The following tables show the trend of the statistics of annual increment of school enrollment and population and the distribution of the increase among elementary, secondary, and higher institutions, public and private. TABLE IIIa.-Increase in sixteen years of the total number of persons receiving educa tion and of the total population. TABLE IIIb.-Per cent of the population receiving education of different grades. AVERAGE AMOUNT OF SCHOOLING PER INHABITANT. Tables IVa and IVb show the relative amounts of schooling given in the different census divisions at different periods since 1870, measured by years of 200 days each. For example, the 5.39 years given for 1906 indicate 1,078 days' schooling for each inhabitant if enrollment and attendance should hold the same percentage to population for 13 years as it held during 1906. Then the number arriving at school age, 6 years, would have attended 1,038 days on the completion of their eighteenth year if their average attendance per year had been the same as the schools of the nation, public and private, reported for 1906. Table IVe shows the estimated average amount of schooling in days at different epochs, beginning with 1800. TABLE IVa. Average number of years of schooling (of 200 days each) that each individual of the population received at the different dates specified in the table, taking into account all public and private schooling of whatever grade. 1880. 1890, 1897. 1898. 1899. 1900. 1901. 1902. a1903. a1904. a1905. a1906. North Atlantic Division, . 1.86 2.42 4.65 6. 15 4. 17 4.57 5.85 The United States.. 3.96 4.46 5.03 5.20 5.09 5.23 5. 13 5.18 5.17 5.21 5.33 5.39 6.95 3.52 3.57 3.11 3.10 3. 14 3.06 3.09 6.07 6.01 6.18 5.97 6.01 6.01 6.20 6.38 a Subject to correction. TABLE IVb. The same, aking into account only the schooling furnished by public elementary and secondary schools. 1880. 1890. 1897. 1893. 1899. 1900. 1901. 1902. 1903. @1904. @1905. ja 1906. TABLE IVC.-Average entire amount of schooling, public and private, since 1800, at different epochs, given in days (partly estimated). EDUCATION IN GREAT BRITAIN AND IRELAND. Chapter I pertains to education in Great Britain and Ireland, with chief reference to the relations of the central government to this interest. For the first time in the history of the country an effort was made during the year just closed (1906) to bring together, in a single presentation, the principal statistics relative to the several classes of institutions aided by Parliamentary grants. The tables in which this information is condensed are reproduced in Chapter I, with so much of the original explanatory notes as is necessary for the understanding of points of general interest. Beginning with elementary education by the grant-in-aid of 1833, the fostering care of the Government has been extended until it reaches to a greater or less degree every class of teaching agency in the three divisions of the Kingdom. Under the impulse imparted by the Exposition of 1851 a systematic effort was made to foster science and art education by the agency of the science and art department, now merged in the board of education; in 1889, in view of the growing importance of modern industries and the consequent establishment of university colleges of a modern type (i. e., colleges preparing students for university examinations and degrees in science and the technical professions), the policy of an annual grant to such colleges was adopted. The initial impulse to these great activities has come from private and municipal effort, but the aid of Government has been indispensable to their forceful development. It will be seen by reference to Table 5 (p. 5), summarizing the particulars comprised in Tables 1-4 (pp. 2-4), that the total sum of the annual appropriations from the national treasury for this work has reached in round numbers £14,780,000 ($71,800,000). In the table referred to this sum is brought into comparison with the annual amount raised by local taxes (rates), which amounts now to £10,390,000 ($50,490,000). The remaining portion of Chapter I treats chiefly of England. In this division of the Kingdom the year has been made memorable by the struggle over the education bill, which, after its passage by a very large majority in the House of Commons, was lost in the House of Lords. The full purpose of this measure, as developed in the House of Commons, has already been explained in a publication of this Office, Bulletin no. 1, 1906. The main propositions of the bill are summarized in Chapter I. They involved absolute control of all schools supported in whole or in part by public funds, and the abolition of religious tests for teachers in such schools. The bill also endeavored to meet denominational demand by arrangements as to religious instruction to be made with the local authorities. These compromises represented the extreme length to which the Government was prepared to go, or in respect to which it was possible to carry the support of its own adherents. In the House of Lords the principle of public control was practically conceded, but with such amendments in regard to religious instruction as virtually continued the same at State expense, and thus defeated the evident intent of the Government measure. Interest in the bill is increased by the action in the French Republic on the law separating church and state, which involves also deep questions of public rights versus church policies. In their respective treatment of this matter the two nations seem for a moment to have reversed their historic attitudes. In England, where all progress has been effected by compromise, the spirit has failed for the time. On the other hand, in France, where the passion for logical procedure generally precludes compromise, this spirit has come to the