EDUCATION IN BRITAIN

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 To Daniel, my husband, whose
immense love and patience have always encouraged me to struggle on.-

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 PROLOGUE
The following paper gathers the most outstanding data on British education as from
its early stages. The different levels have been included: primary, secondary and
university; as well as the different types: state and private. The purpose of the paper is to
provide a clear account of the outstanding pieces of legislation that constitute landmarks in
the development of the educational system in Britain. It traces back the process of
democratisation of education , i.e. how the state began to take more and more
responsibility over education in order to offer it to everybody, regardless of their social or
economic position, so that all had their opportunity in life. On a par with state schooling,
the work follows the development of “public” –i.e. very private- schools in England, trying
to shed some light on their halo of exclusiveness and excellence. Finally, it briefly refers to
the different possibilities at university level, starting by the first and oldest institutions –
Oxford and Cambridge – and covering the spectrum of further education up to the present
day Open University.
Above all this, its main aim is to give a general panorama and provide a clear and
concise guide on education in Great Britain to students of the subject CULTURA Y
CIVILIZACION DE LOS PUEBLOS DE HABLA INGLESA II.

Sandra Fadda
March, 1994

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 TABLE OF CONTENTS

PROLOGUE ii
MAJOR LEGISLATION iv

STATE EDUCATION 1
Primary Schools 2
The Situation in the Pre- and Post- Industrial Revolution Period 2
The “Door of Opportunity” Opens 2
XX Century. Post-Primary Education 4
The Introduction of Secondary Schools 4
Schooling in the First Half of the XX Century: A Thorny Issue 5
How State Education was Conducted: The Situation after the Second
World War 10
The Spread of Comprehensive Schools 12
What Has Recently Been Done 14

PRIVATE EDUCATION 17
The English Public School 18
A Short Historical Sketch 18
How Education is Conducted at Public Schools 20
Public Schools in the XX Century: New Strength 21

THE UNIVERSITIES 24
The Tradition of Oxford and Cambridge 25
Provincial Universities 26
The Open University 27

BIBLIOGRAPHY 29

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 Education in Britain - Major Legislation

Ind. Rev. ---------------------- 1833 --- 1st govt. grants for building schools.
---------------------- 1839 --- grants increased – inspectors appointed.
Palmerston (L) --------------- 1861 --- grants increased – system of payment by results.
Disraeli (C) ------------------- 1870 --- Forster´s Education Act.
Gladstone (L) ---------------- 1880 --- attendance made compulsory.
Salisbury (C) ----------------- 1891 --- elementary education made free.
---------------- 1899 ---Board of Education established.
Balfour (C) ------------------- 1902 --- Education Act.
Campbell-Bannerman (L) -- 1906 --- Education Bill (killed by House of Lords).
Lloyd George (L) ------------1918 --- Fisher Education Act (Geddes Axe).
(Coalition Govt.)
Baldwin (C) ------------------ 1926 --- Hadow Report.
N. Chamberlain (C) --------- 1938 --- Spens Report.
(National Govt.)
Churchill (C) ----------------- 1941 --- Board of Education -------- Ministry of Education.
(Coalition Govt.)
------------------ 1943 --- Norwood Report.
------------------ 1943 --- Ministry of Education White Paper: Educational
Reconstruction.
------------------ 1944 --- Butler Education Act.
“11 +” conducted by LEA.
Tripartite System: * Grammar School – GCE
* Secondary Moderns – GCE –
CSE
* Technical Schools
Wilson (Lab) ------------------ 1964 --- Ministry of Education ------ Dept. for Education and
Science.
------------------ 1965 --- Circular 10/65.
1970s and 1980s ------------------------ spread of Comprehensives
private resurgence
Thatcher (C) ------------------ 1988 --- Education Act: LMS
Ability to opt out of central control
National Curriculum

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STATE EDUCATION

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 PRIMARY SCHOOLS

The Situation in the Pre- and Post- Industrial Revolution Period

In the period previous to the Industrial Revolution the poor had been left
unprovided for in matters of education. England was far behind America, Germany and
even Scotland in this field. In 1803 a group of Dissenters formed the “British and Foreign
Schools Society” to raise funds for this purpose, mainly in the new industrial towns. The
Church of England in turn organised the “National Society for the Education of the Poor in
the Principles of the Church of England” with the same aim. Thirty years later, during the
first Great Era of Reform, for the first time the government granted £20,000 to aid these
societies. The grant was gradually increased from year to year. In 1839 the system was
improved through the appointment of inspectors, whose task was to see that the money was
being properly used. Further contribution to the improvement of the system took place in
1858 when a commission recommended the setting up of local Education Boards. A
system of “payment by results” was introduced in 1861. According to this, the biggest
grants went to the schools that could get most children up to a given test standard.
However, these improvements notwithstanding, David Thomson pictures the
situation as one in which “there was little progress towards a national system of public
education [before 1867]. There were plenty of schools but no general system” (England
XIX Century 135). It was the Reform Bill of 1867 which gave the first real impetus to the
creation of a national system of free and compulsory education. Two years after the
passing of the Bill the Radicals founded the National League in Birmingham. Thus, the
movement towards the implementation of that general system started.

The “Door of Opportunity” Opens

The year 1870 constitutes an important landmark in the history of English
education. A major Education Act was passed then, also known as Forster’s Education Act
after the man who carried the bill and was in charge of education at that time. The
foundations of a national system of education were laid by this Act since it made
provisions for the setting up of elementary schools at public expense. This Act divided the
country in school districts, based on the boroughs and parishes. In the districts where there
were enough church schools, these were not replaced. But where there were no church
schools or they were insufficient for the task, then the rate payers were to elect a school
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board which was to set up schools. The new schools would be paid for partly by grants
from the government, partly out of local rates, and a fee was also fixed. The existing
church schools would continue to be aided by the government.
Later acts of Parliament extended elementary education. In 1880 attendance was
made compulsory for all children under the age of 12. Attempts to raise the school-leaving
age further than 12 had been impossible due to the insufficient number of schools. In 1891
education was made free.
The 1880 and 1891 Acts also meant very important steps forward in education
because they “opened the door of opportunity” (Jarman 24). There were at last schools for
almost all children, who now had access to the basic educational skills and the rudiments
of knowledge.
The Reform Bill of 1867 played a leading role here. English workers now had the
vote. Therefore, the idea that “we must educate our masters” spread. An extended franchise
demanded a better educated electorate which, in turn, made further extensions of the
franchise feasible. Besides, the development of industrial Britain was making it essential
for all to have a minimum of education. People could no longer live and work effectively
without it. Schools were no longer a luxury; they became a necessity. William Forster
summarised the idea:

