irregularities; but it may be hoped that higher motives will prompt all interested in education to press upon those entrusted with the execution of the law the actual legal obligation by which all parents are bound to present their children at the beginning of each meeting of the school. Cases of gross neglect on the part of the authorities, if brought to your notice, should form the subject of a special report to the Department. In your general judgment of the school, you will be careful to make allowances for all such neglect if the managers and teachers cannot be held responsible for it.

38. The Code requires -

I. That all scholars whose names are on the registers of the school must be present at the inspection, unless there is a reasonable excuse for their absence.

*Your attention may be usefully recalled to the following extract from the Code of 1881:

"The Inspector will bear in mind, in reporting on the organisation and discipline, the results of any visits without notice made in the course of the school year; and will not interfere with any method of organisation adopted in a training college under inspection if it is satisfactorily carried out in the school. To meet the requirements respecting discipline, the managers and teachers will be expected to satisfy the Inspector that all reasonable care is taken, in the ordinary management of the school, to bring up the children in habits of punctuality, of good manners and language, of cleanliness and neatness, and also to impress upon the children the importance of cheerful obedience to duty, of consideration and respect for others, and of honour and truthfulness in word and act."


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II. That all such scholars whose names have at the end of the school year been on the register for the last 22 weeks during which the school has been open must be presented to the Inspector for examination.

39. Hitherto, since part of the grant was based upon the individual payment for the successful examination of all scholars who had attended 250 times in the course of the year, managers were interested in getting together all such scholars on the day of inspection. As the grant is now based upon the average attendance of ail the scholars, and will be adversely affected by the failure in examination of backward scholars, it will be your duty to see that every child, who is liable to be presented for examination, is present, unless there is a reasonable excuse on the day of examination, and to record the absent scholars on the schedule as if they had been present and had failed. If the number of absentees be large, the absences should be a positive disqualification for the mark "good" or "excellent" in assessing the merit grant. Among reasonable excuses, probably the most general will be found to be infectious disease in the home, storms, unavoidable absence from home, a death in the family, or the scholar's having left the neighbourhood. Beyond these it is not probable that many reasonable excuses will be found, though cases of an exceptional character may arise, and can only be decided on the day of inspection.

40. Many well-founded complaints have been made of undue pressure on backward scholars by keeping them in after school, by long home lessons, or by an injudicious use of emulation. The fact that a reasonable allowance may now be made for exceptional cases under Article 109e. iii, will, it may be hoped, diminish this evil. Irregularity of attendance cannot be considered as a valid reason for withholding a child from examination; and managers of schools should refuse to countenance this plea, and should co-operate with all concerned in promoting greater regularity of attendance. The following excuses may, however, be reasonably accepted for withholding a scholar: delicate health or prolonged illness; obvious dulness or defective intellect; temporary deprivation, by accident or otherwise, of the use of eye or hand. But in order that all scholars, whom it is proposed to withhold, may not be neglected by a teacher, it will be your duty to look carefully through the list of such scholars, and to form a personal judgment as to the reasonableness of the excuses.

41. As a general rule, all scholars who have failed at the previous examination in any standard in two subjects may be presented a second time in that standard. The fact of such failure can be attested in the case of scholars who were in the school at the previous examination by means of last year's schedule, which will be before you. In the case of children coming from other schools there may be difficulty in obtaining evidence of the highest standard previously passed; but, as a general rule, it should be presumed that such children, if above 10 years of age, have passed Standard III, and all exceptions to this rule should be held to require explanation.

42. In all schools the grant for cookery, §109(g) ix, should be conditional on the provision of special, adequate, and suitable arrangements for the practical instruction of the girls by a duly qualified teacher, in a room (which may be an ordinary class-room) fitted up with the necessary appliances. In schools, the circumstances of which admit of it, demonstration lessons in cookery should be given at frequent intervals by a professional person.

43. It is a fact deplored by all connected with the examination of candidates for admission to training colleges, and by all who have to instruct our future teachers in these colleges, that many pupil-teachers, at the close of their engagement, should possess so scanty a knowledge of arithmetic, geography, grammar, and history. Unless it is supposed that the great bulk of their teachers have neglected their instruction, the school work must obviously have pressed so heavily upon these young persons as to leave very little time for their improvement. It is admitted that boys and girls of 16 or 17 years of age should not spend more than eight hours daily in intellectual labour, and it cannot be thought an unnecessary requirement that out of this weekly maximum of 40 hours (allowing for two half-holidays), ten hours should be reserved for the private studies of the pupil-teachers, over and above the five hours already prescribed for their instruction or examination by the teacher of the school. The new form of Memorandum of Agreement (Schedule VI) requires no more than 25 hours per week of actual service in teaching. When the work of the school is carried on for more than 25 hours, the time-table should be so arranged as to give the pupil-teacher the remaining time for private study in the school or class-room, under the direction of the head teacher. In this way the necessary work of preparing lessons out of school hours may be somewhat reduced.

44. Article 113 has been designed to encourage more advanced and varied teaching in the evening school, and at the same time to indicate clearly its character as a supplement to the day school rather than as a substitute for it. It may be hoped that ere long no scholar will leave the day school for labour who has not passed the full-time Standard; but exceptional cases will arise in which a night scholar may not have reached this standard, or, having reached it, may have forgotten much of what he has learned, and may require to go back and recapitulate. For such cases, the Code provides that examination may be as low as the 3rd Standard; and there need be no objection, when a scholar has for some time been employed, to allowing him to repeat the examination for the last standard which he has previously passed. In all such cases satisfactory explanation should be furnished by the managers. If, in any instance, it is proposed to put a scholar back two standards, sufficient reasons should be assigned. The managers should take reasonable pains to procure evidence at each scholar's admission of the standard in which he has previously been presented, and of the standard for which he is fitted.

