On This Day, 29 February 1916

Birmingham Daily Gazette

Tuesday 29th February 1916 (excerpt)

HARD ON MOTHERS
Taking Children Away from School

Concerning the proposal that the minimum age of school children should be six years instead of five, Miss Mathieson, of the Birmingham Women’s Settlement, who was interviewed late last night, expressed the opinion to a “Gazette” representative that such a provision would really be a very great hardship to the mothers in the poor districts. “Of course in the country it is different,” she said, “but in the large towns you continually find young women who are the mothers of four children under six years of age, and how on earth are they going to get through their house work if they have children on their hands all day? The result is that the children have to run wild in the streets, which is not good for them.”
A Comparison with Germany.
She pointed out that even in Germany, where the children do not go to school before attaining six years of age, an inspector calls on the parents a year before to see what arrangements are being made for the children to enter school. In Germany there were kindergarten, which took the place of our infant schools. The infants’ schools in Birmingham were excellent, good work was being done, and there could not be a better set of teachers.
Councillor E. F. Freeland, a member of the Education Committee, heartily welcomed the recommendation. “I agree.” He added, “And I think that my committee agrees, that five is full [sic] early to the children to commence attending school. Hitherto the Birmingham Education Committee has allowed children of three years of age to be admitted to the schools in some districts but the number of schools in which this has obtained was being reduced, and was only allowed purely on account of the poverty of the parents, which rendered in more desirable that the children should be at school rather than at home. The committee, however, does not believe in it.