The experience of the English Board of Education may be noticed in
this connection. Owing to the interest in national vigor aroused by
the rejection of recruits during the Boer War, England took steps to
provide food for the underfed school children and medical supervision
of the health of the school children. This resulted in the
accumulation of a great body of evidence showing the need of
improvement in the conditions and household management in the homes
from which these children came. Both schools for mothers and infant
classes have been recognized as appropriate extensions of the work of
the education authority, and the national character of the problem
has been embodied in provision for the grant in aid.[64]
The conditions on which grants to schools for mothers and infant
classes are made, set a standard for those communities desiring help
from the central authority, and furnish a basis of judgment as to the
work of any local authority. Those conditions are stated as follows:
A school for mothers is primarily an educational institution,
providing training and instruction for the mother in the care
and management of infants and little children. The imparting
of such instruction may include:
(_a_) Systematic classes.
(_b_) Home visiting.
(_c_) Infant consultations.
The provision of specific medical and surgical advice and
treatment (if any) should be only incidental.
(_d_) The Board of Education will pay grants in respect of
schools for mothers, as defined in Article II of their
Regulations for the year 1914-15, subject to the following
qualifications:
(I) That an institution will not be recognized as a school
for mothers unless collective instruction by means of
systematic classes forms an integral part of its work;
(II) That grant will only be paid in respect of "infant
consultations," which are provided for women attending a
school for mothers;
(III) That grant will only be paid in respect of expenditure
on "home visiting" of children registered at a school for
mothers if neither the sanitary authority nor County Council
undertake to arrange for such visiting;
(IV) The fact that a school for mothers receives a grant or
assistance from a sanitary authority (or a County Council) or
its offices will not disqualify it from receiving a grant
from the Board of Education.
Thus the institutions included under the title "schools for mothers"
have for their main object the reduction of infant sickness and
mortality by means of the education of the mothers. They train the
mother to keep her baby in good health through a common-sense
application of the ordinary laws of hygiene. The training may be given
by means of personal advice from doctor or nurse to individual
mothers, by home visiting, and by means of collective teaching and
systematic classes.[65] It is necessary to distinguish these "schools
for mothers," which were educational, from the maternity centers
maintained by the Local Government Board, intended to provide prenatal
care of expectant mothers.
During the year 1917-18, two hundred and eighty-six such schools for
mothers received aid from the central authority. The work of
representative schools, as described in the medical officer's
report,[66] includes instruction in hygiene, principles of feeding,
needlework, and boot repairing.
In the same way the infant classes or nursery schools are to be
distinguished both from day nurseries which may, if they comply with
stated conditions, receive grants, and from infant consultations.[67]
It is interesting to note that these items in the educational program
are closely related to the plan under which _Mothercraft_ is taught to
(1) the older girls in the public elementary schools, and (2) the
girls between fourteen and eighteen in the secondary and continuation
schools. Under the stimulus of the possible grant in aid from the
central authority and of the supervision and advice of the central
authority, this work is developed by the local authority. The day
nursery or infant class is made to serve the purpose of training the
older girl as well as of training and care of the young child.
The argument here is not affected by the fact that under the recent
Act providing for a Ministry of Health, these functions are
surrendered by the education authority to the New Ministry of Health,
as are those of the Local Government Board. Certain functions remain
educational, and must develop in accordance with educational
principles. Others are sanitary and call for inspection and
supervision.