remarkable tradition for scholarship and athletic prowess. It is their good fortune that their boys coming, on the whole, from wealthier homes are able to stay longer at school and so develop those powers of leadership and initiative so much prized in our British democracy. Length of school life has much to do with that 'liberality' of education on which so much stress is rightly laid, because on it depend the size of sixth forms and the worth-whileness of providing all sorts of facilities for advanced work in classics, history, science, languages, music, &c. A liberal education is as much possible in a day school as in a boarding school: if the public schools have hitherto enjoyed a marked advantage in this respect it is because their boys often come from more cultured homes.

Then it is claimed that the public school is best at inculcating a sense of responsibility and the community life and leadership. There might have been something to be said for this claim in the days of Dr. Arnold and Tom Brown, but it is doubtful if there is so much now. Discipline in all schools is apt to be a great deal better than it was 80 to 100 years ago, when members of the sixth and fifth forms gambled and drank and carried on intrigues with the girls of the village. Nowadays there is almost, if not quite, as much scope for the development of the virtues and powers of leadership in the day school as in the boarding school. A bad spirit at the top of the school, inferior prefects, have the same effect in both institutions, except that in the boarding school the risks of real disaster are greater. On the games field, in scouts, J.T.C., A.T.C., and so on, the powers and scope of leadership are much the same in both types of school; off the fields and out of the form-room things are not much different; indeed, the day-boy prefect may be more hardly tested in preserving discipline on a train, railway platform, or public bus than his public-school equivalent in the corridor or the dormitory where there is usually also a master within earshot.

The claim that the public school implants a better sense of good manners, more courtesy and consideration for others, and encourages an absence of personal arrogance and aggressiveness, is clearly unfounded. These things depend infinitely more upon the home and the homeupbringing and inheritance of the boy than upon the type of school to which he is sent. In religious training, school chapels, corporate worship, the public schools enjoy a great advantage of which, I think, they have often made anything but the best use but this advantage is not intrinsic to themselves. There is no intrinsic reason why every day school should not have its chapel and its religious life and, in my view, they ought to have them and to lay great store by them. There should be definite Christian teaching and practice in all Christian schools, though not necessarily or usually upon a narrow denominational basis. The school chapel can be and should be a focus of emotional attachment for all members of a school, and for the abler

TH

boys it should also stand for the intellectual keystone of their purpose in life.

Here

Another vital point urged in favour of the public boarding schools is the degree of independence they enjoy. indeed they have a great advantage, but, if this be generaly agreed, why should the advantage not be extended to all the other schools, many of which are labouring with diculty under the unenlightened direction of sadly ignorant public committees ? But, once again, the advantage here enjoyed is not intrinsic, but incidental, implicit in te history of the public schools though it is.

A great deal of the attractiveness of the public schools depends not upon the system that we associate with them but upon the quality of the boys that are sent to them and the masters that teach in them. These in turn depend upon the homes that produce the boys: a good home produces a good boy, a bad home a boy who is not so good, to whatever rank of wealth or society he may belong and there is no disputing the fact that in the past the public schools have had something approaching a monopoly of the social cream, or, if not a monopoly, too much of it. What would our local grammar schools be if all the best boys, intellectually and socially, in the neighbourhood, attended them instead of being sent off to Rugby or Charterhouse or Wellington? Who could deny that they would be greatly enriched? There are some apposite remarks in the early pages of Tom Brown's Schooldays where the author is deploring the decline of the village fair or veast' which he attributes to the fact that gentlefolk and farmers have taken to other amusements, and have, as usual, forgotten the poor. They don't attend the feasts themselves, and call them disreputable, whereupon the steadiest of the poor leave them also, and they become what they are called. Class amusements—and, one may add, class education-be they for dukes or ploughboys, always become nuisances and curses to a country". Mr. Aneurin Bevan is right when te says that if the apologists of the public schools want to benefit the children of the poor, there cannot be a better way than to mix all the children together ".

In those day schools of great tradition, like St. Paul's, Manchester Grammar School, King Edward's, Birmingham, where boys stay till 18, religion, loyalty, scholarship, gifts of leadership and initiative, are as real as they are anywhere else. The quality of all schools depends fundamentally on three factors-upon the kind of homes from which the boys come-I mean upon the moral and religious and cultural atmosphere of those homes, not upon their worldly wealth—, upon the length of time those boys are allowed to stay at school, and upon the personalities with whom they come into intimate contact. When these facts are recognized and our practice is based upon them, we shall have gone a long way towards solving our educational and social problems. A. R. WOOLLEY. Wellingborough Grammar School.

