Scottish education in the nineteenth century concerns all forms of education, including schools, universities and informal instruction, in Scotland in the nineteenth century. By the late seventeenth century there was a largely complete system of parish schools, but it was undermined by the
ragged schools, Bible societies and improvement classes. Scots played a major part in the development of teacher education with figures including William Watson, Thomas Guthrie, Andrew Bell, John Wood and David Stow. Scottish schoolmasters gained a reputation for strictness and frequent use of the tawse. The perceived problems and fragmentation of the Scottish school system led to a process of secularisation, as the state took increasing control. The Education (Scotland) Act 1872 transferred the Kirk and Free Kirk schools to regional School Boards
and made some provision for secondary education. In 1890 school fees were abolished, creating a state-funded, national system of compulsory free basic education with common examinations.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, Scotland's five university colleges had no entrance exams, students typically entered at ages of 15 or 16, attended for as little as two years, chose which lectures to attend and left without qualifications. The curriculum was dominated by divinity and the law. There was a concerted attempt to modernise the curriculum resulting in reforming acts of parliament in
Statistical Account of Scotland undertaken parish-by-parish by John Sinclair in the 1790s indicated that all but the oldest inhabitants were expected to be able to read and that many (although fewer girls) could write and count. However, it also indicated that much of the legal provision of schooling had often fallen into decay.[2] In the burghs there were a range or parish schools, burgh schools and grammar schools, most of which provided a preparation for one of the Scottish universities. These were supplemented by boarding establishments, known as "hospitals", most of which had been endowed by charities, such as George Heriot's School and the Merchant Companies Schools in Edinburgh.[4] The Industrial Revolution and rapid urbanisation undermined the effectiveness of the Scottish church school system, creating major gaps in provision and religious divisions would begin to undermine the unity of the system.[5] The publication of George Lewis's Scotland: a Half Educated Nation in 1834 began a major debate on the suitability of the parish school system, particularly in rapidly expanding urban areas.[6]
kirk sessions in towns and aimed at the children of the poor.[7] The Disruption of 1843, which created the breakaway Free Church of Scotland, fragmented the kirk school system. 408 teachers in schools joined the breakaway Free Church. By May 1847 it was claimed that 500 schools had been built, along with two teacher training colleges and a ministerial training college,[8] 513 schoolmasters were being paid direct from a central education fund and over 44,000 children being taught in Free Church schools.[9] The influx of large numbers of Irish immigrants in the nineteenth century led to the establishment of Catholic schools, particularly in the urban west of the country, beginning with Glasgow in 1817.[10] The church schools system was now divided between three major bodies, the established Kirk, the Free Church and the Catholic Church.[7]
Supplementary education
A schoolmaster administering punishment with the tawse
Attempts to supplement the parish system included
ragged schools, Bible societies and improvement classes, open to members of all forms of Protestantism and particularly aimed at the growing urban working classes.[11] The ragged school movement attempted to provide free education to destitute children. The ideas were taken up in Aberdeen where Sheriff William Watson founded the House of Industry and Refuge, and they were championed by Scottish minister Thomas Guthrie who wrote Plea for Ragged Schools (1847), after which they rapidly spread across Britain.[14]
Theory and practice
Scots played a major part in the development of teacher education.
Free Church Normal Seminary in 1845.[15] Ultimately Wood's ideas played a greater role in the Scottish educational system as they fitted with the need for rapid expansion and low costs that resulted from the reforms of 1872.[4] Scottish schoolmasters gained a reputation for strictness and frequent use of the tawse, a belt of horse hide split at one end that inflicted stinging punishment on the hands of pupils.[16]
The perceived problems and fragmentation of the Scottish school system led to a process of secularisation, as the state took increasing control. From 1830 the state began to fund buildings with grants, then from 1846 it was funding schools by direct sponsorship.