45. In framing the Code, my Lords have desired - while retaining as of prime importance the individual examination in reading, writing, and arithmetic - to give greater freedom of choice to good teachers in regard to other subjects, to attach increased weight to intelligence and to the quality of instruction, and to bring the mode of computing the grant into closer correspondence with the various conditions which determine the efficiency of a school. The full attainment of these objects depends largely on your personal exertions and influence, and on the spirit in which you co-operate with the best efforts of voluntary managers, school boards, and other local bodies interested in promoting education. Their Lordships are aware that some of the new duties which are imposed upon you by the Code of 1882 are delicate and onerous, and will call for the exercise, in a higher degree than ever, of carefulness, insight, and sympathy. But they rely with much confidence on the discretion and ability of Her Majesty's Inspectors, and on their willingness to give effect to any measure designed to improve the character of elementary schools, and to increase the public usefulness of the Education Department.

I have the honour to be, Sir,
Your obedient Servant,
F. R. SANDFORD.



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II

INSTRUCTIONS TO INSPECTORS, 1878

VICE-PRESIDENT LORD SANDON, NOW LORD HARROWBY

COPY of "CIRCULAR Letter issued on the 16th day of January 1878, by Viscount Sandon, then Vice President of the Committee of Council on Education, to Her Majesty's Inspectors of Schools, containing his Instructions and Views respecting the Inspection and Examination of the Schools, the Maintenance of their Moral Training, the Character and Aim of the Teaching of the Schools, the Position and Character of the Teachers, and the Objects sought to be obtained by the Provisions of the Code, as bearing upon the Changes proposed to be made next Year by the Committee of Council on Education in the Code and REGULATIONS for PUBLIC ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS."

CIRCULAR TO HER MAJESTY'S INSPECTORS - ENGLAND AND WALES

Education Department, Whitehall,
January 16, 1878.

SIR,

As it has now become evident that, by the operation of recent legislation, the great majority of the labouring classes will be virtually compelled to send their children to public elementary schools, which are aided, and therefore to a large extent regulated, by the State, a heavy additional responsibility is imposed upon the Government with respect to the character of the schools in which these children will be obliged to spend all their school life.

It becomes, therefore, more than ever the duty of the Education Department to do all in their power to secure both that the most suitable and useful instruction, and such as is mostly desired by their parents, is furnished for the children, and that their moral training is fully provided for during the years which they will be compelled to spend in public elementary schools. To enable the Department to fulfil this duty, the Lords of the Committee of Council on Education must principally rely upon the action and influence of Her Majesty's inspectors in their respective districts; and from their knowledge of the zeal and public spirit of their officers, they feel that they may rely with confidence upon their cordial co-operation. Considering, however, the great increase in the staff of inspectors since 1870, and the large number of recent appointments,* and looking also to the increased responsibility now cast upon the inspectors by the important changes in the educational system which have been made in the last three years, both by legislation and by the codes, further directions appear to be desirable.

In conveying to you the following instructions from their Lordships, I am desired to inform you that, in arriving at the conclusions which are herein embodied, they have carefully considered the reports of the most experienced inspectors during the last four years, as well as the many representations made to them during that period by managers of schools, and by other persons of knowledge and experience in educational matters.

With regard to your action respecting the recent Education Acts, detailed directions are not needed, as their Lordships have no cause for doubting that you will, as heretofore, do all in your power to promote their successful working, being careful to maintain an entire impartiality between schools under different kinds of management, and to avoid even the appearance of using your influence in favour of either voluntary or board schools, or of taking a part in local differences on these matters.

There are, however, some general instructions with regard to these Acts to which I am desired to call your attention.

While their Lordships are most anxious that you should afford to any local authorities that may apply to yon the benefit of such advice, on matters covered by your instructions, as may assist them in bringing into full and satisfactory operation the important powers with which they have been entrusted, it is necessary that you should bear in mind, in the case of school attendance committers appointed by boards of guardians, that they are mainly responsible to the Local Government Board, and are assisted and advised in the discharge of their duties by the inspectors of that Board. You will, therefore, be very careful in your communications with such committees to show that you have no authority to dictate to them, or, unless specially directed to do so by this Department under section 27 or 43 of the Act of 1876, to ask for an account of any of their proceedings.

I should inform you, at the same time, that during the present year, yon will probably be specially directed, under the Act of 1876, to report to their Lordships any parts of your district in which the local authorities are not thoroughly fulfilling the duties imposed upon them by those Acts, in respect of the education, the school attendance, and the employment of the children of their districts.

If any cases are brought before you, or come to your knowledge, of an infraction of the 7th section of the Act of 1870, i.e., the time table conscience clause, you will not fail, acting in the spirit of the Act of 1876 (section 7), forthwith to communicate with their Lordships on the subject; and you will take special care to point out to school managers and teachers the importance of the strictest adherence, in letter and spirit, to the provisions of that conscience clause, and to remind them, where necessary, of the total forfeiture of grant which their Lordships would at once inflict, should those provisions be persistently evaded or neglected. It should never be forgotten that a. child withdrawn from the whole or part of the religious teaching or observances of a school, should in no way be subjected to disparaging treatment on account of his parent having thought fit to avail himself of his statutory right in this matter. But, on the other hand, in your communications respecting the arrangements of the time tables. you will remember that you have no right to interfere in any way with the liberty allowed by statute to managers of providing for religious teaching and observances at the beginning and end of the two daily school meetings. In your allusions to this subject and to the conscience clause, you will be most careful not to lead managers or teachers to suppose that the complete provision which has now been made by the Legislature for protecting the rights of conscience, as an essential part of a system of compulsory attendance, and the limitation of the necessary examination by Her Majesty's Inspectors to secular subjects, imply that the State is indifferent to the moral character of the schools, or in any way unfriendly to religious teaching.

In connexion with this subject, as affected by the Code, and your own action as a representative of the Department, I have to direct your attention to their Lordships' views respecting the moral character of the schools, and the character and condition of the teachers.

