the Church desired to carry out some general scheme of education, did the latter attempt to develop and control systems of public schools. tems first generally developed by the German Germany. Thus it happened that state systems of schools Public first developed in Germany; that, as a result, the philanthropic school sysphase of school development was less prominent there because less necessary and was wholly of a supplementary and reformatory nature. In Germany the politico-economic stage of school states development was first reached and most thoroughly carried out. And yet the politico-economic motive, while very definitely announced by Luther (pp. 195-7), came slowly into public acceptance. The first clear recognition of the conception that education. lies at the basis of the economic prosperity, the political power, and the social well-being of a people was, as previously mentioned, by Frederick the Great and other German monarchs of the later eighteenth century. It was not until 1763, at the close of the Seven Years' War, that Frederick could turn his The politica great energies to the subject of education. In his General and economic School Regulations of that year, school attendance was made compulsory, adequate training and compensation for teachers were provided, proper text-books arranged for, methods improved, supervision secured, and religious toleration in education proclaimed. 1 It was not until 1794 that the transition to the new basis was completed. In the school law of that year, which met with prolonged opposition from the clergy and from large portions of the people, a variety of new principles were stated. All public schools and educational institutions were declared to be state institutions. All schools, whether private or not, were to be under the control and supervision of the state. All teachers of the gymnasien and higher schools were to be considered state officers, and the appointment of such teachers 1 See Barnard's German Teachers and Educators, p. 593, for translation of the Regulations in full. motives recognized in late eight eenth and early nineteenth cen turies Developmen of the Prussystem during the sian school eighteenth and nine teenth cen turies Current tend encies in the Prussian school sys tem Develop public school system in France belonged to the state. No person could be excluded from a public school on account of religious belief, nor could a child be compelled to remain for religious instruction contrary to the faith in which he had been brought up. From 1808 to 1811, under von Humboldt and Von Schuckmann, the spirit and conduct of the elementary schools were revolutionized by the introduction of improved methods based upon those of Pestalozzi. General revision of the school laws of Prussia occurred in 1825, 1854, 1872. The tendency of these revisions as well as of subsequent minor changes has been toward the more general support of schools by the central government, with corresponding diminution of support from local and private sources, toward the complete abolition of tuition fees for the elementary schools; toward the centralization of the administration and supervision of schools at the expense of the rights of the local community; toward an improvement of the teaching staff and of the processes of instruction; and toward the complete elimination of ecclesiastical influence. While local pastors are found in the great majority of local school boards, the sentiment of the school as represented by the teaching class is strongly in favor of the elimination of the one remaining form of ecclesiastical control. The point to which other countries must give so much attention - the administration of an effective compulsory school law - has been on account of long experience almost automatically operative in Germany for more than a century. France. Agitation for public education in France began ment of the with the campaign in public opinion against the Jesuits and with their expulsion (1764). Yet at the opening of the Revolution more than half of the men and three-fourths of the women of France could not sign their names. The early Revolutionary Assemblies received many reports on education; the later Conventions passed many laws. But little in the way of execution was accomplished. In 1795 the National Normal School and second Re public in numerous secondary schools, The Central Colleges, were established. Conditions were so chaotic that little was accomplished and this little did not affect the one thing demanded by the Revolutionary sentiment, universal, compulsory, free education. In 1806 was established the University of France, which included in itself, practically as a department of the national government, all secondary and higher education. Both Napoleon and the government of the Restoration neglected elementary education. This was left to religious societies and monitorial schools after the plan of Bell and Lancaster. Public elementary education dates from 1833. At that time Guizot, Origin in th Minister of Public Instruction, proposed and carried into execution a law which established elementary schools of two grades, 1833 primary and grammar, in practically every commune. These offered tuition to the poor without expense; provided religious instruction and reserved to the government the right of appointing teachers and determining their salaries. Primary education was made free in 1881 and compulsory in 1882; the present organic law establishing the most perfect system