How far is secondary education easily accessible to children attending the primary schools? What proportion of them receive it, and for how long a period does their secondary school life last? What should be the relations between the primary and secondary stages of education, and between education and industry? What are the obstacles which impede easy access to the secondary school, and by what measures should those obstacles be removed?

These are questions of vital significance for the future, not only of English education, but of English society. They have too rarely been made the subject of detailed and impartial study. In the following pages Mr. Lindsay has done something to fill the gap. Naturally, the enquiries of a private investigator cannot cover the ground with the completeness of an official publication, and Mr. Lindsay has wisely preferred an intensive study of certain areas, supplemented by the Board's statistics and by corroborative evidence from elsewhere, to the attempt to make a necessarily superficial survey of the country as a whole. But, so far as the resources at his disposal have allowed, his work is thorough and objective. The growing body of opinion which realises the importance of a far-sighted educational policy, based on a realistic examination of social facts, is under a deep obligation to the Barnett Fellowship and to the Social Science Department of the London School of

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Economics for making it possible for him to undertake it. It is much to be hoped that the interest of his results will encourage other enquirers to pursue research into the fruitful, and too much neglected, borderland which lies between educational and social organisation. Mr. Lindsay's conclusions should be compared with those reached by Mr. G. S. M. Ellis in his recently published work The Poor Student and the University. (1)

For the nature of those conclusions, and for the evidence on which they rest, the reader must turn to Mr. Lindsay's book; but I may perhaps be permitted to draw his attention to some of those which appear specially to deserve attention. It is clear, in the first place, that, in spite of the enormous progress which has taken place in secondary education in the last twenty years - a progress so great as to amount to a silent revolution - and of the closer links which have been established between the primary and the secondary schools, the proportion of children who pass from the former to the latter is still, in the country as a whole, surprisingly small, not more, indeed, than 9.5 per cent. It is clear, in the second place, that the percentage of children obtaining a secondary education varies very greatly (whatever the explanation), both from one area to another, and, within the same area, from school to school. Thus at Bradford the percentage of the age-group 10 to 11 passing from primary to secondary schools appears to have been in 1923, 27.1; in London in 1923-24, 6.4; in Warrington in 1923, 7.3; in Oxfordshire in 1924, 8.4; while, in London, the proportion of children

(1) The Poor Student and the University, by G. S. M, Ellis (The Labour Publishing Company, 2s. 6d, net).

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from seven well-to-do boroughs winning scholarships was in 1924 four times as high as that in seven poorer boroughs and in Oxfordshire, in 1924, 172 out of 212 schools supplied no "free-placers" to the secondary schools, It is clear, in the third place, that different social strata contribute in very unequal proportions to the secondary school population. The interesting table of parents' occupations printed by Mr. Lindsay shows that, while 26.9 per cent of the pupils in secondary schools in 1921 were the children of "wholesale and retail traders", 20.5 per cent were the children of "skilled", and only 3.2 the children of "unskilled", workmen. It is clear, finally, that the secondary school is still mainly a preparation for some kind of "black-coated" occupation": of the pupils who left secondary schools in 1921 under 10 per cent passed on into industrial or manual work. It is noticeable, however, that in areas where the percentage of children passing from primary to secondary schools is unusually high, both the proportion of pupils coming from the homes of manual workers and the proportion entering industrial occupations is, as would be expected, unusually high also. In Bradford, for example, where 49 per cent of the pupils in secondary schools were the children of manual workers, no less than 21.2 per cent of pupils leaving them entered industrial occupations.

"There is now", a statesman quoted by Mr. Lindsay is said to have remarked, "a complete ladder from the elementary school to the University, and the number of scholarships from the elementary to the secondary school is not limited, awards being made to all children who show capacity to profit." To the reader who weighs the facts

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presented in the following pages that statement will appear, it is to be feared, somewhat too optimistic. It is true, of course, that in the last fifteen years there has been a remarkable, and most welcome, increase in the accessibility of secondary education. But it still, unfortunately, remains the case that, while estimates of the proportion of pupils "capable of profiting" by secondary education differ, the percentage actually entering secondary schools is, for the country as a whole, far below the lowest of them. The shortage of secondary school places is one serious obstacle, which, incidentally, combined with the great increase in the demand for secondary education, has had the effect of converting the free-place examination from what it was intended to be, and what it is described as being in the statement quoted above - a qualifying examination - into being normally an examination of a highly competitive kind. The lack of means on the part of parents, which prevents them from dispensing with the earnings of their children, is a hardly less serious barrier. The figures presented by Mr. Lindsay of the number of children who, after winning free-places, are obliged to refuse them owing to poverty, tell, indeed, a story which few thoughtful persons can contemplate without grave disquietude. The development of "central" schools has done something to mitigate the first evil, and the increased provision of maintenance allowances the second. But, even so, the gap which remains to be filled before the nation can be satisfied that it is making a wise use of its human resources is still very large.

The realisation of these defects should be, however, a ground for hope rather than for despondency, since it is the

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progress of education itself which has caused public opinion to be conscious of them. It remains to build upon the foundations which have already been laid. The time has come, it may perhaps be suggested, when, in addition to the immediate steps - the provision of more schools, a larger expenditure upon maintenance allowances, and the more general acceptance of the policy, already adopted by Manchester, Salford, Bradford, Sheffield, and several other authorities, of abolishing fees at municipal secondary schools - it is desirable to reconsider the whole question of the relations between primary and post-primary education.

It is obvious, indeed, that in many areas such a reconsideration has for some years been going on. On the one hand, new forms of post-primary education, such as that given in the central schools, are rapidly developing, which, though not "secondary" in the unfortunately limited sense in which that term has hitherto generally been used in England, are secondary in fact, since they are designed to offer a broad and liberal education (including, of course, provision for practical work) during the years of adolescence. On the other hand, the grave waste involved in plunging approximately 80 per cent of the boys and girls leaving the elementary schools into full-time industry (or, in too many cases, unemployment) at the age of 14 is being increasingly realised, and the time cannot be long delayed when the age of full-time attendance will be raised to 15.

The organisation to which developments now taking place or in contemplation seem to point is one under which, to quote an apt phrase of Mr. Lindsay's, "selection by differentiation will take the place of selection by

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elimination." In place of an elementary system lasting till 14, from which a small minority of children pass to secondary schools, education, it seems reasonable to anticipate, will be regraded, in such a way as to consist of a primary or preparatory system for all children up to the age of 11 or 12, followed by varying forms of secondary education, corresponding to the differing tastes and capacities of the pupils, after that age. Thus primary and secondary education will be brought into a simple and logical relation with each other, and the grave intellectual and social wastage caused by our present failure to provide for the years of adolescence will be prevented.

But these are questions which travel beyond the immediate scope of Mr. Lindsay's book, and which are too large to be discussed in an introduction. Whatever educational developments the future may contain, the only foundation upon which a far-sighted and coherent policy can be built is a systematic investigation of the present situation and of the problems to which it has given rise. I welcome Mr. Lindsay's work as a conscientious attempt to explore one corner of this great subject, and I hope that it will lead to further investigations in the same field.

HALDANE.

THE problem examined in these pages is how far the "educational ladder" is effective; whether in fact it is, as it has been described, a greasy pole; and what are the main difficulties that beset the path of the child, the parent, the teacher, and the local education authority. The studies of particular areas, which are printed below, have served to throw light, in greater or less detail, on different aspects of the problem, such as the methods and age of selection, maintenance, and entry to a trade or occupation, while an attempt has been made to estimate the extent of vertical mobility in society.

Perhaps two figures will give perspective to the whole problem and point to the heart of the matter. First, of the 550,000 children who leave elementary schools each year, 9.5 per cent of an age-group proceed to secondary schools, one-third exempt from fees and two-thirds fee-paying, while 1 per 1,000 reach the University. Secondly, of 2,800,000 adolescents in England and Wales, 80 per cent are not in full-time attendance at any school. In conjunction with these important figures two more should at this stage be stated. First, from the evidence of these pages, at least 50 per cent of the pupils in elementary schools can profit by some form of post-primary education up to the age of 16; second, something under 10 per cent of the jobs done by ex-elementary

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school leavers can be described as skilled work. At the same time registered juvenile unemployment is about 65,000, a figure admittedly an underestimate, which takes account neither of casual employment, changing employment, nor under-employment. Finally, it has been conclusively proved that success in winning scholarships varies with almost monotonous regularity according to the quality of the social and economic environment. London, Bradford, Liverpool, and the countryside bear this out in the minutest detail.

One school in Lewisham wins as many scholarships as the whole of Bermondsey put together, seven poor London boroughs have an average of 1.3 scholars per 1,000 children in average attendance, as against 5.3 in seven better-placed London boroughs. In Oxfordshire only 40 schools out of a total of 212 appear as sending scholars or free-placers to secondary schools in 1924; the remaining 172 are mainly poor and remote schools. At Bradford 75 per cent of the children qualified in a school situated in a well-to-do district, while 34 per cent qualified in a poor district. Out of 321 departments at Liverpool, from which free-placers and scholars might have come, 78 failed to nominate a single one, 208 did not win a scholarship, and 115 did not win a free-place. If the 39 wards of the city are analysed, it appears that 8, with an average attendance of 37,133 children, sent 1,224 scholars and free-placers, and that the 31 other wards with 81,422 children had only 850 places distributed among them.

It is proposed to quote from two public men who have ventured opinions on this subject, in order to show the confusion of the public mind. The first was volunteered by

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Lord Birkenhead: "There is now a complete ladder from the elementary school to the University, and the number of scholarships from the elementary to the secondary school is not limited, awards being made to all children who show capacity to profit." The second, made by Alderman Conway, an ex-President of the National Union of Teachers, and an experienced educational administrator, runs as follows: "The restrictive, ineffective scholarship system in vogue for the vast majority of children coincides with a commonly held view that secondary education is something to be doled out with a sparing hand to the bright child of impecunious origin." Someone else has remarked that the elementary school blames the secondary, the secondary the University, the University both; all blame the Local Education Authority, who blame the Board of Education, who blame the people. The distribution of praise or blame might be spared if more light could be shed; minor differences might be dispelled, and a larger view obtained. Mr. Middleton Murry more wisely suggests that equality of opportunity is a happy conjunction of the man and the moment which no amount of preparation can assure, but that it is an injustice, and a remediable one, that a child, who is not yet fit to battle with circumstances, should be deprived of the opportunity to become the best man he is capable of becoming. However, the literature of speculation on this subject is endless, and few living publicists have failed to deliver themselves in varying accents. It may be that the working mother with three or four children is an even wiser judge, both of the benefits and drawbacks of our scholarship system. Nor can the protagonists of separate views afford

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to forget the conclusive evidence of "marking time" in the top standards of some elementary schools and of "wasting time" in and out of industry between 14 to 16 years.

In this connection the Insurance Gaps, with the exception of Widows' Pensions (recently made law), Trade Board Rates of Wages and the absence of apprenticeship, except in unusual cases, before the age of 16, must all be remembered. Each of these social arrangements is calculated to provide cheap labour between the ages of 14 and 16.

The two official declarations governing and determining the scope of this enquiry are the definition of a "free-place" originally given by Mr. McKenna in 1907, subsequently elaborated in the same sense by the Board of Education and the amplification made in the Education Act of 1918, which provides that no child capable of profiting shall be debarred from receiving the benefits of any form of higher education through inability to pay fees. Although shortage of accommodation, a defect admitted on all sides, necessarily converts a qualifying examination into a competitive one, it is impossible to estimate anything until every child in the locality has been reviewed.

It must be more than a coincidence that Bradford and Wallasey, the two districts with the highest secondary school population, one industrial and one residential, have made the most searching and careful annual review of their children. Without such care and comprehensiveness, backed up by publicity and parental co-operation, we are in the region of nebulous guesswork. This is true of London itself. All the evidence collected about London goes to prove that at least another 1,500, and probably many more,

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might with advantage be awarded scholarships and free-places, but until some such review, as at Bradford, is undertaken, there is no definite statistical proof. Again, in Oxfordshire and the countryside generally, until a similar and more thorough canvassing of all children is put in hand, it is impossible to give an accurate estimate. In Banbury, the largest single district of Oxfordshire, it is computed that at least as many again could have taken up scholarships, with benefit to themselves and the community, were there a sufficient number available. What seems quite clear is that the gap between primary and secondary education cannot be bridged by a limited number of scholarships or free-places. The compulsory percentage of 25 may, at the discretion of the local authority, be raised to 40, and in 42 schools all entrance fees are abolished.

Even where fees have been abolished altogether, and where secondary education is free, the number of refusals of free-places exceeds the number of acceptances, as the figures from Bradford testify. This is all the more serious because among the refusals are 50 per cent of the first 200 on the list, and - a statement which is true also of Manchester - a number of the abler children prefer the shorter course at the central school to the full secondary school course. Thirdly, the Director of Education in Manchester informs us that, even were all their schools free, 60 per cent of the children would not be able to afford a full course of secondary education. London has chosen another way out of the difficulty, if, indeed, it should not be described as an evasion of it. Although the total population of maintained secondary schools has doubled in the last ten years, the percentage

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of free-places to fee-payers has actually diminished. An alternative, however, in the shape of sixty central schools has been provided, and each year some 5,000 children are drafted into these schools from the public elementary schools. We are inevitably led on to the conclusion that the two stumbling-blocks are:

1. Shortage of accommodation.
2. Poverty of parents.

The latest available year is given in each case: fee-payers are excluded, except where stated, though they form an average of two-thirds of secondary school entrants, except at Bradford, where all municipal secondary schools are free.

The important but subsidiary questions, such as age and method of selection, the variety of post-primary curricula, the relation between curricula and after-careers, all vitally affect the two outstanding difficulties and cannot be separated from them. Mention has already been made of the economic character of the districts from which scholars come, but there is also the kindred question of occupational classes and the extent to which recruitment is from one class to another. We will deal with each point in turn.

The conclusions that emerge, particularly from a study of Bradford and Wallasey, but also from an examination of other areas, are in the main alike. Between the ages of 10 and 12, say at 11 plus, a change of school, teacher, and

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atmosphere is good for the average child; at that age there is a rich variety of capacity among children; and the various forms and tendencies of post-primary education should correspond to the varying capacities of the children. At present the main types of post-primary education are represented by secondary, central, technical, trade and continuation schools, higher tops and intermediate schools, and in addition a network of evening classes. There is general agreement that a period of four years is the least possible time during which an ample groundwork can be laid. Counter-arguments may be advanced by rate-payers or by industry, but not by educationists. The method of selection is bound to vary, but the broad principle of testing capacity and general ability and of estimating the school record has found common acceptance. Intelligence tests, such as have been used in London, Northumberland, and other areas, have, on the whole, confirmed the other evidence and sometimes corrected errors, but their significance cannot yet be stated with scientific precision. The establishment of impartial examiners, the elimination of the personal factor, the co-ordinating of marking, have all been treated with enormous care and imagination by certain areas, as the pages on Bradford and Wallasey suggest. The very fact of tightening up these arrangements has stimulated public interest in education, and in both the above-mentioned areas about 80 per cent of all possible children are reviewed. Wallasey has conducted a searching enquiry into the personal circumstances of the remaining 20 per cent, and has tabulated the causes of backwardness. Bradford is about to enquire into the reasons for refusal of scholarships and free-places. Sift-

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ing and selection are, then, vital, but if any real meaning is to be given to the selection, the post-primary years must be followed up on that basis. Selection by differentiation must replace selection by elimination. For the one conclusion that emerges from a study of secondary school talent and after-careers, illustrated scientifically by Dr. Burt, the psychologist to the London County Council, is the large number of children of average ability (described by the headmaster of a London secondary school as "ordinary good stuff") with peaks at either end. And yet it is true to say that at present the peaks are lost in the clouds, particularly the peaks of high ability.

In later chapters details about parents' occupations and after-careers of scholars are tabulated, but a summary and estimate will be given below.

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Tables II and III illustrate the main facts of parents' occupations and after-occupations of all secondary school pupils at periods before and after the war.

Table IV reveals that, as between girls and boys, occupations taken up show considerable variation.

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It may be assumed with some confidence that no great changes have come over secondary education in this particular respect during the years since 1921. Roughly two-thirds of the parents of pupils are engaged in the professions, trade, commerce, or skilled work. Only about 13 per cent enter industrial, manual, or agricultural pursuits.

Before making further comment, some particulars of free-places and scholars from areas examined will be given. But each must be tabulated in its own form because of local variations. The second column, after-occupations, relates to the same year, not to the same pupils, as the first column. In each case the latest available year is taken.

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The most significant revelation comes from Bradford, and can be seen from the figures below:

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Over 50 per cent of the children in Bradford municipal schools come from the homes of skilled workers, shop assistants, and unskilled workers. The number of children of unskilled workers is 7 per cent higher than the average for the country. Not only is this true, but the number who go back to industrial or manual work is 21.2 per cent, or 11.3 per cent above the average for the country. In London 50 per cent of the free-placers and scholars come from homes which may be described as above-skilled and unskilled workers and widows - but there free-placers and scholars form only one-third of the total entrants. In Warrington a large percentage of children come from manual workers' homes, but the bulk of them pass to clerical and teaching posts; similarly in Oxfordshire. Again, in both these cases the free-placers and scholars form only one-third of the total entrants, and the number of total entrants to secondary schools is very much smaller relatively than at Bradford. It may be said, therefore, with some accuracy that the "ladder" as it operates in London, Warrington, and Oxfordshire succeeds in lifting a small number each year from manual to clerical and other occupations, while at Bradford free secondary education enables a larger number of children from manual workers' homes to receive the benefits of secondary education, while nearly 25 per cent of that number carry on manual and industrial occupations afterwards. Warrington is a diversified industrial community, and might do the same thing, were there sufficient opportunity. Rural communities, like Oxfordshire, would need to reorganise their main local industry - namely, agriculture - if they are to achieve a result even faintly

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resembling that of Bradford. London is more difficult because, apart from engineering, a very small number of secondary school pupils return to manual or industrial employment. The remaining skilled trades are recruited almost entirely by a non-secondary school population, while technical and continuation schools are gradually assuming a more important place.

Genius flourishes in a free soil, as Mill warned us during the last century. Fifty years of public education have told us that the soil must be fertile as well as free. Slums in London, Warrington, and Bradford, remoteness and lack of community in Oxfordshire, reveal untilled ground in the shape of physical and social evils which are beyond the immediate influence of the educational system. Even here an occasional genius emerges, as the after-careers of distinguished London scholars show. No scientist or educationist can set the bounds of genius. Even physique eludes the well-worn rules. For, though the Metropolitan Police are largely recruited from the countryside, environment has condemned others from the same districts to a life of physical poverty. (1) A champion boxer is discovered among a family of over ten in a Bermondsey slum, and from a neighbouring street a boy is raised to win the blue ribbon of scholarship at Oxford. Nurture can and does drive nature out with a pitchfork: character and tradition can serve mediocre ability with surprising results.

Those are the only conclusions that spring from a study of parents' occupations and after-careers. Warrington, Brad-

(1) See the Medical Officer's Report on children in rural schools for 1924.

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ford, Oxfordshire, London, all show that the unskilled and lowly paid worker, the farm worker and the casual labourer, are as yet not really touched by the scholarship system. Individuals undoubtedly are, but the mass remains unaffected.