My Lords are anxious that you should lose no suitable opportunity of impressing upon both managers and teachers the great responsibility which rests upon them, over and above the intellectual teaching, in regard to the moral training, of the children committed to their charge. You will express your special approbation of all schools where, from knowledge which yon have gained by repeated visits, yon observe that a high moral tone is maintained; you will not fail to enlarge upon the Article (19A)† in the Code respecting discipline as showing the interest taken by Parliament and by their

*The staff of inspectors has risen from 73 in 1870, to 120 in 1877.

†"The inspector will bear in mind, in reporting on the organisation and discipline, the results of any visits without notice (Article 12) made in the course of the school year; and will not interfere with any method of organisation adopted in a training college under inspection if it is satisfactorily carried out in the school. To meet the requirements respecting discipline, the managers and teachers will be expected to satisfy the inspector that ail reasonable care is taken, in the ordinary management of the school, to bring up the children in habits of punctuality, of good manners and language, of cleanliness and neatness, and also to impress upon the children the importance of cheerful obedience to duty, of consideration and respect for others, and of honour and truthfulness in word and act."


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Lordships in this all-important subject; and, where it is not satisfactorily attended to, you will not hesitate to recommend a reduction of the grant. You will, in the spirit of that Article, urge the managers to do all in their power to secure that the teachers maintain a high standard of honesty, truth, and honour in their schools, and that they not only inculcate upon the children the general duty of consideration and respect for others, but also the special duty of obedience to, and reference for, their parents.

Their Lordships have observed with great regret the large number of cases of falsification by teachers of the registers of attendance which have been brought to their notice. They have felt it their duty to visit in the severest manner all cases of deliberate fraud, as it is obvious that persons who are guilty of such fraudulent acts, are unfit for the care of children. You will therefore be careful to remind teachers, at proper times, of the very serious nature of such offences. The reduction of the grant which is made in many of these cases will, it is hoped, lead managers to see that it is their interest, as well as their duty, to give close attention to the details of the daily working of the schools under their control. The experience of many years has shown that the best schools have generally been those where the managers exercise a personal supervision over them, and are in constant friendly intercourse with the teachers and the children. My Lords have been sorry to find that many of the largest schools have in the last few years been deficient in this great element of usefulness, and that accordingly a much lower tone has prevailed amongst teachers and children in these cases. My Lords trust that you will lose no opportunity of endeavouring to secure for all the children of your district the advantage of this supervision, by informing the managers of the importance which their Lordships attach to their personal influence over the schools for which they have accepted the responsibility, as a most valuable part of the educational system of the country; and you will do all in your power to support the authority of the managers over their schools. The friendly interest and supervision of the managers is particularly needed in the case of the young teachers of both sexes in large towns, who being often strangers to the place and living alone in lodgings, without friends or relations, should be the object of their special care. You will therefore inquire from time to time, whether the managers take a personal interest in the conduct, comfort and well-being of these young persons, as my Lords consider this matter to be of great importance, not only to the teachers themselves, but to the children who are entrusted to their care, and who must be much affected by the characters and example of their instructors.

It is needless to remind you that the condition of the pupil teachers of your district should receive your very careful consideration. My Lords have reason to fear that sufficient care has not been bestowed upon them in many cases, either by managers or teachers. You will do well, therefore, to bespeak the special attention of the managers to this important subject. You will oppose the appointment of sickly precocious children as pupil teachers, and you will insist upon good health as an essential qualification for those who aspire to the teacher's office. You should warn the managers and teachers against allowing teachers of this tender age to be overworked, and should point out to them that under the revised memorandum of agreement, arrangements can be made, with great general advantage to the school, by which the pupil teachers may be allowed a portion of the school hours for their own instruction or preparation of lessons, provided that the time so employed, is devoted exclusively, like their five hours of special instruction, to the subjects prescribed by the Code. You should discourage the habit of sacrificing to the preparation of their lessons the times allotted for meals, and you should specially warn teachers of the serious effect upon the health of the female pupil teachers, girls of 14 to 18 years of age, of being kept standing all day at work in their schools. You should endeavour to secure that the pupil teachers receive a regular course of systematic instruction from their teachers, instead of a mere "cram" preparation for examination, and you should do all you can to maintain in the teachers and managers a sense of responsibility for the formation of the character, as well as the attainments of their pupil teachers.

I pass on to call your attention to the large changes made in the Code during the last two years, to the objects their Lordships had in view by those changes, and to the manner in which they desire you to work them. You will probably have observed that their Lordships' object throughout has been, over and above the acquisition by every child of the bare ordinary rudiments of education, to promote the development of the general intelligence of the scholars rather than to seek to burden their memories with subjects which, considering the early age at which the majority of children leave school, would not be likely to be of use to them; and also to encourage such training in school, in matters affecting their daily life, as may help to improve and raise the character of their homes. With respect to the ordinary rudiments, you will urge the teachers, as far as they are concerned, not to be satisfied with just enabling the children to pass the standard examinations which set them free from compulsory attendance, but to endeavour to provide that all children before they leave school, shall at least have acquired the power of writing with facility, of using the simple rules of arithmetic without difficulty, and of reading without exertion and with pleasure to themselves. As regards history and geography, you will encourage, as for as you can, such teaching as is likely to awaken the sympathies of the children. Their attention should be specially directed to the interesting stories of history, to the lives of noble characters, and to incidents which tend to create a patriotic feeling of regard for their country and its position in the world; and while they should be made acquainted with the leading historical incidents that have taken place in their own neighbourhood, and with its special geographical features, an interest should be excited in the colonial and foreign possessions of the British Crown.

Though their Lordships always decline to interfere respecting the choice of the books used in the schools, it will be well that you should point out the great value of using, in the reading lessons, interesting books on such subjects as natural history, the wonders of creation, or the like, which do not form part of the ordinary school course; and with regard to the poetry which the children are required in the higher standards to learn by heart, while you will discourage foolish and trifling songs, and pieces above their comprehension, you will call attention to the value of learning by heart generally, as a means of storing the children's memories with noble and elevated sentiments. Though their Lordships have found it necessary to reduce the number of songs to be learned from 12 to 8, they desire to give every encouragement to singing in schools as a most valuable element in the education of children.

