Of the sixty-eight local education authorities in England making returns in whose areas there are canals, twenty-two reported the presence of children on boats during the year 1926. The number of children found on board was 1,803. Two local education authorities in Wales made returns during 1926, but neither reported the presence of canal boat children in boats registered or found in their area. Legal proceedings were taken by three local education authorities, and in two cases fines of 5s. and 10s. respectively were imposed. CHAPTER II. SECONDARY SCHOOLS (ENGLAND). 1. School Supply and Number of Pupils. 38. The number of secondary schools in England recognised for grant by the Board continues to increase and in 1926-27 reached a total of 1,177. The increase in each of the last two years has been 16 as compared with an increase of 8 in each of the two preceding years. Of the 1,177 schools 635 were controlled by local authorities, 442 were endowed schools or schools of a similar type, 25 were schools of the Girls' Public Day Schools Trust and 75 were controlled by Roman Catholic Orders or Communities. 39. The number of pupils in grant-earning schools in October, 1926, was 342,304 (182,282 boys and 160,022 girls), as compared with 334,194 in October, 1925. As in the previous year, this increase was only partly attributable to the recognition of new schools; there was an increase of 6,902 in the numbers in schools previously recognised for grant. According to the latest returns available there was a further increase in October, 1927, to 349,430 in 1,184 schools. The number of pupils admitted during 1926-27 was 77,732, as compared with 76,268 in 1925-26. 40. The number of secondary schools recognised by the Board as efficient, but not as eligible for grant, increased from 292 in 1925-26 to 305 in 1926-7. In October, 1927, the number of schools had increased to 311, containing 57,655 pupils (29,852 boys and 27,803 girls). The number of preparatory schools recognised as efficient also increased from 102 in 1925-26 to 108 in 1926-27, and in October, 1927, there was a further increase to 110. According to the latest returns available (1st October, 1927) the total number of pupils in secondary schools recognised as efficient, whether grantaided or not, was 407,085, while the number in recognised preparatory schools was 9,274. The preparatory school figures relate only to preparatory schools conducted as independent units; a considerable number of children of preparatory school age are educated in the preparatory departments of secondary schools and are included in the secondary school figures. As explained in our last report, the figures do not include a large number of preparatory and secondary schools which are not grant-aided and have not applied to the Board for recognition as efficient, so that they must not be taken as giving a complete picture of the amount of secondary and preparatory school provision in the country. 2. Free Places. 41. Twenty years have now elapsed since the free place requirement first found a place in the Regulations for Secondary Schools and a brief account of the development of free place provision during that period may not be out of place. The introduction of the free place requirement did not, of course, mark the beginning of the provision of free education in secondary schools, but it is not within the scope of the present survey to examine the facilities that existed prior to 1907 for enabling scholars of public elementary schools to proceed to secondary schools. A historical survey of those facilities is contained in Chapter I of our Report for the year 1911-12. It will suffice to say here that, before the Board's Regulations placed a definite obligation on local education authorities and governing bodies to facilitate the passage from the elementary to the secondary schools by the provision of free places, many authorities, to a great extent encouraged by the Education Act of 1902, which brought secondary as well as elementary education within their purview, had developed their scholarship arrangements very rapidly. Thus, whereas in 1894 the number of scholarships for the whole of England provided by local authorities and tenable at secondary schools was less than 2,500, by 1900 the number of ex-elementary school children holding scholarships in secondary schools awarded by local authorities was between 5,000 and 5,500, and by 1906 this figure had further increased to over 12,000, and, if scholarships restricted to intending teachers be included, to over 23,500. 42. The object of the free place requirement was not, as is sometimes supposed, to open the door of higher education to elementary school children of exceptional promise, but rather to bring the advantages of such education, as far as the limited funds at the Board's disposal would permit, within the reach of the poorer classes and to place them on the same footing as pupils whose parents were in a position to pay the school fees. That this was the intention is clearly shown by the opening words of the paragraph in the Prefatory Memorandum to the 1907 Regulations, which deals with the free place regulation-" The Board have also taken measures to secure that all secondary schools aided by grants shall be made fully accessible to children of all classes." In other words, the free place regulation recognised, encouraged and controlled a system that was already in being. 