L.— EDUCATION. 209 



important its application in detail, ought not to be settled without full 

 knowledge of occupational conditions, prospects and needs. It cannot 

 be said that educational administrators are in as close touch with trade 

 and industry as they would wish to be at this important stage in educational 

 history. We are therefore forced to two conclusions. In the first place, 

 any measures which can be taken to secure the contact which everyone 

 desires should be taken with all possible speed, before the educational 

 position becomes so solidified that any modifications, however desirable, 

 will be extremely difficult, if not impossible, to make. In the second 

 place, local authorities and all others concerned should obtain, so far as 

 is possible, the views of representatives of trade and industry, employers 

 and workers alike, before committing themselves to any reorganisation 

 which might have direct or indirect effects on industrial conditions. The 

 connexion between school arrangements and circumstances of employ- 

 ment are not always apparent at first sight, and too great care cannot he 

 expended in investigating the industrial implication of educational changes.' 

 There is a large question of very general interest which I can state, 

 though I- do not know that I can supply an answer. What is the proper 

 part which formal and external examination should play in our educational 

 courses ? Examinations at the present time play a very large part. 

 In a great many places there is competition and examination for scholar- 

 ships and for free places at the secondary schools ; some four years later 

 there follows the school certificate, theoretically for all. One or two years 

 later follows the higher-certificate examination, and then there are for 

 some all the university and professional examinations in prospect. 

 Entrance to the public schools is obtained by an examination known as 

 the common entrance examination^ which is said in some cases to be 

 competitive, but in all cases involves the reaching by the candidate of 

 a certain definite standard. Competitive examination admits to the 

 Army, Navy, and the Civil Service. The system is so thorough and so 

 universal that the victim, if that is the right word, may never be out of 

 the shadow of an examination from eleven years old to twenty-three, or 

 even later. It is argued, first, that this gives almost inevitably a totally 

 wrong view of knowledge, and makes a boy or a girl from school days on feel 

 that his or her object is not to study a subject, but to acquire the capacity 

 to answer on paper examination questions about it, and that therefore, 

 once examinations are over, he or she learns no more. It is argued, 

 secondly, that the teacher's freedom is destroyed, since he has to teach 

 his subject not in the best way, but in the way which will pay best in the 

 examination, and that the more inspiring, original, and fresh he is in 

 presentment, the less he is likely to succeed on a mechanical system. 

 It is alleged, thirdly, that the system is really unsuccessful, that it picks 

 out for honour those who have the examination faculty and can write 

 fast and to the point, but that, judging by what happens in after-life, it 

 does not really pick the best men and women, and those who will go 

 furthest in their study. 



There is a certain amount of truth, but a good deal of unreasonableness 

 and lack of practical common sense, in all this attack which is so frequently 

 made to-day. My own profession, the schoolmasters, are not inconsistent, 

 though the schoolmistresses dispute the palm with them, for they insist 



1928 ? 



