As exemplified by that of Charles Hayward and Mary E Dugdale of Cardiff, 1900-1910 [married 1912].
Compulsory education to age 12 (from 1899) was in elementary schools - run by a School Board. Teachers were trained as pupil-teachers, for 5 years from age 12 (later increased to age 15), when they would receive coaching as well as being expected to teach. The 1902 Education Act changed this - LEAs took over responsibilty for elementary schools and were also responsible for some provision of secondary schools, based on the "Higher Grade School for Science" already in place in some areas. Training of teachers was improved, and a King's Scholarship was made available to pupil-teachers, so that they could get training at "Normal Colleges" or at day facilities associated with some Universities. Such teachers were then described as certificated.
Weekly Mail 7th March 1903
THE KING'S SCHOLARSHIP. EXAMINATION RESULTS FOR SOUTH WALES. The result of the
King's Scholarship Examination of Pupil Teachers held in November last has
just been issued. The following is the list of the local candidates:
MEN.
Second Class
Division IV. - ... Charles Hayward, Cardiff, Court-road Board; ...
Despite the lowly Division, a Second Class would allow a grant of £20 p.a. to cover the training period. Charles Hayward was described in the census return for 1901 (age 18) as a pupil-teacher, and then at age 20, he was awarded a King's Scholarship. He is believed to have trained at Cardiff University, graduating as well as obtaining teacher certification. Court-road school was in the area just south of Cardiff General Railway Station, in Grangetown, close to his father's home in Westgate Street.
He was described as Assistant Schoolmaster in 1911, he remained at Allensbank Elementary School, Cardiff, [newly built in 1904] until he was promoted to be headmaster of Llandaff Council School in 1937.
From Evening Express 3rd August 1900 [Mary Dugdale 15]
CARDIFF SCHOOL BOARD SCHOLARSHIP AWARDS. A meeting of the Cardiff School Board
was held on Thursday, Mr. Lewis Williams presiding.
SCHOLARSHIP AWARDS. The board
awarded scholarships to the following, tenable at the Higher Grade School of
Science, on the results of a competitive examination (the lists being
arranged in order of merit):-
Girls.- Lillie Wood, Ethel Thomas, Mabel C.
Williams, Mary Dugdale, Flossie Lewis, Nora O'Flynn, Gwennie Jones, Gwladys
Russell, Gerty Griffiths, Francis M, Batt, Lottie James, Amy Nichols, R.
Sullivan, Jessie Ayliffe, Bertha Noel, Laura M. Watts, Winnie Overton, Lillie
Thomas, E. Conroy, Hartie Kidner, Myfanwy James, Gladys Edwards, Gladys
Edmunds, Bessie James, Cassie Jones, Winifred Howe, Gladys Evans, Ethel
Davey, Gwladys Thomas, and Josephine Rippon.
This scholarship would allow Mary Dugdale to be further educated; the Higher Grade School of Science was an early secondary school - it later became Howard Gardens Grammar School and subsequently Howardian Comprehensive.
From Cambrian News 5 Aug 1904 [Mary Dugdale age 19]
University College of Wales. The matriculation examination, 1904. has just
been issued from the University of Wales, and appended is the list of
successful candidates......
List of candidates who have satisfied the examiners in four subjects, and are
specially recommended by them as deserving to be admitted to a subequent
examination in a fifth subject: ...
Mary Evelin Dugdale, Cardiff Pupil Teachers' Centre;...
By age 18, Mary Dugdale was a pupil-teacher. Cardiff had facilities to give
education to pupil-teachers, at a Pupil-Teacher's Centre. Matriculation would allow her
to attend University. However, family memory is that she attended a Teacher
Training College (at Swansea in her case, one of the first colleges to train
women teachers) to become a certificated teacher. She taught at an Elementary
school in Gelligear for a while.
By 1911 she was described as a
certificated teacher, living in Canton, Cardiff.