You will not fail to inform the managers and teachers of the importance which their Lordships attach to good instruction in needlework, in domestic economy, as described in the new Code,* and in the knowledge of "common things", and to such teaching as is likely to promote habits of thrift. You will encourage any well-considered schemes, such as are being adopted in various parts of the country, for teaching practical cookery to the elder girls; while, on proper occasions, you win call attention to the facilities which now exist for the establishment of school penny savings' banks, and to the great success which has attended their introduction in many schools in the poorest districts.

You will bear in mind, and will urge upon managers and teachers, that though certain subjects only are paid for under the Code, and certain subjects only are obligatory, it is in their power to give instruction to children in any other useful and suitable branches of knowledge for which the parents show a liking, or which the character and habits of the population seem specially to require. It cannot be too strongly impressed upon you, that uniformity in the school course, as far as the non-essential subjects are concerned, is not the object their Lordships have in view in their administration, but that, on the contrary, they consider it advantageous to the country generally that there should be a variety in the teaching of the schools, so as to meet the varying and very different requirements of different localities and conditions of life. It is with this view that a great variety of optional subjects, both in elementary science and literature, has recently been added by their Lordships to the Code. From no good school, however, or conscientious teacher, will you ever hear the plea urged that only "paying" subjects can be attended to. The schools which pass best in such subjects are not those which confine themselves solely to the work of the standards, which are necessarily fixed with an eye to

*1. Food and its preparation. Clothing and materials. 2. The dwelling: warming, cleaning, and ventilation. Washing materials and their use. 3. Rules for health; the management of a sick room. Cottage income, expenditure, and savings.


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the capacities of ordinary children, or even to the others enumerated in the Code. Regularity of attendance, which is increasing daily, under the action of recent legislation, will probably give ample time for the more advanced instruction of the better scholars, and of those who remain at school longer than the early age at which compulsion ceases, while the honour certificates of the Act of 1876, which are in fact exhibitions for the best scholars, will, it is to be hoped, judging from the value which already appears to be attached to them, work in the same direction.

Some changes made in the Code, with a view to encourage night schools, will not have escaped your notice. Experience has shown their usefulness, both in the manufacturing and rural districts, in supplementing the work of day schools. The early age of leaving school, and the large number of young men who have either received no instruction at all, or have forgotten what they have learned, will, at any rate for the present, make these schools of much value. As they call for considerable personal sacrifices, on the part both of teachers and scholars, they are likely to be maintained only where a genuine and meritorious zeal for education exists on both sides. Owing, however, to the small numbers of which, in most cases, these schools must necessarily consist, they can hardly be carried on without encouragement and support from this Department. My Lords, therefore, desire you to give every encouragement in your power to local efforts for the establishment of night schools, under circumstances which promise that they will be judiciously conducted, and actively maintained.

I have now to convey to you some directions respecting the examination of schools, and your inspection generally.

The changes in the Code have been so considerable, and the requirements of it have been so largely raised, that my Lords think it most desirable that, in your examinations, the new Code should be worked very gradually and cautiously, so as not to discourage either the teacher or the children, by expecting too much from them at first under a change of system. These remarks will, of course, be particularly applicable to new schools, and to those where many rough and untaught children have been recently introduced by means of compulsion. My Lords wish it to be understood that they do not approve of the examination being taken on paper under Article 19C of the Code,* except in special cases, respecting which, of course, you must use your own discretion. It has long been the practice of the most experienced inspectors, in consideration of the obligation upon girls to learn needlework, while boys have no corresponding obligatory claim upon their school hours, not to apply to girls, in the examination in arithmetic, exactly the same standard of proficiency as to boys. My Lords are of opinion that this practice should be adopted by Her Majesty's Inspectors generally.

Their Lordships further direct me to say that they attach great importance to a second visit (without notice) being made, as far as possible, to every school in the year, with a view to the general encouragement of the teachers and the children, and to enable you to exercise a larger influence upon the general conduct of the school than is possible where only one visit for the purpose of examination takes place; and they would strongly impress upon you their desire that you should endeavour to make all your visits, as far as lies in your power, an encouragement and assistance to managers and teachers in their difficult work.

You will bear in mind that anything like dictation to teachers, as if they were in any sense officers of the Department, or responsible to any one save the managers of their schools, should be very carefully avoided. It is no part of an inspector's duty either to find fault with, or to reprove a teacher. If he thinks it either necessary, or a kindly act, to give advice or warning to a teacher, it should not be done in the hearing of the scholars or pupil teachers.

But above all, it is incumbent on an inspector to show by his manner in examining, and dealing with the classes and with individual scholars, that the main object of his visit to a school is to elicit what the children know, and not to prove their ignorance. That object is entirely defeated, if by a harsh, impatient, or indistinct manner of questioning the scholars, he frightens or confuses them, or if he puzzles them by fanciful and unreasonable questions.

With regard to your assistant, you will not delegate the inspection of a school to him, except in a case of absolute necessity, arising from illness or some such cause. When you have been compelled to do so, you will notify the fact to the Department, and will make a point of making a visit yourself to that school in the same year. You will, as far as possible, confine your assistant's action to the individual examination of scholars. You should, however, always take enough of this work yourself to enable you to report, from your personal knowledge, upon the efficiency of every department. The main duty of the assistant is to collect for you sufficient facts, as to the children's reading, writing, &c., on which you can form a judgment as to the merits of the schools under your inspection; and their Lordships cannot accept any reference to the opinion of an inspector's assistant, as part of the official report on a school. For everything of the nature of inspection, the inspector alone is responsible; and the interests of schools depend so materially upon the results of the yearly official visit, that it is necessary to insist that more time should be devoted by the inspector to an examination into the actual work done in every school on his list, than is frequently given to this duty at present. The increase in the staff of many of the districts, and the reduction in the size of others, will remove some of the difficulties which formerly existed in connexion with this part of the inspector's duties.