43. The actual words of the regulation relating to free places were as follows: "In all schools where a fee is charged, arrangements must be made to the satisfaction of the Board for securing that a proportion of school places shall be open without payment of fee to scholars from public elementary schools who apply for admission, subject to the applicants passing an entrance test of attainments and proficiency such as can be approved by the 44. It should be noted that not all schools on the grant list were required to comply with the terms of the regulation, but compliance was necessary if capitation grant at the higher rate was to be earned. In the first year 89 out of 739 schools did not comply with the regulation and received grant at the lower rate. This number has steadily diminished and at the present time there are only 3 feecharging schools out of 1,184 on the grant list which are not required to offer a percentage of free places, and the terms of the present Regulations do not admit of this number being added to. 45. Although the normal minimum percentage of free places to be offered to ex-public elementary school pupils was originally, and has since remained, 25 per cent. of the previous year's admission, a number of schools were, and are still, allowed to offer a lower percentage, the relevant considerations being in the main the financial circumstances of the school and the adequacy of the provision of free places in other secondary schools in the neighbourhood. no case has a lower percentage than 10 been approved. In the first year (1907-08) 146 out of 650 schools offered less than the full 25 per cent. and the present figures are 152 out of 1,181 schools required to offer a percentage of free places. In 46. In its main essentials the free place requirement has remained unaltered since its introduction. In the year 1924 a normal upper limit to the award of free places of 40 per cent. was imposed, and, as we pointed out in our report for 1925-26, the 40 per cent. limitation. was, under the 1926 Regulations, made applicable to all free places whether offered to pupils entering from public elementary schools or not. 47. The introduction of the free place requirement did not result in any startling increase in the number of ex-public elementary school pupils enjoying free education in secondary schools. A few months before the 1907 Regulations came into force such pupils, including all those who had at any time been in a public elementary school, represented 24.08 per cent. of the total number of pupils. In 1907-08 the proportion, reckoning only those who had been in public elementary schools for at least two years immediately prior to their admission, was 27 per cent. and in 1908-09 the percentage had risen to 30. Since then, as the following table shows, there has been a steady rise in the proportion of free place pupils. The position now reached is that, of the total number of pupils in secondary schools, 37.6 per cent. are assured of free tuition for the whole of their secondary school life. If there be added those pupils who pay no fees but who are not technically free place pupils, because the terms of their scholarships or remission of fees do not assure the continuance of the award during the whole of school life, the percentage is approximately 40·9. 48. The above figures include those schools in which no fees are charged. Sheffield was the first authority to provide free secondary schools, no fee being charged as from the autumn term 1918 in the two secondary schools newly opened at that time. Bradford was the first authority to provide free secondary education in all of its maintained schools. This was introduced in August, 1919. At the present time there are five areas in which all the maintained schools are free, and, in addition, 40 areas in which the percentage of free places awarded at the beginning of the school year in all the schools in the area was approximately 40 or over. 49. It is not possible to state precisely how the financial burden of providing free secondary education for roughly two children out of every five to be found at secondary schools is apportioned as between local education authorities on the one hand and governing bodies of schools and endowed foundations on the other. The Board receive annual returns showing the number of free places awarded by local authorities, by governing bodies and by endowed foundations respectively, but deductions from these figures as to the distribution of cost would be fallacious because, whereas all free places awarded by local authorities are paid for by them, the cost of many awards made by governing bodies falls ultimately on the authorities which aid the schools. The reason for this is purely a financial one. The cost of school maintenance has, as a result of the introduction of Burnham salaries and from other causes, risen to an extent that would in the case of many non-provided secondary schools, have made compliance with the free place article impossible, had it not been for the sympathetic co-operation of the authorities. |