Evolution of Education
Woodbridge Grammar School
For centuries the children of the rich were taught at home by tutors and some of the less wealthy paid for their children to attend small schools that sprang up to meet a local need. For children from the poorest strata of society education was not usually a possibility – every child had to earn their keep as quickly as possible. Only those who were very bright would have been invited to attend a grammar school established either by ecclesiastical bodies, religious guilds or private benefactors.
In 1577 Thomas Arnott, a Lowestoft merchant who had been born in Woodbridge, bequeathed tenements to provide money to support a Free School for boys “knowing that the town was poor and populous and for the love he bore it”. The school was established in what is now 11, Theatre Street. The building later became the parish workhouse.
Thomas Arnott had previously set up a similar institution in Lowestoft to provide education for 40 boys. There he stated his intentions thus “Lowestoft being a populous town facing the sea, inhabited chiefly by mariners and sea faring men, being replenished with a great number of youths, who are very uncivil and ignorant for want of good instruction and education, of my goodly zeal towards the bringing up of the said youths in virtue and learning, I bequeath…”. It seems likely that his intentions were similar in Woodbridge.
Legal action over the terms of Arnott’s bequest reduced the money available to the Free School which eventually had to close in 1647. The loss of the school was a serious blow to the town so, in 1662, three local people decided to create the Woodbridge Grammar School. They were Robert Marryott, Francis Burwell and Dorothy Seckford, the last of the Seckford family. The constitution of the new school stated that the school master was to receive £25 a year to teach 10 boys “sons of the meaner sort of the inhabitants of the town of Woodbridge”. He could charge £1 per annum to teach the sons of other inhabitants of Woodbridge. The constitution also made it clear that the aim was to educate the pupils “thereby they may be fit for University” but that if they were incapable of learning Latin and Greek “to fit them for trades or to go to sea”.
Robert Marryott gave a house abutting the north end of the churchyard for the use and residence of a Schoolmaster. When the number of scholars increased the house was found to be too small, and it was enlarged in 1665, 1670 and 1694 by public subscription. The income of the school was also increased by the rents received from three acres of agricultural land which was given by Francis Willard in 1679.
During the period 1793 to 1814, when there was a barracks near the town, the Free Grammar School attracted pupils from the families of the officers. After the departure of the troops, however, the school went into decline. A significant improvement in the fortunes of the school did not occur until 1861 and by then the provision of education in the town had been broadened.
The National School and The British and Foreign School
Schools providing a rudimentary education to all had been created in some parts of the country by the end of the eighteenth century. During the early decades of the nineteenth century they became widespread. Most of these ‘charity’ or ‘voluntary’ schools were established by religious organizations. Anglicans supported the National Schools and non-conformists supported the British and Foreign Schools. The rudimentary education these schools provided became known as “elementary education”.
A decision to open a National School in Woodbridge was made in 1812 by the “Suffolk Society for the Education of the Poor in the Principles of the Established Church”. The school on Burkitt Road opened in October 1813 and pupils had to pay ½d a week. This was increased to 1d a week in 1818 and parents who could afford it were asked to pay 24s a year. The school was considerably expanded during the 20th century but the original thatched roofed building is still part of the present school.
In 1844 the National School opened an infants department in the former workhouse on Theatre Street. Eighteen years later the department moved across the street into what had previously been the Woodbridge Theatre. The infant department was eventually incorporated into the Burkitt Road site in 1962.
The National School started in the thatched building in the centre of this picture and has since expanded.
A British and Foreign School was founded in 1819 under the auspices of the “Woodbridge Society for the Education of Poor Children”. The original committee had 12 members, most of whom were prominent members of the town. The school was started in a large, white, bay fronted house, which used to be near St John’s Church. The house was owned by the British and Foreign School which was founded in 1819 under the auspices of the “Woodbridge Society for the Education of Poor Children”.
Later William Lockwood Snr, a builder, erected a new school building further up Castle Street in the 1840’s.
Independent Schools
The Provision of Adult Education in 1835
The Expansion of Grammar School in 1861
In June 1861 the High Court of Chancery approved a scheme to amalgamate the Seckford Charity with the Woodbridge Grammar School. This ruling was made at a time when there was a national debate about whether non-educational endowments, which had arcane obsolescent purposes or which had become insignificant in comparison of the endowment, could be converted to educational purposes. Eventually it was decided that such endowments should be used for educational purposes and the Endowed School Commissioners were set up in 1868 to oversee the process.
