§ MR. PINKERTON (Galway)asked the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, If last year the expenditure of public money in the model schools was at the rate of £3 12s. per pupil in average attendance; if the number of new teachers appointed in the national schools was 552; and if only 33 of those had been pupil teachers in the model schools; if, in 1886, the passes in convent and monastery schools were higher than in model schools; and if this was notably so in the highest class; if the model schools are examined by the Head and District Inspectors; and, if the promotion of these Inspectors depends in any way on the success of these examinations?
§ THE CHIEF SECRETARY (Mr. A. J. BALFOUR) (Manchester, E.)The Commissioners of National Education inform me that last year the expenditure of public money in the model schools was at the rate of £3 12s. per pupil, which, however, included the cost of maintenance of the pupil teachers boarded at the establishments, matrons, servants, and other incidental expenses. The numbers are as stated in the second paragraph; but the 33 pupil teachers are exclusive of seven others who became teachers from Training Colleges, having, before they entered the Training College, been pupil teachers. The passes in 1886 show a very slight superiority in the infants and sixth classes of the convent and monastery schools over those of the model schools; while, as regards the first, second, third, fourth, and fifth classes the position is reversed. The aggregate percentage of passes is nearly equal in the two classes of schools, being in the former 90.1, and in the model schools 90 per cent. The reply to paragraph four is in the affirmative. To paragraph five in the negative.