THE ALLIES IN SCOTLAND

(From a Scottish Correspondent)

HE first week-end of June saw two very happy ceremonies in the city of Edinburgh, both of them sponsored by the British Council. The first of these was the opening by Mr. Tom Johnston, Secretary of State for Scotland, before a distinguished gathering, of an exhibition of works of art by artists of our allies. The Council, by the kindness of the Trustees, had procured for the purpose the National Gallery of Scotland and there are now displayed more than 400 works-paintings in oils and water colours, prints and drawings, sculpture and applied architecture-representing every nation among our allies. Many of the paintings, pieces of sculpture and architectural works are by serving soldiers

of the Polish Army, while the artists include a Dutch Major-General and a Norwegian General. The selection and hanging have been done with the maximum effect by Mr. Stanley Cursitor, Director of the National Gallery. When I looked in to see him on the Monday evening following the opening I found him delighted with the reception which the public had given this extremely lively show. He told me that 500 copies of the catalogue, priced at one shilling, had been printed and that he had about ten left. Hurried arrangements were being made for a further large printing.

The Secretary of State's speech was, very rightly, based on his conviction that art knew no boundaries, and that towards a mutual understanding between nations few things could be more fruitful than exhibitions of this kind. Sir John

Chancellor, Assistant Chairman of the British Council, put before the audience with modesty, but with conviction, the aim of his Council to give these foreigners now in our midst an opportunity of maintaining their national spirit on British soil and of getting to know the contribution which Britain has made to European culture.

One remarkable feature of the exhibition is the freedom from the depression of war. These artists, utilizing often the scenes in this country, in which their lot has cast them, have given rein to their natural aptitudes with the result that, for variety of themes and handling, the show is one of the most interesting ever seen in Scotland.

The second ceremony was that of the opening, on Sunday, June 1, of a Scottish-Polish house in Edinburgh. A typical Edinburgh residence has been acquired by the British Council and furnished in admirable taste for use as a social and cultural centre by the Polish troops serving in Scotland. The principal speaker at this ceremony was the Earl of Elgin, who emphasized the literary relationships which have long existed between Poland and Scotland. It was manifest from the atmosphere of the gathering that already Polish men and women who have come to Scotland are displaying an adaptability that gives deep reason for thankfulness. Hardly one of the Poles at the ceremony but has had experiences of a kind that might well daunt the most sanguine heart. Yet the prevailing spirit was not that the best must be made of a bad job but that, by sustaining a resolute hope for the future and by keeping the mind well employed, a day would yet emerge in which these Polish men and women will, in their own country, reciprocate the kindness now being shown them.

Much of the success of these ceremonies is due to the untiring efforts of Mr. H. Harvey Wood, Scottish Regional representative of the British Council.

NEW ZEALAND

THE of an in nutri

HE report of an interesting experiment in child nutri

Zealand Council for Educational Research, is given in Child Nutrition in a Rural Community, by H. C. D. Somerset. From February 1934 to May 1938 records were made of all the children attending the consolidated school which serves the greater part of an area of 350 square miles of mixed farming lands. The district may be described as a healthy one; the school buildings are new and modern; the rooms are separate units built on the open-air plan, that is, three of the walls of each room can be opened at will. Motorbuses convey slightly more than half of the children to school.

To

At the beginning of 1934 it was apparent to discerning teachers in the school (a district high school with a secondary department of 40 pupils) that achievement in studies was not what it used to be; nor was the health of the children what it should have been. There were all too frequent signs of fatigue-pale faces where there used to be rosy evidence of good health. The economic depression, which was entering upon its third year, was making itself felt in the district. Was it taking toll of the children's health? answer this question a nutrition survey of all pupils in the school was undertaken, and, when it was found that a serious position was revealed, the school co-operated with the community in an attempt to improve matters. The improvement in nutrition, as the result of a vigorous campaign in the school against malnutrition, was reflected in an improvement in the studies of individual pupils. The experiment stands, therefore, as an example of the modern idea of the widening function of education.

The first step was to examine the medical record cards. It was found that only 5 per cent of the pupils were classified as malnutrition cases. The methods used were apparently not sensitive enough to reflect trends in child health due to economic changes in the community, and it was felt that this could be remedied if the clinical examina(Continued on page 304)

tions of the medical officers (each of whom was examining between thirty and forty children daily) were combined with a simple objective method of arriving at a nutrition indexone that could be made by teachers as part of school routine. After some consideration, it was decided to use an ageheight-weight scale as the measuring rod for estimating the standard of nutrition. The one used was on the lines of the Baldwin-Wood Scale, but prepared by the Department of Public Health, Toronto, and known as the Toronto Scale. On this scale' malnutrition' meant more than 10 per cent below standard weight, and subnutrition' 8, 9 and 10 per cent below. The first weighing (February 1934) gave the following percentages:

This shows an apparent improvement which largely disappears when the subnutrition and malnutrition figures are added together.