In the official reports which you are called upon to make to this Department, from time to time, respecting the condition of your district, my Lords will be glad that you should generally notice the subjects to which your attention has been directed by this special Circular.

My Lords are fully aware that that no little tact and judgment are required to fulfil the duties of your office, especially in your relations to the managers of the schools. The standard of duty which they place before you is undoubtedly a high one; but they are of opinion that the object of Parliament, and of successive Administrations, in maintaining the present large staff of officers of the highest standing, has been, not merely to certify the Department respecting the rudimentary instruction given in the schools, but that Her Majesty's Inspectors should still take a leading part, as so many distinguished members of their body have done, in developing and raising the character of our elementary schools, so that the country might derive the greatest possible benefit from their institution. Their Lordships have, therefore, felt it their duty, at a period of considerable change in the educational system of the country, to state somewhat fully their views respecting the action and responsibilities of Her Majesty's Inspectors, and also respecting the instruction, training, and management of the schools which are subject to their supervision, so as both to assist and encourage their inspectors, and also to remove doubts which have been expressed by those connected with schools on the various matters which are alluded to in this Circular.

While, from their knowledge of the past and present work of Her Majesty's Inspectors, my Lords rely with confidence upon having their continued zealous assistance, they as confidently rely upon the friendly and public spirited co-operation of the local educational authorities, and of the managers and teachers of schools, in carrying on the great work of national education in the manner and with the results which the large sacrifices of the country give it a right to expect.

I have, &c.
(Signed) F. R. SANDFORD.

To H.M.'s Inspector of Schools.

*19C. 1. The sum of 4s per scholar, according to the average number of children, above seven years of age, in attendance throughout the year (Article 26), if the classes from which the children are examined in standards II-VI, or in specific subjects (Article 21b), pass a creditable examination in any two of the following subjects, viz., grammar, history, elementary geography, and plain needlework.

5. The mode of examination (whether oral or on paper)† is left to the discretion of the inspector.

†Examination on paper will, as a rule, be confined to scholars in Standard VI.


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III

SCHOOL BOARD FOR LONDON

SYLLABUS OF RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION FOR THE YEAR 1885

SCHOLARS

"In the schools provided by the Board the Bible shall be read, and there shall be given such explanations and such instructions therefrom in the principles of morality and religion as are suited to the capacities of the children." Extract from Code of the Board, Art. 91.

STANDARD I

Learn the Ten Commandments, Exodus xx, verses 1-17 (the substance only will be required); the Lord's Prayer, St. Matthew vi, verses 9-13.
Brief account of the early lives of Samuel and David.
Leading facts in the Life of Christ told in simple language.

STANDARD II

Repeat the Ten Commandments and the Lord's Prayer.
Learn: St. Matthew v, 1-12; and St. Matthew xxii, 35-40.
The Life of Abraham.
Simple outline of the Life of Christ.

STANDARD III

Memory work, as in Standards I. and II.
Learn Psalm xxiii.
The Life of Joseph.
Fuller outline of the Life of Christ, with lessons drawn from the following parables:

The Two Debtors.
The Good Samaritan.
The Prodigal Son.
The Merciless Servant.
The Lost Sheep.
The Pharisee and the Publican.
STANDARD IV

Memory work, as in Standard III.
Learn St. John xiv., verses 15 - 31.
The Life of Moses.
The Life of Christ [1st part] as gathered from the Gospels of St. Matthew down to chapter xiv, 36, inclusive; St. Mark, to chapter vi, 56; St. Luke, to chapter ix, 17; St. John, to chapter vii, 1: viz., to Third Passover; with lessons from the following parables:

The Sower.
The Mustard Seed.
The Wheat and the Tares.
The Pearl of Great Price.
Brief account of Bethlehem, Nazareth, Sea of Galilee, Bethany, and Jerusalem.

STANDARD V

Memory work, as in Standard IV.
Learn Ephesians vi., verses 1 - 18.
The lives of Samuel, Saul, and David.
The Life of Christ continued [2nd part], from Third Passover to end of Gospels.
Acts of the Apostles, first two chapters.

STANDARD VI

Memory work, as in Standard V.
Learn Isaiah liii and Ephesians iv, verses 25-32.
The lives of Elijah and Daniel.
Recapitulation of the Life of Christ, together with an account of His discourses as given in St. John, chapters iii, vi, 1-40, and x; Acts of the Apostles, to chapter viii.

STANDARD VII

Memory work, as in Standard VI.
Learn I Corinthians, xiii.
Recapitulation of the lives of Abraham, Moses, Samuel, Saul, David, and Daniel.
Recapitulation of the Life of Christ, as in Standard VI.
Acts of the Apostles, with especial reference to the life and missionary journeys of St. Paul.

General Instruction - The teachers are desired to make the lessons as practical as possible, and not to give attention to unnecessary details.

CANDIDATES AND PUPIL TEACHERS

The course at the pupil teachers' schools should afford a general acquaintance with the Old and New Testaments, with especial reference to those portions which are included in the syllabus of instruction for children.

This course should include, not merely a general outline of the history and literature of the different periods as contained in the Bible and the circumstances of the time, but also special attention should be given to the teaching contained therein.

CANDIDATES

Candidates will be examined in the course appointed for Standard VII.

PUPIL TEACHERS

First Year

Study of the Old Testament* to the death of Moses. Study of the Gospels down to the Third Passover.*

Second Year

Study of the Old Testament to the death of Saul.* Study of the Four Gospels.*

Third Year

Study of the Old Testament to the division of the kingdom after the death of Solomon, with a general knowledge of the Books of Psalms and Proverbs.* Study of the New Testament to the close of the Acts of the Apostles.*

Fourth Year

Study of the Old Testament.* Study of the New Testament to the close of the Acts of the Apostles,* together with some knowledge of the Epistles.