Upon the speedy provision of elementary education depends our national prosperity. It
is of no use trying to give technical teaching to our artisans without elementary
education; uneducated labourers –and many of our labourers are utterly uneducated- are
for the most part, unskilled labourers , and if we leave our workfolk any longer
unskilled notwithstanding their strong sinews and determined energy, they will become
over-matched in the competition of the world.... If we are to hold our position among
men of our own race or among the nations of the world we must make up the smallness
of our numbers by increasing the intellectual force of the individual. (Young 34)

This need for education was growing and becoming clearer due to the fact the
England had to face competition from other countries. Germany had much better schools.
Prussian victories in war spoke very well for the German system of education. In 1867, a
British manufacturer who had visited Germany pointed out that education was giving that
country the advantage over Britain:

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 The education of Germany is the result of a national organisation which compels every
peasant to send his children to school, and afterwards affords the opportunity of
acquiring such technical knowledge as may be useful in the department of industry to
which they are destined... If we continue to fight with our present voluntary system we
shall be defeated. (Jarman 69)

Until 1899 all educational matters had been under the charge of the Vice-President
of the Privy Council, the government body that supervised public services. The
Department of Education was part of the Privy Council. In 1899 the former split away
from the latter and became the Board of Education. Its head was a member of government
who was appointed as President of the Board. By making education an independent aspect
in the policy of government, the British were reflecting their awareness of the importance
of education in their every day life and activities.

XX CENTURY: POST-PRIMARY EDUCATION

The Introduction of Secondary Schools

At the beginning of our century, England still lagged behind Germany and France
for the government had not provided schools supplying the next stage in education. It was
this need which was met with the passing of the Education Act in 1902. This Act -also
known as Balfour’s Education Act after the then Prime Minister- made provisions for the
setting up of secondary schools. These were to be paid for, as in the case of elementary
schools, out of local rates with the help of grants from the central government and a fee. At
the same time, the Act did a lot to simplify the very complicated system of educational
administration. The School Boards which had been created in 1870 were now abolished
and their functions transferred to the new local authorities: the County Councils and the
County Borough Councils. Thus, the local authorities would control both elementary and
secondary education, they would use the rates to maintain the voluntary schools as well,
and they would have a large measure of control over them.
The Act was the cause of bitter political and religious conflict. Inside Parliament,
the Bill was attacked by the liberal Lloyd George. Outside Parliament, Non-Conformists
protested against it because the rates were now to be used to support Church of England

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elementary schools as well as local authority schools. Non-Conformists urged passive
resistance and some individuals refused to pay rates. However, nothing came of this
opposition and, after the Liberal victory of 1906, the government failed –due to House of
Lords’ opposition- to pass a new bill of their own.
The Balfour Act was indeed of utmost importance as the second great step in the
process of the democratisation of education. It brought into existence what was known as
the “educational ladder”: it was now possible for the clever child of poor parents to pass
from the elementary school –which was free- to the secondary school by winning a
scholarship or free place, and to go on from there, by means of scholarships or grants, to
the universities.
In 1918, a new Education Act brought some overdue improvements to the system in
England and Wales. By the so-called Fisher Education Act (H.A.L. Fisher was President of
the Board of Education at that time) fees at elementary schools were completely abolished
(a charge of a few pennies a week had remained in some places) and the school-leaving
age was fixed at 14 in order to put en end to the abusive business of “part-timers” starting
work at 11 or 12. However, this further raising of the leaving age was brought into effect
only in 1921. In addition, local authorities were encouraged to establish nursery schools for
children under the normal school age. But very few actually did this and by 1920 there
were only twenty nursery schools in the whole country. Local authorities were also asked
to provide better opportunities for older pupils through day-continuation schools which
would impart additional education up to 16 (Pelling says 18) but, since attendance was not
compulsory, this part of the act was a failure. In its first version, the Fisher Act was more
ambitious since it wanted to extend schooling beyond the age of 14. But the proposal
perished under the “Geddes axe”. Sir Eric Geddes was a member of the government who
had been assigned the task of cutting down on expenses wherever he could: his “axe” fell
mainly on the cost of defence and education.