With the growth of repetitive processes and the ease and facility with which such processes can be worked by young people between 14 and 18 years, the solution of this problem becomes all the more urgent. It is beside the point to say that our secondary schools produce clerks instead of manual workers. In actual fact, where the net is thrown most widely, the extent and care of testing is most efficient, and where the free secondary school population is largest, as at Bradford, the greatest number return to industrial occupations. But if education is to serve industry, then it must give industry what it most needs. In the chapter on "Education and Industry" it is suggested that a re-orientation of view is now necessary, because a new class in the community is knocking at the doors of secondary schools. The artisan and skilled worker is the largest single group from whom free-place winners come, and the record of free-place winners, as is shown in different areas by headmaster after headmaster, is entirely creditable. In many cases the educational process would reveal no vertical mobility at all, were there no free-place system. This is best shown in Warrington. The local grammar school takes the sons of manufacturers and professional men, and redistributes them among the same class. But the effect of free-places, though only a few in number, and still more of the local maintained school, is to lift each year some sons of skilled

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workers and of a few unskilled workers on to a new plane of understanding, and to give a chance to the boy or girl of exceptional gifts to rise to the high places of knowledge.

All through society the biggest job-finding agency is the parents and the friends and relations of the parent. This is as true of coal-porters in the London docks as of farmers in Oxfordshire, merchants in Bradford, or skilled workers in Warrington. Secondary schools are made up of three classes - the free-placer, the fee-payer from elementary schools, and the fee-payer from private schools; each represents roughly one-third of the annual entrance. In a later chapter, entitled "The Upper Rungs", it is shown how the non-public secondary schools command a virtual monopoly of certain better-paid jobs, and this is true to a lesser extent for the sons of the more wealthy fee-payers at public secondary schools (where fees form only one-third of the annual maintenance, the rest being paid by rate-payers and charities). On the other hand, fee-payers from elementary schools, unless they win an internal scholarship at the secondary school, tend to leave early owing to financial circumstances. For them it is even more difficult to enter professions where premiums are necessary, because the presumption is that they are less able than the scholarship winner. The effect of scholarships in polytechnics and technical colleges may be clearly observed by a study of the after-career of the winners. By sheer merit and technical qualifications they are able to take their places in higher posts in trade and industry. But nothing more than a beginning has been made in this particular direction, in order to counteract the

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hereditary or moneyed qualifications for entering the vocations.

The writer therefore concludes that proved ability to the extent of at least 40 per cent (1) of the nation's children is at present being denied expression, that the full extent of unproved ability is not yet known, only because a sufficiently comprehensive test has not been applied, and that if a very conservative estimate of 20 per cent may be described as below average ability, social environment, in many cases remediable, is the main contributing cause. Furthermore, that the effect of scholarships, limited though they are, has been to break down the irrelevant but formidable barriers of caste, influence, and privilege, for the mutual benefit of the young and the nation as a whole. Finally, the contention that financial considerations bar the way for much greater progress can only be put forward by one half-hearted in the belief that the right place for children under 16 years of age is in a school of some kind, with its corporate life and membership of a spiritual community. Suggestions on the financial side are adumbrated in the chapter "The Barriers of Poverty", and if that is the key to the solution, no less important is a change in the social arrangements and way of life outside the school, in order to make maintenance a practicable and possible solution. The removal from the

(1) The figure 40 per cent represents the difference between 50 per cent and 9.5 per cent. Where a thorough canvass has been made, as at Bradford, at least 50 per cent are described as capable of profiting. For the county about 9.5 or under actually proceed to secondary schools. Dr. Burt, however, makes the figure 75 per cent.

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educational vocabulary of the "ladder idea" does not therefore mean decrease of effort, but a higher minimum of general education and a prospect of indefinite expansion and growth along a variety of paths for the majority instead of a minority of young people.

CLOSELY related with the problem of post-primary education, as the previous chapter has suggested, is the cognate and difficult problem of entering a trade or profession. The whole question of juvenile unemployment would be illuminated if more adequate consideration were given to this constructive side. We have seen that the ladder in education, if that metaphor still has real meaning, affects at most 20 per cent (1) or less of the child population. And the man in the street is quite fair in his criticism if he says the real ladder is outside the school, in the workshop, the business, the hard game of life. This is not the place to show how many men and women of humble origin have risen to places of high responsibility, nor to trace the gradual "moving out" of generations of Londoners from congested to suburban districts. Nor is it possible to estimate the number of metropolitan policemen and skilled builders recruited from country areas to the towns. Such a study might reveal fascinating and important social considerations. But it is evident that the most powerful lever in giving equal opportunity to all children is the public system of education. As Professor Dewey, the eminent American educationist,

(1) At least 80 per cent remain behind when all scholars, free-placers, and fee-payers are taken away.

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has written: "Differences of wealth, existence of large masses of unskilled labour, contempt for manual work, all operate to produce classes. Statesmen and legislation can do something to combat these forces. But the most fundamental agency for good is the public school system."

Between 1908 and 1921 there has been an increase in the number of secondary schools in England of 293, of which 241 are Council schools. The percentage of free-places to total pupils has risen only from 27.6 to 31.8 during those years. And if 8 per cent instead of 4 per cent leaving elementary schools pass to secondary schools, and 22 per cent of these are children of manual workers, this is due to the creation of Council schools and the system of free-places. Moreover, secondary education is outside the reach of the unskilled worker, except for between 2½ and 3 per cent of the total entering secondary schools; this figure has been fairly constant for the last ten years. On almost any day the morning paper will reveal this lack of co-ordination between education and industry, while, at the same time, few children from the unskilled classes pursue any form of post-primary education. In The Times of the day, May 16, Mr. Coppock stated in a speech: "There was a shortage of bricklayers and plasterers, because there had never been a scientific organisation for admitting men into the industry"; and on another page an employer wrote: "Demand for brick-moulders far exceeds the supply. May I suggest that the Government seriously consider some plan whereby youths can be trained on leaving school"; and, again, "My firm is definitely handicapped by the fact that the education provided by the Essex Education Committee is of such a standard that

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it does not fit people to fulfil the ordinary functions that are associated with the staff in our business, and we have had to institute continuation classes of our own." This is significant, coming as it does from a most successful business man who has represented Labour in Parliament, and cannot be accused either of abusing his employees or of underestimating the value of education.

Comparison with other countries is usually unfair, because conditions differ so widely; but America offers an interesting parallel. Just as in England, the growth of secondary education is the most important educational phenomenon of recent years. Between 1890 and 1918 one public high school was established for every day in the calendar year, secondary school enrolments increased more than two and a half times as fast as the population, and the number of secondary school pupils per 1,000 of the population grew from 4.7 to a figure just under 20. During the same period the proportion of non-public - i.e., fee-paying - secondary schools to public secondary schools has decreased from one-third to one-eighth, while the present enrolments of fee-paying pupils is only about 8 per cent of the total.

Not less important than merely quantitative changes have been transformations in curriculum, since the secondary schools must needs cater for a vast and heterogeneous mass of people, and not only for the few. The agricultural high school is only one example of the adaptation of education to new needs, and of the blurring of the sharp lines that used to separate academic and vocational education. The selective ideal which still dominates European countries - the conception that secondary education is suitable and

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desirable for those only who, by virtue of social, economic, or intellectual superiority, can be expected to assume positions of leadership in life - has given ground to a broader interpretation of its functions. It has become now an integral part of the school system. Selection by differentiation is replacing selection by elimination. Without pressing too closely any imitation of other systems, we must admit that a comparison of our own rural districts, as evidenced from the chapter on Oxfordshire in this book, with Wisconsin or Minnesota, reveals vast gaps in our own arrangements. It is not merely that over 2,000 high schools in America teach scientific agriculture, while in England such teaching is the exception, even in the countryside, but that education has lagged so far behind social development. The difference between the household and neighbourhood life and the factory system is big enough, but the difference between 1870 and 1920 is still more illuminating. The results of elementary education and the "ladder" idea are important, but the future of democracy is even more important. In a word, while the cry for more and more secondary education finds a willing response in these pages, based on the evident public needs, secondary education may become as unrelated to the present world as University education has tended to become, unless there is a philosophy of democracy on which it is based.

If the ladder is not to select, and if money is not to select, we are forced to other methods. So long as schools exist - and every decade they are multiplied - they must stand in some more intimate relation both with work and the outside world and with the advances which are made in social and economic life and modern thought. When

[page 29]

there was a very definite philosophy, as in the medieval Church, it was not unnatural that the idea of the "ladder" should work with some degree of efficiency, so that a peasant boy might become a Pope. But in a vast and complex society, such as that of today, co-operative in fundamentals and vitally interdependent, we must surely substitute other methods of preparing succeeding generations for the task of living, No one can say how much trouble, delinquency, blind-alley work, human maladjustment and human waste could be saved by spending more money, and spending it more wisely, on those members of the nation under 18 years of age. We are dealing with imponderables, not with a profit and loss account. But vast fields of labour are at once opened up when we recognise that the capacities, qualities, and desires of the individual are the most precious of all raw materials, and that by guidance and due care we can direct those capacities, qualities, and desires into some channels rather than others, to the benefit of all concerned.

In the United States about 30 per cent of the students in public high schools are pursuing vocational courses. Penn complained that "we are in pain to make them scholars, but not men", and the inclusion of specific vocational objectives in modern secondary education is, in reality, a fuller realisation of an old ideal, in terms of modern social and economic standards. Lord Eustace Percy frequently points out that one reason why the so-called "higher education" works on the whole satisfactorily is that the professions have come to recognise certain standards. Law, medicine, accountancy, architecture, teaching, surveying, and so forth, recognise and demand intensive vocational

[page 30]

training on the top of a broad basis of general education. But, in the absence of the ability to wait conferred by economic means, these professions are closed to all but a handful of poorer children. While premiums for apprenticeship are tending to disappear, together with apprenticeship, premiums for the professions have increased. Only in the case of teaching does the State step in to assist the poor student, though recruits for some Government departments, such as the Post Office and the Air Force, are specifically trained for their future careers. If the entrants to the Post Office in the London area are analysed, it can be seen that they come either from secondary and central schools or from the elementary schools in better-class districts; over one-third in the present year come from suburban or rural areas.

There is, however, an even more serious fact which has to be faced. It is the partial substitution for the adult male worker of successive relays of boys between the ages of 14 and 21. The only adequate answer to that problem, if these pages mean anything, is the requirement of compulsory education in the broadest possible sense of that word up to 16, for all the children in the country, and the recognition that adolescence has other and greater claims upon it than that of industry. For, unless the entire face of modern industry is to change, it is obvious, even if we abolish certain notorious forms of boy-labour, that most of the work is non-educative and low-skilled. Nothing but hypocrisy can allow us to think that anything of value can be learned through such work. That must come outside the shop, outside the factory and the mill. It may be asked why these matters are introduced into a study of facilities for secondary education. The answer is simple. If there

[page 31]

is any substance in the demand for universal secondary education, indeed, if there is to be an extension of secondary education on any considerable scale, besides the expenditure of money to the amount of fifteen or twenty million pounds, besides the variation in kind of school and necessary introduction of vocational courses, there must also go the most careful vocational guidance. Thus only can selection by differentiation be wedded to a reasonable educational opportunity. Statistics prove the absence of both these things today. Not only are the buildings and the teachers and the money lacking, but the realisation of their necessity is lacking also.

In a word, education in a professedly democratic society involves inevitably a further step in advance. The Fisher Act lays down the basis for such an advance, and, as each authority takes stock of its human material, it is forced, like Bradford and Wallasey and Manchester and Middlesex, to admit that there is an immense need for expansion. At the present time one former is worth a thousand reformers, for only by experiment and experience can the best ways be discovered. Secondary education may include grammar schools, art schools, central schools, trade and technical schools, agricultural schools, continuation schools, differing according to varying local needs. In each of these types of school there is, at the present moment, genuine secondary education being carried on. The Director of Education who asserts that central schools are neither fish, flesh, nor good red herring, especially when in his locality only 10 per cent of an age-group proceed from elementary to secondary schools and less than a third of his secondary school population is free, has merely become the victim of nomenclature.

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The real difficulty lies, not in the necessity for different varieties of post-primary education, but in the unequal recognition accorded them by the authorities, and in the confusion resulting from the existence of free and non-free schools. One continuation school in London includes some 300 students pursuing a commercial course; the students are almost all from a poorer neighbourhood, and have come voluntarily after leaving their elementary schools. The work done does not differ materially from certain central school courses, but the curriculum is more elastic. Other continuation schools have picked up most promising material and saved deteriorating ability from wastage. Even unemployment centres, with much narrower opportunities and equipment which is generally inferior, have discovered latent abilities, and have guided neglected or unfortunate young workers in a new direction. In London and the provinces a vast network of evening classes in almost every possible subject is now offered, partly free, to young people. But, as these pages show to be the case in Bradford and London, advantage is taken of these classes mainly by students who have already enjoyed some measure of post-primary education, or by young people in skilled or clerical employments who are assisted thereby in their occupations.

We are entering here on ground somewhat outside this enquiry, but the example of the building trade quoted above is not isolated. There are obviously inadequate educational arrangements for this most important and skilled trade, and for the vast list of semi-skilled and unskilled work included in Trade Board regulations there is still less adequate arrangement, and in many cases none whatsoever. For 200 days in the year we are dependent as a nation on im-

[page 33]

ported food, and it has now become a platitude that we must develop our own agricultural resources on a far more extensive and intensive plan. A recent enquiry revealed that there was a lack of demand by farmers for urban boys, and a lack of desire on the part of urban boys to go to the country. This might not be unsuspected. But it suggests, nevertheless, how educational progress may, if carefully organised, effectively serve modern needs. Wisdom might dictate that the best outlay for the coming years would be an intensive building of agricultural high schools: indeed, there is much to recommend such a course. It is clearly the only means of creating that greater development of agricultural resources which is needed, and incidentally it is one of the conclusions arrived at in this study. Mention of this problem is made here in order to emphasise that economic needs must be served by an educational system, and that the mere production of stenographers, clerks, and black-coated workers is not the objective of secondary education. It is comparatively easy to secure that a greater and greater number of ex-elementary pupils pass a general schools' examination at about the age of 16 plus. It requires a scientific organisation of education and industry, and a re-orientation of the idea of secondary education, to secure a vocational training on the top of a broad general education, such as at present is obtained by the few, for all children, based on their tendencies and desires and the evident needs of production in a co-operative and democratic state. In a word, this chapter is a plea for an alternative theory to that of the "ladder" idea, and for a conception of education more in consonance with the plain facts of economic life.

[page 34]

Finally, all the evidence collected concerning scholarship winners points to the fact that the real problem of adolescence is the non-scholarship winner. Local authorities and enlightened educationists are now engaged in "trying out" a variety of schemes to provide for the non-secondary school population. It may be that the annual review at 11 plus will shortly become merely an indication of the best branch line for the child to follow, that scholarships will be abolished or become universal, and that co-ordination between education and industry will produce new curricula and suggest fresh methods for facilitating the entrance of young people into an occupation. In the voluntary continuation school, in "the discovery centre" at Islington, in the opportunity school at Denver, U.S.A., there appears to be the germ of something significant for the future. In the delicate adjustment of a young person and his work, there is needed, above all, elasticity. "Discovery classes" between 14 and 16 are more human and economical than "recovery classes" between 16 and 18; greater use of the Choice of Employment Act will save young workers from unemployment centres later on. But before a path is cleared through the jungle of overlapping authorities and associations, there must be definite recognition of the years 14 to 16 as years of training; the school must be the centre of activity, even though it is also an employment centre. The Post Office scheme shows what can be done by judicious organisation: it is probable that only organisation, adapted to the peculiar needs of industry and locality, will ever secure those preliminary conditions of equal opportunity and release the larger freedom for adolescents.

IT has become increasingly obvious in the course of this study, that, whatever the percentage of elementary school children who are capable of profiting by secondary education may be, and even if fees are abolished, as at Bradford, for secondary schools, there is still another barrier which is perhaps the most serious of all. Lord Shaftesbury said over fifty years ago, "The extent to which persons in London depended on the labour of their children, their Lordships would scarcely be aware of." In 1877 Thomas Hill Green wrote: "The chief experience to be learned from these districts is that scholarships merely equivalent to whole or part of the school fees are not sufficient to enable really poor boys to continue their school education. Scholarships must carry some payment toward maintenance." In I895 the Royal Commission recommended that scholarships should consist of two different parts: (a) Cost of tuition, books, etc.; (b) contribution towards maintenance on basis of individual need. In a word, the principle of maintenance allowances was conceded on grounds of justice, partly to replace earnings and partly to assist the parent. In 1904 Sir Michael Sadler suggested a separate maintenance fund, from which amounts should be applied on individual application. Since then the public contribution to education has increased, and a variety of schemes have been in operation in different localities.

[page 36]

In 1907 Middlesex offered 14 scholarships with maintenance and 30 exhibitions to secondary schools. The amounts were: nothing under 14, £6 under 15, and £10 over 15, with a lower amount for girls. The 14 scholarships cost £800, and the maintenance £320, or very nearly half. After 1907 two new provisions were added:

1. Maintenance grants to be awarded to 50 per cent of free-place holders after two years had run.
2. Eighty per cent of maintenance grants to be awarded only if holders agree to become teachers in elementary schools.

1. Poverty, or domestic misfortune.
2. Indifference or ignorance of parents.

Lastly we come to the 1918 Act and the Report of the Departmental Committee on free-places and scholarships. The following figures are for the year 1918-1919 in England. There were 1,601 pupils holding maintenance allowances in

[page 37]

grant-aided schools provided by school foundations, the total value of which source was about £10,000. Apart from these Table VII shows the general position.

It will be noticed that, apart from London, about 40 per cent of those exempt from fees have maintenance grants; those exempt from fees form just over one-third of the total secondary school population. London stands out with a figure more than double the rest of England, a point which will be explained later.

The 1918 Act has already been referred to in these pages, and attention has been drawn to the particular clause with which we are here concerned, but the Departmental Committee advised as follows on specific points:

(a) Closer definition of free-place and scholarship, also of maintenance.
(b) All children must be on an equality so far as school activities are concerned.
(c) The necessity of an adequate school life.
(d) The main provision should begin at 14; from 11 to 14 incidental expenses, travelling, dinners, and

[page 38]

special dress should be provided in kind rather than money. After 14 more generous allowances should be made, calculated on the cost of living, not earning power.
(e) Maxima and minima scales were suggested, possibilities of an income limit. A confidential committee should sit and consider cases, and parents should be made aware of the scheme.
(f) In rural areas boarding and travelling expenses are absolutely necessary.

1. The definite scale of income, and the consideration of number of children, etc,
2. The confidential committee which considers cases on their merits.

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amination of individual cases, which is the method prevalent in Warrington and Oxford. Bradford raises other problems.

The second point about London is that a higher intellectual standard is required for a maintenance grant. In a word, free education is offered to a poor student "capable of profiting", but an extra standard is required for maintenance, except in the case of those who gave an undertaking to enter the teaching profession. The Appendix will show the scale now in operation for different ages and types of institution. This plan may be described as a mixed basis, because intellectual standard, parent's income, and the number of children in the family all affect the award. Certain points have already been noticed in connection with London, which may be summarised:

1. The disparity between scholarships awarded and scholarships taken up, a number exceeding 120 in each of the last three years. The authorities say that about 50 per cent of these cases are due to the poverty of parents, and 50 per cent due to the parents exceeding the income limit.

2. The increased length of school life attributed to the minor exhibitions in central schools.

3. The much larger proportion remaining over the age of 16 due to the automatic award of (or continuance of) scholarships consequent on passing the first school examination. This has increased the number of University entrants from the intermediate scholars to London University.

