| Colleges were founded in several of Victorian England's cities. Their foundation has often been ascribed to industrial demands for science and technology, but, in fact, social and professional often outweighed industrial needs, and personal and civic pride sometimes outweighed both. Nineteenth century society provided the wealth, numbers, and interest necessary for success. It also shaped the colleges through demands and contributions. The colleges' adaptability, and their cultivation of benevolence, were vital.; Liberal education was a social distinction desired by the middle classes, and required by professional associations and the Civil Service; professional training itself was also required. Clerks and schoolteachers helped to fill the evening classes which enlarged the colleges' clientele and usefulness. Very limited demand for science and technology reflected industrial England's belated awareness of this need.; The middle classes funded the colleges. Their motives included commemoration and concern for particular groups or subjects. Civic pride and the desire to build a provincial culture played large parts; investment in technology and training smaller ones that is often thought. Solicitation, publicity, and propinquity among solicitors, donors, and faculty within provincial elites encouraged benevolence.; The colleges quickly evolved academic self-government. Laymen formed the first governing bodies, but professors were soon making academic and other decisions. Professors' social standing and professional achievements gained the respect of lay governors, whose acquiescence in faculty control predated statutory definitions. Power went to those whose professional and regular attention to college business warranted it. The constitutions and conventions of modern British universities derive from this process.; The new colleges helped to improve secondary education, made higher education more accessible, trained professionals, and generally enhanced the intellectual life of their surroundings; they became an integral and essential part of provincial culture. Their success defined the future path of higher education and precluded more radical experiments. The combination of new and traditional curricula, middle class dominance, academic self-government, and relative independence of the state all became hallmarks of British higher education. |
