§ MR. YOXALLTo ask the President of the Board of Education if he can state for what reason the Board of Education have abandoned the footnote to Article 10 in the Code of 1906, indicating that, after July, 1909, the Board may require the employment of a certain proportion of college-trained teachers upon the staff of the public elementary schools; and whether, in view of the number of qualified teachers unable to get appointments and the number of unqualified teachers at present employed, the Board will take steps to 1177 re-issue this notice, and to announce some definite provision to secure the reform indicated.
(Answered by Mr. Runciman.) The withdrawal of the footnote was due mainly to the fact that a deputation from the National Union of Teachers represented to my predecessor that the new provision would, in their view, inflict grave hardship on a large number of their colleagues unless all teachers certificated prior to 1908 were to be regarded as "trained," irrespective of whether or not they had in fact "completed a course of training in a training college."