By 1865 the Grammar School had been relocated to a new building – Marryott House – which had been built school on a three acre site to the east of Burkitt Road. The building included a residence for the Head Master and accommodation for 25 boarders. The number of children of the deserving poor of Woodbridge who would be offered free places was increased from 10 to 20.
The Creation of School Boards in 1870
The Government did not become involved in education until the 1830s and eventually took full control in 1870. Ten years later school attendance, up to the age of 10, was made compulsory and by 1890 elementary education was free to all.
In 1870 the government created School Boards (i) to establish elementary schools in areas where school provision was insufficient and (ii) to oversee the existing schools set up by voluntary bodies – e.g. the British Schools and the National Schools. The latter were also given grants the size of which depended on the reports made by School Board’s inspectors. Over the years these grants fell as the School Boards set higher standards.
Within six years both the National School and British School in Woodbridge were complaining about a fall in the size of the grants received to meet the required standard. In 1902 the Education Committee (the descendant of the School Board) suggested that the two schools should consider amalgamating in order to improve their facilities. Representatives of the schools met to discuss the possibility of setting up a United Voluntary School but the two sides could not agree over the religious ethos of such a school and were daunted by the difficulty of raising the money for such a purpose.
By 1907 the non-conformists had withdrawn their support for the British School on Castle Street and this was taken over by the Education Committee. They considered the premises to be inadequate on the basis of “want of accommodation, bad ventilation and sanitation” and they commenced building the Woodbridge County School off New Street. It opened in 1908.
The Church of England continued to support the National School and it was later to become St Mary’s Voluntary Aided School.
The opening ceremony of the
Woodbridge County School.
Further Expansion of the Grammar School
In 1880 the Charity Commissions, with the powers conferred on them by “The Endowed School Act, 1869”, produced a new scheme for the management and regulation of the Seckford Hospital and the Grammar School. The scheme did not foresee any expansion of the facilities provided by the Hospital but it stated that “the residual income of the Charity, if any, may be applied to the purpose of the Grammar School, in improving accommodation …. or generally promoting the efficiency of the school.”
In 1890 the governors of the school prepared for its expansion by purchasing land around the school and eight cottages on Bredfield Street. The grounds of the school were thereby increased to 34 acres. The cottages were demolished in 1891 and, by 1895, the new School House had been erected at cost of £12,000. The latter provided accommodation for 40 boarders, the assistant masters and the headmaster whose previous accommodation in Marryott House was taken over by the Science Master. By the following year a block of seven classrooms and School Hall had been built. Extensive playing fields were also laid out and the present retaining wall along Burkitt Road was built along with the entrance from that road.
Impact of the 1899 Education Act
Until the Board of Education Act of 1899, Education Committees were just concerned with elementary schools. The new Act inaugurated a secondary school system which was under the overall control of the Education Committees. When new secondary schools were built, however, they still charged fees and thus access to them remained dependent, for the most part, on parental income. It was not until 1902 that Education Committees were empowered to offer free places to pupils who would benefit from going to the new secondary fee paying schools. Then, in 1906, the newly elected liberal government considerably expanded the number of free secondary school places. Up to one quarter of secondary school places were to be allocated – free of fees – to elementary school pupils who passed a qualifying examination.
Woodbridge Grammar School became a Direct Grant School in 1920 and started to accept boys who passed the exam. A year later Thomas Mills Grammar School at Framlingham followed them and started to accept girls. Children who did not pass the exam remained at their Elementary School until they reached the school leaving age of 12. This was raised to 14 in 1918.
Impact of the 1944 Education Act
The foundations of the education system we have today were laid down by the 1944 Education Act. It organised schools into three progressive stages to be known as primary, secondary and further education. All children aged 5 to 11 were to attend a primary school. They were then to sit an examination, the 11 plus, to decide which type of secondary school would suit them best. The options were to be grammar, technical and secondary modern schools but few technical schools were established. The 1944 Act also raised the school leaving age to 15 and this was subsequently raised to 16 in 1972.
Farlingaye Secondary Modern School opened in June 1955. It removed the 11 to 15-year-olds from the Woodbridge County Primary School and from the St Mary’s Voluntary Aided School. The latter was then able to relocate its infant department from Theatre Street to the Burkitt Road site.
When comprehensive education was introduced in 1976 Woodbridge School opted out from being a direct grant grammar school and Farlingaye High School started a sixth form.