CHRIST'S HOSPITAL AND THE LONDON SCHOOL BOARD.
/TWO London School Board, before separating for the 1 Recess, appointed a Committee to examine the new scheme prepared by the Charity Commissioners for the future management of Christ's Hospital.. A paragraph, apparently inspired, which appeared in the Daily Chronicle a few days ago, gives the substance of its recommendations. About these we have something to say ; but before saying it, will remind our readers of the main features of the scheme. The founda- tion at present consists of two schools—the junior at Hertford, and the senior at Newgate Street—numbering together about a thousand scholars. Under the new scheme it will consist of five, viz., a preparatory boarding-school for 120 boys, a board- ing-school for 700 boys, another boarding-school for 500 girls, a boys' day-school for 600, and a girls' day-school for 400. The boarding-schools are to be in the country, the day-schools " not more than three miles from the Royal Exchange." Two changes for the better are apparent in these figures. The total number of children deriving benefit from the foundation will be more than doubled ; and girls will get a considerable if not an equal, share in the income. And there will be other improvements. The nominations of Donation Governors will be limited to a total of 200 (a Donation Governor is a benevolent, perhaps we may say a prudently benevolent person, who for a payment of £500 secures for his life the right of having a nominee in the Hospital) ; 100 nominations are to be reserved for the children of distinguished persons ; 177 places in the boarding-schools and 500 places in the day-schools are to be kept for boys and girls from the Elementary Schools of London,—thus providing on a far larger scale than has been hitherto attempted the means of access to the higher educa- tion for the children of the poor. Not the least gain for the boys' boarding-school is the abolition of the absurd arrangement which gives to an officer called the Warden tfie care of discipline out of school, and to the Head Master the care of discipline in school. The Head Master is to have, as of course he ought to have, an undivided responsibility.
It is abundantly clear that the income of the Charity, large as it is, will be considerably strained to provide for the new demands that will be made upon it. Its net amount at present is about £62,000. This will be supplemented in the future by partial payment (not to be less than £10 or more than £20 per annum), to be paid by boarders ; and by fees, ranging between a minimum of £5 and a maximum of £10 per annum, to be paid by day-scholars. These receipts may be estimated roughly, not to go into tedious details, at about £15,000 per annum. From this, however, must be deducted a slim of £5,000 per annum, which will be wanted for a magnificent scheme of exhibitions in the day-schools. No less than 150 boys and 100 girls are to have exhibitions of £20 per annum. When, therefore, the Committee of the School Board preface their recommendations by prophesying an increase of income to the foundation which will raise it to " at least £80,000 per annum," it is not easy to understand their figures. They seem to look for it to the sale of the property in Newgate Street. It is true that some years ago a proposed rail- way bearing some such title as the " Central London Railway," made a provisional offer of £600,000 for the Newgate-Street site Without pretending to any technical knowledge of the value of property in London (and Newgate Street, though it is in a good part, is not in the best), we should say that this sum was an outside value then, and rather more than an outside value now. If it were realised and in- vested, the income of the Charity would be raised to the figure mentioned by the Committee. But these four new schools are to be built out of these funds, sites are to be pro- vided for the four, and two other sites, limited as they are by the scheme to a distance of three miles from the Exchange, cannot fail to be costly. We doubt whether much of a balance will be left out of the possible £600,000. The Committee goes on to recommend that the " Hospital should board, clothe, and educate not less than 2,000 children," and that " considering that the clothing, feeding, and educating of young girls is at least as important as that of boys, and that the neglect of these leads to even more serious evils, at least as many girls as boys should be received into the, Hospital." Now, we are heartily glad that the new scheme will give girls a fair, or approximately fair, share in the endowment of the Hospital ; and we are not disposed to deny that it is quite as important to feed, clothe, and educate a girl, as to feed, clothe, and educate a boy ; but we do not hesitate to say that it is the very worst feature in the Charity Commissioners' scheme that the London School Board Committee not only approves, but seeks to develop. A boarding-school for 500 girls is likely to be very much more of a curse than of a blessing to its inmates. On this point we appeal, without any hesitation, to the general convictions and feelings of our readers. There are probably many parents who, if they had quite free choice about the education of their children, would prefer to keep both boys and girls at home ; but there are comparatively few who, under pressure of various motives, would not consent to send their boys away, while a majority probably believe that a boy gets on better, as regards both learning and development of character, at school than he does at home. It is notorious that the case is wholly different with girls. There are many parents whom no considerations would induce to send their daughters away from home ; there are hardly any who would not keep them there if they could. Compelled to choose a boarding-school for them, they would choose one as like a family as possible. We are convinced that there are few mothers of the middle or upper classes who would not shrink with dismay from the thought of a gigantic boarding-school, where five hundred girls—some of them, it will be remembered, coming possibly from the very poorest homes—are herded together. Does it seem harsh to speak of it as a disadvantage that some of this multitude would " come from the poorest homes "? Possibly ; but we must deal with facts as they are ; and one cannot forget what some of the associations of an overcrowded home in a London shim are likely to be. And, putting this consideration aside, there will always be, in such a huge gathering, the want of indi- vidualising care, the want of home life and wholesome family relations,—wants likely to be injurious to boys, but far more likely to be injurious, we might say to be disastrous, to girls. And there will be the dangers of moral evil. A few corrupt inmates may well cause what would be a positive epidemic and plague of corruption among their fellows. This is a peril to which great collections of girls are, we believe, more subject than are boys ; and, once corrupted, the girl is far less likely to recover her moral health. Most of us know boys and youths who, after showing pretty nearly every bad quality possible at school or college, have yet grown up into respectable and use- ful members of society. Who can say the same of a girl or a young woman that has been once thoroughly tainted with evil? We object, therefore, to this proposed gigantic boarding-school for girls, feeling convinced that its inmates are likely to come out unprepared for life, a life which it must be remembered a large proportion of them will have to face alone. But it is the very part of the scheme which the Committee of the School Board propose to exaggerate. The Hospital is to board at least 1,000 girls. We, on the other hand, sincerely hope, not that the girls will lose a penny of what is due to them, but that the money will be spent in a way more likely to benefit. One of the many wants of girls' education is that of schools intermediate between the High Schools, which are now fairly numerous, and the Primary Schools, in which they are on a full equality with boys. Such intermediate schools scarcely exist, except when they are furnished by private enterprise. Let the girls' share of the endowment be thus divided. Instead of the one day-school, let there be ten, and all of moderate size ; for a school ought not to be distant from the homes of the girls who are to attend it.
The next recommendation of the Committee is positively absurd,—" No more boys are to be admitted till the number of the girls has reached 1,000." How long, does the Committee think, will it be before this takes place ? Certainly several years, if the competitive system is to have fair-play, not to mention any other reason. And for all these years, which may well be as many as four or five, there are no boys to be admitted into the Hospital. Was there ever a more foolish suggestion ? What is to become of a school with all its supply of younger boys cut off I What is to happen to the lower forms / What to their masters, who will have to sit idle or to be discharged/ The fact is that the School Board has nothing to do with the scheme except so far as it provides free places and exhibitions for picked scholars from the Primary Schools. To see that the really splendid scheme which the Commissioners have devised be properly worked out, will require no little diligence and power of management. Let them attend to it, and leave secondary education, which it is not their mission to regulate, entirely alone.
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