of centralized and state-controlled schools now in existence dates from 1886. Until very recently, however, Church schools were as numerous and more influential than the non-sectarian state schools. Until Present ten 1882, religious instruction was given in all schools. All private encies schools are required to have the sanction of the state. Since 1901 all religious congregations have been required to obtain authorization and legal recognition in order to carry on educational work. The supplementary legislation of 1903 has practically closed all religious schools. England. --In England, the land of institutional evolution Developm rather than of revolution, this transition to the politico-economic school syst stage has been longest delayed and is yet far from complete. most recer The various philanthropic-religious school societies have been in England enumerated in connection with the movements from which they sprang. As in many localities of the United States, the first public support of education came in the form of grants to these hurch chools since 833 church-school societies. Beginning in 1833, after a long controversy as to whether the government had any right at all to interfere in connection with education, the English government tate aid to continued to grant annually an ever increasing amount to the schools maintained by the National Society and the British and Foreign School Societies. These grants were used chiefly for the erection of schoolhouses and upon condition of the right of government inspection. In practice none but clergymen were appointed inspectors; moreover, schools were required by law to give instruction in religion. As a result of parliamentary grants, teachers' training colleges were opened in connection with these societies in 1841 and 1844. Grants for pupil teachers, for books, for school supplies, were added within a few years. In 1861 the system of distributing these grants according to the number of pupils that had satisfactorily passed the examinations given by government inspectors in specified subjects was adopted. This is the "payment by result" system, which produced a formalizing tendency in the work of the schools and has tate schools only recently been abandoned. The act of 1870 established the first elementary schools organized, supported and supervised by the state. These are the "board schools," controlled by local boards and supported partially by local taxation, which must be at least equal to the government grants. By the law of 1870 compulsory attendance regulations might be adopted by district school boards; but until there were schools, such laws would be superfluous. By the law of 1880 compulsory attendance under ten was provided for; by that of 1899 the age was raised to twelve, and by that of 1900 the local boards were permitted to raise the age limit to fourteen. These two systems of state or "board schools" and church or "voluntary schools' remained side by side until 1903. nce 1870 In 1902 there were 5878 board schools with 38,395 teachers, to 14,275 voluntary schools with 29,283 teachers. The law of 1903 gave support to the voluntary or church schools from the local rates and thus unified the system. The opposition of the English people to such compulsory state support of church schools pre- Present tend cipitated a violent political conflict and largely contributed to encies in the overthrow of the conservative government responsible for education the law. In 1906 a bill was introduced providing for local political control of all schools, with minority representation for the ecclesiastical organizations contributing a part of the school support for denominational religious teaching in schools where three-fourths of the patrons demand it, and for unsectarian religious instruction in all schools. Public schoc system in New England dates from the seventeenth The United States. Early Free Schools. Many of the early New England schools received their support from a variety of sources, such as the sale or rental of public lands, rental from fish weirs, from ferries, from bequest and private gift, from subscription, from local rates, and in nearly all cases from tuition century of students. Wherever in the colonies it was customary for the local or colonial government to assist schools by grants or by taxes, it was also customary for the schoolmaster to supplement this small allowance by tuition charges regulated for the most part by common custom. As the schools established by the towns required some previous training on the part of those entering them, usually the knowledge of the alphabet or the ability to read, "dame schools" of a most rudimentary character sprang up in great numbers. The government of the New England towns was a pure democracy, and the control of schools remained for a long time in the hands of the town meeting itself. Only gradually were powers delegated first to the selectmen and then, in the eighteenth century, to a school committee. Then the necessity for tuition fees from the pupil was replaced by a more generous assessment upon the town. Thus it hap- These town pened that in Massachusetts by the middle of the eighteenth schools becentury, and in other New England commonwealths shortly before the afterward, elementary schools were for the most part free. Revolution These early systems of public or free schools were largely due to the religious devotion of the New England people and to the practical identity of Church and state. came free 1 |