On this page

• Text (1)

  Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

  • 

    WHAT CAN EDUCATED WOMEN DO? 223

• Transcript

  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

    Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.

    ; *' We Should Not Omit To Mention That ...

    those women who , though willing to work , would not be able to pay , etc . with as much rilifc and reason as many of the present appeals

    for , help and charity . g These women might then be employed in workhouses , either as visitors or residents , without expense to the

    parish . Indeed the two plans we have suggested would be compatibleas the more highly paid and educated matron would of course

    , be the most likely to welcome and co-operate with such fellowworkers .

    " Another opening for remunerative labor connected with workhouses , or at least out-door poor , is the work of the relieving officer ,

    why . should not some -women take a part of it ? Women attend entirely to the administration of relief at the Bureau de

    Bienfaisance in Paris , and why should they not here do just as well for visiting the sick and poor in their own homes ? It would in fact

    be merely the extension of district visitors ' * work , and a co-operation between them and parish authorities for their mutual benefit . "

    Turning to _EDUCATIOIKrAt , _INSTITUTIONS .

    Our needs on this vast subject are perhaps more clearly recognised than in other departments of our social life . But the immediate

    effect has been to throw the education of great numbers of girls of the middle class into the hands of men , through the colleges

    established in London and in our provincial towns . It is impossible to regret this ; the instruction of the good and learned men who have

    undertaken the part of professors to all these " girl-graduates , " is an invaluable gain to our generation . We have no women competent

    to instruct other women in the highest branches of knowledge , nor do I eve ?* wish to see tuition handed over exclusively to our sex ; it

    is a much better and more healthy thing that education should always continue to be a reciprocal thing : men teaching girls , and

    women teaching boys , in the departments in which the two sexes separately excel . But there are surely some parts of the great

    domain of education still closed to female teachers ; in particular the office of inspector in girls' schools , and any share in the educational

    foundations , notably the grammar schools for the middle classes . 'Why should a distinguished poetwho also holds the office of

    school-, inspector , be seen ( as I have seen him ) minutely examining the stitches in pocket-handkerchiefs and dusters ? and why have we no

    grammar schools for our tradesmen ' s daughters ? Charity schools do not supply their place . Still I thankfully admit that the training

    schools for certificated mistresses are an enormous step in the right direction .

    Factories . There is no subject on "which I feel more deeply interested than in

    the due superintendence to be exercised over the immense aggregations of women now employed in factories . Without entering into

    the merits or demerits of the factory system as regards women—a

    What Can Educated Women Do? 223

    WHAT CAN EDUCATED WOMEN DO ? 223

• Citation
  • English Woman’s Journal (1858-1864), Dec. 1, 1859, page 223, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/ewj/issues/ewj_01121859/page/7/