Schooling in the First Half the XX Century: A Thorny Issue

The typical elementary school in the early years of this century was an all-age
school, taking pupils at the age of 5 or earlier, and keeping them until they reached the
statutory leaving age. Education was free but a large number of children stopped attending
full-time at the age of 12 when they were permitted to go to work part time. This was party
solved by the Fisher Education Act which made attendance compulsory until the age of 14,
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with the aim of raising the leaving age further to 15 as soon as possible. However, as late
as 1936, one of the chief arguments against this project was that the children were needed
in factories. Elementary education was therefore still seen as a kind of education designed
for the children of the working classes (i.e. all modifications were thought out so as to meet
those children’s needs).
By contrast, the system of secondary schools, consolidated after the Balfour
Education Act, was intended for a minority. Whether endowed grammar schools –which
now received grants of public money-, or the new schools established and fully maintained
by local authorities, these schools were linked with the universities (both ancient and
modern) rather than with elementary schools. They recruited children at 7 or 8 into their
preparatory department. From there, pupils simply passed up the school, where they stayed
until 15 or over. These schools charged fees and provided a parallel system of education
only tenuously connected with the basic elementary system. After the Liberals won the
elections in 1906, the government lay down as a condition of making grants of public
money that 25% of places had to be set as “free places” for entrants from the “public
elementary schools”. From this provision stemmed what was then called “the scholarship”,
and later “the eleven plus” examination. Notwithstanding this innovation, only a small
proportion of elementary school children could get through the filter of the “scholarship”
which became increasingly competitive.
In due course, a clear differentiation between types of schools built into the national
system as it developed to cover the secondary stage. This was to influence all subsequent
education for all, a demand that began to be clearly advanced after the First World War.
On the one hand, some of those who wished to see the schooling of the majority
extended did not necessarily consider it desirable for all to go to a secondary school of the
existing type, with an academic curriculum largely dictated by university requirements.
Different forms of secondary school seemed more desirable to them, both from the point of
view of social needs and the welfare of the children. On the other hand, some saw the
dangers of further differentiation and called for a unified secondary school, incorporating a
variety of forms of education. This unified school later became known as the
“multinational” or “many-sided” school.
The keynote of the interwar period was the development of different types of
secondary schools –for children over 11- and, together with this, the development of
methods of differentiating between children within each type of school, a process known as
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”streaming”. There were usually three streams –A, B and C- for each age-group. Each
stream learned at a speed suitable to the children placed in it so that bright students were
not held back by slow ones, and the pace of the slower was adapted to their capacity.
In these years between the two World Wars, it became clear that some
reorganisation of education for children over the age of 11 was urgent. The Consultative
Committee to the Board of Education was therefore asked to report on the organisation,
objectives and curriculum of courses of study suitable for children who would remain at
school until 15. The result of this was the Hadow Report of 1926 (named after the
Committee’s Chairman). The report condemned the one-school system and recommended
that, at the age of 11, children should be sorted out and sent to either secondary, i.e.
grammar-type schools –following a predominantly literary or scientific curriculum-; or to
senior elementary schools. In some areas there were also central schools which were half-
way between the other two types. By 1939, most authorities had reorganised elementary
education into two main stages: primary or elementary, and post-primary or secondary for
children over 11.
The main importance of the Hadow Report lay in the fact that it recommended the
break at 11. “By that age”, the Committee argued, “children have given some indication of
difference in interest and abilities sufficient to make it possible and desirable to cater for
them by means of schools of varying types but which have, nevertheless, a broad common
foundation”. They went on to say:

We regard the general recognition that the aim of educational policy must be, not
merely to select a minority of children for the second stage, but to secure that the second
stage is sufficiently elastic, and contains schools of sufficient variety of type, to meet
the needs of all children, as one of the most notable advances. Thus all go forward,
though along different paths. Selection by differentiation takes the place of selection by
elimination. (Rubinstein and Simon 9)

At the same time, some organs –mainly the London County Council- advocated a
new kind of secondary school, multilateral in character (later on to adopt the American
term “comprehensive”, used for the single secondary school). Hence, a Consultative
Committee was again asked to report on secondary schools. The result was the Spens
Report, issued in 1938, which stated that “equality of opportunity does not mean that all
children should receive the same form of education. At the secondary stage there must be
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ample variety of educational opportunity” (Rubinstein and Simon 16). Thus, it
recommended that secondary education should be provided in three types of schools. This
tripartite system included: the grammar school (a term now introduced anew), the technical
school (derived from the junior technical schools started in 1912) and the modern school
(for the bulk of pupils). The Trades Union Conference answered to the report very
categorically:

The separation of the three types of school is ... bound to perpetuate the classification of
children into industrial as well as social strata ... So long as this stratification of children
at the age of eleven remains, it is, in practice, useless to talk of parity in education or
equality of opportunity in later life. (Rubinstein and Simon 18)

In 1941, the Board of Education became the Ministry of Education, and as from
that year – a most critical point in the early stages of the war- preparations were made for a
new and far reaching Education Act. It is important to notice that, during our century, no
great Act of Parliament affecting education has been passed in an era of peace; the Act of
1902 followed on the Boer War, that of 1918 was passed in the closing stages of the Great
War, while the 1944 Act was passed in the last year of the Second World War. There are
two reasons that account for this apparently contradictory fact. One is that in wartime
aspirations are heightened and, as the whole population is involved, and there is to this
extent equality of sacrifice, there is therefore much wider awareness of the justice of
providing equality of opportunity. If maximum effort during the war is to be maintained,
then it must seem worth that effort in terms of what the country will offer its people in the
future, and so governments are stimulated to work out plans. The other reason is that in
wartime there is often rapid scientific and industrial change, so that the need for
educational change is seen in a new light, while the objections of those who disapprove of
excessive expenditure are correspondingly lessened.
With the formation of the National (Coalition) government in 1940, Labour and
Liberal ministers entered the government alongside the Conservatives. The Labour Party,
thus, spoke with a new authority when, at its annual conference in 1942, it gave official
party support to the multilateral school: “We advocate the application of the common
school principle. We believe that it is sound that every child in the state should go to the
same kind of school” (Rubinstein and Simon 24). The TUC lent its support proposing that
the Board of Education should “undertake really substantial experiments in the way of
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multilateral schools” (Rubinstein and Simon 24). Other organisations which also stressed
this point were the Society of Friends, the English New Educational Fellowship –an
influential organisation of progressive educationists-, the London County Council and
some Welsh County Councils.
A new report was drawn up in 1943 on “Curriculum and Examinations in
Secondary Schools”, this time by a special committee of the Secondary Schools
Examinations Council under the chairmanship of Sir Cyril Norwood, former headmaster of
Harrow. The educational system, the report stated, had “thrown up” three “rough
groupings” of children with different “types of mind”:
1- the pupil who is interested in learning for its own sake, and can follow a piece of
connected reasoning,
2- the pupil whose interests and abilities lie in the field of applied science or applied art,
3- the pupil who deals more easily with concrete things than with ideas, i.e. abstractions
mean nothing to him.
For these three groups of pupils three different types of secondary schools were needed
–grammar, technical and modern. The content of the report meant theoretical support of a
new kind for the official Board of Education policy, and the arguments carried
considerable weight.
In that same year –1943-, when severe defeats were being inflicted on the Axis powers
and the end of the war seemed in sight, the government began to turn its attention seriously
to post-war reconstruction. In July 1943 the Board of Education issued a White Paper,
Educational Reconstruction, as the formal preliminary to submitting a bill to Parliament.
This document was rather contradictory because, while it criticised the 11+ as a strong
competitive examination on which not only the pupils’ future schooling but their future
careers depended, it described the future system of secondary education for all as a
tripartite system on the Spens model, which necessarily involved selection (or “allocation”)
at the age of 11. The report spoke of the main types of secondary schools as grammar,
technical and modern. There should be free interchange between different types, however,
and perhaps in certain circumstances, there should be a combination of all on one site or in
one building.
Finally, in 1944, the Butler Education Act was passed. It introduced great changes in
the structure of English Education. Henceforth, schools attended by children under the age
of eleven became to be known as primary schools. The term “elementary” –a very loaded
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one- gave way to a definition of the stages of educational development: primary and
secondary. The latter were exclusively attended by over-elevens. Within primary schools
there were three stages: nursery schools (for ages 2 to 5), infant schools (5 to 7) and junior
schools (7 to 11). Secondary education was established for all children as an integral part
of an educational system which was seen as a continuos process ranging from the primary
school to further or higher education. The school leaving age was raised to 15, though this
was not implemented until 1947. All local authorities (who would have control over both
primary and secondary education) were required to prepare and submit development plans
to the new Ministry of Education which now had power to control and direct the
implementation of educational policies. In other words, the Ministry of Education’s duty
was to provide a comprehensive national system of education.
All matters in the field of education now seemed to be in right order as well as under
due control. However, two weeks before the Education Act passed into law the Local
Education Authority of the London County Council produced its own report proposing the
reorganisation of most of London’s secondary schooling on a unified system of single
schools. The battle was only starting.

