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THE SCHOOL MEDICAL SERVICE IN RELATION TO
PUBLIC ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS.
(3) School Hygiene.
School Teachers report to 'the School Medical Officer any
insanitary conditions arising- in the schools or their immediate
environs. Certain complaints are investigated by the Public
Health Department, while structural defects relating to heating,
lighting or ventilation are referred to the Committee's Architect,
Mr. J. H. Jacques, to deal with. The desks in use are
of the modern dual type, and as opportunity arises box
desks are being gradually substituted for older children,
and chairs and tables for the younger children. The schools,
classrooms, and cloakrooms are cleaned by an efficient staff of
cleaners under the direction of the School Caretaker. Head
Teachers see to the drying of children's clothes when required.
Except in a few Schools the question of meals at schools hardly
arises, as the children are within easy reach of their homes. A
certain number of necessitous children daily attend the School
Feeding Centres.
In the Special Schools, however, where the children come
from all paits of the Borough, proper arrangements are made
for the provision of hot meals at a very low cost—the majority receiving
free meals.
Arrangements have been made, as an experiment (with
Messrs. Horlicks Milk Co.), for a mid-morning supply of malted
milk to the infant departments of two Schools.
(4) Medical Inspection.
For the purposes of the School Medical Service, the whole
Borough is sub-divided into five areas; each separate area is
allocated to an Assistant School Medical Officer with his Nurses,
and served by a Clinic. The schools in each area are visited in
rotation, ths Head Teacher sending out beforehand notices to
parents .informing them of the Inspection, according to an arranged
piogramme. These notices expressly urge the presence of the
parents at the examination.
At the end of a School Inspection Head Teachers are informed
(by a written list) of those special defects found which need their
attention, or which are liable to have a bearing on the child's
educational career.
Arrangments have been made for those scholars who are
absent from school during routine Medical Inspection, to be examined
at an early date at a special visit to the school.
(a) The " age groups " inspected throughout the schools
are :—
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