NOTES ON EDUCATION

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 101, 22 January 1908, Page 5

NOTES ON EDUCATION

p ' (By Socrates.) -MJSDICAL INSPKCTION OF SCHOOLS.; Dr. A. H. Hogarth, one of the secretaries of the International Congress • on .School Hygiene, considers that the important memorandum recently' issued by tiie British Board of Education on tho 'subject of systematic medical inspection of school children is greatly ill advance or what was expected. "Hut," ho says ''there is one prinoiple -oontaincd- in it which is: absolutely wrong-. The Board of Education -views-tho entire sub- ' jeet of school hygiene, not 'as a speciality, but as aii integral factor in the health of the nation. That is-not- accepted by any ono who lias really done. practical work in the schools and who has lull knowledge of tho subject. Tho 'inspection of the school children is, of course, a highly specialised , branch of public health work, and I objcct to such inspection being carried'out by public health authorities and under the direct supervision of the medical officers of health', as it is prescribing definite limits to tho work. "'Pho British Medical Association has suggested that each district containing 200,000 inhabitants should retain for itself the whole time services of a medical officer of schools-: There would bo enough work for him to 'do in his district -to simply look after, the sciiool children. An instance of this is Bradford, where both a medical officer of health officer of schools are engaged, and t: :*'has'been no. question of overlappii. .'i.iriction. Tho suuject was discussetl nt • . ■ recent International Congress on School Vygiene, and, then- Dr. Osier, the Regius.,'"ofe.saor- of .Medicine, Oxford, said: —'If wo':<"o to havo'school inspection, let us have goon men to do the work, and let us pay them .well. It will demand a special training • id' a carcfiil technique. l It cannot be done by second class men, and tho .work is of sufl ■ ;!iit importance to.-warrant, the payment "ood salaries.' i , ' "I contend that the question 'as • to who is to carr.v :!l out the actual'.work,'-about which • childish dispute has arisen between medical officers of health, and .special school drictors,. must obviously bo left to . the discretion of each local- education authority. li>' some places the work could be dono by - ni.edic.al pffieers l of health, in some; .cases by general .practitioners, , ' ahd in others ,by special school doctors. As a matter of fact, it would be n policy to subjcct or subordinate school hygiene to the general sanitary.- administration of the country, which, at the present time,/is very ; far from eatisfactorj - ." CONTLVUATId.V SCHOOLS. , I'ull.-aiid -indeed almost exhaustive, infor- ( mation as'to'what has been done and is contemplatedin the United Kingdom and other 'countries 'in the way. of , continuing and: utilising 1 the"' wurk 'oP the eleinentary school has just been supplied in a valuable book on the subject edited .ind 'partly-- written by Professor M. K. of Manchester (says tho, ,;lScbt'sman" :in a' recent issue)'. The subject'is'discussed'from every 'point of view, and Mr. Sadler has had the assistance of colleagifes aiid senior students of Man-, cliester .tlniversity jn collecting a vast ni.iss of information about rne work actually he■ing done in London, in other'parts Of England and Wale's, iii Scotland, and in foreign countries. Historically considered, the Continuation School is of- the old' Evening Schools, Sun'da}' Schools', Ragged Schools, and other enterprises of the > kind •'started long ago to supply in some measure the lack of..elementary education' ' before ' tho State realised its' responsibility, for public'jnstructioii. ..Tliis Evening .School .in Britain is. at least,a century old. It ihriy almost.bo said to have .been generated in a vacuum; for it arose out of the 'absence, of any system of public'..eleinentary .education' and tho failure of tile Churches and other voluntary agencies to cover the ground. The, stimulus was supplied by religions; zeal and social philautiirupy, and for fifty years, at least the Evening School,maintained the. struggle, for. exis- ' tenco without State aid: or recognition, and rooted itself so firiillv'tliatriinthis department of voluntary educationaf effort Britain has long; taken ,the lead ain'ong tlie nations. ' Wii hear so much- of ou'r. ; educati,onal backwardness, and bf bur being' outstrijipptl by Germany and' other /countries "that it.'-is interesting to be told by Professor Sadler'that the' E veiling Schools' of the early nineteenth century "trained, some of tho leaders, of the industrial and commercial, movement which gave Britain a leading place in tho markets of the world." - It was this supremacy that stirred Germany to emulation, and onrkcen- ' sighted neighbours quickly discovered that education lay at tho root of,'bur industrial success. ' Saxony took the fead, and other German States followed, and the result ,was. the of "tbo unrivalled . German 'sys-tem-,'of public education, one of the prominfeatures of which is the; Continuation School, with compulsory attendance generally, up to the'age of eighteen.

I lie early evening in this country was'.at tlio best a makeshift, and in ISiil tlm Committee of Council on .Education took the first stop towards combining tho work of tho day school and tho evening school by olieriiig grants to the latter when taught b.v certificated teachers. Year alter year fresh steps in advance were taken till tlio Revised Code of 1S()2 "dclinitely assigned to the evening .school the duties of an elementarv continuation schuol." T > mi :« arose i'u Kngland I'roin the i 0„ taehecl to " r grants restrict it! " u ' m clcmenta'r.v education. ami art inu- 1 ..vnnn.'ji 'classes were taught in many Continuation Schools, and the "Cockerton Judgment" decided that grants could not bo paid for what was held to be technical and higher education.- - The result was. that-in Mr. Ilalfour's Act. of 1902 a new and stronger status was given to the Continuation School in .and, when it was made part of tho svstejn of higher education:, under the Local' Ant, 1 ;. -rity, and thiis .entitled to aid from the" '-\tcs. In Scotland, whero no sharp distinction was drawn,, as in England, between- olenienti'iry, and higher education, the English '"difficulty did not arise, and continuation work lias been vigorously pushed forward bv tho Education Department and School "Boards by means of Higher Grade Schools and Departments. i i ■ Germany is the great- exemplar in continuation school work. Its modern development began, as has been said, in Saxony and was stimulated by emulation of the growing industrial power of liritain. Tho great outstanding feature of tlio German system is compulsory attendance. At the very start iu 1830 the local authorities of Saxony were given statutory powers to enforce attendance at continuation sch/iols. Other States gradually followed the. lead, and statutory compulsion is now tho rule in twenty-one out of the. twenty-six constituent- parts of the Empire. Tho live, voluntary .States contain less than n fortieth part of tho German population. The system varies in thu- different States. In eleven States attondaiico is compulsory by Stato law for varying ages up to eighteen. In nine, it is'compulsory only-when imposed by local by-law, but such compulsion is the rule. In Bavaria and three other States and in some parts of Prussia attendance is oflnpulsory for girls as well as boys; in other places for bov3 only. A very imperfect notion of the German compulsory system would be obtained if it were regarded as applying to students only. A governing fact in it is the duty which the law throws on employers to give their' employees up to the ago of eighteen facilities for attendance at continuation classes, and any breach of this regulation is pmishcd by iino or imprisonment. Tho system appears to work admirably in Germany, but it does not follow .that it could be successfully imitated in Britain, whero the social and political conditions and tlio habits and temper of the people are widely different.. In Germain' tho almost despotic authority of governing bodies is acquiesced in with a docility unknown in liritain, and tlio German system of compulsory military service, under which the State keeps its eye and hand oil- every young man, makes it easier than it would bo in this country to exercise universal control over youths'v:ho havo outgrown Uie elementary day school. But the fact that in nearly the whole of Germany every young man undergoes some form of scholastic training for several years ~ after having tho ordinary day school, while in this country barely one in three who leave school at thirteen 01 fourteen receives any further schooling of any kind, certainly affords matter for serious reflection.