The control of education

Abstract

Among the many writings of Professor W.O. Lester Smith is a book called 'To Whom do Schools belong?' (Blackwell, 1945). This seminal work reviews the development of schools in England in relation to their foundation. It examines the individuals, groups and movements which influenced the growth of establishments, and offers some material to consider the fundamental question of who controls education. This major topic has been discussed often enough, and it is not proposed to re-examine it here. It is an educational truism that schools are a function of the society they serve. It is almost axiomatic that in a dictatorship the schools are planned by the dictator, and in a democracy they are organised on democratic lines. The young eskimo learnt in the school of experience and bitter cold: the Australian aboriginal in that of the tribe and tropical heat.