Page:Statesman's Year-Book 1899 American Edition.djvu/1089

 INSTRUCTION 733

Jonlidl 9CCS is 132, viz., 28 archbishoprics and 104 bishoprics, besides 1 apo- stolic delegation, 28 apostolic vicariates, and 11 apostolic prefectures ; while the Roman Catholic population sul)ject to Queen Victoria is estimated at ten millions and a half.

Instruction.

The State regulates public instruction, and maintains, either en- tirely or in conjunction with the communes and provinces, public schools of every grade. Every teacher in a public institution maintained by the State, or by any other public body, must have the qualitications required by law ; and in all public institutions not belonging to the State, the same programme must be fol- lowed, and the same rules observed. No private person can keep a school without having obtained the authorisation of the State.

Elementary education is compulsory for children between six and nine years of age. (Of these, according to the census of 1881, there were 1,808,129.) The compulsory clause is by no means strictly enforced. The enactment, however, provided that education for children of school age should be com- pulsory only when the supply of teachers should reach the proportion to population, in the least populous communes, ot one to every 1,000 inhabitants ; in the most populous, one to every 1,500 inhabitants. The law now applies in all the communes.

Schools in Italy may be cla.ssified under four heads, according as they provide : (1) elementary instruction ; (2) secondary instruction — classical ; {'6) secondary instruction — technical ; (4) higher education.

(1) Schools providing elementary instruction are of two grades. Religious instruction is given to those whose parents request it. Only the lower-gra.de instruction is compulsory. Every commune must have at least one lower- grade school for boys and one for girls ; and no school with only one master should have more than seventy pupils. Higher-grade elementary schools are required in communes having normal and secondary schools, and in those with over 4,000 inhabitants. In both grades the instruction is free.

(2) Secondary instruction — classical — is provided in the (jinnaai and Ucci, the latter leading to the universities.

(3) Secondary instruction — technical. This is supplied by the technical schools, technical institutes, and institutes for the mercantile marine.

(4) Higher education is supplied by the universities, by other higher institutes, and by special higher schools.

Of these various educational institutions, the elementary schools are supported by the communes, subsidies or free loans being occasionally granted by the State. In the normal schools and licei. the State provides for the payment of the staff and for scientific material. The ginnasi and techni- cal schools should, according to the general law, be supported liy the com- munes ; but, in many eases, the cost of these is borne, in great part, by the State. In the technical institutes, half the sum paid to the staff is i)rovided by the State. The universities are maintained by the State and by their own ancient revenues, such expenses as those for scientific material, lal)oratories, kc, being, in some cases, borne by the various provinces of the inii versify region. The higher special schools are maintained conjointly by the State, the province, the commune, and, sometimes, the local Chamlicr of Commerce.

The actual expenditure of State funds by the Ministry of Public Instniction in 1896-97 was 42,918,376 lire ; in 1897 the provinces expended 5,432,773 lire and the communes (including subsidies from the State and the provinces), 75,945,801 lire. There' are, besides, revenues derived from foundations (opere pie) for the benefit of schools of different grades generally