A PERIL TO EDUCATION
Stn,—There must be many like myself with first-hand knowledge of the educational position today who can foresee an almost complete collapse of the structure which we have known as the Secondary School system, failing a wider general realisation in responsible quarters of the critical position. By over-working continuously for four and a half years, those masters who remain, aided magnificently by retired men and by mistresses, have held things together since the summer of 1940 ; but they are desperately weary, like many other sections. of the nation, and look anxiously for adequate reinforcements over the years immediately follow- ing the war.
Few will deny the urgency of securing adequate teachers for our most intelligent pupi's ; but the scales proposed for graduates by the recent Burnham Committee, on which graduate teachers were inadequately represented, are totally insufficient to attract men and women of the ability required. Protests which have appeared in the Press are apt to be .brushed aside with the comment that they come from a vociferous section anxious to turn national emergency to their own advantage, than which nothing could be more unfair. I feel it is more effective to draw attention to the following facts:
(a) Many good candidates have in the past finally decided to enter the profession through lack of capital to buy a practice in another pro- fession. Far more sa'aried posts will be available, e.g., in Medicine and Dentistry, after the war, at salaries starting at approximately the maximum under the new Burnham graduate scale.
(b) Many of the promising young graduates previously teaching in Secondary Schools have reached the rank of major or squadron-leader in the Services. They will look elsewhere than to teaching after the war if they are to maintain the standards to which their families have become accustomed—and 'I are will be competition to secure their services in all branches of civilian life at a time when trained minds are scarce.
(c) Unless adequate teachers are available for the most intelligent pupils, the standard of what may be termed our research students in all branches of learning will inevitably fall in the course of five to ten years, than which no greater calamity could handicap us in the effort to re-establish prosperity.
The chief weakness lies in the maximum of the graduate teacher's scale, which compares very unfavourably with remuneration in other occupations requiring similar qualifications ; and only one male graduate in fourteen secures a headship of a Secondary School, the proportion among women teachers being considerably lower.—Yours faithfully,
Bury Grammar School, Bury, Lancashire. L. C. Loup.
Previous page
