Early Diagnosis and Training: Cure of Feeble-Minded: The Mental Deficiency Act, what it has achieved and its failures, were dealt with by Mrs. Ellen Pinsent formerly one of the Commissioners of the Board of Control in an address she delivered in Birmingham yesterday. At the present time, she declared, there were far more mentally defective children in the elementary schools of the country than there were in the special schools. What the Act had failed to achieve was early diagnosis and training of feeble-minded children. It ought to be possible in some way or another, she said, to bridge the gulf between the local education committee and the local committee dealing with mentally defectives. The great work of the future seemed to be the establishment of co-operation with the Education Committees, the Home Office Schools, Borstal Institutions, and prisons, with a view to inducing those authorities to adopt a uniform standard of notification, and to concentrate on early diagnosis and training.
Transcribed in whole or part from scanned originals: Presented with or without modified text and punctuation. For absolute accuracy refer to the original newspapers. Source: The British Newspaper Archive.
Referenced
GRO0245 Devonport: Ellen Frances Parker: 1866 – 1949