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134
Urinals.—-In some of the older schools, sparge pipes are still fixed ; but
now, in all cases, flashing three or four times daily from a length of hose is
relied on to give the stalls, floors and channels a cleansing much more thorough
than can be obtained by a sparge pipe sprinkling down the front of the stalls.
Water Supply comes in all cases from the Metropolitan Water Board.
In 1906, I advised the Education Committee that the drinking fountains in all
the schools should be taken directly off the main ; but this has only been done
at Silver Street and St. James's Schools.
It has been difficult in the past to secure thorough cleansing of the cups
attached to the drinking fountains, so that now the use of cups has been
abolished altogether, and as opportunity serves the taps are all being set in an
inverted position, so that the stream rises upwards into the scholar's mouth,
and the back-wash, as it falls into the basin, keeps the mouth of the tap clean.
One has to remember that the scholars who are most inclined to use the
drinking fountains are those who are suffering from a febrile condition, possibly
a forerunner of diphtheria, or some other infectious disease.
Lavatory and Cloakroom Accomodation is provided at all
the schools. The washing basins are all on the intermittent-flow principle,
and the waste pipes in some cases discharge under the basins into a halfchannel
pipe (which facilitates the removal of blockage), and so over gully
outside. The hooks in the cloakrooms are in two or three tiers, and twelve
inches apart; so that if the clothing does not touch at the sides, yet they
overlap one another considerably. Fumigation, more or less often, of the
cloakrooms, has been suggested, but scrubbing at least once a week with hot
water and soap is the proper treatment.
Heating of the Schools is effected partly by a hot-water circulation, and
partly by Boyd's ventilating grates.
Artificial Lighting is produced from an ordinary gas installation, but
by electricity at St. Edmund's.
Incandescent gas-light burners are used in all the provided schools except
Silver Street, and amongst the non-provided schools at St. James', National
and Lower Latymer.
Seating. The policy of gradually substituting new desks for the old
ones has been continued; new dual desks have been supplied during
the year to Raynham Road Infants', Croyland Road Infants', and Silver
Street Girls' Departments.
In consequence of the Education Committee not now admitting children
under five years of age, the galleries in the "babies' rooms " are too small for