4. The actual excess of accommodation over attendance in secondary schools in poor districts at a time when the reverse is the general rule. A sum of £5,000 per annum has been set aside to meet reduced-fee scholarships.

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It is convenient to take Warrington next, because its scheme is quite different and has much to recommend it in other ways. In the chapter on Warrington Dr. Bowley's figures for pre-war years were quoted, which proved the complete dependance of the larger families on children's earnings; similar enquiries in the poor boroughs of London reveal the same fact, but London is a mixed community, whereas Warrington is distinctive in its general level of equality.

Admission to the secondary school is on an examination basis only for all entrants, and the fees are very low. Those requiring assistance are invited to fill up a form stating the financial position of the family, and the awards are made on the basis of the average income per head of the family. It is noticeable that in Table LXXII on page 168 most of the award go to families with man, wife, and three children, though in some cases earnings of children under 16 are included in the total family wage. The assistance varies with average income per head of family; in five cases, for instance, where that income exceeds sixteen shillings only, free books are granted. On the other hand, a labourer with six children, earning £2 a week, receives the same amount as a skilled wire-drawer with three children earning £4 a week. In each case the child is entitled to a free-place - that is, free tuition and stationery. At the age of 13+ junior scholarships are offered for competition, equivalent in value to £5 plus books and renewable; at the age of 16 senior scholarships are offered for competition, equivalent in value to £15 plus books and £20 for the second year, but in each case the family budget must warrant the award. The difference

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between this and London is that, though the basis of award is a combination of merit and need, no child can enter the municipal secondary school except on the same basis of merit. The thirty odd fee-payers did not ask for assistance, but they passed the same examination as the free-placers. On the other hand, abundant proof exists to show the defects of this system.

1. Fifty per cent of the applicants qualified; there was accommodation for only 25 per cent.

2. The record and length of school life of free-placers is better than that of the fee-payers.

3. Evidence of masters at poorer schools showed that a considerable number were deterred from entering, owing to the loss of earning power that would follow.

Oxford shows still a further variation, and raises fresh points. It should be remembered that both in the case of Warrington and Oxfordshire the number of children deterred from entering must remain an unknown number until a compulsory examination of all children has been made, as at Bradford and Wallasey. With the scattered country schools of a rural district like Oxfordshire, and only forty schools out of a total of 212 sending free-placers and scholars, this point is of paramount importance. Secondly, as has been shown, free-places and scholarships are in effect the same thing today in Oxfordshire, and the examinations have been

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amalgamated. The maintenance, however, takes three forms:

1. General: expenses, meals, games, etc.
2. Boarding: not to exceed £40 a year.
3. Travelling: train, bus, or cycle.

Bradford, though more straightforward and simple, raises

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still more fundamental difficulties. No question of free-place, fee-payer, and scholarship arises, but grants-in-aid are given to needy pupils by a confidential committee.

As all children are examined there is further evidence to hand of the root problem. Besides the correspondence between secondary school pupils and economic environment, which is a common feature everywhere, two further facts emerge:

1. The very large number who refuse the offer of free-places. We attribute this to the comparatively large earnings obtainable in the mills, but the authorities are conducting a detailed enquiry into individual cases, and the result will be significant.

2. The large number of applicants for withdrawals from school before the course has been finished. In about 25 per cent payment was made in acknowledgment on amounts of £3 per child, the majority of which were granted.

From Middlesex, a mixed district, the main problems indicated by Sir Benjamin Gott were inability to pay fees and incidental expenses and to sacrifice earnings. Mr. Spurley Hey says of Manchester that 50 per cent of those

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selected by a first examination could not go forward to secondary schools, even if the school were free, because their parents could not afford it. In Birmingham 60 per cent of those offered admission refused, the main obstacles being fees, incidental expenses, and the sacrifice of earnings.

Manchester prepared a comprehensive scheme (1) to meet their urgency, adding an extra £8,000 to the estimates for the year 1925. Certain principles are involved in the new plan:

1. The allowance is to meet the extra cost of the child, and not to compete with wages.

2. Scales of income are to be fixed, but the family income and other factors are to be considered.

3. Though the minimum age is fixed at 14, amounts not exceeding £2 in central and £3 in secondary schools may be given if the lack of it "might prevent either the admission of suitable pupils or their continued attendance."

4. Children remaining in elementary schools after the year in which they reach 14 years may receive amounts up to £10, provided they stay a whole year.

5. Pupils in other than secondary schools may receive amounts up to £15, and in secondary schools up to £20; between the ages 14 and 16.

(1) The scheme was not carried on the Education Committee.

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Plymouth, on the other hand, which is trying to give free secondary education, does not recognise maintenance during the time of compulsory education.

An analysis of existing schemes in other counties and boroughs does not show any new principle, but generally a combination of the various ideas already enumerated. It is obvious that counties have a somewhat different application of maintenance, because travelling and boarding are becoming more and more important, especially with the redistribution of rural schools. Every county and borough now admits the principle, and spends varying amounts on some form or other of assistance.

It was stated in the earlier part of this book that having made primary education compulsory, it was found that many children were uneducable owing to neglect, disease, and other causes. It may be said of secondary education that, with its rapid growth, particularly since the war, many children either cannot take advantage of it owing to inability to afford the money, or cannot continue it, having entered the schools, for the same reason. These pages reveal the fact that it is impossible to dissociate the free-place system from the maintenance system, or, to state the same thing in a different way, maintenance is affected by the fees prevalent in secondary schools. It is true that Bradford is faced with the same problem as other places, but the basis of judgment is easier where all pupils are on the same footing in regard to fees. At present fees vary between nothing at all and twenty-seven guineas a year; there are twenty of the latter, all foundation schools. But the average fee is between four and ten guineas a year. Again, while 25 per

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cent of the previous year's admission is the normal percentage of free-places, eighty-nine foundation schools receive 10 or 12½ per cent, and thirty no free-places at all.

Certain conclusions have already emerged from the study of particular districts. In 1919 we spent a quarter of a million pounds on maintenance, just under 40 per cent of free entrants to secondary schools received some form of assistance, and about 10 per cent of all children in secondary schools. On the other hand, the income from fees amounted to about £3,000,000. Unless a most unlikely advance is made in real wages, it is safe to conclude that more and more maintenance will be required. It is common knowledge that the chief difficulty in raising the school age is the difficulty of the parents in foregoing their children's earnings. In any working-class district the suggestion of raising the school age to 15 is greeted with disapproval, unless liberal maintenance is also assured. But there is another side to this question which was faintly suggested by Sir Michael Sadler in 1904. The households consisting of a husband, non-earning wife, and three dependent children number fifty-six out of every thousand skilled workers, and fifty-two per thousand in the case of unskilled workers. These households, containing a large percentage of the child population, receive the same wage as a childless couple or a bachelor. The only method of keeping head above water is for the mother to go out to work, and the elder children to take what is often the first and most unsatisfactory job at 14 plus. Many a free-placer is being kept at a secondary school by the long hours of a sacrificing mother, a fact which again and again came to my notice. Sir Michael Sadler suggested a maintenance

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fund, and, if equitable treatment is to be given to all children, it seems that nothing short of special provision can supply the need. It is true that a certain section of the community do not need assistance, and that fees can be easily afforded by a small minority, but it has been shown that a new section of the community is asking for secondary and continued education today, for whom fees and lack of maintenance are the great difficulties, and, in not a few cases, the only obstacles. If an examination, as at Warrington, and, still more, Bradford, is the only test of entrance, then need must be the only basis for maintenance. Secondly, the amount must include incidental expenses under 14 years, and be graduated with age and the number of children in the family for succeeding years. Thirdly, such publicity must be secured, and such a public opinion must be aroused, that no deserving and able child can be held back. The only adequate method would seem to be a compulsory examination of all children, a determination of their ability, frank canvassing of parents, and minute enquiry into reasons for refusals. If a child earns ten shillings a week or £25 a year, probably nine shillings will go to the parents. It is not unreasonable to pay from a maintenance fund specific amounts, varying with the number of children, as a means of raising the school age, whether in elementary or secondary schools. Not only must post-primary education from 11 to 15 or 16 be free, but special help must be given in some shape or form; as Manchester, Birmingham, Liverpool, London, and the countryside testify. We might spend £4,000,000 on continuation schools for all from 14 to 16, but the experience of present continuation schools suggests that the same money

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would be more wisely spent in assuring an unbroken course of education at least up to 15 years for a majority of the children. The division of schools at 11 plus might then once and for all be made on educational, and not financial, considerations, and equality of accessibility would be assured. Whether the money be disbursed as a family endowment, or as special maintenance for the school period, is a question for the economist and actuary, but in either case it is obvious that maintenance will become increasingly necessary, and that existing machinery will need radical alterations. It is one thing to meet special cases, quite another to deal with a great mass. London, which is the only comparable example, has been forced to adopt a scale, and since the 1918 Act to widen the scope and extend in all directions the operations of that scale. Even then, as we have shown above, it cannot be pretended that the scale meets the needs of the poor family. The proportion of those not paying fees to those paying fees in maintained secondary schools in London is 4 per cent less in 1923 than in 1913, but the proportion staying on after 16 years is 6 per cent higher. The writer of these pages, therefore, after considering as many sides of the question as possible, leans towards the conclusion that some subsidy to wages for married persons with children is the best and quickest method of raising the school age, and more dignified to the parent than the ceaseless and meticulous enquiry into borderland cases. That some maintenance will be necessary as well is a possibility, but the whole question will be reduced to reasonable and workable proportions.

A BRIEF survey of the recent history of education is an essential preliminary to any understanding of the existing system in England, and especially in London. That system was described twenty years ago by a well-known authority as "a chaos, but a chaos of creation out of which order will in time evolve." It might be described in much the same language today. Each locality has its peculiar problems, and London, because of its history and its amazing growth, has a crop of questions unlike any other authority in the country. There is no space here to deal with the many contributions made by individuals, movements, and voluntary and religious societies to the building up of our present system. Nor is it possible to comment in any detail upon the numerous commissions set up during the nineteenth century. These things can be found elsewhere in blue books and histories. There are, however, certain traditions which we have inherited, and certain outstanding events which sum up the tendencies of an age, to which reference must be made. The Act of 1918 stands in line with an organic and historic growth of at least four centuries.

The nineteenth century inherited two educational traditions: one the grammar school with its scholastic significance, the other the apprentice tradition of the workshop. Both had been weakening during the eighteenth century, and the

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industrial revolution tended to smother them. While it would be untrue to say that the idea of a ladder had yet occurred, it is estimated that the supply of grammar schools was greater in proportion to the population in the later Middle Ages than at any age up to 1902. Further, free scholars were, of course, the true foundation of the big public schools like Eton and Winchester, and also of the two Universities, Oxford and Cambridge. Before 1870 all elementary education was controlled and mainly supported by religious denominations, such as the Society "for the Promotion of the Education of the Poor in the Principles of the Established Church", and the British and Foreign School Society. Not until 1833 was the first public grant of £20,000 made, and this was distributed by religious societies. In 1839 the grant was increased to £39,000 and administered by a committee of the Privy Council. The grants grew with the demand of a rapidly growing population, until in 1870 the position compelled new and more comprehensive legislation.

At that time there were in England and Wales 4,300,000 children of school age, of whom 1,300,000 were in schools conducted by religious bodies at an annual cost of £1,600,000. This sum came from three sources in about equal proportions - fees, Government grants, and voluntary subscriptions. Another million children attended private venture schools, which were notoriously inefficient, and the remaining two millions did not attend school at all.

The Acts from 1870 to 1876 made school attendance compulsory, and established public elementary schools as an obligatory charge on the local rates. The School Board of London was created as a publicly elected body. Thus arose

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two types of elementary school: the voluntary schools of the religious organisations, and those of the public authorities. Each was aided by the State, each charged fees, and each had a deficiency, met in the one case by voluntary contributions, and in the other by the rates. Intimately connected with educational legislation has been a series of Factory Acts from 1833 down to the present time. By 1880 no child under ten could avoid school attendance, and there was an educational qualification for half-timers between 10 and 13. It is a curious commentary on the times that the leader in factory reform, Lord Shaftesbury, should move an amendment to the 1870 Act proposing to change the age limits from 5 and 13 to 4 and 10, and should call the education rate "a water rate to extinguish religious fire among young people". He used these words: "The extent to which persons in London depended on the labour of their children their Lordships would scarcely be aware of, and it was impossible that a man could maintain wife and family on nine shillings a week, unless he was assisted by such labour." This argument did not die with Shaftesbury. Before bringing elementary education up to the historic date of 1902, it is well to consider the position of secondary education in the nineteenth century.

The first step was a reform of the older public schools (about nine being exempted), which was followed by a revival of the small grammar schools. Their success led at a much later date to the creation of municipal and county schools. The Commission of 1868 discovered that there were 782 endowments for secondary education, and that through them about 9,279 boarders and 27,595 day boys were

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receiving education; there were also proprietary and private adventure schools, and about a dozen Quaker schools. But the importance of the next thirty years in secondary education is bound up with the reorganisation and application of endowed funds, which had been hedged round with conditions quite out of keeping with the times. By the Endowed Schools Act of 1869 powers were given to commissioners, and finally transferred to the Board of Education in 1899. The enquiry of 1868 was the first to recognise the "ladder", but nothing was done to facilitate its working. Secondary school exhibitions were not made obtainable by elementary school pupils, except where this was already the case. The enquiry of 1895 was able, however, to point to the actual successes of ex-elementary school children at the Universities, and so to overcome the reluctance of English people to believe in the possibilities of anything of which they have had no practical experience. Reference must now be made to three sources of aid, which almost by accident had come to the rescue of secondary education.

There were, firstly, grants to the science and art departments at South Kensington, which had come to dominate a whole body of schools. Secondly, by the establishment of County Councils, and in the following year the passing of the Technical Instruction Act, another side-door was opened. Money was allowed to be spent on such general education as was necessary as a basis for the technical work. Moreover, the windfall of "whisky money" enabled Councils to provide technical education without the necessity of a rate. By 1895 about £317,000 was being spent, and in the following manner:

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The third source of assistance came from the School Boards themselves. Owing to the deficiency of secondary education they had set up "higher grade" schools, the first of which was established in 1872. The actual words of the 1870 Act did not prohibit this procedure. In 1899 the Local Government Board auditor surcharged all expenditure incurred on pupils over 15 years of age, and the decision being upheld in the courts, the only way out of the difficulty was a new Act. Apart from the City Parochial Charities Act of 1883, which led to the development of art schools and polytechnics, and the Technical Education Board of 1893, which brought the Council into closer relation with institutes and polytechnics, the most important event during these years was the Welsh Intermediate Education Act of 1889, which may fairly be said to have laid the foundations for the 1902 Act. For the first time a rate was raised for secondary education, County Councils received larger powers; a series of schools were set up, whose functions were to take the most promising pupils of elementary schools, continue their general education, and pass on the most able to the University. The "ladder" idea thus originated in Great Britain, and must be distinguished from a connected secondary school course, from 9 to 19, such as that of Prussia, which definitely excluded the working classes.

Thus the stage was more than ready for a new and comprehensive measure of elementary and secondary education.

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While the school age had been creeping up in the elementary schools, the area of secondary education had been widening. The co-ordination of the two stages called for one authority with enlarged powers. The Acts of 1902 and 1903 transferred to the Council all the powers of the School Board, and made it the local education authority for nearly all forms of education. In 1901 the newly constituted Board of Education made grants to secondary schools, in 1907 the requirement of 25 per cent free-places was made the condition of a Government grant, and by 1912 County and Borough Councils had founded 330 new schools and taken over fifty-three existing schools. Thus an important thing had happened. The local education authority had become responsible both for the supply of schools and for the transference of pupils from one type of school to another.

Between 1902 and 1918 the legislation with regard to elementary schools was of one kind. Having made education compulsory, it was discovered that social conditions and neglect had made certain children uneducatable. So we have in 1906 the Provision of Meals Act; in 1907, medical inspection and treatment; in 1908, legislation for wayward and neglected children, and in 1913, for mentally defective children. Finally, in 1918, comes the third great charter of public education, inaugurating a new era by its declared provision that "no children shall be debarred from receiving the benefits of any form of education by which they are capable of profiting, through inability to pay fees."

IN order more fully to explain the growth of secondary education during the last thirty years, and especially the relation of primary to secondary schools, we may take a glance at London thirty years ago. There were about 600 or 700 scholarships for elementary schools, of which about one-half were localised. The amounts in money varied from remission of whole or part of fees to sums of £20 a year. In addition, there were a number of scholarships and exhibitions tenable at efficient secondary schools, either on independent foundations, or attached to special elementary schools, or in the hands of the London School Board. The latter number varied between fifteen and twenty each year. Probably there were about 900 in all. These scholarships were freely used by the Charity Commissioners as a means of compounding the claims of special districts and classes to the benefit of reorganised endowments. Thus Parmiter's, formerly a free school for all boys at Bethnal Green, was now a fee-paying school open to all comers, but it retained something of its former local character, and offered eighteen scholarships to past pupils of elementary schools in Bethnal Green. The united Westminster schools and the Drapers' School at People's Palace offered more than half the total

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number of London scholarships. These were almost "continuation" schools, the curriculum being based on the assumption that pupils had passed through the elementary standards, as in American high schools today. The other schools, however, assumed that the pupil was educated from an early age at the secondary school, and scholarship holders had to find their places in a system constructed for the requirements of a different class. In the country as a whole the number of secondary school pupils per thousand of population was 2.5 as compared with 9.3 in 1923. In London there were thirty-six endowed secondary schools attended by 12,500 boys, ten proprietary schools with 1,800 boys, and about 450 private venture schools. Most of the endowed schools exist today, though with differences, and if we may judge from the Bryce Commission of 1895 and the Education Department Census of 1897, these are the only schools that can possibly be called secondary. Each school drew largely from its own locality, and their geographical distribution had more relation to Elizabethan than to Victorian times. Their composition was middle-class, being the sons of licensed victuallers, managers, agents and shopkeepers, with a small sprinkling of working-class children.

Until 1890 the governors of St. Olave's Grammar School, Southwark, were sixteen members of the Church of England, residing, carrying on business, or rated in the parish. The original sixteen were appointed by letters patent of Elizabeth, and the survivors filled the vacancies by co-optation. Since 1890 the various changes in the Board illustrate the growth of outside authority. There are now governors appointed by the Bermondsey and Southwark Borough Councils, the

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London County Council, London, Oxford, and Cambridge Universities, local hospitals and other interests. As St. Olave's regained its Elizabethan importance no less than nine flourishing private schools vanished away. This partly illustrates the present confusion in our disjointed system of elementary and secondary schools. These endowed schools were planted according to the whim of the charitable founder, and, of course, had no relation to the elementary schools, which, for the most part, were not in existence at their inception. As a historian writes: "The founders had no more idea of universal education than the founders of almshouses dreamed of universal pensions." Primary education had developed the need of some capacity-catching machinery, some definite method of selection.

An analysis of East London schools at this time reveals that they failed to reach more than the upper fringe of the working classes. Many children would come for a single year or term to finish, and therefore enhance their commercial value after leaving the elementary school. The average leaving age was about 13½ years. Boys came mainly from richer and quieter homes, but did not stay long enough to benefit. There were three main difficulties in the path. Elementary teachers were anxious not to part with their children; parents were little acquainted with the advantages of secondary education; and, what was most often, parents wanted the incomes of their children. It was recommended that the age of admission to secondary schools be lowered to 10 or 11, and that emoluments should become progressively larger. It was also suggested that some manual work be combined with the literary training, in order to bring the

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grammar schools into line with existing conditions. There was fear expressed that the scholars merely transferred their class.