How State Education Was Conducted. The Situation after the Second World War
State laws provided a framework within schools operated and the central
government provided a large part of the money, but there was only a fairly loose state
control over the schools throughout the country. The Ministry of Education established
standards to which schools had to conform and it sent out Her Majesty’s Inspectors, who
were officials of the Ministry, to visit and make thorough reports on the work of every
school from time to time. They gave advice to the teachers and suggested new ideas.
However, in every school the headteacher had a great deal of autonomy in deciding what
was to be taught and how the teaching was to be carried on.
The 1944 Education Act did not actually legislate for the divisions of secondary
education –a most controversial issue in previous and later decades. These divisions sprang
from the logic of the Hadow and Spens Reports and had been confirmed by the Norwood
Committee in 1943. In consequence, after the passing of the Act, most local authorities
provided three types of secondary schools:
1- GRAMMMAR SCHOOLS gave a liberal and scientific education up to the age of 18,
preparing students for the General Certificate of Education (which students took at the
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 age of 16 and qualified them for middle-class occupations.), and in some cases for
University entrance. In order to study in these schools children had to pass an
examination –the eleven-plus- consisting partly of intelligence tests, partly of tests of
knowledge. In short, grammar schools were reserved for children who won places at
them by getting high marks in the 11+ exam. Here students were expected to stay at
school at least until the age of 16, and normally to take the GCE Ordinary level
examination. These schools also had “sixth forms” which prepared students for the
Advanced level certificate, the sine-qua-non requisite to enter University. Most
grammar schools were maintained by the Local Education Authorities. A few others
were independent and self-supporting (though not regarded as public schools). Still
others were independent of the local authorities but received direct grants from the
Ministry of Education, and received some pupils who paid fees and some (at least
25%) who did not. Some of these schools were academically among the best in
England.
2- SECONDARY MODERN SCHOOLS gave general education, including some
practical instruction, up to the age of 15. Students prepared for non-professional
occupations. These schools were adapted for the needs of the children of a less
academic disposition. There was streaming within the secondary moderns: A, B and C,
the C stream was for the children of the least academic type, concentrating mainly on
practical work and other activities which could best develop the capacities of the
children who were placed there. Many secondary moderns planned their A stream
teaching so as to lead to the GCE. At a lower level, another exam was implemented. As
from 1965, this was the Certificate of Secondary Education, within the reach of
children leaving school at 15.
3- TECHNICAL SCHOOLS were also provided for by the Act of 1944. These were
schools which provided teaching up to the age of 18, like the grammar schools, but
concentrated on technical subjects. Some of them provided an extended education and
an avenue to the universities. However, these schools were never successful enough
and never really developed to reach the same status as the grammar or the secondary
modern schools.

