Women in Education
Early in the Victorian Era, upper class girls were expected to get married and so they did not need to receive a formal education. Instead, they were likely to learn how to entertain guests through the use of their “accomplishments,” which included talents such as piano playing, singing, and flower-arranging (The British Library, n.d.). Women were seen as raising the future generation, and their morality was prized because a moral mother would naturally rear moral children. A woman’s career was the domestic life, and while it required no formal secondary education, strides were made in schools which allowed women of the lower classes to serve as teachers. In 1846, the British government created a program for teacher training, which allowed students thirteen and older to serve as apprenticed pupil-teachers, so they could both learn and teach in an approved elementary school. At the end of their apprenticeship, the pupil-teachers were allowed to take the Queen’s scholarship exam and, if they passed, they could go on to a training college. If they did not pass, then they could remain in the classroom as an unqualified apprentice, and could continue to study in order to pass the exam. This allowed both men and women to enter into the teaching field, and the grants given by the government for the teaching program allowed for middle class women to become involved in the classroom (Horn, 1989).
While the pay was not high, women were attracted to this career because it promised better pay than most domestic service jobs such as factory work. Women were also generally paid less than their male counterparts, and school managers of cash-strapped schools were more willing to hire them as a way to limit expenditures. Even in the profession of education, women were still upheld to a high moral standard, and they were expected to conform to the Christian religious views at that time. Women in education training programs were supposed to dress in such a manner that portrayed them as neat and plain. In fact, some education committees forbade women from wearing flowers, ornaments, or finery because it might distract their pupils. A woman’s success as a teacher was firmly believed to be linked to her success at following the Victorian Era morals surrounding women (Horn, 1989). While employment opportunities in education for women allowed them access to a steady, respectable job, this job still made them follow the status quo surrounding their gender.
While the pay was not high, women were attracted to this career because it promised better pay than most domestic service jobs such as factory work. Women were also generally paid less than their male counterparts, and school managers of cash-strapped schools were more willing to hire them as a way to limit expenditures. Even in the profession of education, women were still upheld to a high moral standard, and they were expected to conform to the Christian religious views at that time. Women in education training programs were supposed to dress in such a manner that portrayed them as neat and plain. In fact, some education committees forbade women from wearing flowers, ornaments, or finery because it might distract their pupils. A woman’s success as a teacher was firmly believed to be linked to her success at following the Victorian Era morals surrounding women (Horn, 1989). While employment opportunities in education for women allowed them access to a steady, respectable job, this job still made them follow the status quo surrounding their gender.