APPENDIX II

QUESTIONS

STANDARD IV

(One question only in each Section to be attempted.)

SECTION I

1. From what point did Moses view the Promised Land? Why was he not allowed to enter it?

2. Why had the children of Israel to wander forty years in the wilderness?

SECTION II

1. "On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets." Write out these two commandments.

*It is intended that in each year, after the first, the work of the previous years should be shortly recapitulated and the new work should be taught in fuller detail.


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2. What did Christ say about "the peacemakers", "the merciful", "the pure in heart", "the meek"?

SECTION III

1. Give an account of the healing of the Centurion's servant.

2. Relate the incident of the healing of the "impotent man".

SECTION IV

1. "Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom is no guile?" About whom and on what occasion were these words spoken? Explain the words "no guile".

2. What did our Lord say when asked the question, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath days?"

SECTION V

1. Write out and explain the parable of the mustard seed.

2. Explain the following:

(a) "A sower went forth to sow".
(b) "Goodly pearls".
(c) "The thorns sprung up and choked them".
(d) "Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them".
3. Mention any buildings or places in or near Jerusalem connected with the Life of our Lord.

SECTION VI

How are children taught in the Bible to behave:

(a) At home?
(b) At school?
(c) With their companions?
STANDARD V

(Only three questions are to be attempted from each of the first two sections.)

SECTION I

1. What led to the death of Eli, and what were his chief faults?

2. What qualities of Saul fitted him for the kingship, and what other qualities led to his rejection by God?

3. Give instances of generosity, domestic affection, and piety from the life of David.

4. "There is no restraint to the Lord to save by many or by few." Describe briefly the occasion on which these words were uttered.

5. State, in a few words, who were Abimelech, Ishbosheth, Abner, Hiram, and Absalom.

6. Write out the verses from the 14th chapter of St. John, beginning with "If ye love me", and ending with "I will love him, and will manifest myself to him."

SECTION II

1. Relate the parable by which our Lord taught Peter how oft he should forgive his brother.

2. Quote texts in which our Lord teaches -

(a) Humility.
(b) The dangers of wealth.
(c) Self-sacrifice.
3. What attempt was made by the Pharisees and Herodians to entrap Jesus by a crafty question, and how did he answer them?

4. Write a short account of how our Lord kept His last Passover.

5. In what words does our Lord show that all the commandments can be fulfilled by love of God and man.

6. Show, from the introductions to St. Luke's Gospel and to the Acts of the Apostles that St. Luke probably wrote the latter.

SECTION III

(All should attempt this question)

How are children taught in the Bible to behave:

(a) At home?
(b) At school?
(c) With their companions?

STANDARD VI SECTION I

(One question only may be answered)

1. Quote any verses from Isaiah 53 which give a picture of -

(a) The humble life of the Messiah.
(b) The manner of His death.
2. Write the verse beginning, "Be ye kind one to another", and mention any similar words used by Christ Himself.

SECTION II

(Two questions only may be answered)

1. "And Ahab said to Elijah, Hast thou found me, O mine enemy? And he answered, I have found thee because thou hast sold thyself to work evil in the sight of the Lord." Explain these words of Elijah, and relate the incident which gave rise to them.

2. Describe the final parting between Elijah and Elisha.

3. What is told us of the early life and training of Daniel in Babylon?

4. What points in Daniel's character are most worthy of imitation?

SECTION III

(Three questions only may be answered, of which the last must be one)

1. How did Jesus deal with little children? What warning and advice did He give His disciples on these occasions?

2. Relate the story of Christ's triumphal entry into Jerusalem.

3. What does our Lord teach with reference to the way in which we ought to worship God?

4. Relate the story of Christ's sufferings in the garden of Gethsemane.

5. "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they follow Me." Explain this passage.

6. Give any incidents from the Acts of the Apostles which show that the Christians rejoiced even under persecution, and what was the result of the persecution to which they were subjected.

7. How are children taught in the Bible to behave:

(a) At home?
(b) At school?
(c) With their companions?
STANDARD VII SECTION I

(One question only may be answered)

1. Write out St. Paul's description of Charity. Give the meaning of the word "Charity" as he uses it.

2. On which clause of the Lord's Prayer did Christ lay special stress? What parable did He give to teach the same lesson?

SECTION II

(Two questions only may be answered)

1. Relate God's promises to Abraham, and show how they were fulfilled.

2. "And there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face." Relate any incidents in the life of Moses which illustrate this verse.

3. What worthy points are to be noticed in the character of King Saul?

4. "David, the son of Jesse, the man who was raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the sweet Psalmist of Israel." Explain and illustrate this verse.

SECTION III

(Three questions only may be answered, of which the last must be one)

1. Mention some of the chief points of Christ's teaching in His conversation with Nicodemus.

2. Explain the following sayings of Christ, and mention the incidents which gave rise to them:

(a) "He that is not against us is for us."

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(b) "Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of."
(c) "Let the dead bury their dead."
3. What mistakes did the Pharisees make as to the observance of the Sabbath, and how did our Lord reprove them by word and deed?

4. How did Jesus, by word and deed, teach the disciples to be humble?

5. Why was St. Paul persecuted at Lystra?

6. Write a short account of what happened when St. Paul visited Jerusalem for the last time.

7. How are children taught in the Bible to behave:

(a) At home?
(b) At school?
(c) With their companions?
FOR CANDIDATES AND PRESENT FIRST YEAR PUPIL TEACHERS

SECTION I

(One question only may be answered)

1. Write out St. Paul's description of Charity. Give the meaning of the word "Charity" as he uses it.

2. On which clause of the Lord's Prayer did Christ lay special stress? What parable did he give to teach the same lesson?