The Spread of Comprehensive Schools

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 In the fifties of our century, the pressure for entry to the grammar schools
constantly grew, and the system developing was, as Michael Young describes it, “a true
meritocracy of talent”(21). Until the first decades of the XX century, higher education had
been enjoyed by the wrong people. It was too limited and most able working-class children
could not get to university. In the field of education, there was no selection by merit but by
birth. No matter how academically able a child was, his education depended on his father’s
bank account. M. Young quotes pamphlets of the 1930s ridiculing the criterion of success
at the time: “It’s not what you know but who you know that counts” (36). It is a true fact
that the grammar schools had enabled lower class children to climb up the educational
ladder and have a University degree. But there was still a huge mass of wasted academic
ability among the lower classes. The deeply embedded idea of aristocratic tradition had not
been left aside: “By imperceptible degrees an aristocracy of birth [turned] into an
aristocracy of talent” (Young 48). And what was even worse, the future career as well as
the whole life of a person was decided at the age of 11.
Consequently, both the grammar school and the 11+ examination came under
increasing attack on the grounds that they were elitist and deepened class divisions: “Every
selection of one is a rejection of many” (Young 15). The bitterest criticism came from the
London County Council, which, as early as 1947, decided to reorganise on comprehensive
lines. The London School Plan (adopted by the LCC in March 1947) envisaged the
establishment of 103 comprehensives in the following decade. Other counties followed
suit.
The name comprehensive was given to this kind of school because they gather
together in a single institution children of all intellectual levels, instead of segregating them
into academic and practical –or more able and less able- by the eleven-plus examination.
The comprehensives provide a common curriculum for all students up to the age of 13 or
14. Some use the device of streaming within the school; some leave students to choose
among several courses; some others combine the two methods. In this way the
comprehensive schools which were conceived as very large schools providing grammar
streams, technical streams and modern streams for the different types of children.
A few comprehensive schools, however, were established in the 40s. The tripartite
system continued to be dominant, even though this new type of school was taking well-
defined shape. During the 50s comprehensives started growing but some of them brought
new problems. People said they were too big and unfriendly. Some even had a bad
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reputation. The huge schools with big classes easily got out of control when there was not
a strong head. The teachers, whose numbers were swelling, were changing too rapidly,
with too few qualifications and too much freedom to do as they pleased (the powerful
National Union of Teachers protected them from being sacked for incompetence). The new
schools needed stability and time, but the hectic changes and turnover of teachers –
particularly in big cities- constantly demoralised them.
In January 1965 the Labour government began a policy of actively encouraging
comprehensive secondary schools with the aim of catering for children of all abilities. In
1964 the former Ministry had been transformed into the Department for Education and
Science. In that year, the new Secretary of State for Education and Science, Michael
Stewart, outlined the intentions of the Labour government in the House of Commons. In
July 1965, Circular 10/65 was issued to all local authorities declaring the government’s
intention “to end selection at eleven-plus and to eliminate separatism in secondary schools”
(Rubinstein and Simon 24). Local authorities were asked to submit, within a year, plans for
reorganisation on comprehensive lines. Anthony Crosland, then Secretary of State, was
responsible for the introduction of such big change.
This pressure towards comprehensives came not just from Labour. In every
constituency parents were furious when their children were not selected. As one
headmaster put it: “No one wants to agree to a set of standards which they know excludes
their own child” (Sampson 136). No ambitious parent who paid taxes within a democracy
would be ready to tolerate the demotion of his child at the age of 11, which was not only
wasteful but also inequitable.
Despite the changes of government, the number of comprehensive schools grew
rapidly. While in 1965 less than one child in ten in England and Wales attended them, by
1979 the proportion had climbed to more than four in five. Within comprehensives,
traditional subjects such as Classics gave way to new ones such as Liberal or Social
Studies, while at all levels of education formal methods of teaching were giving way to
informal ones. The old master-student relationship was left aside and a new attitude was
adopted in which students were encouraged to find out things for themselves. Students
found out about art, maths, life, etc., all through experiments and experiences, through
examples and discoveries.
At present, although almost all state secondary schools are comprehensive, the
equalising purpose has not yet been achieved. Moreover, while some people admit that the
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comprehensive does do something for the 80% of pupils that within the former system
would have had to attend a secondary modern, it tends to have a levelling effect, thus
bringing down the 20% that would have attended a grammar school under the previous
scheme. This is one of the reasons why at the moment there is a very fruitful debate going
on in Britain about what education is and in what way is being administered.
But what happened to the grammar schools? In the 1960s and 1970s, politicians
could no longer justify subsidising this kind of élite as the movements towards
comprehensives gathered weight. The Donnison Report was drawn up in 1970 to the
Labour government. Its conclusions stated: “Grammar schools of the traditional type
cannot be combined with a comprehensive system of education…We must choose what we
want. Fee-paying is not compatible with comprehensive education” (Sampson 136).
Finally, in 1976, when Labour returned to power, the government decided to withdraw the
direct grants from grammar schools. They had to choose whether to convert themselves
into comprehensives or to become full fee-paying (independent) schools. Many of them
chose the second course, and there followed the most ironic consequence of reform: there
were now more fee-paying schools than ever before, while the ladders by which poorer
children had climbed to success were completely suppressed. Many parents who had
longed to see British class divisions eroded at this formative stage now saw that the
reforms apparently widened the divide, without the traditional bridge of the grammar
schools.

What Has Recently Been Done

Since the rise of the Conservatives to power under the leadership of Margaret
Thatcher, some big and important changes have taken place in the field of education. One
of these changes is the attempt to reintroduce grammar schools in some Conservative
areas. There is a tendency now to concentrate on brighter students and people seem to have
some sympathy for these views since they have voted the Conservatives for 15 years now.
In 1988, a most important Education Act was passed as part of Mrs. Thatcher’s
policy of “rolling back the frontiers of Socialism” (L’Strange). What the Conservative
government is trying to do through this act is to bring education more under the control of
the central government and less under the influence of the local authorities of the different
areas. The idea is to remove power from local authorities, always closely associated with
the Labour Party. And they are doing this by means of three sets of measures:
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 1- LOCAL MANAGEMENT OF SCHOOLS: An individual school can take control
of its operations, particularly as regards budget. Headteachers are in charge not
only of the academic part but also of the money and decision on resources, e.g.
building and objects in general. This LMS includes the management of people as
well, i.e. the headteacher also decides upon salaries.
How much does the school get from the government? For each pupil, the
government gives the school £ 1,280 for the year. This means that the more pupils a
school has, the more money it will get from the government (this money-per-pupil
allocation is called ‘capitation’). Consequently, each school has to present itself in
the area as a good school and thus attract the greatest number of students. There is
competition among schools of the same area and thus the standards are raised.
2- ABILITY OF SCHOOLS TO OPT OUT OF THE LEA: The government is
offering money to any school that wants to take itself out of the Local Education
Authorities. This has to be done with the agreement of the parents and the teachers
of the school. They opt out of local control and become under central control. Thus,
the educational system becomes more centralised. Before the elections of 1992, out
of 24,000 schools, only 200 had chosen to opt out the LEA. Two months after the
elections, 2,000 had already applied and many others were in the process of
applying. Apparently, these new developments are going to be very beneficial to
the schools and to education in general.
3- THE NATIONAL CURRICULUM: Until 1988, the only compulsory subject had
been Religious Education. After that year, the National Curriculum contained a
number of core subjects and a number of optional ones. The former, which are an
essential part of every school’s curriculum, are Mathematics, English, Science and
a Foreign Language. The latter group includes a number of subjects from which the
student can choose a certain number. Some of them are: History, Geography,
Religion, Social studies, etc.
All these changes seem to reflect the British understanding that, in the words of
Hugh L’Strange, “education is the key to the future of a country”. And no country, big or
small, rich or poor, should be in a position to ignore this. Despite the recent government
cuts upon the education budget, the British seem to have finally taken in Benjamin
Disraeli’s words: “Upon the education of the people of this country, the fate of this country
depends”.
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PRIVATE EDUCATION