The position with regard to girls was not very different. There were about twenty high schools, and a slightly less number of middle and secondary schools. The girls at East London middle schools were, for the most part, daughters of tradesmen, ministers, schoolmasters, and clerks. This applied almost equally to scholars and fee-payers. Managers found that the later the entrance to secondary schools, the less progress was made. On the other hand, examination at an early age was thought little test of superior ability, and for all practical purposes scholarship might be awarded to the cleanest and healthiest children. This latter remark is a prophecy so far as future legislation was concerned. More than half the girls stayed less than two years at the middle schools. On the whole, it was thought that girls did not so much need the ladder as widespread instruction in many subjects, especially domestic economy, the laws of health, and good literature.

The general conclusion on London education of thirty years ago was that it was "an example of a vast disordered aggregation of different unrelated agencies of all types and kinds." In 1877 Mr. T. H. Green, referring to the grading of secondary education, wrote the words: "It embarrasses all schemes. Such and such a course of study is settled on logical grounds, the best adapted for boys who are being educated for a certain kind of life - the education of a gentleman, second grade being less gentleman-like, and so on - the educational significance becoming a social one. The

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chief lesson to be learned from experience of these districts is that scholarships, merely equivalent to the whole or part of the school fees, are not sufficient to enable really poor boys to continue their school education. Scholarships must carry some payment toward maintenance."

With this picture of 1892 we have to compare the position of London today, after the war, and the Fisher Act of 1918. The legislative changes have been referred to already, but side by side have gone the silent action of the authority, the influence of inspection, and the general growth of educational experiment and experience. Before describing the actual facts of the present position in London, it may be well to comment on the area which it comprises and the powers of the administration.

The county of London, some 120 miles square, has a population of four and a half millions, and is closely surrounded by an outer zone of two and three-quarter millions. The dividing lines are neither industrial, economical, nor geographical, but rest on tradition and statute. Furthermore, residence and occupation are often far more apart. For example, as many people come into Hayes (Middlesex), or Hammersmith as go out from these places every day. No less than a million come into the central area for business every day. The question of travel and accommodation vitally affects the provision of education. Though London possesses neither coal nor iron, nor any staple industry, its docks and export trade have promoted every kind of manufacture, and made it a market for a wide and varied range of commodities. In the twenty years before the war the Port of London received a 50 per cent increase of tonnage. Old

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industries, like shipbuilding and silk manufacture, have died down, but motors, aeroplanes, and engineering have taken their place. About one-eighth of the workers are engaged in carrying about the rest of London and its needs. There are 200,000 clerks of varying kinds. Food, tobacco, drink and lodging make up another large group. The small trader abounds, in spite of the growth of large stores. Then there are curious local occupations which have survived. Among the more obvious are the city businesses and West End shops: engineering (Woolwich and Erith), (Hackney and Tottenham), (Willesden and Hammersmith); clothes ready-made (East End), bespoke (West End); boots and shoes (Bethnal Green); woodwork (Shoreditch); scientific instruments (CIerkenwell); printing (City, Holborn, Southwark, and Westminster); building trades (Hammersmith and Wandsworth); chemicals (Stratford and Battersea); dock labour (the river boroughs). Again, the foreign population is largely contained in certain areas and trades, while a constant stream of immigration from the provinces renews the whole. Mention is made of these facts because education does not exist in a vacuum, and though in its deepest sense it cares for none of these things, it is necessarily linked up with the two factors, place and work. The London education authority is now responsible for either maintaining or co-ordinating all forms of education within the county. Practically all elementary education is under its control. In the various branches of higher and technical education, it is associated with other authorities, such as the University, the City Companies, the governing bodies of endowed schools, polytechnics, and institutes. The tendency is thus to graft new social control

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on to old voluntary and endowed institutions, while the local authority itself becomes responsible more and more for directly maintaining institutions.

The administrative machine is presided over by a chief officer, and his staff numbers over 1,000, together with over 100 inspectors. All matters relating to the Council's power under the Education Acts, except the power of raising money, stand referred to an Education Committee, consisting of about fifty persons. In elementary education the Committee is assisted by some 500 statutory bodies of managers, for provided and non-provided schools.

There are 590 provided and 361 non-provided schools in London, and education is compulsory between 5 and 14, while children between 3 and 5 years may be admitted. In addition to the ordinary elementary schools, the Council in 1910 organised a system of central schools with a view to providing for specially selected children, from the age of 11 and upwards, a four years' course of instruction with a definite commercial or industrial bias. Sixty-six are now in existence. The pupils are in the main selected from the ordinary elementary schools at about 11 years of age, partly on the results of the junior county scholarships' examination, and partly on the progress and promise shown in their schools. Considerable discretion is allowed to head teachers of both contributory and central schools, acting in conjunction, for the final selection. Education is entirely free, and the curriculum is framed with a special view to industrial and commercial pursuits, based on broad general groundwork. Of the sixty-six schools, nine have an industrial bias, thirty-six a commercial bias, while twenty-one combine the two.

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These schools are replacing the old higher grade schools, though a few of the latter still remain. In most cases the premises are converted into elementary schools, with a staff somewhat more specialised and experienced. Though education is free, there are some major and minor exhibitions granted for maintenance to help less fortunate children.

Secondary schools are of great variety, and can only be distinguished by the authorities that control them. There are 103 public secondary schools in London, twenty-four of which are maintained and fifty aided by the Council. Some receive 25 per cent free-places, others are recognised without any Board of Education grant. To these must be added an unknown quantity of private schools, probably at least 590, and a much smaller number of definitely denominational schools. The private schools fall into three classes:

1. Those which aim at being first-grade secondary schools, with high fees and a small number of pupils.

2. Predominantly preparatory, where fees are low and numbers strong; the teaching here is often inefficient.

3. Cramming establishments, some of which are efficient with a limited scope.

Evening institutes, although lying outside the scope of this report, deserve mention, if only to show the demand which

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they have created, and because a closer connection has been made between them and the polytechnics and technical institutes. Their types are varied, some catering for students over 17, others covering the two or three years after elementary education ceases. London University, with its scattered colleges, and the Imperial College of Science and Technology crowns the edifice so far as London itself is concerned.

So far nothing more than the skeleton of the system has been described; it remains to show the proportion of children who start on the adventure, how they are helped or retarded, what rung they reach on the ladder, and what generally becomes of them when the official educational system launches them on to the world. In order to discover these things an analysis of the scholarship system - the links in the chain - is, of course, necessary.

The following figures for 1920 indicate some elementary facts:

At the age of 11 a general scholarship examination for the whole area is held in order to select the junior county

(1) March, 1925, 12,885.

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scholars. It is held twice a year, and the number of scholarships available is known in advance within small limits, being determined by the amount of money available. The Board of Education is supposed to pay 50 per cent of the expenses incurred by the local education authority, and it is for the local authority, within certain limits, to determine how much it can afford, and to interpret the meaning of the Acts. In the case of the Fisher Act of 1918, the critical phrase is "ability to profit". "Inability to pay fees" and "capability of profiting" are obviously terms of wide comprehension. However, the number of junior scholarships available in London is something under 1,500. Since the war it has varied between 1,500 and 1,600. In 1905, 2,000 were awarded and taken up, but though the number has steadily decreased, the rate of lapse has steadily decreased also. Whereas 54 per cent completed the fifth year in the beginning, today about 77 per cent are found in that category. A preliminary examination is held in each school, and the papers are marked by the headmasters or headmistresses, in conjunction with the inspector. Those who are thought to stand a further chance are entered for the final examination. For the preliminary examination children must have attained to Standard IV, and be eligible by age and residence. The final paper is designed, as far as possible, to test ability and common sense.

When the 1,500 scholars have been skimmed off, there are also some 600 other scholarships provided by other bodies than the Council. The ages of entrance vary from 8 to 15, the provisions and conditions are complicated partly by local considerations and partly by attendance at

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certain institutions, but they are almost all of a secondary nature.

Roughly speaking, the next 5,000 go to the various central schools scattered over London. The position of the central school as a half-way house, being neither elementary or secondary, is typical of the practical, compromising growth of our educational system. The exhibitions offered, 750 at £15 a year, and 250 at £2 10s. to £5, have so far had the effect of raising the leaving age to about 15.

In 1919 it was estimated that there were about 74,000 children of an age group, and so far these have been taken away.

1,500 junior scholars to secondary schools.
600 other scholarships to secondary schools or technical schools.
5,000 free-places to central schools (950 (1) receiving maintenance exhibitions).

(1) Of the total central school population.

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Taking the period of the last five years, the following numbers illustrate the outward movement at 13 plus:

If, then, the year 1919 is taken (other years will not show great variation), we can estimate the approximate number who pursue a secondary education, including for the moment those who attend central schools, and the number also whose education in any organised or systematised form ceases at the age of 15.

This table illustrates the movement from elementary schools to advanced forms of instruction either by scholarship, free-place, or paying fees. Of the 2,570 who pay fees, about 2,500 pass to secondary schools, and the remainder to trade and technical schools. Thus central schools are entirely free, trade schools largely free, whereas public secondary schools, with regard to ex-elementary scholars, are about. 56 per cent free.

Of an age-group about 7.7 per cent proceed to secondary

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education, and about 7 per cent to central schools. Making allowances for other possibilities, there are well over 60,000, or 80 per cent, of an age-group who pursue no further organised course in education. This figure agrees with the estimate made previous to the proposed continuation schools. Of the remainder about two-thirds are in employment during the first year of independence, and in normal times about 2,000 are unemployed between the ages of 15 to 16. At present both estimates are out of proportion owing to the tragic state of juvenile unemployment. For example, Messrs. Eager and Secretan estimate that 15 per cent of those between 14 and 16 in Bermondsey are unemployed. About 40 per cent of these young workers are connected with industrial work, mostly repetition processes; about 19 per cent are engaged as carters, van boys, and messengers; while a further 17 per cent are employed in minor clerical and office work. Various methods - such as evening classes, continuation schools, and unemployment centres - have been used to deal with this problem, but it may be said that no adequate method or provision has yet been found. Professor Strong estimates that 40 per cent of these school-leavers become errand boys, van boys, and messengers; of these 31 per cent ultimately drift into general or casual labour, 33 per cent enter low-skilled trades, and about 13 per cent into skilled trades.

The evening institutes do not attract the rougher type of boy, but rather the boy in the "better" type of job and home; the attendance falls off rapidly at 15, and there is strong evidence that sheer fatigue prevents a great many young workers' attendance. The unemployment centres

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have very few boys or girls under 16, though many who are displaced from work at 16. The continuation schools, except where there is a definite scheme of work, as with the Post Office and Public Trustee Office, also fail to attract children under 16. Casual or unskilled employment, disinclination to enter a settled trade, personal unrestraint, distaste for discipline or continuation of education - general deterioration and in the bulk uneducated workers tending to lower the standard of living and industrial progress. This is the downward path.

Mention is made of this 80 per cent because it emphasises the proportion of those for whom secondary and central schools now cater, and also because at a later stage it will be necessary to estimate the extent to which the system succeeds in selecting those best able to profit. Meanwhile two points may be stated. Already 44 per cent of those entering secondary schools from elementary schools have passed in primarily through ability to pay fees. It must not be supposed, therefore, that all these children are supernormal. On the other hand, there were, in April, 1916, above Standard VII, over 3,000 children who might be classified as supernormal, for whom central school provision ought to be made. It was on this calculation that the Committee on Central Schools decided that an additional forty were necessary to provide for an annual intake of 8,000 children. They referred in their report to three other reasons besides lack of accommodation. The first was an unwillingness of the teachers to part with brighter children, the second difficulty was with non-provided schools, only one-third of the managers expressing a wish to co-operate. The Jews' free

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central school and Roman Catholic schools have become part of the system, and this difficulty can be met. The third and most serious problem is connected with the parents and social environment. Probably only better wages, improved housing conditions, coupled with greater knowledge of the educational system, will ever overcome this stumbling block.

Of those who proceed to junior technical and trade schools, or to the central schools, the first two kinds of school (1) cater for definite trades - such as engineering, navigation, book-binding, furniture-making, photo-engraving, and so on - and about 90 per cent follow occupations upon which their course of study has a distinct bearing, and continue their education. The central schools very largely cater for clerical work, especially among girls, and about 10 per cent of the boys go into engineering or skilled trades. The average age of leaving for all these types of school is 15 plus, though for trade schools alone it is 16 plus.

Besides the Juvenile Employment Exchanges there are still left in London a few of the old Skilled Employment Exchanges. They make a point of looking after only the boys in the higher standards of the elementary schools. In analysing various periods of their work, it is clear that, though the majority of the children were Standard ex-VII or VII, it is impossible to find skilled jobs or apprenticeships except for a few. The hours of work averaged over eight, and in a few cases were as much as eleven. About 50 per cent stayed at their job, chiefly apprentices, for four years, and another 50 per cent had two, three, or more jobs during

(1) There are at present 2,027 pupils, 50 per cent paying and 50 per cent with scholarship, at junior technical and trade schools.

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that time. Slackness, hours or wages, dullness of work, are the reasons given for changing work. The boys mainly wanted engineering, and the girls clerical or garment trades. This is of interest, because the pupils were almost all above normal, the parents being workmen with a fair sprinkling of casual and dock labourers, and the Exchange is supposed to deal with the more able school-leaver. Dr. Llewelyn Lewis in a book, The Children of the Unskilled, points to the difficulty of such children finding work; their families are large, their environment has long been against them, and often health is affected. Following in father's footsteps is a very general rule, because apprenticeships are gained far more by parental relations or friends and relations than by Labour Exchanges, or by rising from the unskilled ranks. Among the juvenile unemployment today in London it is of importance to record that, though dullness and low ability play their part, 9 per cent are from central, trade, or secondary schools, 12 per cent from Standard ex-VII, and 28 per cent from Standard VII.

I have mentioned these facts about standards reached, central schools, skilled employment agencies and unemployment, because, although there is no available comprehensive information, it is clear that the difference of ability in these cases between scholarship winners, central school pupils, and top standards in the elementary schools is not very great. Further evidence from the eleven voluntary continuation schools reveals the same fact, as does the expert psychological enquiry of Dr. Burt into educational ability.

We now come to the actual composition of the various types of secondary school.

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Between 1919 and 1922 there was an increase in aided and maintained schools of 2,722, of which 1.477 came from increased accommodation, and 1,245 from "squeezing up".

The returns for (4) and (5) are incomplete; at least 1,000 are under 12 years of age. This is not the place to comment on the relative advantages and disadvantages of the preparatory department in the public secondary school system, but merely to point out their numbers. Seventeen schools out of group (3) are under inspection from neither central nor local authority, but eight of these are recognised by the Council for the attendance of its scholars. All groups (1) and (2) and twenty-six of group (3) are working under the regulations of the Board of Education for the awards of grants. There are ninety-eight schools (forty-two boys' and fifty-six girls') to which scholarship holders may go for their secondary education. Taking the whole of London, 7.7 per 1,000 of the population are in attendance at secondary schools. Although this total is below the average for the country, 9.3 per 1,000 population, it must be mentioned that

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a good central school in London compares very favourably with many a secondary school outside London. Such is the testimony of an inspector with an intimate knowledge of both areas. It is also true that the quality of work done in an American high school, to which reference is sometimes made, is at least a year behind the average London public secondary school. The shortage of accommodation, however, was recognised by a sub-committee of the Council who reported in 1919. The summary of proposals estimates for another 4,000 children, or looked at from another angle, the new scholarship scheme intends to maintain about 16,000 scholars at secondary schools, as compared with 10,000 at present. This would bring the total number up to 45,000, or 10 per 1,000 population. The economy campaign has so far prevented much realisation of this programme. But the proposed line of advance is clear:

1. Increased number of central schools.
2. Further accommodation in secondary schools.
3. Increased number of scholarships.

In each year about 45 per cent are scholars.

Table XIII shows the admissions to secondary and junior technical schools in 1919.

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There are thus 10,833, or 14.2 per cent, of an age-group, 30 per cent of whom are exempt from fees, 70 per cent of whom pay fees, entering these schools, and 80 per cent of the scholars are in receipt of maintenance. Maintenance allowance requires two conditions: a certain standard of merit and, for children under 14, an income of under £250 a year. The income limit for free-places is £450 a year. It is of great importance to state here that there are schools in poor districts with empty places, and that at one school a reduced fee scholarship examination has been started to assist poor students.

Before returning to this problem in greater detail, a brief survey of the top rungs of the ladder is needed to complete the picture. At 16 plus, when the next division of pupils takes place, intermediate scholarships, free-places, and bursaries are open. These may be won by free-placers or fee-payers, subject to income limits - £550 for free-places, £450 for maintenance grants - on the result of an approved first examination. The standard for a free-place is a "pass" at 16 plus or 17 plus, whereas a pass at 16 plus, or honours at either age, entitles the winner to a scholarship. In either case intending teachers who pass are given a scholarship. In Table XIV the increase for 1922 and 1923 is due to the introduction of the above scheme.

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These students will either pursue a further two or three years at the secondary school, or at a polytechnic or technical institution. It was mentioned before that 77 per cent of the junior county scholars remain until the end of their fifth year, as opposed to 50 per cent in 1914. The number remaining to 18 with some kind of scholarship was, in 1914, about 10 per cent; today in the Council's maintained schools it is 15 per cent. The percentage of boys in England generally remaining after 16 years of age is 7, as compared with 15 in Scotland. The next table gives a comparison of fee-payers and free-placers passing the first examination in four of the Council's schools. It will be observed that 18 per cent of the former, as against 40 per cent of the latter, entered, and that 53 per cent and 67 per cent passed respectively. From the school life statistics of a secondary school in a poor part of London, where great trouble has been taken to keep pupils as long as possible, the following significant facts emerge:

1. That the average leaving age of free pupils has gone up steadily over the last ten years, and is higher than that of fee-payers.

2. That the number of fee-paying pupils who leave during the year after reaching 12 years has doubled in the case of girls, and almost trebled in that of boys.

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IN the previous chapter the scholarship system was reviewed, the requirements necessary, and the numbers awarded. The proportion won, in the first place, to the number of pupils in an age-group has also been estimated. It is now necessary to discover the occupation of their parents and their subsequent careers. It is obviously true, as may be seen from the table of scholarship winners

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THIS may be taken as a typical rural area for the south and midland parts of the country, but a survey of the working of the educational ladder must of necessity be preceded by a brief description of the county itself.

Oxfordshire is a poor county; its rateable value is lower than surrounding counties; its occupations are limited mainly to agriculture and domestic work, with only a few local industries surviving. Its agriculture is distinguished mainly by mixed farming and low wages, and there is a steady stream of emigration to the towns and outside the county. Between the ages of 15 and 20 the men begin to emigrate, and after 19 the number is abnormal. Between the ages 14 and 16 there are about 3,500 boys and 2,000 girls occupied, and over half this total is engaged in agriculture and domestic work. About one-third of the total population lives in Oxford and one-fifth in Banbury, Henley, Chipping Norton, Witney, Bicester, Thame, Headington, and Cowley. The remainder is scattered in villages mainly of less than 1,000 inhabitants. The railway system covers only a small portion of the county, though an infrequent motor-bus service radiates from Oxford to the main towns mentioned above. There are thus four governing facts which affect the educational system and its working:

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1. Large percentage engaged in agriculture.
2. Poverty of parents.
3. Scattered population.
4. Lack of communication.

