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102
This co-operation which is found throughout the service does away with much
overlapping and ensures continuity of medical supervision.
(2) CO-ORDINATION.
The very happy relationships I have the pleasure to enjoy with my colleagues,
including the head-masters and head-mistresses of your various schools, enables
us to co-ordinate your medical services with the other work which is carried on
by you. Here we find the work of the Investigation Officers very helpful,
particularly because they investigate matters which have to do not only with children
of school-age but also with other children and persons who come within our purview,
but who are not of school-age.
(3) SCHOOL HYGIENE.
The schools of Barking illustrate both ancient and modern architecture.
The ancient schools are of the factory type—great three-decker buildings, each
floor built on the lines of an old Sunday school with a central hall and classrooms
on three sides of it. The modern schools are well laid out, either in quadrangles or
in sun-traps and are so built that they can be used virtually as open-air schools.
I am naturally disappointed that the modern schools have not been built with
baths. Baths are necessary ; firstly, because physical exercises with the older
children should, at times, be pushed to a point where by reason of perspiration
and other conditions a bath is necessary, and secondly, because bathing is an
acquired taste and if the baths supplied in your houses are to be used properly
the habit of bathing must in certain cases be inculcated in the children.
Again I find it necessary to discuss the arrangements for drying wet clothes and
boots. As you know I want to see a rule enforced for the changing of wet foot-gear
on arrival at school, and I hope that in the forthcoming year this difficult question
will be solved.
The provision of lavatories on each floor where the schools are of two or more
storeys is a matter I have previously called to your attention.