Abstract
THREE times within the last twelve years a Royal Commission has reported on the science teaching of our higher schools. In 1864 the Public Schools Commission announced that from the largest and most famous schools of all it was practically excluded. In 1868 the Endowed Schools Commission declared that the majority of school teachers had accepted it as part of their school work. The Science Commissioners of 1875, in their Sixth Report, on Science Teaching in Schools, testing this statement by inquiry, reports that of 128 endowed schools examined by them not one-half has even attempted to introduce it, while of these only 13 possess a laboratory, and only 10 give to the subject as much as four hours a week. And this statement is curiously illustrated by the statistics of the recent Oxford and Cambridge School Examination, which show that out of 461 candidates for certificates from 40 first-class schools, while 438 boys took up Latin, 433 Greek, 455 Elementary Mathematics, 305 History; only 21 took up Mechanics, 28 Chemistry, 6 Botany, 15 Physical Geography.
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TUCKWELL, W. Sixth Report of the Science Commission . Nature 12, 549–550 (1875). https://doi.org/10.1038/012549a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/012549a0