_To the Editor of the_ DAILY POST.
SIR,--I am sure that the inhabitants of Dudley will duly
appreciate the prompt and straightforward manner in which
(Mr. Harper) the head master of the Dudley Grammar School has
replied to my letter of Monday last, respecting the omission of
awarding prizes to the boys this midsummer; but, whilst I fully
agree with him that the reception by a boy of a gold medal at
his hands may be looked upon as a presumed assumption that
the holder will be able successfully to pass the examinations
which are now instituted at Oxford and Cambridge for the middle
classes, yet I maintain that hundreds of boys will pass that
elevated mental examination without being the gold medallist of
their school; besides the fact that any youth is eligible for
that ordeal, whether he has been educated at a public school
or merely received private tuition; neither do I still see
any valid reasons why a dozen excellent book prizes should be
withdrawn from the junior classes at that school to be the
means of elevating the classical and scholastic standing of one
or two youths, probably much better fitted, both by position
and capacity, to battle with the difficulties and mental toils
attendant upon the earlier training of youth.
As an ardent promoter of education, sir, I rejoice with others
to see that the great, nay, almost once irreproachable,
Universities have at last opened their hoary portals to that
class of society for whose benefit and interest those seats
of learning were originally instituted; but I cannot but
feel that there is great danger in store for the lads of any
independent grammar school lurking under this expanded mental
promotion offered by the Universities, of the chances of the
master devoting an overdue attention to the senior classes,
with the view of coaching them up to the required altitude, at
the risk of neglecting the important ground-work of tuition
indispensably required by the junior classes. Apart from this
temptation to elevate the fame of a school at the risk of
damaging its productive qualities, a paralysing effect is sure
to be produced upon the younger boys, when they feel and know
that years of mental toil have yet to be gone through ere a
prize is likely to be won, or an encouraging smile awarded by
the dreaded Dominies.
It is very gratifying to find that the Head Master of this
school is so truly anxious for the welfare of this important
institution; and as an inhabitant of this town, having children
to educate at that school, I would respectfully claim with him
my share of anxiety for its continued usefulness, and onward
progress. But institutions, Sir, like the Dudley Grammar
School, were never, in my opinion, intended to be the grinding
schools for the aspirants for classical honours; neither am I
persuaded that the class of parents who usually send their sons
to that school will, as a rule, be disposed to keep them there
up to a period of youth (16 years,) with the idea of bettering
their commercial position by becoming an associate of one of
our Universities.
Rugby, Shrewsbury, Birmingham, and the like, are the public
schools that will most benefit by this recent relaxation; but
the ordinary Grammar Schools of this period are not required
to promote boys (not students) to a comprehensive knowledge of
Latin authors, algebraic lore, and mathematical expositions,
attainments which do not come within the scope of the class
intended to be benefited by such institutions, for it is too
often the case that a superficial exterior is made to suffice
for an empty ground-work; and I fully concur with the Rev.
Master, "that a few subjects well taught would be a better
training for the middle classes than a superficial knowledge of
a larger number of subjects."
Having reasons to suppose that the Head Master has had very
little to do with this important alteration, I trust, for
the welfare of both boys and the town, that he will use his
professional and scholastic influence to induce the trustees
of the Prize Fund to rescind their resolution of awarding
medals instead of books, believing that a persistence in this
unwise step will not only alter the acknowledged character
of the school, by producing a pecuniary loss to the funds
of the same, but inflict an uncalled for injustice upon the
minds of parents in this neighbourhood, who have an undoubted
right to the best-devised advantages that can be derived from
that heirloom of knowledge handed down to us for the last two
centuries.
If, Sir, an annual gold medal prize can be of any use in
elevating the ancient renown of this Grammar School, pray let
the trustees appeal periodically to the parents of the boys
attending the school for the funds for that specific object,
and rely upon the well-known generosity of a Dudley public;
rather than inflict an ungracious discouragement upon the
junior classes of the school.