21
 THE ENGLISH PUBLIC SCHOOL

A Short Historical Sketch

The foundation of public schools in England occurred together with the

introduction of Christianity. The first of them was founded by St. Augustine and is known
as the King’s School in Canterbury.
In those times, education was essentially in the hands of the Church, and these
schools were taught not by monks, but by the secular clergy. They arose, broadly speaking,
at any place of considerable importance where there was a cathedral or a collegiate church.
They grew up inn large numbers in Anglo-Saxon times, and even the Danes founded them.
Canute is said to have instituted “publicas scolas” in cities and towns, given them masters
at the cost of the State, and sent them “boys of good promise to be taught grammar”
(Darwin 6). At the end of the XII and beginnings of the XIII century, the government of
many of these schools passed to the monasteries, but the teaching does not seem to have
been done by monks and the schools remained essentially secular institutions, although the
monastery had the right of appointing the schoolmaster.
The song school was sometimes found united with the grammar school, but what
we know as song and grammar schools should not be considered as a single institution.
They are found side by side in connection with all the great churches of the great centres of
population; however, they were distinct foundations, completely differentiated in function
as they were in their teaching and generally in their government. The song schools were
entirely professional for those who performed the services in cathedral or church, and to
some extent, they seem also to have played the part of elementary schools. A grammar
school, on the other hand, was a school which taught Latin and Literature.
Who attended the grammar schools? In a general way, everyone did. Among the
upper classes, the elder sons who were to be knights and squires did not go, as a rule, but
their younger brothers did. At the other end of the scale villeins were, in theory, not
allowed, but select villeins were, in fact, admitted. However, when King Henry VI founded
Eton in 1440, he thought it worthwhile to forbid their admission.
It was another rule, theoretical rather than practical, that education at these schools
should be free. In fact, there were usually some fees since original endowments were
becoming too small. Apart from this, rich parents had a habit of “tipping” the
schoolmaster, which also contributed to the up-keeping of the school.
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William of Wykeham founded Winchester in 1382. This founding marked a new
development, because Winchester may be called the first school-college. Wykeham had
already run some sort of school at Winchester for some years. Now, however, he
conceived the far bigger plan of founding simultaneously New College at Oxford and a
grammar school at Winchester, separate and yet allied to it, which should feed Oxford
College with scholars.
Later on, Henry VI decided to do the same for Cambridge, by founding King’s
College and Eton in 1440. He not only adopted Wykeham’s idea, but very largely the form
of his statutes.
The period of the dissolution of the monasteries marks another era in the history of
schools. The endowments of schools under the control of the monasteries were included in
the confiscation of the monasteries themselves, so that many ancient schools fell upon hard
times and either ceased to exist or struggled on in a greatly reduced state until revived later
by new endowments.
Elizabeth I’s reign is credited with the foundation of a large number of schools but
many of these “Elizabethan” schools were, in fact, much more ancient and had never
entirely disappeared. The innovation here was that the schools were now founded and
endowed not by a royal founder or by some one benefactor, but by a body of benefactors
or, as one author says, by “joint-stock enterprise”.
The Commonwealth encouraged schools, though it temporarily destroyed the
Church’s hold on them. The Restoration brought back the power of the Church, now
increased and strengthened. By the XVIII century, some of these schools had gained
prestige over others and now began to flourish. The well-to-do began to desert their local
grammar school and, travelling having become easier, they went to schools farther from
their homes. They went to Eton, Harrow, Winchester, Westminster, Charterhouse or
Rugby.
Again, the middle of the XIX century was a time of unexampled expansion. To that
period belongs the founding of a number of schools which today are – and have been for a
long time – both famous and prosperous:
School Foundation
Marlborough
Cheltenham
Radley 1840s
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 School Foundation
Lansing
Rossall 1840s

Wellington
Bradfield 1850s

Clifton
Malvern 1860s

This sudden impulse to the founding of schools was due to two factors mainly.
Again, the greater ease for communication contributed to this. What the improvements of
roads or coaches had done in earlier times, was now more markedly done by railways. The
other factor was certainly the springing up of a general admiration among parents of the
upper middle-class for what is known as the public schools spirit. These Victorian public
schools were used to remove the sons of tradesmen from the taint of trade. And G.K.
Chesterton said about this: “The public schools are not for the sons of gentlemen, they are
for the fathers of gentlemen” (Sampson 140).
In the XX century, public schools enjoyed renewed prestige and power. But before
looking into this period, the way in which these schools are run should be briefly
explained.

How Education is Conducted at Public Schools

Children’s education starts at preparatory (prep) schools at the age of 7. The
preparatory schools are mostly private in the fullest sense, and are operated as private
enterprises as if they were shops or factories. Such a school is often the property of its
headmaster, who is not controlled by any governing body, but works as an independent
businessman. These preps prepare children for public schools’ Common Entrance
Examination and for public school life. The schools in the state system do not prepare boys
for the public schools’ entrance exam, so a boy who tried to change from the state system
to the independent school system at 13 would find difficulty in adapting himself to the
change of curriculum.

24
 Pupils stay at preps until the age of 13. Some of these schools are closely attached
to particular public schools. The word “public” was used to refer to the fact that the boys
who attended these schools were not educated privately but in a place under public
management or control. The word has come down to the present to produce a real paradox:
a public school today in England is a very exclusive and very private educational
institution for the very few. The income of these schools is partly from gifts and
endowments, and mainly from fees paid by parents. In general, these are boarding schools
– i.e. they provide residential accommodation for their pupils – though many of them take
some day-students as well. Each school has a board of governors separately constituted,
who control the finances and appoint the headmaster who, in his turn, appoints the other
teachers. The school is regularly inspected by the inspectors of the Department of
Education and Science, but otherwise it is quite independent.

