A TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY.
LTO THZ EDITOR OF THE " SPICTATOR.”J
BIR,—I have read with great interest, and in thorough agree. raent, the article in the Spectator of October 13th, on "A Technical University," in special reference to the better use to which the Goldsmiths' Company might have applied the large sum of money which has been bestowed on what may or may not prove truly to be a Technical University. The writer has
• .shrewdly described the admirable and appropriate uses to which the City Companies might apply their funds in the furtherance and promotion of good training in their various crafts. I ask permission to inform your readers that there are City Companies which are actively carrying out the very work
• which the Spectator describes as so valuable to the public weal. The method employed has been the very simple and effective one of granting apprenticeship premiums of £15 to £25 for the benefit of trained industrial-school lads. The Boys' Home has had the advantage of these premiums ; it is the oldest amongst the certified industrial schools of the Metropolis, where, of course, every boy receives rudimentary instruction in a trade as well as his elementary education in the school- room. The City Company steps in just when the home training is completed, and helps the lads, or certain of them selected for the purpose, by paying for their apprenticeship ' to carefully chosen master-tradesmen. The two Companies who have been rendering this important service are the 'Tylers' and Bricklayers' Company and the Carpenters' Com- pany. The former of these two Companies has been carrying on this practice for years past, and has not only paid the -apprenticeship premiums, but has enrolled the apprentices in the books of the Company, so that during the term of apprenticeship the Company's officials might show an interest in each lad's progress, and at the end of his time enrol him as
freeman of the City of London.
It is difficult to over-estimate the value of the assistance which has been thus rendered :—(a.) As a stimulus to managers 'of industrial schools to make their industrial and technical -training thorough and effective, so that their boys may be eligible for the apprenticeship. (b.) As an encouragement to deserving, hard-working lads who have the right stuff in them, with a little help, to become first-class artisans. Here is indeed s means whereby the gutter-child, for it is such that the Boys' Home and similar institutions have to deal with, may rise to • be an honoured citizen of London. (c.) As a means whereby the race of British artisans may become better craftsmen. For it is generally admitted that a modification of the old apprentice- ship system must be resorted to if the British workman is to hold his own. Technical schools can be no substitute for this.
I may add that at the Apprentices' Exhibition held recently -at the People's Palace, the work of several of our Boys' Home young workmen showed well and won prizes, and that one of -these apprentices, under the Tylers' and Bricklayers' Com- pany, won the highest prize for the best bit of bricklaying,— building a chimney. It is much to be hoped that your valuable article will leave its mark in the council-chambers of our wealthy City Companies, and that more of them will help in the way now pointed out. A few thousands spent yearly on the apprenticeship of young tailors, shoemakers, -printers, as well as carpenters, cabinet-makers, and bricklayers, would work great good to the lads themselves, and redound to the general advancement of those crafts which the Com- panies have under their special protection and patronage.—I
• The Boys' Home, Regent's Park Road, N. W.
[We have received a similar letter as to the efforts of the
• Carpenters' Company. All such work is excellent; but we -want the Companies also to provide direct teaching in their arts.—En. Spectator.]
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