Some thoughts on free schools, faith schools and the Forster Act

I am not intending here to debate the merits and demerits of Conservative education policies – although as you will all know I see them as a real opportunity to change education for the better. Instead, I want to look at the issue why government funds education and, if we accept the rightness of such funding, what might be the limits of control implied by funding.

First we need to ask what would have been the situation had the 1870 Education Act (the Forster Act) not been passed – this was the act that created school boards (which interestingly enfranchised women) and led to compulsory elementary education. However – as we should note – the overwhelming majority of children already received an elementary education. This was reported by the The Royal Commission on the state of popular education in England (cited here):

“The number of children whose names ought, at the same date, to have been on the school books, in order that all might receive some education, was 2,655,767. The number we found to be actually on the books was 2,535,462, thus leaving 120,305 children without any school instruction whatever.”

The whole structure created by the Forster Act was not put in place to simply address the problem of the children not in school (less than 5% of the total) especially since the Royal Commission had also noted that England’s performance was better than that of Prussia where elementary education was compulsory. The Forster Act structures were there to exercise state control over an education system dominated by the Church of England. And we should note that these were fee-paying schools.

Thus the answer to our question – what would have pertained if the Forster Act had not prompted the nationalisation of schools – is that we would have had a substantial and largely effective education system since the providers (be they church, charity or private business) sought to meet demand for elementary education. This is not to say that the Forster Act was wrong but to observe that it is a myth to say that there was no education available to the poor prior to it passing.

Indeed, we know from the studies done throughout the 19th century that engagement in education related directly to levels of income (something still observable today). Which leads to the conclusion from E. D.West that:

“…since per capita income continued to grow after 1858, both the number of day scholars and the average years of school attendance would have continued to grow.”

What state involvement acted to do was to push aside the extension of private provision for poor children other than that already existing and provided by the churches. As a result of the 1870 Act the provision of elementary education became less diverse and the choice available to parents (which had included evening and weekend schools that fitted with shift patterns) was limited to Board School or Church School – essentially the circumstance that persists today.

So, while I am not arguing for an end to the state funding of education, it is the case the absence of such funding would not have meant the absence of education. We cannot know for sure what that market might have brought about except that it would have met to demands of the vast majority of parents – they would have had choice in education rather than merely a pseudo-choice of school. And that choice would have included the full range of providers – private, charitable and faith – a different array of philosophies –democratic, Waldorf, traditional – and a variety of curriculum emphases – liberal, technical, vocational.

The idea of free schools opens up the possibility to develop – in part – this free market in education. There are risks involved but, given that the current system fails so many children despite record levels of funding, the risk for the individual child of continuing the current system is far greater. And above all, as West concludes:

“What is needed is choice in education. School choice has not and will not lead to more productive education because the obsolete technology called “school” is inherently inelastic. As long as “school” refers to the traditional structure of building and grounds with services delivered in boxes called classrooms to which customers must be transported by car or bus, school choice will be unable meaningfully to alter the quality or efficiency of education.”

...