The distribution of elementary schools is a problem common to every rural area. The paradoxical position may be seen from the fact that the borough of Banbury with 13,500 inhabitants has 25 elementary schools, and the Deddington district (just south, but within twelve miles) with 7,000 inhabitants has another 20 schools. With such a plethora of minute schools, it is only natural that certain ones stand out for their efficiency and scholarship, and, as will be shown later, proximity to a secondary school establishes a close scholarship connection. It is fair to say that only recently have the authorities begun to treat the problem of secondary education and its accessibility as a county question. There is no doubt that this must lead in turn to

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a redistribution of elementary schools; the distribution has not materially changed since 1877.

There are roughly 17,000 children on the school rolls and 724 teachers, a ratio of 23 pupils to 1 teacher, but classes are often smaller. There are more than three times as many women as men teachers, and less than 50 per cent of the total are certificated. Two-thirds of those who are certificated are head teachers.

Seventeen schools have 1 room, 112 have 2 rooms, 46 have 3 rooms, and 21 have 4 or more rooms. Therefore, as far as elementary education is concerned, there are three important considerations inextricably bound up with each other:

1. Small and scattered schools.
2. Inadequate accommodation.
3. Uncertificated staffing.

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The county scholarship scheme is as follows:

1. Junior county: age 10 to 12. Eighteen awards. Fourteen must have been in elementary schools. Tenable for two years and renewable. Fees, books, and stationery.

2. Intermediate: age 12 to 14. Six new ones awarded. Tenable for two years and renewable. Fees, books, and stationery.

3. Senior: age 14 to 16. Six new ones awarded. Tenable for two years and renewable. Fees, books, and stationery.

4. Allowances: based on Confidential Report (for holders of free-place, local scholarships, and county scholarships).

(a) General - whole or in part: expenses, meals, games, fees, etc.
(b) Boarding - not to exceed £40 per annum.
(c) Travelling - train, bus, cycle.

There are six secondary schools in the county, three maintained and three aided. Each has a history and tradition of its own, except a new school at Bicester, and, until this year, each has held a free-place examination on its own. The schools are situated according to the accidents of history, and in no way form part of a connected scheme, either within the county or in an inter-county scheme, still less (as has been shown above) do they bear any geographical relationship with the many elementary schools scattered over the county. Three of them have boarding accommodation: this enables fee-payers from outside areas to send their

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sons to these schools; it is not uncommon to find sons of foreign Civil Servants, small business men, and farmers among this group.

A brief description of each school is necessary, because each has its peculiar problems, after which a review of the whole field will suggest the common problems and tentative conclusions.

Burford is a small school, five miles from a railway station, and only reached by bus at long intervals during the day. The following table shows some relevant facts:

The constitution of the school is roughly:

One-third boarders - fee-payers.
One-third day-boys - fee-payers.
One-third exempt from fees.

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fathers' professions. There is another group of fee-payers who come for one or two years and use the school as a preparatory course, rather than attend the elementary school of their district.

In the earlier days of scholarships and free-places, from 1905 until 1914, about seventy-five were awarded, or an average of seven each year. Their average lengths of school life was three years. An analysis of parents' occupations shows that the majority were:

1. Small tradesmen.
2. Clerical workers and skilled workers.
3. Schoolmasters.
4. Farmers.
5. Innkeepers.

1. Clerks (of one kind or another).
2. Apprenticed to a trade.
3. Further education, mostly University College, Reading.
4. Teaching profession.
5. Farmer's sons who go back to the farmer.

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local school at Burford, 9 came from Shipton, about four miles away, 7 from Enstone, over ten miles away, while other schools, mainly in the Chipping Norton district, sent 1 or 2 scholars in the course of ten years. So much for the past.

An analysis of the last years since the war reveals a somewhat similar result. The number of free-places or scholarships awarded each year varied between five and ten. They were mainly sons of:

1. Small tradesmen.
2. Skilled workmen and clerical workers.
3. Postmen and constables.

In the free-place examination for 1924, held for the whole county, there were 38 applications for Burford, of whom 13 secured over half-marks, 15 over 25 per cent, 6, 25 per cent or under, and 4 practically nothing. Six of those with over half-marks were over 12 years of age. There were vacancies for 6 boys (and 4 girls when the girls' department is ready).

There was much evidence to show that there is little relationship between the work done in the elementary schools and that done in the secondary schools. Those who won the free-places were thoughtful, but very slow. It is noticeable that of 130 entrants to the school between 1919 and 1923, 42, or roughly one-third, were sons of farmers; of these 25 were boarders and 38 were fee-payers. This group and

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the other referred to above, who use the school as a preparatory course, bring down the average length of school life to 2 years 11 months. At present there are 4 boarders with grants from the Council. It would seem that only an extension of some form of maintenance, plus a special bus service, would enable boys from surrounding villages to take advantage of secondary education.

Witney is a mixed school with a much bigger population from which to draw; it will be noticed that a large number of girls is to be found at this school, 15 of whom come by special arrangement from Burford each day. Below are some relevant facts:

In the earlier days of scholarships, taking a sample of the years 1904-1908, out of 23 awards no less than 13 afterwards became teachers, and the remainder, as far as is known, were apprenticed to some trade. Over half were sons of labourers, male servants, blanket operatives, working masons, etc., and the rest small tradesmen or schoolmasters. The fee-payers, as at Burford, came largely from farmers or owners of small businesses. In a word, each year a few children from the working classes were able to climb into the ranks of the teaching profession, but the main body was untouched.

In more recent times the three years 1921-1923 reveal the following facts:

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Of the 45 free-places, 25 came from schools in Witney, and, with the exception of three employees in the blanket mills, the fathers' occupations were small tradesmen or clerical workers. Hailey and Ramsden, two neighbouring schools, each won 4 free-places, and the fathers' occupations were all of the less skilled and labouring kind. Five children had no father living. In each year the fee-payers were children of middle-class parents, farmers, tradesmen, licensed victuallers, and professional classes.

In the 1924 county examination for free-places there were 43 entrants for Witney, of whom 18 secured over half-marks, while three county scholarships were won. The two local schools do not appear among the first 10 in the free-place examination, a similar event happening at Henley this year. The standard, according to the headmaster, is a lower average than in industrial districts.

Banbury. This is one of three maintained schools in the county, and recruits largely from Banbury itself. It has accommodation for 200 pupils, is overfull, with rather more boys than girls. The average length of school life is four years, and 81 per cent of the pupils are drawn from elementary schools. The table below shows the number entering for free-places over a long course of years, the number of

[page 126]

awards made, and the large number recruited from one particular local school:

In the last year of the above table, 1923, the examiners said that 25 per cent of those entering were capable of profiting by secondary education. This would mean awarding exactly twice the number actually given. It will be observed that the number of entrants has steadily increased, but that the awards have not kept pace. The average age of entry has also steadily lowered. Until 1918 the examination was confined to the borough of Banbury, and, as was seen above, in 1924 a county free-place examination was held. Over the course of years the number awarded was usually about the same as those who gained over half-marks in the examination. In practice, of course, the school gave the usual 25 per cent. This has been raised under the new order from the Board of Education to 40 per cent in the

[page 127]

year 1924. Dashwood Road, a neighbouring school, undoubtedly has a special tradition, and prepares definitely for the annual examination.

From an analysis of free-placers for seven years, the following table illustrates the parents' occupations and pupils' after-occupations:

If the parents' occupations for fee-payers are taken for a smaller period, it is found that two-thirds are farmers, merchants, or proprietors, or drawn from clerical ranks, and one-third are from G.W.R. [Great Western Railway], gardeners, chauffeurs, and other workers. On the whole, the parents' occupations and children's after-careers, so far as statistics tell, do not differ materially in the case of free-placers and fee-payers. Inside the school the free-placers do better, partly because of the stimulus from the homes, and in some cases because of the parents' struggle. It was felt that from the financial point of view many free-placers could afford fees, and the question of an income limit was raised. The school has produced one or two University scholars: one a sizar at Trinity College, Cambridge; the other, who was the son of

[page 128]

a journeyman earning thirty-five shillings a week, won a Brackenbury scholarship at Balliol, and eventually went into the Indian Civil Service. A large percentage of the Council scholarships come from the Banbury district, and by far the largest number of entrants for free-places. It is another example of the higher intelligence found where the community is larger and competition keener. Out of a total of 203 attending the school this year, 117 are exempt from fees and 86 are fee-payers. Out of the 117, 68 are free-placers, but most of the remainder are county scholars, and 17 of the free-placers also hold county scholarships. It is clear, therefore, that in the one maintained county school there is a much greater proportion of scholars than in any other part of the county. The fee-payers, who are in a minority at the school, tend to come at a later age and to stay two or three years.

Thame resembles Burford in certain aspects, and Henley in others. It is another illustration of the mixed school, boarders and day-boys, and has an enrolment of about 135. The average length of school life is long - four years and six months - but only 55 per cent are ex-elementary school children. As usual there is a strong tradition of scholarship winning from a particular school, and as usual that is a local school. In this case it is the John Hampden School, Thame, which each year had won between 25 and 50 per cent of the free-places. The other elementary school in Thame has the next largest quota; the other schools have won four during the last five years, and six others less than four. Inasmuch as Henley Grammar School has an even smaller number of ex-elementary school pupils, and those largely from Henley

[page 129]

itself, it is evident that from many schools in the district covered by Thame, Watlington, Henley, and Goring, (1) where there are 57 schools and a population of 35,000, no free-place or scholarship is ever won. Of the 57 schools, 11 are Council and 46 church or proprietary.

Most of the fee-payers came from private schools, and were sons of substantial middle-class parents. The free-placers varied. In each year there were one or two sons of labourers side by side with those of local tradesmen, artisans, and small owners. Actually, over five years, there is only one farm labourer's son. Evidence again goes to prove that free-places were won by sons of parents who could well afford to pay fees: the headmaster had nothing but praise for the progress made by poorer pupils admitted under the free-place system.

Henley Grammar School is another old foundation, and the school buildings are also reminiscent of coaching days. It has accommodation for about 130 boys, and only 50 per cent are ex-elementary school children. The average length of school life is four years. Twenty-one years ago it had only sixteen pupils, and used to be one of the fifty schools not inspected, but in 1918 it came under the Board of Education regulations as a grant-earning school. The numbers this year (1924) are only 109, and this is attributable to the high fees, which are twelve guineas a year. There are six boarders who live with a master, otherwise it is a day school. There is no preparatory department, though about eighteen are under 12 years of age.

An analysis of the occupations of the parents of fee-payers

(1) There is some overlapping in Berkshire schools here.

[page 130]

and free-placers is shown in the table below. The period taken is 1918 to 1923, since the school came under the Board of Education:

As usual the small tradesmen and farmers and clerical workers are the biggest groups. Gardeners and chauffeurs are a local growth, and so are represented among the fee-payers and free-placers. No less than eight publicans are represented in the fee-payers' list. The after-occupations are not sufficiently tabulated, though where pupils left at an early age the reason given is almost always parents' circumstances.

A majority of the boys came from Henley itself, either from a private school or one of the four elementary schools. Out of seventy-two free-placers thirty-five were won by the four local schools. The other schools represented are as follows:

There is a lack of connection between elementary schools, especially those in Henley itself, and the secondary school. Free-placers tend to be discouraged; bright pupils are kept

[page 131]

back for the sake of the individual school. It is noticeable this year (1924) when a county free-place examination was held only thirteen candidates entered from Henley, and in 1923 out of thirty-eight candidates entering, of whom twenty-five came from Henley, not one of the latter was in the first ten - i.e., secured a free-place. The school is divided into three houses, one of which is reserved for free-placers and scholars. In every department of school life this particular house leads; the senior class has a majority of free-placers, and in the Cambridge local examination they have formed the majority of successful candidates.

After this survey of elementary schools, the scholarship and free-place system, and the secondary schools, it remains to estimate the main facts for the county as a whole. The time is obviously one of transition and progress, so that the truth today may not be the truth in a week or a month's time. For example, a new school at Bicester is already working; Chipping Norton must have one in the near future, while a girls' department at Burford is under way. Again, it is likely that certain elementary schools will be closed and some amalgamated. The promise of central or continuation schools has been allowed to die away. The percentage of 25 with regard to free-placers has been raised to 40 this year in the two schools. In spite of these changing circumstances the broad facts hold good, and the only changes at present are for the extension of facilities, in one way or another, looking towards a co-ordinated system of

[page 132]

education up to the age of 16 years. That co-ordination, to be effective, must stretch across the borders of counties as they are today. It is obviously serious when a differential fee of five guineas is charged for pupils whose nearest secondary school happens to be across the border in Berkshire or Northamptonshire.

The following table illustrates for 1924, the best year, the number of awards made under the free-place and scholarship system. This is the first year of a free-place examination for the whole county.

Out of a total of 212 schools forty appear in either the free-place or scholarship list. Apart from Banbury, which has a large percentage, the towns do not play a conspicuous part this year, as in other years, and this may be due to the holding of a free-place examination for the whole county and the greater publicity given to the scholarship scheme. The largest number of pupils comes from the Banbury district.

(1) Three pupils entered for both examinations.

(2) Eighty-one pupils over 50 per cent marks.

[page 133]

The following details are about the fifty-nine free-placers:

[page 134]

The following are details of the junior county scholars:

Among the list of parents' occupations, in each case, small tradesmen head the list; there is an absence of farmers, about eight farm labourers, and the remainder is a miscellaneous group of postmen, policemen, mechanics and skilled workers, and a small number of widows. There are in the county about 11,000, or over a third of the occupied male population, employed in agriculture, who are over 25 years of age, the next largest group being building, with nearly 4,000. It must be plain that, as far as a half of the possible parents are concerned, a very small number win free-places or scholarships. It may be assumed that the total entrance to secondary schools is under 250 annually. In 1919 it

[page 135]

was 211, and in 1920, 222. Of these, according to the Oxford Education Committee, about 67 per cent are ex-elementary school children, the remaining 33 per cent come from some kind of private school. We are now in position to make a further table as follows:

These figures represent the latest improvements made both with regard to additional secondary school accommodation and increased number of free-places. In former years the number of free-places and scholarships, as well as the total entrance, would be smaller. In this last year, however, less than 5 per cent are assisted, while the total entrants are about 12 per cent, two-thirds of whom have been in elementary schools. The position may be made clear by stating that only 7 per cent of the children of the county, between the ages 14 to 18, come under educational influence; the remaining 93 per cent are employed or at home; the majority in agriculture, domestic service, carriage and conveyance.

The distribution in secondary schools is as follows for 1921:

[page 136]

The following table illustrates certain facts in comparison with other counties:

From the above table three further facts stand in relief:

1. The small number (relatively) receiving secondary education.
2. The shortness of school life.
3. The early age of leaving.

1. Overcrowding at home and bad nourishment.
2. Children wanted as bread-winners.
3. The teachers' struggle against these conditions (i.e., outlook and conditions of home).
4. The tendency of teachers to keep promising pupils back.
5. Lack of knowledge and publicity about free-places and secondary education, though this is less than formerly.
6. Lack of co-ordination (e.g., curriculum) between elementary and secondary schools.
7. High fees of certain schools and inadequate maintenance allowance, though each case is considered purely on its merits.

[page 137]

unable, and, in addition, many of the fee-payers from elementary schools leave early on the grounds of home circumstances. The difficulties of fixing an income limit are many, owing to fluctuating work and wages, and for the most part the smallness of incomes. It is becoming increasingly difficult to award maintenances and allowances on a regular system, each case being considered on its own merits. Indeed, in many cases small owners find it difficult to estimate what is their income, while labourers with tied cottages would need to juggle with vulgar fractions to come to a reasonable estimate.

In Oxfordshire a penny rate for higher education produces £2,754. The rates are at present divided in the following proportion:

The proportionate amount spent on higher education is about the same as in 1913 - namely, 4 per cent of the total county expenditure.

It is obvious that progress has been made since 1914, but the working out of the Fisher Act has hardly begun. The old idea of the educational ladder which belongs to a machine conception of society must be replaced by a more democratic metaphor. At the present the ladder succeeds in picking out less than 5 per cent from the elementary schools as capable of profiting by secondary education. One headmaster, with twenty years' experience, has said that double the number selected from his district might well have con-

[page 138]

tinued at a secondary school. But in the face of the glaring facts here presented, it must be clear that the great need is for a many-forked road leading out the children from about the age of 11 to the age of 15 or 16 in some educational venture or other. At present it is a constant struggle for most parents to keep their children at a secondary school, while all the evidence points to the progress of those who win the small number of scholarships and free-places which are awarded. So long as four-fifths of the elementary schools are untouched in a single year by the educational ladder, and 93 per cent of the children in a county are under no educational influence between the ages 14 to 18, the county is paying too dearly for an examination list and an experimental selective process. It is economising in opportunity and denying the possibilities of growth for the coming generation.

It may be said that Oxfordshire is not a typical county, and that is to a certain extent true, for the figures relative to school life and school leaving are behind the general average for English counties. It is noticeable in this connection that while the number of secondary school pupils per 1,000 of population is only two points higher in Wales than in England, the percentage from elementary schools is nearly double. Again, in Wales, over 50 per cent of the total are free pupils, while in English counties the relevant figure is 34 per cent. Only a very small number of the sons of agricultural labourers win free-places and scholarships, and it is unlikely that more than a handful can afford to go as fee-payers. Out of the 250 odd entrants to Oxfordshire schools not more than ten can be put in this category.

[page 139]

Inasmuch as over one-third of the occupied male population is engaged in agriculture, 11,000 in all, 4 per cent is not a large proportion of the total secondary school entrants.

During the last four years, starting in 1921, the Ministry of Agriculture have initiated a scheme of scholarship for the sons and daughters of agricultural workers. The scholarships are divided into three classes: the first enable ten students each year to attend graduate courses in Universities, the second enable ten students each year to pursue a two years' course in some branch of agriculture at an appropriate college, while the third class makes provision for 150 students a year to attend a course for two or three terms at a farm institute. It is noteworthy that none of these courses is open to children under 16 years of age. The scholarships are open to sons and daughters of any persons engaged in rural occupations. The following table will show how extensive the field is from which such children might come:

[page 140]

From this list only 667 bona-fide applicants emerged during three years. The occupations of the parents for the years 1922-1924 were as follows:

The Class I students had all been to secondary and grammar schools; the Class II students had either been to secondary, higher grade, or in some cases only an elementary school. Forty-one per cent returned to work on the farms as wage-earners, 6 per cent to parents' small holdings, 14 per cent to dairy work, 8 per cent to horticulture, 20 per cent are continuing studies with further help, while 2 per cent emigrated and 1 per cent left rural occupations. It is of note that fifteen Class III students were successful in obtaining Class II scholarships. The average age of Class III scholars is about 19.

