Handbook of Birmingham / Prepared for the Members of the British Association, 1886

by British Association for the Advancement of Science

Even now the accommodation provided does not reach that required. The population being 420,000 there should be places for one-sixth of that number, according to the government scale, that is for 70,000. Thus the Board is still behind-hand to the amount of 5,000 places. Moreover, according to the average of the last eight years, the population of the Borough is increasing at the rate of 60,000 per annum, and consequently the accommodation required at the rate of 1,000 per annum. In other words, the Board has to provide five new schools to catch up the present deficit, and one school every year to keep pace with the yearly increase.

Besides the schools whose curriculum is confined to the subjects named in the New Code, the Board has established, upon the initiative and in a great measure at the cost of the Chairman, George Dixon, Esq., M.P., a Technical School for boys in the 7th standard, which provides an education in elementary science, machine construction, &c.; and which is furnished with a large chemical laboratory, and an admirably fitted lecture room, a special room for teaching technical drawing, and a workshop in which the boys are trained to the use of tools and to working from scale. This school, which is well worth a visit, is in Bridge Street, five minutes’ walk from the Town Hall, in premises handed over to the Board, rent free, and partially fitted up by Mr. Dixon.

Many of the Board Schools form real architectural ornaments of the town. They are in three stages of design, the earliest being that in which boys, girls, and infants form separate departments, the boys and the infants being usually on the ground floor, the girls on the floor above the boys. In the second stage a large centre hall is surrounded by class-rooms on the ground floor; half way to the roof runs a gallery, from which doors open into another set of class-rooms. The infants are on the ground floor (except in Hope Street), in a separate part of the building; the whole school being under the supervision of a master. In the last stage everything is on the ground floor. The latest erected buildings of this stage are models of airiness and light. The specimens of the three styles easiest reached and most worth seeing are respectively Bristol Street, Icknield Street, and Stratford Road or Foundry Road.

It should be noticed that half-time scholars are now almost unknown, although the conditions of life would seem to point to a wide extension of the system.

A few scholarships, far fewer than could be wished, are at the disposal of the Board. They are of three classes, Major, Elementary Science, and Minor. Boys who hold the Wright, Piddock, and J. H. Chamberlain Memorial Scholarships receive £15 a year, on certain conditions, during a two years’ course at King Edward’s School, and £25 a year, with remittance of fees, for three years more at Mason College. Several Elementary Science Scholarships, in connection with the Science and Art Department, have hitherto been provided out of a fund called the Higher Education Fund, raised for the purpose of assisting poor but deserving scholars, by which a grant of £5 is guaranteed, with an additional £5 on passing a good examination under the Science and Art Department. It is greatly to be regretted that the funds raised for providing Minor Scholarships are all exhausted, except the Chamberlain and Edgbaston Day School for Girls Trust Funds.

In the early stages of the Board’s work, when a Church majority was elected, religious education was given in the Birmingham schools. Upon the accession of the Liberal and Non-Conformist party to power such education was entirely done away with. The result of frequent and somewhat bitter controversy has been that at present a small portion of the Bible is read each day by the head teacher without note or comment.

The Voluntary Schools have, up till quite recently, had no common organization. There has now, however, been formed an Association of Voluntary School Managers, under whose auspices it is proposed to undertake some amount of inspection, and which will frame and discuss all measures directed to their common welfare. The Chairman is the Rev. Canon Bowlby, Rector of St. Philip’s.

Municipal School of Art.—[By Mr. E. R. Taylor, Head Master.]—The Society of Arts and School of Art were, in June, 1885, transferred to the Corporation under the above title. This Society was established at a meeting held in the Public Office, Moor Street, on 7th February, 1821, at which it was resolved:—(1.) “That an Institution be now established in Birmingham for the encouragement of arts and manufactures, and that it be called ‘The Birmingham Society of Arts.’” (2.) “That a Museum be formed for the reception of the most approved specimens of sculpture, and of all such other works illustrative of the different branches of Art as the Society may have the means of procuring.” (3.) “That suitable accommodation be provided for students.” A subscription list was forthwith opened, and Sir Robert Lawley, Bart., gave in addition a valuable collection of casts from the antique. The Museum thus formed was opened for members and students in May, 1822, and in 1827 the first annual exhibition of pictures was held. In 1829 the Society erected the galleries in New Street, now occupied by the Royal Society of Artists, and in this year the first conversazione of the Society of Arts took place. Until 1842 the Society was managed by a joint committee, composed of lay and professional members with equal powers. The lay committee, representing the subscribers, were desirous of furthering the original intention of providing means for art education by applying for aid from the Government School of Design, newly formed in London. Hitherto the teaching had been carried on by the members of the professional, or artists’ committee, who acted as visitors to the School for Drawing from the Antique. The school was open on two evenings in each week, but the average nightly attendance was only fourteen.

The professional committee demurred against these proposed changes, and, on their being adopted by the subscribers, withdrew from the Society, and afterwards formed the present Royal Society of Artists. In 1843, Mr. Dobson, who is now an Associate of the Royal Academy, became the first Head Master, and the title of the Society was at this time altered to “The Society of Arts and School of Design.”