SECTION II

(Two questions only may be answered)

1. Relate God's promises to Abraham, and show how they were fulfilled.

2. "And there arose not a prophet since in Israel like unto Moses, whom the Lord knew face to face." Relate any incidents in the life of Moses which illustrate this verse.

3. What worthy points are to be noticed in the character of King Saul?

4. "David, the son of Jesse, the man who was raised up on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the sweet Psalmist of Israel." Explain and illustrate this verse.

SECTION II

(Three questions only may be answered, of which the last must be one)

1. Mention some of the chief points of Christ's teaching in His conversation with Nicodemus.

2. Explain the following sayings of Christ, and mention the incidents which gave rise to them:

(a) "He that is not against us is for us."
(b) "Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of."
(c) "Let the dead bury their dead."
3. What mistake did the Pharisees make as to the observance of the Sabbath, and how did our Lord reprove them by word and deed?

4. How did Jesus, by word and deed, teach the disciples to be humble?

5. Why was St. Paul persecuted at Lystra?

6. Write a short account of what happened when St. Paul visited Jerusalem for the last time.

7. How are children taught in the Bible to behave:

(a) At home?
(b) At school?
(c) With their companions?

PUPIL TEACHERS OF THE PRESENT SECOND YEAR

SECTION I

(Two questions only may be answered from the First Section)

1. "Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness." Show from the Old Testament that this was so.

2. Write a short account of the history of Isaac; drawing from it lessons suitable for children.

3. Show in a few words how Joseph proved himself -

A good son,
A good brother,
A good servant;
and write down any texts yon may remember concerning our duties to parents, brethren, and masters.

4. Give an account of the first Passover.

SECTION II

(Four questions only may be answered from this Section, of which the last must be one)

1. Explain the following phrases:

"Enter ye in at the strait gate."
"Why take ye thought for raiment?"
"Ye cannot serve God and mammon."
"Do not sound a trumpet before thee."
"Ye are the salt of the earth."
2. Write the story of the cleansing of the leper by Christ; and draw a comparison between leprosy and sin.

3. How did Jesus answer those who complained that He made friends with sinners, and was not strict in His obedience to the law?

4. How did the people of Nazareth receive the teaching of Jesus, and what did He say of their conduct?

5. How did Jesus rebuke Simon the Pharisee? What was the great fault of the sect to which this man belonged?

6. What message did John the Baptist send to Jesus, and how was it answered?

7. What gave rise to the discourse on the Bread of Life P How is the Bread of Life superior to the manna that fell in the wilderness? What mistake did the Jews make concerning the words of Jesus about this Bread?

8. Give, in your own words, some reasons why we should love God.

PUPIL TEACHERS OF THE PRESENT THIRD YEAR

SECTION I

(Two questions only are to be answered from this Section)

1. Give one or two words in explanation (such as you would give to a class) of each of the following: Priests, High Priest, Levites, Tabernacle, Altar, Ark of the Covenant, Sacrifice, Passover, Day of Atonement, Holy of Holies.

2. "In those days there was no king in Israel." What days are here referred to? How were the people governed? What caused them to desire a King?

3. Give an account of one of the judges whom you specially admire, and give your reasons for admiring him.

4. "To love me was wonderful; passing the love of women." By whom was this said? and show the lament was justified.

SECTION II

(Four questions only may be answered from this Section, of which the last must be one)

1. Who were the Pharisees and Sadducees? Why did they oppose Jesus?

2. Who were the Publicans? Why were they despised? Why did Jesus seek their company? Name any with whom He was intimate.

3. What did Jesus say to the rich young ruler? What was the result, and what warning did it give rise to?

4. "I came not to destroy the law but to fulfil it." Prove the truth of this statement.

5. "He spake this parable unto certain which trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others." Write down the parable as nearly as you can in the words of the Bible.

6. Give an account of our Lord's appearances after His resurrection.

7. How did Jesus, when he was dying, show -

His forgiveness of his enemies?
His kindness to a fellow-sufferer?
His duty towards his mother?

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8. Write short explanations of the following:

"The wind bloweth where it listeth."
"The Jews have no dealings with the Samaritans."
"He should be put out of the Synagogue."
"In my father's house are many mansions."
"It is not lawful for us to put any man to death."
"There was set a vessel full of vinegar."
9. Give, in your own words, some reasons why we should love God.

PUPIL TEACHERS OF THE PRESENT FOURTH YEAR AND EX-PUPIL TEACHERS

SECTION I

(Three questions only may be answered from this Section)

1. What practical lessons would you endeavour to impress on your scholars while reading the history of Joseph and his brethren?

2. Explain the true nature of the office of the Prophets of the Old Testament. Illustrate your answer from the First Book of Samuel.

3. What are the chief lessons to be learned from the history of Eli?

4. Write the life of St. Paul between his conversion and his journey with Barnabas.

5. By whom, and on what occasions, were the following words Spoken:

(a) "Be it far from me; for they that honour me I will honour, and they that despise me shall be lightly esteemed."
(b) "Art thou he that troubleth Israel?"
(c) "Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee; for where thou goest I will go; and where thou lodgest I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God."
(d) "Lord, behold, he whom thou lovest is sick."
6. Draw a sketch-map to illustrate St. Paul's first missionary journey. State, in their correct order, the chief events of the journey.

SECTION II

(Three questions only may be answered from this Section)

1. Give the substance of our Lord's replies to the special charges brought against him by the Pharisees.

2. In giving a lesson on the parable of "The Good Samaritan," what practical lessons would you deduce suitable for Standard I, and for Standard VI, respectively?

3. "And now abideth faith, hope, and charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity." Explain clearly what is here meant by charity. What is the teaching of Jesus with regard to this same charity?

