| AdminHistory | The Technical Education Act of 1889 empowered local Councils to delegate their authority in respect of technical instruction, except for raising the rate or borrowing money, to a Council Committee. On 29 June 1890 the Technical Schools Committee was established in Birmingham, following the submission of a report to the Council regarding the Act by the Museum and Art Gallery Committee. The committee consisted of the Mayor, eight members of the Council, two representatives each of the School Board, Mason Science College and Midland Institute, and two artisans. The committee's main function was to oversee the provision of technical education in the city, and in accordance with the report's recommendation, that no aid whatsoever should be granted to any institution not under the entire control of the Council. Unlike other Local Authorities, the Council opted to take full control of the Birmingham and Midland Institute's technical and science classes, after an agreement was reached, with the Council paying the Birmingham and Midland Institute a total of £1200 a year to cover rent, clerical work and utility costs.
The Technical Instruction Act granted Local Authorities discretionary powers to provide, or to help provide, technical or manual instruction, at no more than the rate of 1d in the pound. The Act was intended to help improve the standard of technical education of Britain’s workforce, since British commerce was now facing increasing increased competition from more the modern industrialised economies of Germany and the U.S.A. The Act of 1889 defined technical instruction as the principles of science or art applicable to industry, and the application of these in the workplace, which included modern languages, but excluded instruction in the actual business practice of any trade, industry or employment.
The Act also set up a central government department of Science and Art, but made allowances for local interest groups by including any form of instruction represented by the Local Authority to be required by the circumstances of the district’s economic activity. The difficulty facing the Council in Birmingham rested on both the sheer size and scope of the handicrafts and trades practised in the city, while it was felt that the clause excluding instruction in the practice of a trade would impair the effectiveness of the Act. A report of the Birmingham Technical School Committee, dated 18 October 1892, noted that while it was preferable for an apprentice to learn their trade in the workshop, the widespread division of labour in the workplace as a result of increased mechanisation and specialisation meant that ‘a youth may be kept at one kind of work year after year, learning nothing beyond it’.
The report had recommended the establishment of day classes, with a course of study more advanced than that of the school at Bridge Street, but less rigorous than that of Mason Science College, as well as setting up of branch schools. Although positive recommendation was at first withheld due to inadequate resources, these were quickly increased under the provisions of the Local Taxation (Customs and Excise) Act, 1890, which allowed for a proportion of the Local Taxation (Customs and Excise) duties paid to the Local Taxation Account to be used to fund technical instruction. Birmingham was thus to receive additional revenues of £9000 during the first year expressly for this purpose, while the Technical Instruction Act of 1891 allowed the committee to set aside any money unspent at the end of the financial year for its original purpose. The 1891 Act also enabled the Council to contribute to schools outside its district, and to provide scholarships.
A Municipal Technical School was opened in the rooms of the Midland Institute on 19 January 1891, which granted a limited number of free admissions to poorer students. While the general pattern of scientific teaching remained largely as before, the school arranged new systematic courses of study extending over two years, and adapted to the needs of local industry. The Science and Art Department sanctioned a number of subjects not included in its Directory, including Electrometallurgy, Iron and Steel Work and Mechanical Engineering, amongst many others. The preparatory course covered Mathematics and Mechanics, Chemistry, Practical Plane and Solid Geometry, Physics and Metallurgy. There were also eleven special courses geared to specific trades such as engineering, chemicals and building.
Class sizes expanded rapidly, to the extent that the Council of the Institute was anxious to resume possession of its classrooms, and refused to extend the lease on its rooms to the City Council beyond 1895. On 6 December 1892 the Technical Education Committee recommended that the Council purchase a plot of freehold land extending from Suffolk Street to Summer Street for £11,888. The school was finally opened on 13 December 1895, and its headmaster, Mr W.E. Sumpner, was formerly the principal of the Physics Department at Battersea Polytechnic, taking an annual salary of £500.
In 1893 the committee informed the school that private funding for certain scholarships would cease, establishing 24 maintenance scholarships instead for pupils from local elementary schools, worth £25 over two years. With the foundation of the Day School in 1897, the scheme was modified; 24 minor grants were established, allowing the recipients free schooling for four years, plus an additional maintenance grant of £5 for the third and fourth years. A further eighteen free admissions were granted for three years, plus twelve transfer scholarships of £5 for boys leaving Waverley Road or Bridge Street schools.
In July 1896, the motion in favour of a Day School was finally approved, after which further changes and extensions were made at the Suffolk Street building, including the opening of a Women’s Department. The Day School scheme was given final approval on 16 March 1897, and was intended to provide technical and scientific instruction for boys about to engage in manufacturing, but not as artisans, as well as those about to pass through Mason College into the scientific professions. Every effort was made to ensure that the curriculum did not overlap with that of Mason College, or the other technical schools controlled by the Board engaged in producing the next generation of skilled artisans.
The courses typically lasted for four years, divided into three stages, and it was estimated that education for the pupils could be provided at £8 per head, of which the school fees would cover costs of £3 per pupil per year, with the rest subsidised by additional grants allocated by the government. The Day School was officially opened on 17 September 1897 by Sir John Gorst M.P., with pupil numbers almost doubling from 78 that year to 154 by 1899. In 1903 the committee was disbanded, and the function of technical education fell to the Technical Education and Evening Schools Sub-Committee (see BCC/1/BH/4), which reported to the new Education Committee formed that year (see BCC/1/BH). |