The highest salaries are given by the London School Board. Trained assistants (female) begin at £85 a year, and head mistresses receive from £200 to £300. Higher salaries are given for special work, and in the large provincial centres also it may be said without inaccuracy that the regulation scale is constantly broken in order to secure good teachers of special subjects. In London pupil teachers’ schools the salaries of assistant mistresses begin at £125 a year, rising by annual increments of £5 to £150. Assistant masters in similar posts receive £140 to £170 per annum. Salaries for both sexes are said to be rising gradually throughout the country, and although a contrary movement has recently been initiated in the London School Board, it is hardly likely that it will be carried out to any great extent.
Elementary versus Secondary Schools.—Hitherto elementary schools have not commended themselves as a field of work for the class of women who now form the staff of girls’ secondary schools. The salaries offered outside London have not been high enough to tempt them; holidays are short in comparison with High Schools (six weeks in the year instead of thirteen); and, lastly, the conditions as to training hitherto exacted have been practically prohibitive. Women who have already received an expensive education are not inclined to spend two or three years more in a denominational training college. The relaxation of rules in favour of women who have passed certain recognised examinations, and the opening of day training classes in connection with recognised colleges, such as Owen’s College, Manchester, and several of the local University Colleges, may do much to open the elementary schools to a more cultured class of women. Such women would soon obtain the headship of a school, and would then, under a liberal Board, find a good field for the exercise of talent and organising power. I fear, however, that the shortness of holidays may still prove a serious obstacle.
Domestic Subjects.—Meanwhile a new field of work is being opened by the inclusion of domestic subjects in the school course. A teacher of cookery in elementary schools can earn from £80 to £100 a year in a fairly agreeable manner, and private and visiting teachers often earn more. Dressmaking and laundry work are also in great demand, particularly in evening continuation schools; and if to these subjects is added a knowledge of sick-nursing and elementary hygiene, the combination forms an admirable stock-in-trade for a teacher. In some towns School Boards are training their own teachers, probably with more haste than thoroughness, to fill the posts for which such a sudden demand has arisen. Instruction in domestic subjects is also being carried on under the auspices of the County Councils, for there are few among their number that have not devoted a share of the funds available under the Technical Instruction Act, and in towns by the power of levying a penny rate, to the furtherance of technical education, in which domestic instruction for girls is almost always included. Thus, throughout the length and breadth of the land, teachers of these subjects are eagerly sought; and cookery schools, embryo technical schools for women, and voluntary agencies, such as the National Health Society, are busily employed in training teachers and sending them out to different districts. The Liverpool School of Cookery is particularly active in this direction.
The misfortune is that in these subjects there is no definite standard, and each school trains after its own fashion. The money for technical education was gained by a side wind, and the passing of the Act found the country unprepared, no organised system of instruction or of training for teachers being in existence. As experience is gradually accumulated the different agencies at work will probably make comparison of methods and adopt to some extent a common system and standard. In this connection it should be mentioned that though women have no place upon County Councils, they may be and are appointed upon the local committees for carrying out the Councils’ schemes, and in this way they are able to take an active share in educational work.
It cannot at present be foretold what shape this large enterprise will eventually take, but it seems likely that for some time to come the teaching of domestic subjects will form an important and considerable opening for women. It is fortunate that it is so, since many are thereby enabled to find congenial employment who have no taste for the purely literary side of education. In time permanent institutions for domestic instruction will probably be formed in the large centres of population—indeed such a movement has already begun. The superintendence of work at these centres, which will also embrace outlying districts, must give rise to good appointments, and it is well to bear in mind that these will certainly fall by preference to women who besides technical knowledge have received a good general education, and possess powers of organisation and management. Women so qualified will probably be highly paid. The rank and file may not impossibly find their earnings diminish as their numbers increase; at present their services are at a scarcity value. In view of the certain extension of this branch of teaching work it is worth while for girls or their parents to consider whether (viewed as a wage-earning instrument solely) a course at a school of domestic economy, requiring at most two years, and costing a comparatively small sum (say £15 per annum), is not more advantageous than three or four years at Oxford or Cambridge, costing from £70 to £100 a year. In the ordinary branches of teaching, as I have shown, a woman seldom earns more than £150 a year, and teaching is almost the only breadwinning occupation followed by women graduates. I know teachers of domestic economy who make as much or more in the winter months, and have the summer free for either rest or self-culture.
