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Taking the country as a whole, it is found that 16 per cent, of
the children entering school are found, at the first examination, to
require treatment for some disease or defect. Examination of
entrants is made by the School Medical Service and these defects
are discovered, but it is considered that adequate supervision of the
pre-school age child would have prevented many of the conditions
from arising, or would have resulted in speedy cure. It is interesting
to note in this connection that of the 2,682 entrants to school
examined in Hackney during 1937, 681 needed some type of
treatment—559 had defective teeth, a condition which could have
been remedied before the child attained school age by the use by the
parents of the Borough Council's dental clinics.
Day Nursery.—The Hackney Day Nursery, established in 1934
by a voluntary committee at No. 85, Hackney Grove (re-named
Sylvester Path), provides accommodation for ten babies under 2
years and twenty children between 2 and 5 years.
The Nursery was open on 225 days during the year, when the
following attendances of infants and children were made:—
Attendances of infants under 2 years 2,173
Attendances of children between 2 and 5 years 4,854
Total number of attendances 7,027
A charge of lOd. a day is made for the care of a child or Is. 4d.
a day for two children from the same family.
An annual grant of £200 is made by the Borough Council to
the committee of the Nursery.
The following are extracts from the Annual Report of the Day
Nursery:—
CHAIRMAN'S REPORT.
(Alderman C. Fisher Yates.)
It is an annual duty and a privilege of the Chairman to pass in review the
chief events which have occurred during the year covered by this Annual Report.
I intend this year to be brief, for I think that the very work of the Nursery is
all the testimonial that it requires.
T am tempted, however, not to be brief on the subject of an appeal for more
financial support, for while I do not expect those upon whom we know we can
rely, to make further efforts, I do hope to see new sources of revenue forthcoming.
As a small suggestion, those who are interested could ask their friends
and their friends in turn could be persuaded to ask other friends, ad infinitum, to
collect the useful tokens which appear daily in the "Daily Mirror" and the
"Daily Sketch." We do not ask for much but just for the little more which
can be given without being missed.