The Public School Tradition

Many distinctive characteristics of British education can be ascribed, at least partly, to the public school tradition. The present-day level of ‘grass-root’ independence as well as different approach to education has been greatly influenced by the philosophy that a (public) school is its own community. The 19-th century public school educated the sons of the upper and upper-middle classes and the main aim of schooling was to prepare young men to take up positions in the higher ranks of the army, the Church, to fill top jobs in business, the legal profession, the civil service and politics. To meet this aim the emphasis was made on ‘character-building’ and the development of ‘team spirit’ (hence traditional importance of sports) rather than on academic achievement.

Such schools were (and still often are) mainly boarding establishments, so they had a deep and lasting influence on their pupils, consequently, public-school leavers formed a closed group entry into which was difficult, the ruling elite, the core of the Establishment.

The 20-th century brought education and its possibilities for social advancement within everybody’s reach, and new, state schools naturally tended to copy the features of the public schools. So today, in typically British fashion, learning for its own sake, rather than for any practical purpose, has still been given a high value. As distinct from most other countries, a relatively stronger emphasis is on the quality of person that education produces rather than helping people develop useful knowledge and skill. In other words, the general style of teaching has been to develop understanding rather than acquiring factual knowledge and learning to apply this knowledge to specific tasks.

This traditional public-school approach, together with the abovementioned dislike of central authority, also helps to explain another thing: the National Curriculum, the purpose of which was to do away with the disparities in the type and quality of education, was not introduced until 1989 – much later than in other countries.