SCHOOL-LEAVING AGE
Sta,—From the first of next month every child in this country is to stay at school until after he has reached the age of fifteen. In con- sequence there will for a year be no entry into the junior ranks of industry; and that year chances to be the most dangerous and critical in our industrial history, a year when our need of workers is vital. Let it be said at once that full-time education up to the age of fifteen or sixteen is a need which is beyond question. The case for it has been argued and won, won finally and completely. The question is, rather, will every child who stays on at school for twelve more months from April 1st receive education during that time? The dutiful taxpayer assumes, with some doubt when he stops to consider the matter and recalls what daily experience shows him in other directions, that value for the child's time and the country's money will be received. But probably the only people who could answer the question authoritatively are those who, in one capacity or another, are salaried servants of the State educational system. Certainly very few members of Education Committees are in a position to do so. Few of them have time or inclination to obtain familiarity with the work of the schools. Immersed in administration and overwhelmed with committee work, they rely for such knowledge on the officials.
Careful, detailed, ingenious plans, of which the London County Council's is the latest, have been made to provide opportunity for the kind of education the Aot demands, and in a decade or two the child of fourteen-fifteen may find that year an imegral part of the most valuable period of school-life. And no doubt during those decades this will be true of an increasing number of children each year. But can it be true for more than a very small proportion of those whose age puts
them at the mercy of this April 1st? The essentials are ac quate school buildings, enough teachers of good enough quality and a reasonable
supply of equipment—books and other tools. As for buildings, most of
the children will spend the year in a " modern secondary " school ; that is, in what was called until lately a senior elementary school. Some
will stay on in the "all-age" school in which they have passed all their school-life. Only a comparatively small number of the modern secondary schools have been recently rehoused, and many of them are, as buildmgs, not far removed from slum standards. Additional teachers are hard to come by, and many schools are short- naffed even now. Doubtless war strain is largely responsible for the unenthusiastic work which is not uncommon, and until the slow flow of new recruits from the Emergency Training Colleges increases it is not easy to see where an adequate supply is coming from. Together, these factors mean that the fourteen-year-old will not often find a separate class-room and teacher awaiting him and his contemporaries. Yet it is clear that without them a curriculum which marks a real advance and fresh interest will be hardly built. Where they are lacking, the child and his parents are likely to regard the year as spent in marking time—as just another of the irritating futilities imposed on the helpless citizen. Whether this conviction is justified or not, nothing could be more unfortunate or more undesirable in its effect on the character of the young adolescent. Recent events and the knowledge now common to all of the precariousness of our position and our future do not warrant panic decisions and changes of policy. Educational advances long overdue are more necessary than ever. But blind disregard of facts is equally dangerous, and only the certainty of real benefit to the fourteen-year-olds of this year should keep them at school and away from productive
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