PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS. 771 



expenditure. But great caution is required lest we get too far ahead of current 

 opinion. It will be wise to spare no pains in carrying the mass of the people 

 along with us, and in proving our case to the practical mind of the ratepayer. 

 Things are moving fast. People listen to argument. When educational plans 

 are put before thein, they materially help the expert organiser by their practical 

 criticisms. Many new educational efforts have been started during the last few 

 years. No harm will come from a little slackening of the pace in administrative 

 change. We may be content to watch the outcome of much that has been 

 recently begun. 



We still know too little about what is actually going on in England. The 

 educational magazines have rendered a great service to us in supply ing_ informa- 

 tion, and every year they furnish us with fuller materials for a critical judgment 

 as to what is going forward in a considerable number of schools. The Special 

 Reports of the Board of Education are also a mine of information. But the limits 

 of our exact knowledge of the actual work of English schools are still extra- 

 ordinarily narrow. Too little of scientific value has yet been published about 

 the work of the public elementary schools. And, to turn to another important 

 part of our educational system, if anybody wished to say what the curriculum of 

 all the great Public schools is at the present time, how much time is given in each 

 form to each subject, how many exemptions are allowed, and what kinds and 

 degrees of specialisation are permitted, he simply could not answer the question. 

 He would have to content himself with the details of a few schools, and for the 

 rest to put up with generalities. Thei-e is no adequate published account of what 

 is actually the scheme of work in each of the great English Public schools. The 

 nation is practically in the dark on the subject. We have no materials for 

 accurate and detailed analysis of their present courses of study. One school does not 

 know what another is doing. Parents do not know. The public does not know. 

 And yet great changes have been made, and all manner of new plans are being 

 tried. But there is no proper comparison of results. 



It is much to be desired, therefore, that we should have a fuller record of 

 what is actually going forward in English education of all grades at the present 

 time. And this is a suitable occasion on which to plead for a systematic, periodic 

 series of physical measurements of children in all schools. Such a series of 

 measurements will form the only sound basis for generalisations as to the 

 physical improvement or retrogression of the community. But, besides this, we 

 need something like an inventory of present educational effort in England, 

 intelligently written, and with a careful examination of its bearing upon the 

 economic and social needs of the nation. We welcome in this connection the 

 recent decision of the Board of Education to entrust his Majesty's inspectors 

 with the new duty of taking wide surveys of educational work, and of_ considering 

 the relation of what is done in schools to the needs of the communities in which 

 the schools are situated. But is it too much to hope that from time to time the 

 central authority will publish these reports and surveys, and that every teacher 

 and every member of a local authority will be able to receive regularly, without 

 trouble and without payment, each new number of the series from headquarters ? 

 We need much more cross-fertilisation of educational ideas. We have much to 

 learn from the freedom with which the American Bureau of Education issues, 

 without charge and abundantly, information to all who ask for it. The great 

 thing is that we should not have things forced upon us by the central authority, 

 but that we should do them willingly and gladly in our own way ; and we are 

 far more likely to do that if we are continuously thinking of the matter and refresh- 

 ing and stimulating our minds by a knowledge of what has been actually accom- 

 plished in our own country and in other lands. 



It is clear that we cannot hope to see all the desirable reforms and improve- 

 ments in English education undertaken simultaneously. Financial considerations 

 alone forbid any such ambitious scheme. It will be far better to concentrate en a 

 few things at a time, and to do these thoroughly an^l well. And in selecting the 

 parts of the problem upon which effort should thus be first concentrated, will it 

 not be wise to look to the growing points in English education as we find it 



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