A further examination of the occupations of parents showed that the excessive malnutrition was evenly distributed through all the economic groups of the district. Thus it was not directly due to poverty. But ignorance of food requirements was general, and there was need to urge parents so to order their home lives that the children had ample sleep and were not burdened with their parents' worries.

Immediately after the February weighing in 1935 a campaign against malnutrition was started. Regular meetings of parents were organized, and lectures given on diet, food values, &c. A committee was formed to go into the question of a milk ration for underweight children. The result was that in twelve months the amount of malnutrition in the school fell from 23 per cent to 8.5 per cent, and subnutrition from 11.5 per cent to 9.0 per cent.

The study showed, then, that a good health campaign is abundantly effective, and that a milk ration is the biggest single influence in improving nutrition. The best results came with individuals. One boy with an intelligence quotient of 120 was achieving only mediocre results in school. His nutritional status was found to be 15 per cent below normal. He was given a pint of milk daily, relieved of homework, and recommended a full twelve hours' sleep a day. By the end of the year his nutrition was nearly normal and his achievement came into line with his intelligence. To improve his geometry and algebra he needed, not extra homework, but extra calcium and sleep."

The time taken for measurement of nutrition was negligible say four minutes per child per year. The result of the experiment seems to show that, if preventive medicine is the best kind of social security, the best place to begin is the school, and that teachers are in the best strategic position to supplement the remedial work of school medical officers. S. B. L.

GIFTED CHILD PROBLEMS IN THE U.S.A.
O much has been heard about the problem child and

in the United States efforts are now being made for the gifted child.

The Teachers College of Columbia University recently held a conference on Education for the Gifted, for it is generally agreed by American teachers that many gifted children are victimized, even by their teachers.

For example, it is believed that a child who knows all the answers, is far brighter than any other children in the

class, and may even make the teacher look silly on one or two occasions, is picked out to do the class chores because there is nothing the teacher can teach him.

Such children used to be called favourites. They were always called upon to clean the blackboard, to straighten the books, to run little errands for the teacher. Actually, other children resented these favours and in the long run the gifted child suffered from these little attentions.

In the United States there is a movement afoot to bring these children together in special classes where they may work at ease and among children with equal gifts. The argument in favour of this is that gifted children, when attending school, may become lazy. They find the work very easy, make no efforts, carry off most of the prizes. Then they go to high school or college, where they are likely to meet a greater percentage of bright students than they did in the elementary school. Now, instead of shining they appear dull. They still believe that they can carry everything before them without effort.

The argument against the segregation of the gifted is that it would warp their characters, make them feel very superior, mould them into an unsocial and even antisocial class.

On this score a recent survey by Prof. Terman is interesting. Over a period of years he followed the careers of 1,300 young men and women who passed through the Speyer School, Manhattan; all of them fell into the gifted class.

At the time of writing the figures are not complete, for naturally such a survey must be spread over a great many years, and the recent disclosures by the professor deal with men and women now between the ages of 26 and 32. Prof. Terman started his investigation in 1922.

Out of the total mentioned above, 3 per cent had died sixteen years after leaving high school. Of the survivors, about 95 per cent of the boys and 85 per cent of the girls had continued their studies at college. Most of them were about two years below the average age of their year and many of them acquitted themselves well. A good proportion, however, did not do very well.

Law, engineering, geology, and medicine attracted a large percentage of the boys. Teaching, religion, and social work also had their followers, some became jazz musicians, a few went to Hollywood, one became a policeman, another a fox farmer. Less than 1 per cent of them were out of work and none was on relief.

Average earnings were about £10 per week, although one young lawyer still in the twenties was turning over £2,500 a year, and the jazz musicians were earning at least £20 per week.

The girls were not so well paid. Many became teachers, a large percentage went into offices and libraries. There were also nurses and interior decorators among them. About half the total number had married, and of these 8 per cent had divorced.

"well

The moral standard of these gifted children is above the average", according to Prof. Terman. Three boys had criminal records and two or three girls had illegitimate children, while one of the girls had become a prostitute. A small percentage also drank a good deal.

The conclusion drawn by the professor is that on the average his gifted children are doing well, although none of them has become a leader in his or her profession. Meanwhile the struggle for special schools for the gifted goes on. S. H. KAHN

THE ROCKEFELLER FOUNDATION

HE Rockefeller Foundation has published A Review for

The Rocket President, Raymond B. Fosdick. He cites

"

some institutes now under German domination and remarks that to sit by and watch the disappearance or decadence, or, worse, the perversion of institutions of learning which in earlier and better days we were privileged to assist is not an easy assignment ". Owing to the war, many scientific workers scattered throughout the world have been recalled. (Continued on page 306)