Higher Teaching Posts.—But few posts of higher teaching or superintendence are open to women. Even those mentioned above are only just beginning to take visible shape. Headships of High Schools are of course important positions, and are often well paid. An initial salary of £250 a year (sometimes, however, only £150) is offered, generally with rooms, but not board; capitation fees, varying from 10s. to 30s. are usually added, but these do not begin until 100 pupils have been entered. Thus in an unprosperous neighbourhood a mistress may have all the trouble of organising and managing a school for £150 or £200 a year; for it is precisely in these districts that the lowest initial salaries are offered. In some few cases the income rises to £700 or £800 a year. The headships of colleges and training colleges available are of course very limited in number, and the same may be said of the college lectureships at Oxford and Cambridge, with rooms in college. These are not well paid, and are chiefly attractive for the pleasant university life they afford. Few women are as yet engaged as University Extension lecturers, though it is hard to see what impediment, beyond the prejudice of sex, stands in the way of their employment.
Religion and Philanthropy.—Religion and Philanthropy have not hitherto been reckoned among the avenues leading to remunerative employment for women; but it is by no means certain that this will be the case in the future. The Catholic Church has always provided careers for women in connection with convents and sisterhoods, and institutions formed upon their pattern are springing up in the Church of England and even in the Dissenting churches. Since, however, the members are merely supplied with board, lodging, and clothing, and are content to find their reward in the satisfaction of their calling, there is little further to be said about these occupations from the industrial point of view. The feminine side of religious and philanthropic work, however, is developing upon much broader lines than heretofore, and though at present it partakes largely of the character of amateur work, it can hardly fail in course of time to create remunerative and (if the term may be allowed) professional occupations for women. To some extent this is the case already. Even in the Established Church the propriety of women preaching appears to be regarded to some extent as an open question, and—with or without formal sanction—the innovation seems destined to spread. Whatever else women preachers may lack they at any rate seldom fail of a congregation, an item which no church can afford to disregard. It can hardly be doubted that in this field also the labourer will eventually be found worthy of her hire. For example, philanthropic societies have usually a paid secretary, besides, in many cases, visitors, lecturers, and propagandists. Most of the religious bodies have now “Settlements” in the London slums, with women’s branches. The resident manager is certainly paid in some instances, and will no doubt soon be in all. Political work may also in time afford occupation to a limited number of women. It is, however, in purely religious work that we may expect to see the next development of women’s activities. In almost all denominations women are already at work preaching and exhorting, and the desirability of giving formal sanction to their proceedings is being actively discussed in Nonconformist churches.
Law.—Of the learned professions only one, that of medicine, is open to women. A combination of law and ancient custom keeps women out of the legal profession, and it is only in certain of its approaches, such as conveyancing and accountants’ work, that they are free to seek a livelihood. A summary of the case by Miss Eliza Orme LL.B., gives a clear idea of the situation. “Women can make wills and simple agreements without qualification. Anything else (i.e. deeds) must be nominally done by a solicitor, and women can only be employed by them as clerks. Women cannot go into court. If they do chamber practice (i.e. settling difficult deeds for solicitors, or giving counsel’s opinion), they can only do it through barristers as ‘devils,’ receiving half fees. If women are to be solicitors the Act will need altering. To be barristers they must be admitted by the benchers of one of the four Inns (Inner and Middle Temple, Benchers’ Inn, and Gray’s Inn), and if a woman applied, probably a joint council of all would sit.
“The Benchers might admit them as certificated conveyancers, which would not allow them to plead in court; but men themselves have not used their certificate for many years.
“The University of London law degree is open to women. It is a thorough practical test, but not a legal qualification to practice.”