Public Technical Education
Education for Industry and Commerce in England. By A. Abbott, C.B.E. (Oxford University Press. 5s.)
This excellent little book is misnamed. Its subject is what everyone understands by " Technical Education " ; that is, the vocational further-education provided nowadays by the State for those who are coming through, or have come through, the public elementary schools. It is not concerned directly with University education. Mr. Abbott tells the story of technical education in England : from the founding of the first Mechanics' Institutes in 1824, right down to the present-day four-fold provision of Continuation Schools, Junior Technical Schools, Senior Full-time Courses, and Technical Day Classes, for the 76,000 students who receive day-time technical instruction ; and the far more widespread provision for the 900,000 students who attend evening classes. In the 'forties the State begins to lend a reluctant and niggard hand. In 1852 there is created the Department of Practical Art, which in 1856 becomes the Department of Science and Art. In 1873 examinations in " technological subjects " are founded. In 1879 they are turned over to that nobly anomalous body The City and Guilds of London Institute. In 1881 there is a Royal Commission. In 1889 a Technical Instruction Act is passed, and " whisky money " makes glad the heart of the educa- tionist. Then, in 1902, comes the memorable Act providing the foundation on which the present edifice has been built ; and from that point the story is one of extensions and adapta- tions continually in progress and still proceeding. None could be better qualified to tell at any rate the latter end of the story than Mr. Abbott ; for he was for more than thirty years H.M. Chief Inspector of Technical Schools, with unrivalled opportunities of observing and influencing at close quarters the things of which he writes.
His narrative and description done, he takes stock. Are the present provisions capable of meeting our present and future industrial needs ? He thinks not. He glances at scientific and industrial research, with which he has also had close official acquaintance, and judges that at the moment the provisions for research are far ahead of the provisions for applying the results of the research in workshop adminis- tration and practice. He wants the latter to catch up ; so that industry may be staffed with men who, though not them- selves scientists in the research sense, yet know enough of science to turn to workshop account the discoveries of the laboratory. He is thinking of the charge-hand, the foreman, the superintendent, the production engineer, the designer, the tester, the manager. If these have not enough science to know what the laboratory people are about, how can they utilize their discoveries or even judge when and how to invite their aid ? The training of the research specialist Mr. Abbott assigns to the Universities. The foreman and the manager, and the works experts of various kinds will continue mainly to derive from the multitude who pass through the public elementary schools. The bright ones will be picked out, as now, at the age of thirteen or more. They will continue at school for several years beyond the " leaving age," and their education will more and more be given a technical and scientific bent. They will enter their employments as working trainees, rather than apprentice craftsmen, and Mr. Abbott hopes that in the future, much more than now, employers will arrange for them to be released during a part of the working week, that they may continue their studies in the light of their workshop experiences.
Mr. Abbott is quite right. The equipment called for in many a foreman and manager today cannot be acquired by men who have started work in a humble capacity at fourteen, and made their way up by their own efforts, aided by study in their leisure hours. Industrial needs have ontgone that process. Such equipment can be found only in those who have had a broad general education topped by a sound technical and scientific training. There will always doubtless be some responsible posts in which native qualities count for more than education, but they will become ever fewer in number. The employer who reckons on finding his future upper staff from among men who have picked up in the work- shop all that they know, will find himself badly let down. And the employer who refuses to allow the pick of his well- trained youngsters time off in working hours to continue their scientific training will come to wonder how it is that his business is always just a little behind with the next move ; for young men who have worked by day and attended classes by night are apt to be not quite so quick off the mark as those who have borne less strain.
But is Mr. Abbott right in assigning the main body of science graduates of our Universities to the research labora- tories ? Has he reckoned with the danger of overcrowding ? How long would it be before the " Standing Room Only " notices were out ? The future foreman, as a rule, and the future manager, in some considerable measure, will be of technical school origin ; but surely the university graduate will be somewhere in the running for an odd foremanship, and well to the front for appointment to many a managership ; while for the works specialist of one kind or another he will surely be not only an eligible, but an importunate applicant. Let the providers of university education ponder Mr. Abbott's calm relegation of their finished products to the narrow confines of the laboratory ; and let the responsible heads of our great industrial concerns learn from him what provisions exist for the supply of that type of highly trained scientifio practitioner of which they will need more and more as the years go by, and what they can do to use and to improve the provisions to their own great advantage. JOHN HILTON.
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