Keith Hudson wrote:
>
> Hi Tor,
>
> At 02:07 13/08/00 +0200, you wrote:
> >Keith Hudson wrote:
> >
> >
> >> My last paragraph to Tom Walker really summarises the point I was really
> >> trying to make -- that the English educational system, fee-paying though it
> >> was, was already comprehensive enough in the 1870s that it didn't need
> >> rescuing by the State (for the sake of economic productivity and national
> >> pride more than anything else).
> >>
> >
> >
> >According to Roy Strong did the government not do too much but not
> >enough to develop the educational system.
>
> Well, that's a matter of opinion, isn't it? I can't prove that if the
> government had kept out of it then the school system would be be better.
This has been discussed about other times too.
I was looking at Alan G. R. Smith's book "The Emergence of a Nation
State - The Commonwelth of England 1529-1660" Second edition of 1997.
And there, at page 198:
"The old view of the disastrous role of the State in education in the
sixteenth century was put forward long ago by A. F. Leach, who believed
that many of the schools which existed at the time of the Reformation
were dissolved or impoverished after the dissolution of the chantries in
1547. His ideas are no longer tenable. It is clear that during and after
the reign of Edward VI, when the chantry act was passed, steps were
taken by either the State or town corporations to reform and improve the
educational establishment wich existed in 1547."
And the good old days for education may not be 1870, but 1640:
"In fact, in quantitative terms English higher education did not get
back to the level of the 1630s until after the First World War; in 1931
male university entrants formed about 2.3 per cent of their relevant age
group compared with the 2.5 per cent going on to higher education in
1640" (page 197)
But overall litteracy was worse back then than about 1930, of course.
Investigations about how large part of the population was able to write
their own names in the 1640s indicates that at that time male litteracy
was about 30 per cent, and female litteracy was only about 10 per cent.
(page 199)
If we go to Norway it is evident that first after the laws about schools
and education that Norway got in 1889 did Norway get an educational
system that worked. Already between 1730 and 1740 did Norway get the
first laws about schooling for every person, but the system did not work
in lots of parishes. And about 1870 there was municipalities where only
20 per cent of the children went to school, and others where almost
every child went to school. It depended on the local authorities how
much they cared about education for the common child. But by the law of
Education of 1889 things changed. Where I live now illitteracy was
widespread about 1870, I know that lots of people were not able to write
their own names at that time.
What is being discussed in Norway about education now is the standard of
the buildings, many places they are not in shape. They need reparations
and better ventilation. And teachers' wages, which is improving. Things
that takes money.
The quality of education is not the big theme.
--
All the best
Tor F�rde
http://home.sol.no/~torforde/
email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
