Statement adopted by the graduates of the Queen's University in Ireland, assembled in public meeting in Belfast, on Wednesday, 6th December, 1865.

Date:
[1865]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Statement adopted by the graduates of the Queen's University in Ireland, assembled in public meeting in Belfast, on Wednesday, 6th December, 1865. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    dissolving the Board of Commissioners for the Diocesan, Royal, and other schools of public foun- dation, and constituting a new Board of National Education to which should be committed the charge of both elementary and higher class school education. The Committee recommended the es- tablishment of County Academies, and of at least four Colleges—one in each of the provinces of Ire- land—and suggested the advisability of conferring degrees on the students of those Colleges by a cen- tral Board in Dublin. The Committee state that the objects to be kept in view in the proposed system of public education are as follows :— “ The system should be iu harmony with the real wants and position of the class for which it is intended; it should, as much as possible, accord with other portions of the education system; it should be of the most improved character; it should be general, common to all, without distinction of class ' or creed; and once established it should be rendered per- manent.” And in concluding their Report the Committee say : “ Your Committee have thus endeavoured to lay before the House as ample an account as was in their power of the conclusions to which they have arrived on the important questions submitted to their consideration. They have aimed at establishing a system, adequate, they trust, to the wants of the country, open to all sects, professions, and classes ; cheap, imiversal, and they are willing to hope, durable. * * ♦ * Your Committee are not insensible, however, to the difficulties which must necessarily impede its immediate adoption; they are far from urging precipi- tate or wholesale experiments, at the same time they con- sider it of moment that whatever portion be adopted, its re- lation to others should be steadily kept in view. Without a due observance of this principle, it will be at any period difficult to establish a sound and comprehensive system, and education [will] be exposed to a series of abortive attempts, involving large expenditure with little benefit to the public. Committee re- commend a tliorongh system of Public Educa- tion. Opinions of Com- mittee.