Public Schools in the XX Century: New Strength

In our century, especially after the Second World War, public schools had to
overcome several difficulties based on opposition and criticism. However, they seem to
have gained new strength in the course of time, surviving every attempt to reform or
abolish them.
In the 1940s, the general feeling was that public schools were hardening social
distinctions. Hence, the Fleming Report was passed which proposed that public schools
should allocate one fourth of their places free to the state primary school. However, despite
the general feeling against public schools’ elitism, the plan did not prosper.
In 1965, the Secretary of State for Education and Science asked Sir John Newsom
to head a commission in order to find ways to integrate into the state system the
independent boarding schools. The Newsom report recommended that local authorities
should assist half the pupils going to public schools, but local authorities as well as
headmasters resisted the scheme. The Labour government taxed public schools heavily and
due to this fact the fees soared. Many people thought that middle-class penury as well as
competition from grammar schools would gradually cause the public schools to weaken
and finally disappear. But parents still found the money to pay the increasing fees, and the
expansion of comprehensives – with the consequent disillusion over them – increased the
attraction.

25
 In 1963, the Headmasters’ Conference, the club of 200 heads, started their own
magazine, Conference, to counteract the damaging impressions given by critics on public
school education. In the late 1960s the headmasters hired a full-time Public Relations firm,
and by 1972 they had formed the Independent Schools Information Service which became
their lobbying organisation. In the early 1970s the headmasters were told that the Labour
Party would abolish their schools. The headmasters now formed their own committee,
“carefully not calling themselves ‘public schools’, with the associations of snobbery and
privilege, but ‘independent schools’ which sounded like independent television, free and
democratic” (Sampson 138).
Other important events brought about remarkable changes to public schools. The
university students’ revolts in 1968 and 1969 led students to hate their headmasters and
prefects whom they associated with figures of military discipline. These crises prepared the
way for important changes: in the 70s nearly all schools abolished beating and most
fagging, and many headmasters relaxed relationships with their students. Several
headmasters introduced girls into their sixth forms. Sampson concludes: “The schoolboys
revolt had indirectly done more than headmasters or governments to reform the old public
schools – and to strengthen them for the competition to come” (139).
The 1970s was a period of new strength and self-assurance for public schools.
When the old grammar schools disappeared, the public schools found a new vacuum to fill.
Many of them would have gone bankrupt if the grammar schools had remained.
Applications for entry to public schools increased, while many former grammar schools
joined their status as full fee-paying schools. Now the top schools competed more
ruthlessly in order to attract clever students and get them into Oxbridge. They would no
longer admit the children of any old boy, not even those of a cabinet minister. M. Young’s
idea of the meritocracy with the grammar school at the top was torn to pieces. The
grammar schools had been swept away by the comprehensives which became the only
roads to the top for most children. It was the public schools which became the new
meritocracy and competed much more systematically for Oxford and Cambridge. As from
1979, with the Conservative Administration and the lowering of tax-rates, public schools
have been secure against changes. Their future seems to be one of stability and
permanence of their tradition.
The old English public schools constitute one of the clearest examples of
continuous British institutions. Although at present they are rivalled by newer foundations,
26
the so-called “Clarendon Schools” retain a disproportionate influence. They are nine in all
and were all founded before the mid-seventeenth century:
School Foundation
Winchester 1382
Eton 1440
St. Paul’s 1509
Shrewsbury 1552
Westminster 1560
Merchant Taylors’ 1561
Rugby 1567
Harrow 1571
Charterhouse 1611

But these schools are not what they used to be when they were founded. They have
adapted to modern times. They are now more artistic, more interested in science and
engineering, but also much more competitive with each other in their training for A-levels
and university entrance, which cuts them off from the rest of the school system. John Rae,
the author of The Public School Revolution, justifies this phenomenon as follows:

The public schools used to be anti-elite, but they are now quite elitist. The basic problem
is social justice – yet you need injustice to achieve long-term ends. The biggest damage
we do is to perpetuate a class division. But it may be the price we have to pay for
excellence. (Sampson 141)

Although Labour leaders as well as Social Democrat leaders advocate drastic

reform and even the abolition of public schools, the words of Peter Bromhead in the 1960s
still hold true:

What is the place of the public school in English education? Why are they so successful,
both in having such an excessive number of applicants for their limited places, and in
seeing so many of their former pupils claiming the leading positions in so many of the
departments of the nation’s life? The crude answer is: because English society is what it
is, and the public schools are part of it. To be successful in life it is useful to be the kind

27
of person who fits in readily with those who are already at the top. Public schools help
you to be that kind of person. (1991 ed., 78-9)

28
THE UNIVERSITIES

29
 THE TRADITION OF OXFORD AND CAMBRIDGE

There are no state universities in Britain; each one of the universities has its own
independent government. From the state they receive charters which define their status and
give them the power to grant degrees. The intermediary between the universities and the
Treasury is the University Grants Committee. Every five years the Treasury tells the UGC
how much money it intends to make available to the universities in the next five-year
period.
There are now around twenty-five universities in England, one in Wales, five in
Scotland and one in Northern Ireland. However, England had no other universities apart
from Oxford and Cambridge until the XIX century. The two traditional universities date
from the early Middle Ages, from the XII and XIII centuries.
A unique characteristic of Oxford and Cambridge is their collegiate system. Both of
them are made up of different colleges – like small independent universities – which are
parallel and equal institutions, but none of them is connected with any particular field of
study. No matter what subject a person proposes to study, he may study at any of the
colleges, and he will remain a member of the same college until he graduates. Therefore,
the university is a sort of federation of colleges. Its effective head is the Vice-Chancellor.
The university prescribes syllabuses, arranges lectures, conducts examinations and awards
degrees. Each college is governed by its Fellows, of whom there are about thirty (one
every ten students approx.). They are responsible for teaching their own students through
the tutorial system, i.e. a scheme of individual tuition organised by the colleges. The
Fellows elect the head of the college, whose title varies from college to college: Master,
President, Rector, Provost, Principal. Other teachers do not teach through the tutorial
system but through lectures and they are called Dons.
Admission is only through colleges and each sets a limit to the number of
undergraduates it can take each year. They take note of the marks the applicants have
obtained in the General Certificate Examinations, and they call them up for interview and
subject many of them to special written examinations of their own. The tests are also used
for allocating scholarships. The allocation of scholarships is possible because the colleges
are supported partly by endowments (some of them are big owners of property), partly by
fees paid by the students, many of whom get the money from public authorities.

