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CHAPTER V.

GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND.

EDUCATIONAL STATISTICS AND MOVEMENTS 1893.1

For previous articles on education in Great Britain, see

Detailed view of the educational system of England. Report 1888-89, Vol. I, pp. 78-111.

Brief view and current statistics. Report 1889-90, Vol. I, pp. 237-248.

Educational system of Scotland. Ibid., pp. 187–236.

Elementary education in London and Paris. Ibid., pp. 263-280.

Brief view of systems of England and Scotland, with current statistics. Report 1890-91, Vol. I, pp, 125-134.

Provision for secondary and for technical instruction in Great Britain. Ibid., pp. 135-150.

Educational system of Ireland. lbid., pp. 151–164.

Elementary education in Great Britain and Ireland, 1892. Report for 1891-92, Vol. I, pp. 97-104.

Technical instruction in Great Britain. Ibid., pp. 105-137.

Religious instruction under the London school board. Report for 1892-93, pp. 208216.

TOPICAL OUTLINE.-Educational statistics, 1893.—Comparative view of elementary education, England, 1876 v. 1893; Scotland, 1880 v. 1893.—Gradual progress in scholarly ideals indicated by changes in the departmental regulations (annual code); liberal spirit of the code for 1895; practical end of the system of "payment upon results.” Improved status of evening schools.—Citations: Industrial schools and juvenile crime; Technical education under the London county councils.Tabular view of State-aided colleges.

The following table presents the chief educational statistics of Great Britain and Ireland, as set forth in recent official reports or other specified sources. As will be observed, the entire province of secondary instruction is omitted from the table. Presumably one outcome of the royal commission appointed (December 8, 1893) to investigate a report upon secondary education will be a systematized view of i existing schools of secondary grade:

1 Prepared by A. Tolman Smith.

a University, exclusive of the colleges. Whittaker's Almanac (1893) gives a total of £200,187 as the combined income of 19 Oxford colleges and £305,061 as that of 17 Cambridge colleges.

b Also 8,253 evening students.

e Average number on rolls. The number of pupils who made at least one attendance was 1,022,287. d Also 5,454 paid monitors.

e From Statesman's Year Book.

ƒ In addition to pupils in elementary schools receiving grants from the science and art department. g Parliamentary grant for use in the work of the department, 1893–94.

While it is extremely difficult to obtain a comprehensive view of higher education as maintained in Great Britain, the statistics of elementary education are very complete and uniform for the successive years from 1870.

Up to a very recent date the chief effort of the Government has been to get all children under instruction and to secure appreciable results as an outcome of the public money expended. So long as this standard prevailed the statistics of attendance, enrollment, etc., offered a sufficient index of progress. The following table brings into comparative view the chief items relating to the elementary school system of England and Wales for the years 1876 and 1893 and to the system of Scotland for 1880 and 1893. As regards England and Wales, it should be noted that the earlier of the two dates (1876) was the year of the passage of the first of the laws amending the original "education act” of 1870.

The purpose of the law of 1876 was "to afford additional means for securing the attendance of children at school, especially in districts where there was no school board, or where there were no by-laws in force as to school attendance." The authorities constituted by the new law in districts not under school boards were termed "school attendance committees.”

The six years during which the law of 1870 had been in operation had shown clearly the need of greater stringency in respect to school attendance. It will be remembered that the chief purpose of the original law had been to secure the instruction of all children, and thus free England from the stigma of dense and increasing illiteracy. The part which the Government assumed in the work was simply to require adequate school provision in every district. This might be afforded in public elementary schools managed by elected boards and maintained in part by local taxes (rates), or in private (voluntary) schools, of which the various religious denominations were in general the owners and managers. Both classes of schools were to receive grants from the Government upon the same conditions, and their proper fulfillment of the conditions was to be determined by annual examinations conducted by Government inspectors. Since 1876 the system has been further modified by the laws of 1880 and 1891, the former obliging local authorities to make by-laws for compelling parents to send their children to school and the latter providing for the remission of school fees by means of an annual grant to the schools accepting its provisions. The effect of the law of 1891 has been to make elementary education practically free.

The earlier of the two years (1880), employed in the comparative view for Scotland, is not marked by any event of special importance. The law establishing the Scotch system was passed in 1872. The Government assumed substantially the same relation to the work in Scotland as in England. The Scotch law was, however, more comprehensive, as suited the more highly developed and more homogeneous state of popular education in the northern division of the Kingdom. In Scotland a school board was called into existence in every parish, and not only were the parish schools, but also the higher grade burgh schools, placed under the management of the boards, although the burgh schools did not share in the public funds. Subsequently these highgrade schools were permitted to share in the local taxes, so that the system of public education in Scotland was carried to the door of the universities.

As the Scotch law embodied a compulsory clause, its effects upon school attendance were uniform throughout the country. Religious instruction was restrained simply by a conscience clause, which pe mitted children to be withdrawn from the exercise at the request their parents, whereas in the English law, not only was there a con science clause binding upon all the schools, but there was also a c

prohibiting board schools from giving instruction in any "religious catechism or religious formulary which is distinctive of any particular denomination."

Scotland has been entirely free from the contentions over this subject that have repeatedly convulsed England. The former was the first, also, to secure exemption from school fees, the laws providing for their remission bearing date 1889 and 1890.

It should be added, for the more complete understanding of the comparative statistics, that until 1890 the amount of the grant for each school depended in a measure upon the actual number of children present on the day of the inspector's examination, hence this item has always been reported.

As regards the view presented above it will be seen that certain. items included in the table have little more than local interest. Even these, however, serve to make the impression more precise and definite. The variation in the number of institutions inspected, for example, may arise from purely accidental causes, as severe weather rendering the schools in certain rural regions, especially of northern Scotland, inaccessible.

The decline in the number of pupil teachers is significant, especially when considered in connection with the increase in the number of certificated and assistant teachers. It shows a growing preference for adult teachers who have passed through the training period. It can