This chapter looks at the effect which the 1902 Education Act had on the schools and on the lives of girls in Luton. Some of the curriculum changes offered a genuinely wider concept of education, an attempt to shift the emphasis ‘from mere instruction to education’1 and a desire to stimulate children as individuals whose physical and mental needs must be met. Others, however, were based on an ideology which thought of girls primarily as potential wives and mothers and presented a challenge to a town where women had, for many years, been an accepted part of economic life.

External influences were significant: the Boer War activated a concern for the health of the nation, the responsibilities of Empire influenced an ethos of duty and service and the First World War affected the lives of children, particularly with regard to their level of attendance. Another major influence on the working lives of children was the setting up of agencies which gave them advice on their choice of employment. Diana St John, having assessed the experiences of girls educated during this period under the London County Council, identified different approaches to the education of girls. The first of these is that schools came a poor second to the influence of the home. The second approach held that girls’ education should be directed towards their future domestic roles. A third, very negative, attitude tended to ignore girls almost completely. The fourth was more positive, however, and saw girls as ‘pupils in their own right’:

Luton schooling is assessed with these factors in mind.

The 1902 Act

County councils were to be responsible for education, but in Bedfordshire both Bedford and Luton were large enough to be Part III authorities and could therefore control elementary education within their boroughs. As far as Luton was concerned the changes meant that the Luton Education Committee (LEC) supervised the town's elementary schools while the Bedfordshire Education Committee (BEC) controlled secondary education and also assumed responsibility for the schools in the hamlets.