§ MR. JAMES STUARTasked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, Whether he is aware that the Irish Intermediate Education Act of 1878 admitted girls as well as boys to its benefits, leaving power to the Commissioners created by the Act to make necessary arrangements, subject to the sanction of the Lord Lieutenant; that, by the Act of 1879, creating the Royal University in Ireland, women were admitted to all the examinations, degrees, prizes, and scholarships of that University, on the same footing as men; that the arrangements of the Intermediate Education Commissioners have hitherto been such as to give girls the same choice of subjects and the same standards as boys, thus affording them equal opportunity of preparation for the Royal University; that efforts have from time to time been made to alter the programme, so as to lower the standard for girls; and that it has now 918 been proposed by the Commissioners to make two programmes, one maintaining the same level of excellence as hitherto, to which alone boys will be admitted, and to which girls will be admitted on condition of competing with the boys, the other for girls only, on a lower level, which would practically exclude the severer subjects of study, and be unsuitable as a preparation for the Royal University; whether the effect of this arrangement would largely disturb the teaching arrangements of high-class girls' schools in Ireland, by putting strong pecuniary pressure on parents of girls and on teachers to adopt the lower standard; whether the effect of this would be to put great difficulties in the way of girls preparing for the Royal University, and thus tend to nullify the intentions of Parliament in opening the Royal University to women; and, whether, under these circumstances, he will advise the Lord Lieutenant to withhold his sanction from the proposed plans?
§ THE CHIEF SECRETARY FOR IRELAND (Sir WILLIAM HART DYKE)No such change as that referred to has been made in the programme of the Intermediate Education Board. The subject has been under their consideration; but they have postponed their decision until the year after next.