1834 guide to Jersey - education
1834 guide to Jersey:
Education
Jersey's private education system appeared to the author to be succeeding
This is the chapter on education from the Jersey volume of The Channel Islands (the result of a two year residence) by Henry David Inglis
At a time when the education of the people forms so prominent a feature in all systems of national improvement, it is necessary that I should bestow a few words on the means of intellectual improvement in Jersey.
Endowment schools
There are two endowments for free schools in the island, both in the country parishes: one called St Anastase, the other St Mannelier. These were founded in the reign of Henry VII, who granted a charter to the endowers. The property attached to these chartered schools is extremely small, and altogether inadequate to carry into effect the intention of the founders.
The nomination of the masters lies with the Dean, and the Rectors of the 12 parishes. The schools are, or rather were, intended to be free to all, the inhabitants of the eastern and of the western half of the island having respectively the right of sending their children to the two schools.
Little good, however, has resulted from these foundations. The allowances were too small to secure the exertions of competent masters, and it hashappened that for a considerable period the whole revenue has been swallowed up in repairs to the buildings.
Such has long been the case with the school of St Anastase, which does not at present boast of a single scholar. Until lately, when the school of St Mannelier was put upon a somewhat better footing, 20 was the greatest number of pupils known to attend. Since the appointment of the present master, the number has increased to about 40, but the establishment still languishes.
The States of the island ought to vote a part of the island revenue in aid of this institution. Their funds are frittered away in ill-devised works, generally so clumsily executed that the necessity for continued repairs keeps up a constant drain on the revenue, and prevents their application to works of greater utility.
Co-educational school
In the town of St Helier there is a national school on Bell’s system, for the youth of both sexes, who are instructed gratis, in the common branches of education. This school is supported by subscriptions and donations, and there is also a fund, the interest of other donations, from which clothes are provided, and which are presented as prizes.
The school may be said to be in a flourishing condition, and it is believed by those who have had the best opportunity of judging, to have been very instrumental in improving the intellectual and moral condition of the lower orders.
The ‘seminaries’, as they are called, in the town and neighbourhood of St Helier, are sufficiently numerous; there are, I believe, between 20 and 30 of such ‘establishments’ and although I readily admit that among the conductors of these there are some fitted for the task of instruction, they are of course trading speculations, and offer no guarantee, such as that which under an improved system of national instruction, ought ot be provided.
With respect to the state of education throughout the island, I should say that instruction is very general. Indeed, in the country, among the native inhabitants, there is scarcely any child who is not at school. In some of the parishes there are slenderly endowed schools; in others there are no endowments. But there is no parish in which there is any want of schools for instruction in French, English and Arithmetic.
Sunday schools also are sufficiently provided, but their efficiency is considerably impaired by the exclusive adoption of the catechism of the episcopal church.
I have frequently walked into the country schools, and have always found the masters painstaking and tolerably intelligent.
There is also an endowment of about £76 per annum for aiding students in their studies in the universities of Oxford and Cambridge.