4. Give a concise account of our Lord's conversation with Nathaniel; or the woman of Samaria; or with Pilate.

5. Give short explanations of the following passages:

(a) "Thus have ye made the commandment of God of none effect through your traditions."
(b) "Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees which is hypocrisy."
(c) "Every tree is known by his fruit."
(d) "Some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up with it and choked it."
6. "He is despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief." Illustrate this passage from the Gospel narrative.

SECTION III

(One question only may be answered from this Section)

1. Give, in your own words, some reasons why we should love God.

2. What was the importance of the Temple, (1) in its influence on the National Life, and (2) in its influence on the Religious Life of the Jews.





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IV

SCHOOL BOARD FOR LIVERPOOL

SYLLABUS I

RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION FOR INFANTS

i. C0URSE FOR THE FIRST SIX MONTHS OF THE SCHOOL YEAR

1. For the elder classes:

(a) The first part of the instruction in "Bible Epochs and Lessons", ending with the death of Samuel. Pictures should be used with these lessons, and the word "epoch " explained.
(b) The Lord's Prayer, with or without one of the school prayers, and simple texts and hymns should be known by heart.
Hymns* 12, 19, 40, 46, 48, 53, 61, 62, 63, 70, 71, 74, 76, 78, 85, 96, 99, 128, 142, 145, 162, 163, 170, 173, 179.

2. For the lowest school section - (See Syllabus III):

(a) Easy conversation lessons and very simple hymns on -

(1) God as the maker of all natural things, the sun, moon, plants, animals, &c.
(2) The difference between God's making (creating) and man's making, showing man's need of tools and materials for his work.
(3) God as our Father in heaven, loving, all-powerful, and all-knowing. (Hymn* 46)
(4) Prayer to so kind and great a Father, a privilege never to be missed.
(b) Repetition of some short prayer, hymn, or text by heart.
(c) Easy conversation lessons about some of the Scripture prints, illustrating incidents in the life of Christ - e.g.. His birth and childhood. His constant labour of doing good, His love of little children, &c.

ii. C0URSE FOR THE SECOND SIX MONTHS OF THE SCHOOL YEAR

1. For the elder children:

(a) The second part of the ''Bible Epochs and Lessons", in addition to very simple lessons on our Lord's parables of the Sower, the Good Samaritan, the Unmerciful Servant, and the Prodigal Son.
(b) The Lord's prayer, with or without one of the school prayers. Some simple hymns and texts should be known by heart, and such explanation given of the meaning as is suitable to the age of the children.

2. For the lowest school section:

(a) Easy conversation lessons, and, if possible, hymns on -

(1) The loving, truthful, and prayerful character that God desires in His children. (Hymn* 76)
(2) The displeasure God has in seeing jealousy, quarrelling, deceit, and forgetfulness of Him.
(3) The book that teaches us about God - the Bible. (Hymn* 170)
(4) God sending Jesus to teach us the way to heaven. (Hymns* 70 and 74.)
(b) Repetition of some short prayer, hymn, or text by heart.
(c) Easy conversation lessons on the parables of the Good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son, and the Pharisee and the Publican; pictures to be used in the description.
(d) The life of Joseph should be sketched by simple description of pictures referring to it.

SYLLABUS II

RELIGIOUS INSTRUCTION FOR JUNIORS' AND SENIORS' SCHOOLS THREE YEARS' COURSES FOR SCHOLARS

NOTE. In JUNIORS' SCHOOLS, the portions of the course for the first year and the second year should be studied alternately.

FIRST YEAR - Old Testament - Book of Genesis and the Book of Exodus, chapters I to XII.
New Testament - St. Luke, I to XI.

SECOND YEAR - Old Testament - Book of Exodus, XIII to end; Joshua; Judges; 1 and 2 Samuel; and 1 Kings, I to XII.
New Testament - St. Luke, XII to end; Acts, I to VIII.

THIRD YEAR - Old Testament - 1 and 2 Kings; Daniel; Ezra; Nehemiah, and Esther, &c.
New Testament - Acts, XI to end.

TEXTS TO BE COMMITTED TO MEMORY

I - JUNIORS (Standards I and II) are to be able to repeat each year, with intelligence, 30 verses as follows, viz.:

FIRST YEAR - Psalm XXXIV 11-16; Prov. I 8-10; IV 14; XV I, 3, 9; Matthew V 3-11; VI 24; XI 28; John XV 1, 2; Rom. VIII 28; Phil. II 3; 1 Peter II 17, 18.

SECOND YEAR - Psalm CXXI; Prov. VI 6-11; XII 22-24; XVI 9; XXVII 1; Matt. XVIII 19; John V 39; Eccles. XII 13; Rom. V 8; 1 Cor. XIII 4-8; 1 Thess. IV 11, 12; 1 John III 7, 8.

THIRD YEAR - Psalm XXIII; Prov. III 5, 6; XVII 5; Eccles. IX. 10; Matt. VI 6-8; VII 21; John III 16, 17; Rom. VI 23; Ephes. VI 1-7; 1 Peter II 17; James I 12-15; Rom. XXI 4.

II - SENIORS (Standards III to VI) are to be able to repeat each year, with intelligence, in addition to the Lord's Prayer and Ten Commandments, 30 verses as follows, vis.:

FIRST YEAR - Psalm I; Prov. XI 1; XXII 1; Ezekiel XVIII 21-27; Luke X 25-28; John IV 24; VII 17; Phil. II 3; 1 Peter III 8-13; James III 16-17.

SECOND YEAR - Psalm XXXII; Prov. XVI 9; Micah VI. 8; Matthew V 43-46; VII 7-14; Phil. IV 8; 1 Thess. IV 11-12; 2 Peter I 5-7.

THIRD YEAR - Psalm XV; Prov. X 12; XIV 29; Eccles. IX. 10; Lament, III 26-27; Isaiah XLIII 25; Matt. VII 21; XXVI 41; John VI 27; Ephes. VI 1-7; Colos. III 12-13; 1 Thess. V 14; James I 12-15; Rev. XXI 4.

*Huddersfield School Board Hymn Book.