30
 Although both universities offer training in almost every field of study, Cambridge
is more developed than Oxford in scientific studies, whereas the latter is more developed in
the field of business. In any case, both have adapted to modern times, and now meet the
wide range of interest of applicants.

PROVINCIAL UNIVERSITIES

The first English university to be founded after Oxford and Cambridge was Durham
in 1832. The University of London was given a charter in 1836. All along the last century,
institutions of higher education were founded in most of the big industrial towns and in a
few other centres. For some time they could not give degrees themselves, but prepared
students for the London University examinations. They were called “university colleges”
because they were not universities in their own right. Their purpose was to provide higher
education for people who could not afford the cost of going away from home for their
studies. One by one these colleges, as they grew bigger and more solidly established, were
given charters and became independent universities. All of them have now achieved
independent status, some only since the 1940s and the 1960s. Today, there are established
universities in London, Durham, Manchester, Liverpool, Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield,
Bristol, Reading, Nottingham, Leicester, Southampton, Exeter, Hull and Newcastle upon
Tyne. These go by the name of “Redbrick” universities (although the term has now fallen
into disuse) to distinguish the provincial civic universities of the period 1850 – 1930 –as
well as London- from “Oxbridge”.
In 1949, a new university institution was founded at Keels, Staffordshire. Later on,
the early 60s produced a number of completely new foundations: these were the
universities of York, Lancaster, Sussex, Kent, Warwick, Essex and East Anglia. They were
the product of anew enthusiasm to expand universities in the 60s and 70s with the idea
that, as Lord Robbins put it: “It is not a good thing that Oxford and Cambridge should
attract too high a proportion of the country’s best brains and become more and more
exclusively composed of a certain kind of intellectual élite” (Sampson 147).
Provincial universities first developed with money provided by private donors,
many of whom were local industrialists. Later on, they started receiving most of their
financial needs from the state.

31
 Higher education in Britain also includes colleges of advanced technology, and
medical schools attached to teaching hospitals which, together with education within the
universities, provide training for doctors and dentists. A few of the technical colleges are
getting recognition as schools of technology. Eight of these were given their own charters
in 1966-67. In 1964, a new body was set up: the Council for National Academic Awards
(CNAA). Any college of advanced technology which has developed a course at university
level may apply to it, asking to have the course recognised as a degree-level course in its
own right. In such case the CNAA looks thoroughly at the structure and content of the
courses, the teaching facilities and the proposed system of examinations. If the CNAA is
satisfied, the college may then organised its own syllabuses, teaching and examinations,
and students are then awarded CNAA degrees. Within few years after 1964, thirty colleges
were raised to the newly-invented category of “Polytechnics”. All of these, run by local
councils, were fully established by 1973. The Education Act of 1988 provided for a change
in status of polytechnics. They became independent institutions, with a status similar to
that of universities. They get their funds from fees, grants from government-funded
research councils, public and private sector organisations, endowments and donations. But
the main source of funds is the state. In the future, grant will come through the University
Funding Council or the Polytechnic and Colleges Funding Council.

THE OPEN UNIVERSITY

The Open University developed in the 1970s and was devised to satisfy the needs
of working people of any age who wished to study in their spare time for degrees. It was
the original brainchild of Michael Young, the prophet of the meritocracy. Young’s idea of
a correspondence university was taken up by Harold Wilson and Jennie Lee in the mid-
sixties; it had not started when the Tories returned in 1970, but the new Secretary of State
for Education, Margaret Thatcher, realised that the OU could provide graduates much more
cheaply than conventional universities. So, the OU was set up under a Tory government, in
a brand new setting, in open fields which eventually became the new town of Milton
Keynes, between Oxford and Cambridge.
Anyone can buy the coursebooks by post or from any major bookshop. Their
courses are presented on one of the BBC’s television channels and on the radio. Most
course work is run by part-time tutors who are scattered around the country, and meet the
32
students to discuss their work at regular intervals. There are also short residential summer
courses.
The Open University is an important step forward towards the ideal of education
accessible to everyone who aspires to it, at every level. However, it faces strong
competition from the polytechnics which provide shorter and cheaper courses.

Notwithstanding the emergence of so many universities to cater for everybody’s

tastes and interests, the road to most of the top jobs in Britain remains almost as narrow as
ever. The only serious rival of Oxford and Cambridge as the route to fame and fortune is
the London School of Economics which has extended its influence in the age of economics
and business. However, although some predict that there may be some weakening of the
Oxbridge influence in high places in the future, their graduates are still favourites for those
occupations in which social confidence and smoothness are of utmost importance. They
are also to this age of business hegemony by going into other fields such as accountancy,
banking, insurance, computers and advertising. They still attract and recept a high
proportion of the country’s “best brains”, in Robbins’ words, and it seems that their
stability and continuity at the top of power and prestige will remain unchanged in many
years to come.

33
 BIBLIOGRAPHY

Selected Bibliography:
Bromhead, Peter. Life in Modern Britain. London: Longmans, Green & Co. Ltd., 1968 ed.,
1991 ed.
Darwin, Bernard. The English Public School. London: Longmans, Green & Co. Ltd., 1929.
Davis, Robin. The Grammar School. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books Ltd., 1967.
L’Strange, Hugh. “Politics and Education”. Lecture, 1992.
Rubinstein, David and Brian Simon. The Evolution of the Comprehensive School: 1926-
1966. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969.
Thomson, David. England in the Nineteenth Century. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books
Ltd., 1983.
_______. England in the Twentieth Century. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books Ltd., 1982.
Warner, Rex. English Public Schools. Northampton: Clarke & Sherwell Ltd., 1945.

General Bibliography:
Fraser, Derek. The Evolution of the Welfare State. London: Macmillan Education Ltd.,
1991.
Pelling, Henry. Modern Britain, 1885-1955. London: Sphere Books Ltd., 1969.
Statham, June and D. Mackinnon. The Education Fact File. London: Hodder & Stroughton,
1991.
Unstead, R.J. Britain in the Twentieth Century. London: A & C Black Ltd., 1966.

34