Westminster Confession. In 1866 the government established the Argyll Commission, under Whig grandee George Campbell, 8th Duke of Argyll, to look into the schooling system. It found that of 500,000 children in need of education 200,000 were receiving it under efficient conditions, 200,000 in schools of doubtful merit, without any inspection and 90,000 were receiving no education at all. Although this compared favourably with the situation in England, with 14 per cent more children in education and with relatively low illiteracy rates of between 10 and 20 per cent, similar to those in the best educated nations such as those in Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Scandinavia, the report was used as support for widespread reform. The result was the Education (Scotland) Act 1872, based on that passed for England and Wales as the Elementary Education Act in 1870, but providing a more comprehensive solution.[18]
1872 act
Under the
poor law. This was enforced by the School Attendance Committee, while the boards busied themselves with building to fill the gaps in provision. This resulted in a major programme that created large numbers of grand, purpose-built schools.[18] Overall administration was in the hands of the Scotch (later Scottish) Education Department in London.[17] Demand for places was high and for a generation after the act there was overcrowding in many classrooms, with up to 70 children being taught in one room. The emphasis on a set number of passes at exams also led to much learning by rote and the system of inspection led to even the weakest children being drilled with certain facts.[18]
To compensate for the difficult of educating children in the sparesly populated Highlands, in 1885 the Highland Minute established a subsidy for such schools.[20]
Secondary education
The Mearns Street Public School built for the Greenock Burgh School Board still bears its name, carved on the stone pediment above the entrance
Unlike the English act, the Scottish one made some provision for secondary education.
Trinity College, Glenalmond.[4] The result of these changes was a fear that secondary education became much harder to access for the children of the poor.[19] However, in the second half of the century roughly a quarter of university students can be described as having working class origins, largely from the skilled and independent sectors of the economy.[19] The Scottish Education Department introduced a Leaving Certificate Examination in 1888 to set national standards for secondary education. In 1890 school fees were abolished, creating a state-funded, national system of compulsory free basic education with common examinations.[1]
The curriculum and system of graduation were reformed. Entrance examinations equivalent to the School Leaving Certificate were introduced and average ages of entry rose to 17 or 18. Standard patterns of graduation in the arts curriculum offered 3-year ordinary and 4-year honours degrees.
Courts, which included external members and who oversaw the finances of the institution. Under the 1889 act new arts subjects were established, with chairs in Modern History, French, German and Political Economy.[23]
The University of St Andrews was at a low point in its fortunes in the early part of the century. It was restructured by commissioners appointed by the 1858 act and began a revival.[23] It pioneered the admission of women to Scottish universities, creating the Lady Licentiate in Arts (LLA), which proved highly popular. From 1892 Scottish universities could admit and graduate women and the numbers of women at Scottish universities steadily increased until the early twentieth century.[24] The University of Glasgow became a leader in British higher education by providing the educational needs of youth from the urban and commercial classes.[25] It moved from the city centre to a new set of grand neo-Gothic buildings, paid for by public subscription, at Gilmorehill in 1870.[26] The two colleges at Aberdeen were considered too small to be viable and they were restructured as the University of Aberdeen in 1860.[23] A new college of the university was opened in Dundee in 1883.[21] Unlike the other Medieval and ecclesiastical foundations, the University of Edinburgh was the "tounis college", founded by the city after the Reformation, and was as a result relatively poor. In 1858 it was taken out of the care of the city and established on a similar basis to the other ancient universities.[23]
The result of these reforms was a revitalisation of the Scottish university system, which expanded to 6,254 students by the end of the century
William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin was appointed to the chair of natural philosophy at Glasgow aged only 22. His work included the mathematical analysis of electricity and formulation of the first and second laws of thermodynamics. By 1870 Kelvin and Rankine made Glasgow the leading centre of science and engineering education and investigation in Britain.[23]
At Edinburgh, major figures included
Joseph Lister (1827–1912) and his student William Macewen (1848–1924), pioneered antiseptic surgery.[27] The University of Edinburgh was also a major supplier of surgeons for the royal navy, and Robert Jameson (1774–1854), Professor of Natural History at Edinburgh, ensured that a large number of these were surgeon-naturalists, who were vital in the Humboldtian and imperial enterprise of investigating nature throughout the world.[28][29] Major figures to emerge from Scottish universities in the science of humanity included the philosopher Edward Caird (1835–1908), the anthropologist James George Frazer (1854–1941) and the sociologist and urban planner Patrick Geddes (1854–1932).[30]
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