Sponsored Teacher Training Education in 1800s

TonyV

TonyV

He who cleans up after his ancestors...
One of my maternal grandfathers came from an ordinary working class family in the Northamptonshire village of Cottingham. His father was a coachman and gardener so I don't imagine that the family had much money.

There were 6 children in the family and two of them, including my grandfather, went on to become head teachers. I know that my grandfather attended Culham College in Oxfordshire sometime in the late 1800s. This was a teacher's training college. During his time there the head of the college was a Reverend Doctor (presumably of Philosophy). I imagine that the other teacher son went through similar training. I have pictures of my grandfather at the college dressed in various activity clothing - as a bandsman, as a cricketer in whites etc. All very normal college stuff I imagine, but where did the money come from for the education and his extras, board and lodging?

I wonder whether anyone on the forum knows whether young men and women of humble backgrounds aspiring to teach were helped to study by churches or other instititutions? I cannot otherwise think how they could have received such higher education. Any ideas gratefully received
 
Have a read of this TNA Research Guide. One of the sections says:

Different types of teacher training were established and carried out at different times:

  • Before the Education Act 1902, the training of teachers was largely carried out under a pupil-teacher system .
  • Training schools and colleges (also called 'normal schools'). Initially started by the charities the British Society and the National Society in the early 19th century to train teachers in their elementary schools
  • Universities became involved in teacher training in 1890 when 'day training colleges' attached to universities were established
  • In 1902 the training of teachers became established as a form of higher education, enabling the new local education authorities (LEAs) to make secondary schools available for the training of pupil-teachers.
Going by the second paragraph, it looks like a charity could well have been involved.
 
Thanks Jan. I'll certainly have a look. It is pretty clear that institutional/charitable money was involved. By 1902 he was working in schools as a trainee teacher. I had always assumed that he went to college before doing that but maybe he was sponsored by his local education authority after showing aptitude.
 
Culham College has a website
http://www.
culhamcollege.co.uk/history-of-the-college

They may be able to offer some advice/records perhaps?
 
Thanks Molly May. Yes I found that a year or two ago and was able to correct one or two things they'd got wrong. Tut!
 
Culham College was a Church of England institution and graduates would therefore normally teach at a National School (National Schools were CofE schools).

See the National Register of Archives for the whereabouts of records.
 
Thanks Peter. I learn something every day. So he must have been sponsored by the church as I suspected originally.

Tony
PS is your avatar a picture of you?
 
TonyV said:
... I had always assumed that he went to college before doing that but maybe he was sponsored by his local education authority after showing aptitude.
Click to expand...
A number of my older teachers worked as assistant teachers before they did their study in Victoria, Aust. I think it was quite a normal thing to do pre war. I have a couple of 'Assistant teachers' in back in my tree aged in their teens.
In fact if you checked some of the qualifications of teachers in the 1950's who'd been around a while, you may find no qualifications at all, they'd just been 'teaching' for years.
Wouldn't happen now of course.
Sandra
 
Just following up on both Peter's and Sandra's helpful comments. He was 19 in 1891 and already listed in the census as a pupil teacher. In 1901 he was a teacher at a Board School. I find it quite difficult to age young men of that generation from their photographs because they tended to wear what would today be considered 'old' fashions i.e. more like their fathers would wear. Also sitting (or standing) for your photograph in those days required you to be very serious and po-faced.

He could have gone to Culham between the two censuses and certainly his college pictures suggest a fairly mature young man who could have been older than the more conventional 18 year old tertiary students of the present time.

I too have found trainee teachers, particularly female ones of those times, who seem to have gone straight from school to teaching. It reminds me of the time I took a pretty academic 2 year post grad diploma as one of the first mature students on a brand new course. After qualification I received a letter from the course principal telling me that I was now one of the few people qualified to teach the course and would I be interested in applying! At the time I thought that a bit odd because I had had very time to add experience of the discipline to my academic learning. On reflection however it made more sense and mimics what happens a lot in academia.
 
I have a similar situation with my Great Grabdfather ( William Rodger)but in Scotland, his father being a blacksmith. He started his training at a school in Alloa and went on to take the Queens Scholarship in Edinburgh in 1863. The thing is he seems to disappear between 1863 and 1866 when he married Harriet Tidmarsh at Little Compton in Gloucestershire. How William got from Scotland to Gloucestershire I don't know maybe he was at a boarding school. Harriet too was a teacher but what training she had I don't know either but it was enough for them both to be heads at Harmston School near Lincoln.
 
Hi Homebird
I'm not sure whether the situation in Scotland was the same as that in England but if so the TNA guide linked in Daft Bat's post (first reply to my original post) is worth a read. It suggests that teacher training institutions were set up by voluntary organisations and scholars passing an exam at around 18 could go to one for three years. I suspect that your great grandfather was probably at one of those between 1863 and 1866.
Tony
 
TonyV said:
Hi Homebird
I'm not sure whether the situation in Scotland was the same as that in England but if so the TNA guide linked in Daft Bat's post (first reply to my original post) is worth a read. It suggests that teacher training institutions were set up by voluntary organisations and scholars passing an exam at around 18 could go to one for three years. I suspect that your great grandfather was probably at one of those between 1863 and 1866.
Tony
Click to expand...

Hi Tony,
He began his training when he was about 14 I think at a school in Alloa before he took the Queens scholarship. I just wish I could find out where he was between 63 and 66 because it falls between the census returns.
 
You may find the article here of interest

Code: 
http://www.ed.ac.uk/education/about-us/maps-estates-history/history/part-two
 
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