University and Educational Intelligence

Abstract

IN “A Forgotten Chapter in the History of Educa tion,” referring especially to the important report of the Consultative Committee on Examinations in Secondary Schools, issued in 1911, Mr. J. S. Thorn ton pleads earnestly the case of the College of Pre ceptors, a union essentially of the private schools, as the originator and sustainer of a system of leaving examinations which has not only been the inspirer of the Local Examinations instituted by the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, but has also helped mate rially in making them efficient. To quote his own words, the College “was the poor inventor; the Univer sities, by their capital and prestige, have worked the invention for all it is worth. College and University have done together what neither of them could have done separately.” So he urges that, rather than setup some other system, the State should more fully utilise the services of both bodies. But Mr. Thornton's pamphlet is much more than an apologia of the Col lege of Preceptors; it is really a fervent plea for the full recognition by the State of the private school master and the private school, even to the extent of adequate financial aid. In support of such a policy he adduces the example of Scandinavian countries, and claims that the extraordinary success it has achieved from the point of view of efficiency, fruitfulness of suggestion, freedom of experiment, excellence of results, and economy in working fully warrants the closest investigation with a view to the recognition by the State under conditions of educational freedom of every kind of efficient and needed school.