The applications and awards vary with counties, and seem to depend on a variety of factors. Wales has supplied 19 per cent of the candidates, particularly Class I and Class II, and this may be attributed to the number of small holders and poorer children who reach the intermediate schools. Cornwall is another county of small holders, and does well. Westmoreland, which consists mainly of holdings above fifty acres, had only one applicant. Again, progressive

[page 141]

farming districts show a fair proportion, while counties with competing industries, like Nottinghamshire and Derby, or counties near London, like Hertfordshire and Surrey, have smaller numbers. Arable counties, where the numbers are smaller and more scattered, or areas where "living in" is still in vogue, compare unfavourably. There is the additional factor of the unequally provided secondary school accommodation and free-place provision. The authorities in summarising the position have noted the following points:

1. Higher education is regarded as a means to enter professions other than agriculture.

2. The future of the degree student being uncertain, pupils are discouraged.

3. Boys and girls working on the land need a fresh incentive to take up further education (there are 100,000 boys and girls so working).

4. The large number of children of small holders.

5. The influence of -

(a) Type of farming.
(b) Competing industries.
(c) Proximity to towns.
(d) "Living in".
(e) Facilities for general education.

The types of education provided by the college and the institute are distinct and based on a difference of function. ... They are not meant to be successive steps preparatory the one for the other. ... The colleges should be entered from the secondary school, and properly demand a sound

[page 142]

preliminary general and scientific education; the institute presumes a lower basis of general education.

It may be thought that the provision of an educational ladder is unduly neglected, and that the local classes should lead to the institute, and the institute to the college. This view ignores two considerations, educational and economic. On the one hand, there is little to be gained by training a boy without access to capital for large-scale farming; there are too few openings for a clever boy without money to get a footing in the business by beginning in a lowly paid post and developing by his ability into a manager. As far as farming is concerned, the educational ladder is apt to end in mid-air. Then from the educational side the better preparation for a higher technical course is not a preliminary technical course, but a sound education of a scientific type. The true educational ladder for the county boy of ability is from the primary school by scholarship to the secondary school, and there to the agricultural college.

[page 143]

ranks of farmers are constantly irrigated by a fresh stream of talent rising from the great body of workers. Mr. Joseph Duncan, in his book Agriculture and the Community, writes as follows: "The agricultural ladder does not offer an effective escape for the farm-worker; he cannot earn or save enough capital. The future I see is quite different from that of the advocates of 'the agricultural ladder', who want to create small holders who may climb to be small farmers and perhaps even large farmers. That is merely to provide a few outlets here and there by which a few of the workers can escape, leaving the mass where they are, working in a small-scale precarious industry, where the net productivity will never admit of more than a bare subsistence."

This is not the place to suggest alternative organisation of a difficult industry, except to point out the relationship of continued education to general economic life, a matter more closely examined in a later chapter. The interest of the two quotations, one from official quarters, the other from an official of the rural workers, is that they both condemn the "agricultural ladder", though from different angles and for different reasons. More important are the emerging conclusions:

That agriculture does not offer opportunities, develop abilities, or stimulate ambitions of those engaged in it; this as a testimony from the workers' official; secondly, that degree and diploma courses are no guarantee of paid occupation, except for a very small number; this as witnessed by the officials of the Ministry. If, then, we accept these two conclusions there is no argument or objection to a steady increase of the number of scholarships and free-places, nor

[page 144]

to the regular pursuit of post-primary education in whatsoever type of school from 11 plus to the age of 15 and 16. Perhaps the increased intelligence and interest aroused by such community life during the years of adolescence will of itself contribute new remedies for the agricultural problem.

IT is suitable and proper to consider Bradford, because in the availability of secondary education it has been a pioneer, and today has a leading position. If all other towns and authorities were brought up to the Bradford level, we should be approaching something like equality of opportunity for the growing generation. So far as environment is concerned, Bradford is distinguished for a local industry, the woollen trade, and the schools very largely send children into the manual, technical, or clerical branches of that industry.

The great contribution to educational progress made by Bradford is in the method of transference of pupils from elementary to secondary schools. In the following pages, therefore, it is proposed to elaborate in some detail the steps that have been taken. The following table illustrates the total population and the elementary school population:

It will be noticed that there are more Council than voluntary schools; there are about 2,500 children between the ages of 3 and 5, and about 750 over 15 years, on the register. Out of 960 classes about 100 contain over fifty

[page 146]

pupils; this is a considerably lower figure relatively than either Leeds or Sheffield.

Every year an examination is held for all children in public elementary schools between the ages of 10 and 12, working in Standard IV or above. Candidates between 12 and 12½ may sit, if they have not previously sat twice, and children up to 13½ may be admitted for the pre-apprentice class for boys, and the handicraft class for girls, at the school of arts and crafts.

The examination aims to select pupils for the nine free secondary schools, four central schools, the school of arts and crafts, and for free-places at two Roman Catholic secondary schools and the Bradford Grammar Schools, boys and girls. It should be stated that the examination is compulsory, but that preference for one kind of school or another is given allowance. The standard of admission to secondary schools is a qualifying one, but to the grammar school competitive. Although a number refuse, the free-place at the boys' grammar school has come to be looked on as a prize.

When the results are at hand a communication is sent to the parents of all successful pupils. The parents of the first 100 on the list, boys and girls, receive a special notice urging them to let their children take advantage of the facilities offered. The next step is the filling in of the form requiring a minimum of four years' (1) attendance at a secondary school, and three years at a central school. Three preferences are allowed for choice of schools. The grammar school usually interviews a larger number than there are vacancies, and makes its choice.

(1) Until the end of the term containing the sixteenth birthday.

[page 147]

This is a mere skeleton of the actual process, and numerous questions arise immediately, such as the age of examination, the nature and marking of the papers, the schools and districts from which the winners come, the place of the interview, the intelligence test, the school record, the relation of elementary to secondary schools; but before commenting on these it will be convenient to take the actual figures for various years, and let them illustrate some of the points mentioned above.

The examination was first held in 1919, and Table LII indicates the results in that and following years:

It would be confusing to talk of an age-group, because of the first conditions, already referred to, regarding who may sit. But if we take the last year, 1923, and further analyse pupils by ages and standards, the result is Table LIII:

[page 148]

As far as Standards IV and V are concerned, about 84 per cent of those eligible on the roll were examined. Even after unusual care and thought, it will be observed that 15 per cent of those eligible have escaped the examination, some no doubt through sickness or absence. There has been much discussion on the age and standard of entry; each side quotes its own psychologists, and each side is competing for the child in its own kind of school. Elementary school teachers point to those left behind, to the grouping of standards into one class, and assert that the majority is penalised to satisfy the free-place winners. They also point to the advanced work now being done in their schools. The secondary schools reply that they like their entrants young and adaptable, and, moreover, that they are quite capable of profiting, that Form I is better staffed and equipped than Standard V, and that Form I is part of an integral five years' course leading up to the school-leaving certificate.

It may be noted that the Departmental Committee unanimously agreed on 11, and, at the same time, admitted the unwisdom of penalising exceptionally able children under 11 or some retarded children over 12. The following table shows the age-groups for 1919-1920:

[page 149]

In connection with the age of entry, it is interesting to note that about 3,500 new candidates take the examination each year, and if the age-group is 4,250, about 84 per cent take the examination as soon as they are eligible. Below is an analysis of the 3,550.

Of the 2,750 who stay in the public elementary schools, 1,500 take the examination a second time. Thus 1,250 drop out, most of whom were over 11 years at the first attempt. Approximately 1,300 annually do this. The next table is an analysis of the 1,500 who take the examination a second time:

[page 150]

It is now possible to state in round figures the process of transference from elementary to further full-time education. Each year about 5,000 children are examined, 3,000 qualify on a percentage basis as above normal intelligence, and about 1,100 accept free-places, of whom 800 are making a first attempt and 300 a second attempt. Thus something over 1 in 5 go forward, and about 4,000 remain behind. The average age of entry to secondary schools is 11 years 3 months. The obvious question is, Why do so many decline?

There is no income limit, but the qualifying standard in operation and the secondary school accommodation appear to be a sort of natural evolution - i.e., not the result of special policy. It is possible to predict the number of acceptances to the number of offers with some accuracy. The examiners report that the alteration of marking by 1 per cent will bring in or cut out about 2½ per cent of the candidates, or 125, of which about 40 will accept offers. The standard is approximately constant, being just below the level of the absolutely normal child. At a strictly average level 50 per cent qualify; in actual practice about 55 per cent qualify. Roughly, one-half of those making a first attempt qualify, and three-quarters of those entering a second time. It is of interest that of the 200 boys and girls heading the list, and to whose parents special letters were sent, no less than 47 boys and 63 girls refused the offers.

The inspectors, after careful scrutiny, are satisfied that there is no measurable indication of inability to profit from pupils in the secondary schools; they also state that there is not sufficient evidence and experience of intelligence tests to make any scientific conclusion. One attempt to relate

[page 151]

environment and performance in the tests was made by dividing up the city social conditions into four grades, Grade 4 being the best. The marks work out as below:

The table below indicates another attempt to classify kinds of elementary school with examination results:

[page 152]

Of the candidates 74 per cent were in Standard IV and 27 per cent in Standard V or above. There are wide differences between the percentages of those accepting of the number who qualified. (1) Social environment and proximity to a secondary school as usual play an important part. How much weight should be given to sheer economic necessity in the whole question of refusals is difficult to determine with any accuracy. It must be mentioned that in Bradford the mills absorb nearly 90 per cent of elementary school leavers, and that the starting wage averaged over £1 a week, so that for many a family this is a heavy inducement to go straight to work. There are few cases of private schools competing for the free-place examination, though arrangements for them are made, and as only about 160 annually go to the central schools or school of arts and crafts, and no question of fees arises, it may be said that the elementary school and the secondary school are parts of an independent system. The chief recommendation of Bradford is that the base or area of choice is broader, and the relative number pursuing a full course of secondary education is greater than anywhere else in the country.

Having left the first stage, we must now follow up, as far as it is possible, the successful ones who attend the nine municipal schools and four aided schools. In the first category there are 4,222 pupils, and in the latter 1,698,

(1) The number of refusals is very large. Bradford authorities have at any rate estimated the dimensions of the problem, and a most thorough and intimate enquiry is about to be launched to discover the reasons for refusals.

[page 153]

a total of 5,920. The table below illustrates the salient facts:

The next table is of importance, because it gives more life to Table LX, and because in so many cases the secondary schools are open to the accusation that they prepare for very little besides clerical occupations. The year taken is 1922-23, and covers all Bradford schools, municipal and aided:

(1) The five fee-payers come from the West Riding.

(2) Four hundred and seventy-one attend Bradford Grammar School. These figures, particularly column (3), illustrate the importance of Bradford's experiment. Although Wallasey, largely a suburban and residential neighbourhood, has a percentage for column (4), 0.6 higher than Bradford, no authority has yet arrived within distance of supporting 17.6 free-places per 1,000 population, The next table illustrates the forms reached at the time of leaving secondary school by those not proceeding to places of higher education.

[page 154]

Column (4) is the one to which most importance attaches. Column (1) is no doubt affected by local conditions: the average length of school life is higher than Wallasey or the country generally. Bradford Grammar School stands by itself, as the figures on p. 155 show, which are taken of school leavers between April, 1921, and December, 1922.

Apart from the free-placers at Bradford Grammar School, who provide a large number, indeed a majority, of the University scholarships, there are fee-payers who, if between 10 and 12 years, pay £19, and if over 12 years pay £26 a year, besides other subsidiary expenses for books, dinners, and

(1) 206 girls.

[page 155]

sports. Besides the big number who enter Universities, the majority of the remainder pursue a professional training or enter trade. But that is very much the old system by which a small number of artisan and workers' children are drafted into Universities, or possibly to a higher position in the training or technical world. The part which the nine free secondary schools play is less in this respect, because of the constant temptation to leave and the inability to afford premiums for the articled professions. Between May, 1914, and June, 1924, there were 2,202 applications made for the withdrawal of children before completing their course, 1,478 applications were granted, and in 325 cases payment was made in acknowledgment. The reasons given are monotonously the same, whether it be assistance required at home, transfer to a commercial school, the offering of a job, or sheer stress of circumstances.

Table LXI, column (4), has already been noted as perhaps the most striking statistic in regard to Bradford, refuting as

[page 156]

it does the common charge that increased secondary education only caters for the clerical and commercial pursuits. Bradford's figure for industrial and manual occupations is double the average figure for the country, but that is only one-half of the picture. The other side is contained in Table LXIII, which relates to one year admittedly, but the results, if not typical, lean towards the Conservative side for two reasons. Firstly, poorer parents are naturally suffering most from the slump, while wealthier ones are also likely to send more children to local schools than to boarding schools. Some of the more significant figures are underlined, and the difference between the grammar schools and other schools is brought into sharp relief. If the underlined figures are extracted their importance is obvious:

If the last five classifications (xi to xv) in Table LXIII are taken as one group, we may say that 46 per cent of the parents of one class provide only 21 per cent of children entering the same class. Here is definite evidence of vertical mobility. Bradford Grammar Schools, on the other hand, draw to the extent of over 90 per cent from a professional or proprietary merchant class, and send back in an even greater proportion to the same type of occupation.

[page 157]

WARRINGTON is reported to have a greater diversity of trades and industries in proportion to its size than any other town in England: this is partly due to its nearness to Liverpool and Manchester. The largest single group is the metal workers, of whom there are about 9,000. There are some 2,000 textile workers, mostly female, and about 2,500 engaged in transport, clerical, and personal service respectively. In addition to these larger groups there are between 500 and 1,000 employed in chemical processes, leather, printing and book-binding, building, public administration, professions, and shopkeepers. Bedsteads, tubes, boilers, engines, gas-stoves, soap, cotton goods, beer, boxes, glass, rubber, flour, white lead, timber, and other smaller articles figure in the network of local industries. Unskilled labour claims between 3,000 and 4,000 persons.

Warrington has its fair share of slums and back-to-back houses, but the salient fact about housing is the large number of a predominant type; over 50 per cent are four-roomed houses. In pre-war days the exemption clauses from compulsory education were distinctly liberal, and this fact accounted for the large percentage of boy and girl labour. There were actually 300 girls under 14 years of age at work, and 75 per cent of those over 14 were at work.

[page 163]

The town is divided into nine wards as follows:

Wages then, and even more today, varied in the different trades. Minimum standards have increased the wages of the worst paid, but machinery has replaced much of the hand-work and thereby increased the number of unskilled labourers. Before the war over one-third of the families received less than thirty shillings a week, and only 15 per cent over £3 a week. The average wage was between thirty and thirty-five shillings. In about 50 per cent of the families the father was the sole wage-earner, and out of 11 per cent living below the poverty line 1 in 6 came from this category.

[page 164]

Where, for example, the man plus three children were wage-earners, 1 in 27 families was below the poverty line. Again, in 10 per cent of the families below the poverty line the husband was dead or unable to work. The importance of the child's wage is therefore obvious. One further fact regarding this group of families must be recorded. The occupations in no less than two-thirds of the cases was that of a labourer, while a further 10 per cent were carters. It was estimated that as regards three-fifths of the poverty low wages was the cause, while as regards one-fourth the size of the family was the cause. Doubtless these two factors are interwoven.

Table LXVI illustrates the correspondence between congestion and poverty, and also the large number of unprovided schools. Ten are Church of England, eight Council, and five Roman Catholic. Arpley Street was always a better school, and used to charge higher fees in the proprietary days; the tradition clung to it, and children from all over the town came to it in preference. This, of course, no longer prevails. Oakwood Avenue is a new school with modern buildings. Wycliffe School, an old British school, has been condemned for some years, and Silver Street Council is so overcrowded that a new infants' department is to be built as soon as possession can be obtained of some houses on the site. Many of the others are old buildings dating back thirty and fifty years. Summarising our information so far, Warrington is largely artisan, with a strong metal-workers' group, living in small houses, often subletting one or two rooms; its children attend the twenty-three elementary schools, of which the majority are non-provided, from the age of 5 to 14 years.

[page 165]

Warrington has one municipal secondary school with 314 pupils. The fees are £1 17s. 6d. per annum, and the constitution of the school as below:

The transference from the elementary schools is as follows:

From the above table it appears that just over 5 per cent of an age-group go on to secondary education, and less than 2 per cent go on to free education. Between 14 and 18 years of age there are about 5,000 young people employed; of late years a varying number up to 400 have been unemployed, of whom about 150 are between 14 and 16.

The employment of those between 14 and 18 years of age is as follows:

[page 166]

To cater for the above young persons an elaborate system of evening classes has been arranged, at which over 1,000 attend. The majority take the general course, which includes English, commercial and domestic subjects, and then proceed to the commercial or technical institute or to the school of art. The cost is three shillings a term, but admission is free to all who have reached the two higher standards at the elementary school. Those in the highest standards proceed straight to the second-year course. Some of the big firms also pay fees for evening work, and require compulsory attendance; about 200 pupils attend on these conditions.

[page 167]

Money prizes and bonuses reward those whose attendance is regular. It is not a rare thing for evening students to complete the full five years' course, though the majority stay for about two years.

We are now in a position to study in closer detail the system of transference from elementary education to secondary education or industrial life. Warrington does, at any rate, preserve the original intention of the free-place by basing all scholarships fundamentally on necessity. This does not mean that necessity alone will enable a child to have free education. Admission to the secondary school is on an examination basis for all, but out of the number chosen a certain number will have filled in forms for free-places. These are given where the Committee is satisfied about the parents' income. The average income per head of family is the rough method used to determine the claims. Free books, equivalent to thirty shillings for the first year, are given where the need is less urgent. At the age of 13 junior scholarships are awarded equal to £5 and free fees and books. These can be renewed for a second year. At the age of 16 senior scholarships equal to £15 plus fees and books are awarded. The qualifying examination is the school certificate. This is increased to £20 in the second year. The amount and conditions for a bursary are the same as for the senior scholarships.

There are two methods of proceeding to University education:

(a) Two scholarships (£70), matriculation standard, for Warrington boys and girls.
(b) A number of scholarships (£70), matriculation standard, for Warrington secondary school.

[page 168]

This is the outline or skeleton of the system. By analysing the entrants for a single year, we may breathe some life into the dry bones.

In 1924 there were sixty-one entries, and thirty free-places were given. In four cases free books were awarded, six were refused, though in two cases the refused came as fee-payers. Below is the history of the six cases:

The following table gives details of the families from which free-placers came:

[page 169]

[page 170]

It is obvious that the last column is the determining one when awarding the free-place. The families vary from the labourer with six children, earning £2 a week, and with an average per head of 6s. 1d., to the skilled wire-drawer with three children, earning £4 a week, and with an average per head of sixteen shillings. It must be assumed that the remaining thirty children who were fee-payers in this particular year did not fill up the income paper because they suspected they were above the limit. Four times the number who went as fee-payers or free-placers applied for admission, and of the total 50 per cent were deemed capable of profiting by secondary education. To this number must be added an unknown number who did not apply at all for various reasons. The schools from which the free-placers came, as seen above, are:

The record of the Council schools is above the non-provided schools in 1924. In order to illustrate the working of the system, samples of three years before the war and after the war have been analysed:

[page 171]

Arpley Street Council stands out, and the Council schools have a better record. The free-placers stayed longer, and their school record is higher. Among the clerks are a number of second-class Civil Servants, while others, whose occupation is unknown, passed the senior Oxford examination. A large number of girls stayed only two or three years, and afterwards helped in the home. Poor circumstances account for the early leaving age of so many fee-payers.

[page 172]

Arpley Street again has a preponderating number of entrants; the same facts apply with regard to length of school life as in the previous year. The four teachers from the fee-payers received bursaries to enable them to stay on at school. The number of children from the skilled workers, mostly quite small incomes, is again well over one-third.

Unfortunately the records for this year are incomplete. A greater number of schools contribute to the entrants.