front in the final adjustment of questions arising from the effort to enforce the separation law. Apart from the education bill the year has been marked in England by efforts to increase and improve the higher elementary schools, which have been put upon a firm basis, as explained in Chapter I. The public agitation of measures for relieving the necessities of poor children, which are made the more evident by the action of the compulsory school laws, has led to the passage of the provision of meals act, which is also fully explained in Chapter I. Tables I and II (p. 10) pertain to the several classes of schools in England grouped together as "public elementary." Table III (p. 11) indicates the progress of the "ordinary public elementary" schools under the workings of the law of 1902 and the administration of the board of education. Chapter I closes with a survey of university education in the United Kingdom, including statistics showing the number of registered students for specified years for the period 1897 to 1905, inclusive. The accompanying notes pertain either to current events in university life or to features of special interest in the organization of individual institutions. EDUCATION IN FRANCE. Chapter II, pertaining to education in France, reviews the principal education laws passed by the Republic, with special reference to the anticlerical policy, which culminated in the law of January 24, 1905, providing for the separation of church and state. Apart from its political and religious bearings, the law marks a crisis of great significance in education. For centuries the Church was the chief support of education in France, and under the Republic it has been a powerful rival of the Government in this field. In 1901, when the associations law was passed, which resulted in the suppression of the religious orders, the great teaching agencies of the Church, onefourth the children in primary schools and more than half the students in secondary schools were in schools belonging to those orders. The influence of the orders has been regarded as adverse to republican institutions, and the purpose to eliminate them from the work of education, formed in the early days of the Republic, has been tenaciously maintained to the present time. As pointed out by M. Buisson, the separation law is the final step in this movement. (See p. 20.) The papal encyclical of February 11, 1906, denounced the law on the ground that it ignores the hierarchical organization of the Church and violates the principles upon which its life depends (see p. 24). As the faithful and the clergy are forbidden to carry out the law, the situation has assumed a very serious aspect. The law is considered in Chapter II solely in respect to its educational bearings. In view, however, of the wider consequences of its rejection by the Church, special interest attaches to the recent signs of a conciliatory attitude on the part of the Government. ED 1906-VOL 1- -II It has been found necessary to devise some measure for the disposition of the Church properties. Hence the law of January 2, 1907, which provides that where no associations are formed either in accordance with the law of 1905 or that of 1901, to claim the use of the Church properties, the same shall revert to the municipal or communal authorities. It then becomes possible for priests to secure from the mayors of communes long-term leases of the property, and contracts are already being drawn up for the purpose, as explained in Chapter II. A bill has also passed the Chamber of Deputies, waiving the formality of a previous declaration in the case of persons desiring to hold public meetings. Thus public worship may be continued without legal restriction. Other matters are involved in the separation law, as, for example, the repair of churches, with respect to which new measures are promised. These successive laws give a new legal status to the Church on the basis of municipal or communal organization. The statistics comprised in Chapter II present in concise form the operations of schools and higher institutions for selected years from 1877 to 1903-4. These statistics afford an index to the practical development of the system of public instruction, and a means of following the movement toward a completely secularized system. The comparative statistics of higher education (p. 33) are particularly significant, as they show conclusively that the measures which have restored the isolated faculties to the status of organized universities have given them new life and vigor. This is evident from the increase in the total number of university students, and more particularly from the increasing number of students in the provincial universities. (Table XII, p. 33.) The superior council of education, whese constitution and functions are explained in the chapter here considered, offers an instructive example to other nations as to means of securing a proper consideration of projected changes and reforms in education before they are practically applied. To this body of professional experts are referred all matters pertaining to the scholastic work and to the administration of the system; hence undue haste and crude experiments are avoided, and radical changes such as those recently accomplished in the province of higher education, to which reference is made in Chapter II, are introduced without disturbance and with the harmonious cooperation of those affected by them. At the present time the council has before it a proposition affecting the secondary schools in France. As explained in Chapter II, the most radical change from existing conditions under discussion is the suppression of the baccalaureate. Instead of this degree, it is proposed to adopt a leaving certificate, the same to be awarded upon |