Aberdare Boys’ Grammar School

   The Noble Lord said that this was one of the most interesting occasions which had ever occurred since Aberdare bad been moulded into a parish. In congratulating them on the commencement of that very fine building he should like to avail himself of the opportunity of referring to the condition of education in Wales at this present moment. He would not trouble them by going over the well-beaten ground of what had been done for education since the passing of the Education Act of 1870, in which he was proud to have had a part. Their schools they knew, were excellent, well appointed, well provided in every respect. They also knew that of late years, for the benefit of those who were ambitious to learn and who had the means of continuing their education—a blessing, he was sorry to say, not granted to all children—they had the advanced elementary schools, which were doing much. They came now to the intermediate schools. The intermediate schools of this country up to this time had generally been of two sorts—one the old endowed schools, such as Swansea, where he had the honour of receiving his own education, and the other, such as Cowbridge, at which his father and his uncle received a portion of their education. (Hear, hear.) These had been about the only two schools at which a liberal education could be got. There had been, no doubt, scattered over the country a considerable number of private adventure schools, some of them, doubtless, good, but, generally speaking, there was— no guarantee given to the public that these schools were well managed and well conducted, and that their children were receiving the education they hoped for. Reference had been made to the inquiry instituted into the state of intermediate and higher education in Wales. Now, intermediate education could not be established without passing an Act of Parliament. Education was a subject upon which a great many men had their opinions, and years passed before an intermediate education scheme could be carried out. What the Government were able to do was to adopt the recommendation of the departmental committee which conducted that inquiry, and to found two colleges in addition to that of Aberystwith, which had existed before. Now let him call their attention to what had taken place in the last two years. When he and his other friends inquired into the state of higher education—not intermediate, but higher education—they found that the only college on a popular basis was the College of Aberystwith. At Aberystwith College, to which they owed so much on account of the zeal of those who were its first founders, and on account of the stimulus it gave to education throughout the country, there were at that moment only 57 scholars. Since then two other colleges had been founded —those at Cardiff and Bangor— and they bad now nearer 700 than 600 scholars at those institutions. (Hear, hear.) It was not to be expected that the working classes—and he doubted whether in the whole Empire there was a population in which the proportion of working men to the whole was so great as at Merthyr and Aberdare—it was not to be expected that they would at first he able to avail themselves of the advantages of those colleges. At that time they had no advanced elementary schools, and, as he had said just now, the number of intermediate schools was very small. He had taken out of an authentic report some figures which would interest them all, and be specially interesting to the labouring classes, who had received or were receiving education at these three colleges. Cardiff, with which they were most interested, was founded in October, 1883. The number of students who had been there had been 940, and out of those the number of the labouring classes had been 285. (Applause.) He thought they would agree with him that, considering the great disadvantages under which the labouring classes of those times prosecuted their studies, this was a moat satisfactory result—(hear, hear)—very nearly a third of the whole number belonging to the labouring classes. And some of the very, ablest men—some of the men most prominent now in the public eye, both at Oxford and in Wales —were men whose fathers were labouring men, and who, with an immense amount of energy and self-sacrifice, were enabled to obtain the best education that, first of all, Wales, and afterwards England, was able to give them. (Applause.) Next to Cardiff he would quote Bangor, Bangor was founded in 1884—the population of that part of Wales included men who were most eager for information—he meant the quarrymen of the slate quarries, who had always been prominent in everything connected with education and connected with good works of all sorts, and there the numbers had been 564, of which 142, or exactly one-fourth, belonged to the labouring classes, (Applause.) Now he came to the oldest of the institutions, which he believed, on account of its having been the first—on account of the sacrifice made by the people to found it—attracted the greatest amount of national interest in Wales, that was Aberystwith. Aberystwith had been at work twice the time of Cardiff and Bangor, which had done admirable work and turned oat some of the ablest students that Wales had produced, but the situation of Aberystwith was very peculiar, though nobody could say that they had not a most hearty desire to promote education among the working classes. It would a scandal if any such thing were said. He had not been able to obtain the proportion of the numbers of working men who had received their education at Aberystwith since its foundation twenty years ago, but the numbers were only twelve. Why was that? It was very interesting to see the cause. Cardiff had not only a very large population, containing a vast number of working men who were earning high wages, but it was surrounded by districts where the wages on the whole had been far higher than the average, and the result was that Cardiff led the way. The actual number of students at Aberystwith for the year 1892-93 was 232, and there were only twelve belonging to the labouring classes. Why was that? It was simply this, that they lived in a rural district. Aberystwith had no population except that of a bathing town, and the wages among the agricultural population was low, and the result was as they know, that the number of working class students was out of all proportion to those in the other colleges. With regard to this school at Aberdare the committee had £600 more than was absolutely required for the building, and that £600, and as much more as they could gather together, would be used in founding scholarships to help those who availed themselves of the benefits of the school. Nothing could be more remarkable than the sudden outburst of educational enthusiasm in Wales when they saw the prospect of having intermediate schools founded. In all Wales there would be no less than 90 of such schools, of which sixteen would be provided for Glamorganshire, including those already existing. Some of them might feel some doubt whether they had not gone too fast in this matter, but we had great faith in the desire of the Welsh people for better education where they were sure they were getting it and where they wore paying for a good thing. Intermediate schools wore so called because they stood half-way between the intermediate schools and the colleges. They were the schools in which people must be prepared for the colleges, and, not only that, but they were the schools in which people must be prepared to fill all the professions, to supply the intellectual leading of which every great country had need. Great as would be the advantages for the coming generation, he ventured to predict that infinitely greater would be the advantages for the future. He believed the work they were doing that day would have a blessed effect, not limited to their own time, but extending into the remotest future. He hoped that the fund for founding scholarships would receive the sympathy and support of the richer men among them. There was one matter which he had forgotten which was of the greatest interest. He had received that morning from Mr. Acland, who had taken so deep an interest in the educational progress of Wales, a paper containing the appointment of a large central educational committee and providing for its support, the object of which was to appoint from all Wales some 66 men, men representing all classes, who were to meet, either themselves or by their executive, four times a year to consider everything of interest in the intermediate schools, to provide for their examination, and to provide for their inspection. This would be of the greatest possible advantage. (Applause.)

  Upon the motion of Mr. R. H. Rhys, JP, seconded by the Rev. Aaron Davies, a cordial vote of thanks was passed to Lord Aberdare, and his lordship having replied the proceedings closed.