[page 173]

The skilled workers, most of whom are in the engineering or building trades, provide a substantial portion. It is noticeable that two University students anticipate following the medical profession. They are both girls and from the better schools, Arpley and Beamont. In one case the father was a pawnbroker, and the other an assistant manager.

If we take a sample of three years since the war certain changes are noticeable:

During the three years 1920-1922, 250 out of a total age-group of over 4,000 children, or just over 6 per cent, went on to secondary education, of whom 111, or 44 per cent, went as free-placers. Over 50 per cent came from the eight Council schools, and with one exception each school made at least one contribution. But out of the twenty-one elementary schools over 50 per cent make an average contribution of one or two pupils. By far the biggest group come from the homes of skilled workers, and of these, metal workers constitute at least one-half. The other are building trades, tanning, railway and post-office. The next group, under the head clerical, includes insurance agents, foremen, superintendents, small shopkeepers, and each year a few teachers. Of the last group six were deceased and two unemployed.

[page 174]

Compared with the three pre-war years, the most noticeable point is the increase of skilled workers' children and the absence of shopkeeping and professional classes. A greater number of schools contribute. Arpley Street sends a smaller number, though it still leads. The municipal school, established now for twenty years, obviously recruits from an artisan class and entirely from elementary schools. The capacity of the pupil bears no relation to the depths of the father's pocket. According to many authorities as many again could profit by secondary education, and there was no guarantee that the best children came. Undoubtedly some headmasters kept back pupils. Others were frightened by incidental expenses; others were indifferent or ignorant of the real meaning of secondary education. It was now possible to judge the effect of the school on the locality, because it had recruited from elementary schools entirely, and had selected many for responsible posts in the locality. In the banks, municipal offices, skilled trades, and teaching profession there were many old pupils. But in the professions where premiums were required - such as accountancy, architecture, law, medicine - the cost was prohibitive, except in rare cases. Nearly all the children came from homes where the average wage was about £3 a week. The school had a science bias, but the present sixth form, all of whom have passed matriculation or the higher schools' examination, are on the arts side. One boy, the first so far, is about to enter for an open scholarship in history at Oxford. He has passed all his examinations over a year below the normal age; his father was at Wycliffe School, and an iron-worker all his life, until recently, when he became a trade union

[page 175]

official and a much respected local councillor. In a word, there is definite vertical mobility resulting from this even imperfect system of transference between the elementary and secondary schools. Two schools will serve to show the inequality of opportunity, even in a small town with a democratic secondary school. Wycliffe Council School, to which reference has already been made, has between 400 and 500 pupils, with an average class of forty-eight, and in condemned buildings. Three classes were being conducted in one room, and the girls' playground was about 30 yards square. The children came from overcrowded homes with insufficient nourishment, and only about 1 per cent went to a secondary school. The influences of environment and retardation had started before the child left the infant school. In spite of heroic attempts by devoted teachers to brighten the class-rooms, they cannot overcome the bad light and lack of sun. The after-occupations are mainly blind alley or repetition factory jobs. The latter are most popular because of the larger money, and in all cases the child at 14 is regarded as an immediate wage-earner. The families tend to be bigger in the poorer parts. It was assured on all sides that the main trouble was economic and not mental. At least 15 per cent could profit by further education, were economic conditions favourable. Instances of bright boys were quoted who, after two years in ex-Standard VII, were forced out to work as van boys or in factories.

The same conditions may be seen in Silver Street, a Council school. One instance will explain many others. A boy was thought to be retarded, and yet was quick and able in certain

[page 176]

other aspects. It was discovered that he slept in one room with his mother and a man, a daughter of 20, another of 19 and another of 11, and two sons aged 13 and 9. This family had actually let a second room. Many families had an average per head of five shillings. Another family with nine children was supported on forty-five shillings a week. The children had had nothing but toast and tea for the last two weeks. Even when the one in a hundred did go to a secondary school, homework was an impossibility. Yet even from this school had come two ministers in an Australian Government, two City and Guilds gold medallists, and two University degrees via the teaching profession. How much hidden talent there was can only be conjectured, but the same figure (15 per cent) was quoted as a minimum for further education. I interviewed boys of the top standard, and the headmaster said he would put some of them against a public school boy and confidently await results.

Both of the above schools represent the poorer neighbourhoods, but in the most modern and best equipped school at Oakwood Avenue, I was assured that at least as many again could profit by secondary education were there opportunity and accommodation. Indeed, at this school there were children whose parents were most anxious for them to continue at the secondary school, but the competition was too severe.

There is evidence thus from the headmasters of elementary schools, both those in poor and those in better neighbourhoods, from the secondary school itself and also from the public or consumers, that there is abundant room for more secondary school accommodation. To meet this demand

[page 177]

the local authority proposed two things. First, to hold a preliminary examination for all children who have reached Standard IV, the papers being set by the head teachers, 25 per cent of the marks being on school record. Secondly, the building of an intermediate school with a course from 11 to 15 years of age. Also the education authority is taking over the juvenile employment section, and appointing a full-time official. So far the Juvenile Employment Exchange has been merely a payer-out of small pence, and no regular Committee has been meeting. These three steps are obviously in the right direction, though the problem of maintenance is bound to occur directly, and still more indirectly, when an intermediate school is set up.

So far no mention has been made of the local grammar school for boys, which is aided and receives a small number of free-places each year. The fees have been raised to £15 per annum, and thus it precludes the wage-earning population. There are about 220 pupils, and an analysis of the fathers' occupations, length of school life, and occupations afterwards pursued shows the strong contrast to the municipal secondary school.

In the three years before the war 1910-1912 eighty-eight new pupils were enrolled, of whom nineteen were free pupils, with aid either from the school governors or from the local authority. The free pupils were almost entirely drawn from artisan homes, the fee-payers entirely from homes of the professional or manufacturing class. About 50 per cent of the fee-payers had previously been in private schools. Many used the preparatory department as a jumping-off ground for other schools; while another group came on from

[page 178]

Arpley Street or Stockton Heath, two elementary schools with a superior standard, and spent one or two years, and occasionally three years, qualifying for a clerical post, sometimes in the parents' business, sometimes entering one of the professions. This is the result of analysing each individual record. The results of a similar enquiry into the years 1920-1922 reveal much the same kind of facts. There were 137 entrants to the school, of whom twenty-five were relieved of fees, while forty came from private schools. Only occasionally does a poor school appear among the contributing schools. The free-placers tend to come from the shopkeeping and supervising group, rather than from skilled workers as before the war. The average length of school life is about three years and four months.

It is obvious that the grammar school does not affect the main problem, except that on p. 173 we must add about another 100 to the 250 who, during the years 1920-1922, proceeded to secondary education. Of this 100, seventy-five were able to pay fees, but there is no guarantee that they would have secured admission to the municipal school, while a small number came from outside the municipal area. There is not much sign of vertical mobility within the grammar school, except in the case of the free scholars, whose records compare very favourably with the fee-payers; indeed, they are all picked students. Whatever happens in the near future to the grammar school, it remains evident that, as the Director of Education said, 75 per cent of those in elementary schools are fit for further education, whether at an intermediate or a secondary school. At present less than 10 per cent enjoy any other education than evening school,

[page 179]

and less than 5 per cent enjoy it as a right. Although the free-place system in Warrington is properly in theory a qualifying examination, in practice it is severely competitive. What is wanted is obviously more secondary school accommodation. Some headmasters contend that they can do all that an intermediate school will do, and in the better schools they have much to recommend that opinion. Sheer poverty and bad environment being the twin opponents of educational advance, there must go hand-in-hand with greater accommodation a more profound and sympathetic civic feeling.

WALLASEY is of importance, not only because its number of secondary school pupils per 1,000 population is the highest in the country, but also because that number has risen to twenty-one from fifteen in 1920. As at Bradford, the further fact emerges that considerable trouble and care have been taken to make the free-place examination affect as many children as is possible. It is not enough to say that the character of the population has demanded much greater provision for secondary education than in more industrial centres. Undoubtedly this is an important factor. Since 1920 there has been a continuous experimenting and growth. In that year, for example, the net was cast widely over age-groups from 10 to 13 years of age; this was gradually altered on its higher limit to 12 years 1 month in 1924, though exceptional children still had an opportunity. On the other hand, children under 11 might enter, but only when special ability is noticed; this provision has prevented over-pressure, and the comparatively few who take this opportunity have justified their inclusion. In 1920 no less than 583 out of 1,300, or 45 per cent, were not entered, head teachers considering them not up to standard. In 1921 all children who had reached Standard IV were examined, if between the ages 11 and 12. The percentage was reduced to 28, and in 1922 to 22. It was thus made easier to allocate backward areas and determine a standard of attainment.

[page 181]

In the next place the examination from being a cumbrous and scattered list of subjects has been reduced to simple tests in English and arithmetic plus an oral test and estimation of school record. Elementary and secondary school teachers have hammered out in round-table discussions the most suitable methods of relating their work. The qualifying test is now held internally at each school, and the variation in marking, obviously the main difficulty, has been reduced to a minimum. But experience has taught them that examining is a special aptitude, and the problem now is how far expert knowledge in examining can be combined with the internal test. The assessment of the school record has also been in some measure standardised by the visitation of a specially qualified man who has ironed out any more extravagant estimation of marking. The order of merit, according to the written tests, is not materially altered, though in a few cases the effect, nervousness or illness, is counterbalanced.

The second test being competitive, and marked by one man for each paper, has not presented so many difficulties. With regard to age, the zero point is taken as 11 years 6 months, and allowance for age under and above the zero point is made to the extent of 1 per cent per month calculated on the maximum marks obtainable. Thus, with 400 as maximum, a child 11 years 9 months would lose twelve marks, and a child 11 years 2 months gain sixteen marks. Children under 11 could only gain twenty-four marks, and depended for the rest on their special ability. When the marks are finally settled, the leading candidates are offered available free-places in the grammar school and high school, the second group at the municipal secondary schools, and the

[page 182]

third group at the central schools. The Director lays great stress on this general and yearly survey, which not only tends to co-ordinate and unify the different schools, preventing overlapping and making transition smooth, but also has compelled reorganisation of the senior elementary schools. Practical and more concrete subjects, greater individual attention and adaptation, have been found necessary for the last three years at the elementary school. There is also the important enquiry now being conducted into the 25 per cent who are not presented for examination. Late admission, irregular attendance, sickness, and home conditions, as elsewhere, are the main causes of backwardness. The inspectors, as at Bradford, have complimented the system, particularly the co-ordination of curricula that has resulted. The fact that they suggest easing down on the arithmetic papers only helps to support the thesis that as far as Wallasey, admittedly a favourable environment, is concerned, at least 75 per cent of the elementary children pass the qualifying standard for further education.

The annual examination has now been held for some five years, and there are available statistics that have an important bearing on the general problem. In 1920 the following figures were elicited:

[page 183]

It thus appears that in the Council schools 71.3 per cent entered for the first test, and in non-provided schools 49.5 per cent. Undoubtedly the difference between the fine modern schools erected by the local authority and the less favourable conditions of non-provided schools partly accounts for this difference. The boys tended to show peaks in attainment after the age of 12, and the girls seemed to show a single-subject attainment. But these details cannot be too hardly pressed without considering the individual school and, eventually the child itself. Among such variety free and easy transfer is demanded, though the scholarship winners showed a decided superiority over their contemporaries.

In 1921 all children between 11 and 12 years of age were examined. There were 1,237 on the roll, and 893 were presented for the first examination. Out of every twenty-four children between 11 and 12, nine were in Standard IV, nine were in Standard V, eight were below or above. And if we analyse the entrants from Standard IV. the following is the result:

Thus 133 qualified (and could enter as fee-payers), and 46 won free-places, but no less than 321 failed in the test. This means that Standard IV varies in different schools, and suggests a more accurate reorganisation of standards. Another point that emerged was that 240 over-age children were sent in, of whom 204 passed the qualifying test, but in most cases the adjustment for age-marks ruled them out of

[page 184]

the competition. Out of the 893 presented, 694 qualified in the first test, but there was only provision for 310; thus 384 who qualified were left over. Including central schools, this meant places were found for 23 per 1,000 population. But if the remaining 384 were to be brought in, 2,000 additional places would be necessary, and this would make the total something over 40 places per 1,000 population. The first examination is, of course, qualifying and the second competitive, a test for free-places, selective and therefore of a higher standard. The danger of too many examinations, of cramming and private tuition, was appreciated, and attempts made to correlate primary, central, and secondary curricula, so that the examination was taken, as it were en passant.

In 1922, 1,000 children entered, including two from private schools; 651 qualified, or 65 per cent, and should have received secondary education. Actually 198 went to secondary schools and 160 to central schools, leaving over, as in the previous year, a considerable number. A minimum curriculum for primary schools was fixed this year in order to avoid the special preparation danger referred to above. The internal was substituted for the external examination. The accuracy of the correspondence between school record and examination marks was demonstrated, and it was found that in English 73 per cent did satisfactory work. It was also discovered that certain trades - such as plumbing, which did not take on apprentices over 16 - militated against boys completing the full secondary course, and made the parents prefer a central school.

The year 1923 further revealed the weaknesses of the

[page 185]

backward pupils, though the following table records the advance on previous years:

A special investigation of the 318 retained or backward children was made. Behind each case is a secret history, sometimes a terrible history. It was found that late admission affected only thirty-three out of 238 children who started in the Wallasey infants' departments, and that illness was the cause of this. Out of eighty transferred from private schools or other districts, some had been neglected by parents, some had been at poor schools, one had lived in a caravan, others came from scattered homes. No less than 141 of the total had suffered or were suffering from some illness which lowered their vitality. Wallasey, being a residential district, is fairly free from the social evils of industrial districts. The Chief Medical Officer reported that in 1920 over the whole country 47.9 of the nation's children were victims of some defects. Irregularity of attendance, largely consequent on ill-health, affected between half and one-third of the total here concerned, while in nearly half the homes conditions were unsatisfactory, and in twenty cases very bad. Taking, then, the whole 318, their mental ability was described as:

[page 186]

Group (d) would require special attention. Group (a) were further analysed, and every case could be explained by causes physical or social beyond the immediate influence of the educational system. The authorities agreed with Mr. Cyril Burt's general analysis. Special classes, with no more than thirty in each, starting at the age of 10 for at least four years, are to be arranged, and attention especially directed to regularity of attendance, discovery and connection of physical defects and counteraction of home conditions, while the curriculum must be carefully adapted to the needs and background of these pupils.

In the year 1924 the number presented rose from 75 to 79 per cent. in the case of boys, and out of 1,124 examined, including 44 under-age and 57 over-age candidates, 778 passed on to the second or competitive examination.

The position in Wallasey, then, may be stated with some exactitude. A conservative estimate shows that now about 80 per cent are presented out of the possible age-group, and that of these 68 per cent qualify for secondary education, and that less than 20 per cent pursue secondary education. So that although this figure is the highest in the country, the hard fact still remains that there are as many left over, who have qualified, as there are going on to secondary school. The ability of those finally selected is undoubted, but, of course, it must also be remembered that a considerable number enter the secondary schools each year as fee-payers who are of equal merit, or at any rate satisfy the same test, as the 300 odd for whom places cannot be found.

[page 187]

The municipal secondary school and higher standard centres are all free, and admission is obtained to both on the results of a competitive examination. Certain schools win most of the free-places, and others few or none, and this corresponds with environment to a large extent. The great majority of the parents of free-places are skilled workers, with a smaller number of clerical workers and a small minority of unskilled workers. Below is a comparison of occupations pursued by school leavers for the year ending July 31,1924:

There are also the Hulme grammar schools (boys and girls).

The total entrants to secondary schools from the area are about 270. This means about 163 go to the Hulme grammar

[page 188]

schools. Not more than one-third would go free, which means a total of 107 + 50 = 157. The Board of Education statistics for 1921-22 make it only 131, but we must add a small number for those outside the area. The number of children qualifying for either a free-place, scholarship, or admission to a higher standard centre has in the last year 67 per cent of children aged 11 years, and 73 per cent of those aged 12 years.

IT was said of a famous Bishop of Lincoln in the thirteenth century, "Porcorum custos ascendit culmina cleri" [The keeper of the pigs ascended]. There is no doubt that the monastic schools drew from the very poorest, and there was a potential "ladder" through the Church; but the gradual transference of endowments from the relatively poor to the exclusive use of the rich is a commonplace in educational history. Eton, apart from twenty pupils of noble birth, was a free grammar school to all who came. Leigh Hunt wrote of Christ's Hospital: "Now and then a boy of noble family may be met with, and he is reckoned an interloper and against the charter, but the sons of poor gentry and London citizens abound; in my time there were two boys, one of whom went up to the drawing-room to his father, the master of the house, the other down to the kitchen to his father, the coachman." Fortunately this experience can be paralleled today, because Christ's Hospital has kept something of its original charter. In 1854 the original "twenty poor scholars" of Charterhouse included the sons of a rector, a mayor, a rear-admiral, a gentleman, a barrister, and a solicitor. The Commissioners in 1864 reported that "the sons of persons in the town (Harrow) who happen to belong to a class in society decidedly inferior to the mass of boys in the school having to encounter the knowledge that they were born and bred in an inferior position are naturally at a disadvantage." From the seven-

[page 190]

teenth century up to 1870 "the free scholars" were not seen at Dulwich College. At Rugby, Dulwich, Harrow, and other places county schools were eventually founded for the local inhabitants.

Little mention has previously been made of the big private schools, because they do not affect the specific problem. They are outside public control in the majority of cases, but they still exercise a big influence on University education, and still people commanding positions in many professions. The fact that nearly one-sixth of the House of Commons are old pupils of Eton, that the Army, Navy, Diplomatic Service, and Church of England are largely recruited from these schools, and that the professions of law and medicine include a majority of men who have grown up in such places, only shows how important an influence the non-public secondary schools exert. Their waiting lists are full, and most of them have a small number of scholarships which assist, though not maintain, a limited number of able children; they are not hampered with maintenance grants, early leaving, nor the restricted opportunities of so many town secondary schools. Situated for the most part in the countryside, drawing their pupils from the more sheltered ranks of society, in many cases endowed with closed scholarships to the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, and with certain other avenues, before mentioned, of advance accessible even to the mediocre in scholarship, they remain as yet outside the main stream of secondary education. This is the place neither for criticism nor commendation, except to say that the top end of the ladder is necessarily foreshortened by their existence. For while the public secondary school, solely by means of scholarship, now holds its own with any other

[page 191]

school, so far as University standard is concerned, at the same time there are rungs missing; there is a dead end down certain avenues of advancement. But this leads us to the final consideration of University education.

The main problem of these pages is adolescence, but in estimating the worth and workability of the "ladder idea" some mention must be made of the accessibility of University education, particularly for free-place and scholarship holders coming from elementary schools. Mr. Mansbridge has written that from 1850 to 1900 the poor boy of parts had no chance of going either to Oxford or Cambridge, except in a few favoured schools, and that girls had no chance at all. During the last twenty years progress has been made, and no local authority entirely avoids some provision for University scholarships. The provision, however, is based on no clear-cut scheme, nor on a declared principle. The double growth of secondary schools and University colleges has raised a fresh crop of questions, most of which are as yet unanswered. Mr. G. S. M. Ellis (1) has collected some valuable material on the growth of University scholarships. It appears that in 1907-08 the position was as follows:

(1) Special number of Progress, July, 1924, "The Poor Student and the University".

