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15
condition ot tnr child, their help may be very valuable. The fact that teachers are ready to refer
such children to the care committees implies close collaboration and a clear appreciation, on their
part, of the social point of view.
Children's care workers have a unique opportunity of seeing the evil effects of bad housing
on the elementary school population. Physical deterioration of the children, due to overcrowding,
insufficient sleep and nervous strain, cannot escape their observation, and the recognition that
improved housing is fundamental for social progress has on occasion led care committee members
to concentrate almost entirely on this aspect of their work.
Many individual care committees bring flagrant cases of overcrowding and bad conditions
to the notice of the housing authorities, and two local associations have a sub-committee with
the same object in view. Many care workers are to be found as members of local voluntary housing
committees, whose object it is to re-condition unsuitable habitations at small cost. One care
committee member is known, after studying the problem in other areas, to have inaugurated
one of these housing schemes which is reported to " bid fair to bring about a complete transformation
in what has been for many years one of the dingiest, most insanitary and overcrowded spots
in London."
Recent reports of the Board of Education point to the fact that what it terms the " load
of disability " in child life is lifting. Not the least important factor in this change is the higher
standard of education and sense of responsibility on the part of parents. It is increasingly possible
to leave the initiative to them when the physical well-being of their children is at stake, with the
consequence that the care committee, less preoccupied by individual propaganda on behalf of
health and hygiene, and less concerned with the making and keeping of appointments at hospitals
and treatment centres, can turn attention to less obvious problems and to more general propaganda
on cognate subjects. Health lectures to groups of parents and older children and encouragement
of such an organisation as the Junior Red Cross, with its concomitants of observance of simple
health laws and formation of a sense of social responsibility, have been found to stimulate the
growth of sound principles to a remarkable extent.
The reorganisation of the schools in accordance with the recommendation of the Hadow
Report, i.e., the transfer of all children to senior schools at the age of II, is having a profound
effect on children's care committee work, in that it involves a re-orientation of ideas. Hitherto
care committee work has generally been very closely connected with the individual school to which
all the members of one family went. The head teachers and the care committee workers consulted
eacn other constantly and very often the families were intimately known to both.
The care committees now have to consider how, with the children of one family attending
Beveral different schools, they can retain the ideal of one visitor to each family and yet preserve
the link between the school and the home. A possible line of development will be that, while in
the junior schools the care committees will concentrate on the home visiting, in the senior direct
contact with the children of an age to be co-operators in plans for themselves might prove to be
the best method.
The care committees have so far adapted themselves and grown with changing conditions,
and it is hoped that they will once more prove their vitality, and, surviving the disrupting effect
of reorganisation, will be able to join in the educational ideals expressed in the Hadow Report.
Schools and Homes transferred from former Poor Law Authorities.
Last year reference was made to the various schools and homes transferred to
the Council's jurisdiction from the former poor-law authorities. During 1931 further
steps have been taken to devise as far as possible a uniform system of administration
of the medical arrangements, notably in connection with infectious diseases, by the
organisation of a scheme of medical certification, daily supervision by a nurse and
prompt removal from the institutions of cases of infectious illness, thus obviating
the necessity for quarantine, and rendering redundant accommodation formerly
reserved for probation and observation purposes. Also steps were initiated towards
arranging for the immunisation against diphtheria of the children in those schools
and homes where the managing committees had assented to the scheme. (Further
reference to these matters are made on page 94 of this report.)
The arrangements made continued during the year whereby cases of otorrhcea
from these schools were temporarily lodged at the Andover children's homes, Islington,
and the Hornsey Rise Home while attending the after-care clinic, Kentish Town,
for ionisation treatment (>ee p. 24).
Attention was given during the year to the system of dental hygiene at the
homes. From the preliminary survey made of these institutions by Dr. Margaret
Hogarth, it appeared that in practically all of the homes some system of dfntal
inspection and treatment had been provided, but that in two of the institutions,
viz., Cumberlow Lodge, South Norwood, and the Hornsey Rise children's home,
Islington, no provision had been made for routine oversight by dental surgeons.
Housing.
Attempts at
group
education.
Reorganisation
of
schools.
Residential
schools and
homes.
Ionisation.
Dental
treatment.