Education

Relief from a burial monument showing a teacher and students, Neumagen, Germany, c.AD 180. G. Dagli Orti/NPL - DeA Picture Library/Bridgeman Images.

Educated Slaves in Ancient Rome

A literate slave was a must-have in wealthy ancient Roman households. Keen to capitalise on this taste for learning, masters and slaves alike turned education into profit.

Students on board the Floating University, from Walter Harris, Photographs of the First University World Cruise (1927). Courtesy of the author, Walter C. Harris, University Travel Association.

Was the 1926 Floating University a Failure?

In 1926 an American university went to sea and caused an international scandal. Could it still be considered a success?

West African activist and educator Adelaide Casely Hayford, c.1920s. History and Art Collection/Alamy Stock Photo

Adelaide Casely Hayford’s African Education

Colonial schools in Africa eroded national identity and pride; in Sierra Leone a new way of teaching had to be found.

Carving of medieval university students on the tomb of the scholar Giovanni da Legnano, Bologna, 14th century. Sailko (CC BY 2.5).

The Medieval University Experience

The experiences of medieval university students are familiar: they missed their mothers, asked for money and got into trouble.

China’s first group of government-sponsored overseas students, by Milton Miller, 1872.

China’s First International Students

Realising the world was changing around them, the Qing government began sending students abroad.

IQ testing using a ‘form board’, US, 1955.

Future Leaders or Social Outcasts?

The obsession with gifted children is an ancient one, but it took on new life in the 20th century.

Doctoring the Ladies

Although not allowed to study at university, women in 18th-century England still found ways to join – and challenge – the scholarly world.

The Medieval University Monopoly

New universities sprang up across medieval Europe at a rapid rate, yet at the start of the 19th century, England had only two: Oxford and Cambridge. For centuries, England’s two oldest institutions enjoyed a strict duopoly on higher learning, enforced by law. Why were they allowed to?

The History of Dyslexia

‘Word blindness’ was a recognised condition more than a century ago. But it was not until the 1970s that it began to be accepted by the medical establishment.