[page 192]

The very small number of "Council scholars" proceeding to Oxford and Cambridge is important; tradition, closed scholarships, and greater affluence account for the figures of foundation schools. By the years 1911-1912, 373 local authority scholarships were awarded to boys, 187 of which were won by Council school boys, and 91 to girls, a total of 464. In that year 1.9 per cent of the boys and 1.5 per cent of the girls leaving secondary schools proceeded to University education. The average annual value of the awards was £46, and in spite of the small amount, 95 holders went to Cambridge and 38 to Oxford; doubtless many held scholarships or exhibitions as well. London received 81, Leeds 58, Manchester 52, Sheffield 38, Liverpool 34, Bristol 27, Durham 20, and Birmingham 11. Roughly one-third of the local education authorities, covering a population of 4,000,000, neither awarded nor maintained University scholarships. It is computed that 177 phantom or potential students were thus deprived of assistance, calculated on the average standard of other areas. The two kinds of area chiefly affected by this gap are purely agricultural counties, especially in the south, and small county boroughs with a population just exceeding 50,000. The significant fact about University scholarships is that they are amenable to the same laws as secondary school scholarships. Where there is a regional University scholarships are attracted, and vice versa where secondary schools are few and scattered, as in the agricultural south, scholarships are lacking.

The position today is impossible to estimate owing to the lack of statistics. But certain points emerge from the studies of Mr. Ellis and others:

[page 193]

1. There is a strong sex differentiation in favour of boys.

2. The value depends on a multitude of factors:

(a) Parents' income limit.
(b) Flat rate, varying with pupil or University,
or achievement or need.
(c) Indefinite value, based on various conditions.
(d) Reductions for obtaining other scholarships.
(e) Increase in cost of living.

3. No reliable statistics on total given, but a tendency to change a definite for an indefinite number.

4. The dependence on "advanced courses" in secondary schools.

[page 194]

scholars drift into teaching, one-third of the present senior county scholars in London are entering the teaching profession, and I believe statistics for the whole country point in the same direction. About one-twelfth of those entering the first examination continue for the second school examination. Some areas suffer badly in this respect. The question arises, Should a second school examination ensure a University career? London offers students a free-place, but restricts scholarships to the winners of open scholarships. A reasonable policy, however, might be:

1. To assist all holders of open scholarships (as London).
2. To assist all holders of second school certificates (as Birmingham).
3. To consider other cases on merits (as Southend).

Perhaps the second is the most important point - the value of the award. The value often determines the subject pursued and the University attended; the value often deters a student from starting a course at all. A fixed value is as unsatisfactory as a maximum value, while indefinite amounts and complicated conditions only bewilder the embarrassed student. The North Riding of Yorkshire have set a standard which is reasonable and which other authorities might follow.

[page 195]

Reduction on the maximum grant of £100 is made only when the total scholarships from other sources exceed -

1. A free-place (£200) at Oxford and Cambridge.
2. A free-place (£175) at London.
3. A free-place (£140) at other Universities.

Mr. Ellis concludes his illuminating study by three suggestions prompted by the last twenty years of local experiment:

1. At least one scholarship to be awarded for 50,000 population (two would not bring us up to Scotland's figures).
2. Preservation of local interest and increase the 200 State scholarships.
3. The State to provide for research, post-graduate work, and professional training.

[page 196]

University. But there are other professions, such as medicine, law, scientific research of various kinds, which are virtually closed to the children of poor people. The varied extensions of adult education that are a feature of modern educational development may give citizenship a more honoured place in the country, but besides that it is imperative to recruit technical ability and high scholarship from the widest possible basis, irrespective of social or economic origin. It is one of the functions of the University to attract such talent. The fact that 1,090 students in 1920 and 2,019 in 1921 qualified for the 200 State scholarships, and that at the same time a number approximating to 75 per cent of the annual entry to Universities passes in without any scholarship whatsoever, suggests that the scales are heavily weighted against the poor student.

IN previous chapters we have surveyed in some detail special areas. It is now proposed to travel more lightly over other districts, enumerating only the important facts and figures relevant to this study. In each case there are local considerations to be borne in mind, and sometimes there will be minor qualifications owing to special circumstances. From the foregoing pages it is obvious that the only intelligible method of interpreting the crucial parts of the 1918 Act - that is, the determination of the number capable of profiting by secondary education and the removal of economic barriers preventing those who are capable from taking advantage of such education - is to examine all children somewhere about the age of 11 years, and then make careful enquiries why scholarships offered are refused. If a broad and comprehensive test of merit is applied, the same for free-placers and fee-payers, it is then possible to discover how much capacity is being lost. At present some authorities have a common examination, some have different standards, some examine a selected number, others examine all. Some make close enquiries and give publicity to their examinations; others tread softly and assume they have cast their net sufficiently wide. This is not to assume that secondary education is for all, nor that such education should be entirely free, but that without such method and

[page 198]

rough working basis it is impossible to make an accurate estimate of the needs of the locality. Not all areas with a larger number of secondary school pupils have also a large number of free secondary school pupils, as the following tables show:

Middlesex is an area with a common examination for all entrants, and a uniform qualifying standard for the county. A further examination is held for a selected list of candidates, estimated in some places on ability, in others on the basis of double the number of available free-places. Any parent could demand the second examination, but very few did.

[page 199]

Thus no less than 1,585 children, eligible on educational grounds of a very decided character, were not transferred. The district suffers from unequal accommodation and different intellectual standards. The Director also hints that there are other kinds of tests than that accepted by the Departmental Committee - namely, the likelihood of reaching the "first examination" standard by 16 or 17. In this district there used to be a large number of parents waiting to pay fees for their children; this is not so now.

The problems now are:

(a) Ability to pay fees.
(b) Ability to pay maintenance.
(c) Ability to sacrifice potential earnings.

Manchester is also a city where there are available statistics, and some important facts emerge from them. Out of 20,000 odd children, there is a preliminary selection of 7,000; the parents of 3,000 will not allow the final test.

[page 200]

The actual figures appear below:

The second examination is open to all who have gained 50 per cent, and whose parents are willing. Thus 4,130 children compete for 1,400 vacancies in municipal and central schools.

In 13 schools 100 per cent of eligible children gained 50 per cent or over.
In 33 schools 80 to 100 per cent of eligible children gained 50 per cent or over.
In 53 schools 60 to 80 per cent of eligible children gained 50 per cent or over.
In 75 schools 40 to 60 per cent of eligible children gained 50 per cent or over.
In 28 schools 20 to 40 per cent of eligible children gained 50 per cent or over.
In 5 schools below 20 per cent of eligible children gained 50 per cent or over.

There were 4,130 children competing for 1,398 vacancies, of which -

(a) 2,014 children were competing for 470 high school vacancies.

[page 201]

(b) 2,786 children were competing for 928 central school vacancies.

From 19 schools 20 or more pupils went on to higher education (one school sent 31).
From 47 schools (5 provided and 42 non-provided) no pupil went on.
From 18 schools between 1914 and 1921 no pupil has proceeded to secondary education.
From 28 schools (11 provided and 17 non-provided) only one pupil went on.

A very bare recital of facts and figures is almost enough in a case like this. Sufficient is it to say that in Manchester about 8,000 children are selected every year by a first examination, and that 50 per cent of these could not go forward, even with a system of free secondary education, because their parents cannot afford it. What is required is maintenance and a greater variety of type of post-primary education.

Liverpool is another important centre of industry and trade, in some ways analogous to London. It has a dock area and a strong commercial bias. During the last five years there were 420 scholarships and 1,665 free-places given, and 321 departments from which the children might have come. There were 78 departments who did not nominate

[page 202]

a single child, 208 out of 321 did not win a scholarship, while 115 failed to secure a free-place. A member of the Education Committee points out that this is primarily due to economic and social conditions of the homes. Taking the three kinds of schools, the proportion per 1,000 of population sent on for free secondary education was as follows:

There are 64 Council schools, who together won 295 scholarships and 1,080 free-places, but 6 schools won half the total. There are 43 Roman Catholic schools, who together won 81 scholarships and 377 free-places, but 5 schools won half the total. There are 53 Church schools who together won 41 scholarships and 199 free-places, but 4 schools won over half the total. A further subdivision would reveal one or two in each case who carried off a quite disproportionate number. If the 39 wards of the city are analysed, it appears that 8, with an average attendance of 37,133 children, sent on 1,224 children, and that the 31 others, with 81,242 children, had only 850 places distributed among them. At present it is not known how many children are capable of profiting, and it has been agreed that in future a general examination of all children shall be held. From visits in some of the poorest schools in Liverpool it was quite obvious that the parents did not contemplate any further education after the age of 14, but the masters assured me there were many boys who, with maintenance grants, could easily profit by secondary education.

[page 203]

The results of the admission examination in Birmingham show that nearly 60 per cent of the children who are offered admission do not accept it. The main reason is the inability or unwillingness to meet the cost of -

(a) Fees.
(b) Incidental expenses.
(c) Foregoing possible earnings.

In Wales there is the same diversity. For example, Anglesey divides the results of the examination into three classes - those with over 60 per cent, those between 50 and 60 per cent, those with 33 1/3 and 50 per cent - and a pass in the third class qualifies a candidate for entrance as fee-payer. Flintshire has a uniform examination for all school districts, and this is the only avenue for free-placers or fee-payers into municipal or intermediate schools. In Radnorshire the fee-payers' standard is 10 per cent less than that

[page 204]

for scholars. Swansea secondary schools are quite free, but there are fees at the intermediate schools. Thus, in Wales, where post-primary education is more accessible, there is much variation in subjects, examining board, age of entry, and standard of entry; there is overlapping and lack of continuity. It should be easier to make of education a continuous process where 90 per cent of the secondary school population are ex-elementary school pupils.

Bournemouth has a general test examination for all children between 10½ and 12 years of age, while Brighton frankly states that the preliminary examination there is an eliminating test. For the second examination, in 1922, 171 pupils qualified and sixty-nine scholarships were given. Lancashire for the three years 1922-1924 has undertaken a yearly review of all children of suitable age. The entrance for scholarship examination has increased from 3,020 in 1922 to an estimated 5,600 in 1925. The figures are as follows:

The review is conducted by head teachers with the object of discovering suitable children for possible transference, and in 56 per cent of the cases graded tests, according to the age and attainment of scholars, were used. In Bury 290 out of 650 entering for the examination were reported unsuitable, the rest were offered secondary or central school places. In Burnley the percentage of retardation is estimated in 1923 as 16.6, and 1924, 12.3, varying in different schools from

[page 205]

12 to 60 per cent. But each year about 30 per cent of the children reached a qualifying standard for post-primary education, though only 6 per 1,000 population of Burnley children are in secondary schools. In Croydon it is stated that while a number of unsuitable candidates enter for the preliminary examination, not all of scholarship standard enter, it being quite understandable that in poorer districts many parents do not see their way to make provision for secondary education, even with the assistance of maintenance grants. Cumberland is also satisfied that quite an appreciable number of children of promising intelligence have not been sent forward, but adds significantly that it is not always the child that comes out top in a written examination who is possessed of the best qualifications.

Durham was one of the earlier authorities to size up the problem, and one of the difficulties it foresaw was on the administrative side. The elementary school code, the secondary school regulations, the regulations for junior technical schools, each laid down different amounts of square feet per child for accommodation. Also the salary basis further complicates the question. One has known schools where the transference of an extra half-dozen pupils to secondary education and consequent diminution in average attendance has made a reasonable difference to a headmaster's salary. In 1916 it was estimated that the children between 12 and 15 could be classified thus:

[page 206]

The striking figures are that only 4.5 per cent were in secondary schools, that 30 per cent were finished with day schools, and that 10 per cent of the total, actually in elementary schools, were below Standard V. Out of a total of 45,000, deducting the backward and those in higher elementary or secondary schools, there were 33,000 for whom account was necessary. Recognising that in the previous year out of 850 leaving secondary schools 231 left under the age of 15, and that 187 out of 270 leaving over the age of 17 were pupil teachers, the problem presented enormous proportions. Even after struggling to make secondary education increasingly free, only 6.3 per 1,000 population are in secondary schools today. There are no children under 11 years of age in these schools. It would cost well over two million pounds, on the basis of £75 a place, to give secondary education to all in Durham. The suggestions made in the survey of 1916 before the Fisher Act were for "higher tops", with classes of not more than thirty-five, specialist teachers on secondary school scales, and an allowance per head for books, apparatus, stationery, etc. The survey closed with this statement: "It was far from the intention of our educational legislators that an insignificant percentage only of promising students from the elementary schools should be enabled to climb successfully the rungs of secondary education. This has been the result. The remedy for this defect must clearly take some form of educational overlapping."

In answer to an enquiry from the local Trades Council, the East Ham Committee said that, with the exception of seventeen boys, all who qualified in the examination and whose parents desired admission had been found a place.

[page 207]

In 1924 the following were the relevant figures for the examination:

Gloucestershire in 1923 held a compulsory examination in seventy-seven departments; in 1925 in all departments. Though this county is above the average for English counties, due in some measure to the better inheritance of grammar scholars from the middle ages, over 30 per cent of the pupils come from private schools, and 11 per cent are under 11 years of age. Huntingdonshire states that in view of the fact that secondary schools are now supported by public money to such a large extent, while the fees paid by parents have become relatively unimportant, the willingness on the part of a parent should not of itself entitle a pupil to admission, and they therefore propose to make a qualifying examination for all. Northumberland now has a common examination for scholars and fee-payers. After a most interesting and detailed test of over 13,000 children between the ages of 11 and 12, it was discovered that over 50 per cent are normal or average, a further 20 per cent are advanced, while 1 per cent are of very high intelligence. The rest, which amounts to 24 per cent, must be classed as backward, though in varying degrees. Nottingham has a common examination for all children in Standard IV or above, between 11 and 12, but has to recommend further free and assisted scholarships, based on evidence of need. Somerset, in order to make more

[page 208]

widely known the advantages of free-places, and to secure entry of all suitable candidates, has decided that all children between 11 and 12 shall be examined, shall take the county free-place examinations, while East Sussex has amalgamated the county scholarship and free-place examinations. West Ham have become conscious that their test is not qualifying, but competitive, and it has been decided that not merely the names of candidates recommended be published, but also the applicants, whose standard of work is sufficiently high to warrant inclusion, if no limit to the number of awards existed. There are 13,000 pupils between 10 and 11, and 6,000 between 12 and 13 years of age. Although only 1,275 sat for the examination, a common preliminary and qualifying examination was not accepted, owing to the unnecessary expense and labour entailed. It would appear difficult to carry out the Fisher Act with any accuracy until some such review had been undertaken. In Wiltshire 188 awards, including local charities, were made from 1,227 applicants, 1,207 of whom had passed the county eliminating test. Of the 1,039 left over, seventy-two entered as fee-payers. In 1924, two years later, 277 obtained at least 60 per cent, and did not proceed to a secondary school.

An interesting commentary is offered by Newcastle through the words of a Director: "The effect of this section of the Act (i.e., the crucial part on which this book dwells) will be to destroy the present competitive system of scholarships and to put in its place a system which the prospective candidate for higher education will need to show due qualification, and not necessarily pre-eminence among his fellows"; and again: "I am of the opinion that a system of secondary

[page 209]

schools, under which large numbers of children may claim free admission, and under which large numbers may claim admission proportionate to their means, while other children pay full fees, cannot continue. ... As, however, every child is entitled to education in an elementary school up to 14 or 15, a general transfer of all normal children to places of higher education at or about the age of 12 would appear to serve as a necessary concomitant, a system of free further schools."

Before leaving this general survey and indicating the tendencies they reveal, mention of two places who have experimented further into grading of schools should be made. The one is Carlisle and the other Leicester. The main feature of the latter is the grading of pupils from 11 years of age, when an examination is taken by all children, except certain backward ones whom head teachers need not enter. Those reaching a prescribed standard and whose parents sign a four years' agreement go to secondary schools, as free-placers or fee-payers; others are drafted to an intermediate or central school; all others, including the exempted, are drafted to senior schools. The junior schools range from 7 to 11 years and are mixed. In the junior as in the senior schools there is duplication of classes; there may be three or four parallel classes moving at various speeds through the schools. Transfer to a parallel class is possible during the school year, and to a different parallel at the end of the year. The Roman Catholic schools are outside the scheme, though Church of England schools have their own junior and senior schools. Parental difficulty, due to the greater distance some children have to walk, has been overcome

[page 210]

while the staffing problem presented few obstacles. No compulsion is exercised for intermediate school pupils to remain at school after 14 plus, though they may take the school certificate and stay a fourth year; indeed, a few have done so. About 50 per cent of an age-group enter for the examination, and as not more than 20 per cent are subnormal about 30 per cent more should enter. Of about 4,000 children of the 11-year age-group, about 1,500 passed the qualifying examination for entrance to an intermediate school. Between 400 and 500 qualify as fee-payers or free-placers for secondary schools, and an average of 400 actually go forward. The great merit of these preliminary parallel classes is the easier task of transference. The curriculum may be varied to suit special aptitudes, and at 11 plus the general examination, dividing pupils into three classes, with later transference from senior schools to intermediate and intermediate to secondary where it is desirable, becomes at once more elastic and more selective.

Carlisle has a scheme resembling Leicester in many points. Junior schools are for all up to the age of 11, except that there is no infant department. The junior merit examination then takes place, and pupils go either to senior schools up to 14, to central schools up to 15 or 15½, or to the old grammar school and girls' high school. It is proposed that the senior schools become central schools as soon as possible, and later secondary, and that the central schools become secondary. In a word this is gradual secondary education for all. Junior technical schools were turned down as being too rigid in code, but all senior schools have workshops and handicraft rooms. The central schools have so far worked

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under the elementary code, but a few children have taken the matriculation and senior Oxford examinations. Below are two tables showing the age-groups at central schools:

From August 1 these two central schools will become secondary schools, and as the above figures show there has been a progressive lengthening of school life, until it has become at least as long as certain secondary schools in other parts of the country. The senior schools pay particular attention to practical and individual work and cross classification of pupils for various subjects, but there are no parallel classes as in Leicester. There is obviously much to discuss in these two experiments; the motives, as always, which prompted them are mixed. For the reorganisation of existing schools is a scheme which combines economy

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with a certain efficiency. The Carlisle plan is definitely working towards secondary education for all at a future date. With regard to raising the school age, premises and staff are assured, but there are questions as yet unanswered, such as exemptions and maintenance, which immediately raise controversy. In the Leicester scheme it is frankly admitted that the intermediate scholars are mostly capable of profiting by secondary education, but "for various reasons" are unable to proceed to secondary schools. Inasmuch as "various reasons" are mainly economic, the problem still remains. In Carlisle much of the success is due to the bringing together of teachers, parents, rate-payers, and all concerned parties, and informing public opinion. The central schools were started before the war voluntarily, and a graduate from Cambridge was put in charge.

THE following Schedules show the effect of the income limits as regards eligibility and maintenance grants.

The number of children means the number inclusive of the scholar in each case. 0 means ineligible for scholarship or free place; † means eligible for free place only.

Junior awards. - Amount of annual grant payable up to the end of the school year in which the age of 14 years is attained.

Trade scholars who commence their training in March or April and are 14 years of age by July 31, will receive grants under Schedule No. 2 as from August 2.

[page 214]

[page 215]

These tables may be extended when the number of children exceeds eight by increasing the income limit by £50 for each additional child. The expression "child" means a son or daughter who (1) is under school age, or (2) is pursuing his or her education as a full-time student.