Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Portraits
- Acknowledgements
- Sources
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- I The Political Arena
- II An Uneasy Beginning
- III Degrees for Women
- IV The Parliamentary Seat to 1886
- V The University and Secondary Education
- VI Examining and Teaching – the Long and Crooked Road to Compromise
- Appendix
- Index
19 - Training the Teachers: Qualifications and Registration
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 21 March 2023
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of Portraits
- Acknowledgements
- Sources
- Abbreviations
- Introduction
- I The Political Arena
- II An Uneasy Beginning
- III Degrees for Women
- IV The Parliamentary Seat to 1886
- V The University and Secondary Education
- VI Examining and Teaching – the Long and Crooked Road to Compromise
- Appendix
- Index
Summary
With the achievement of a modified Matriculation syllabus, the introduction of inspection of secondary schools, and the admission of women as candidates for degrees, those pushing for an improved education system could concentrate on two last major demands – the acceptance of Education as a subject of University study, and the award, to those who undertook it, of formal qualifications for teaching: and the registration of teachers, which had been promised in Forster’s Bill of 1869, but not achieved a decade later.
The first shot in the campaign (other than the futile attempt by John Robson to have the notion raised in Annual Committee, fifteen years earlier) was aimed directly at the Senate, on 22 May 1877, and was fired by the Heads of the North London Collegiate School and of Cheltenham Ladies’ College – Frances Mary Buss and Dorothea Beale. They, writing for themselves and for fourteen other Head Mistresses of Endowed and Proprietary Schools which shared almost five thousand pupils, memorialised the Senate,
. . . in favour of the establishment by the University of an Examination of Teachers above the grade of Elementary School Teachers, with the view of certifying their professional competency.
The memorial expressed succinctly the argument which was eventually to carry the day:
We believe that, under the present conditions of higher education in England, the offer of any means of professional training will prove quite inadequate to induce those preparing to become higher-grade Teachers, unless they have a prospect of obtaining, through examination by a competent authority, certificates of qualification of sufficient value to ensure to the holders of them a compensating advantage in the competition for educational employment. This can only be done either by the Government or by the Universities. We believe the Universities . . . to be the fittest authority to test the qualification of Teachers intending to give such instruction; and we are of opinion that a Certificate or Diploma given by them would alone command the confidence requisite for currency.
The Senate referred the memorial to the Examinations Committee, but there is no record of any action by the Committee in that or the following session. Ten months later, a letter expressing similar sentiments was sent by the College of Preceptors, and was also referred to the Examinations Committee by the Vice-Chancellor.
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- Information
- The University of London, 1858-1900The Politics of Senate and Convocation, pp. 211 - 218Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2004