school premises are far from satisfactory with regard to lighting,
ventilation, construction, and often even cleanliness; these defects
naturally have their effect on the health of the teachers, so that
notwithstanding medical inspection during training and the rejection
of the unfit, an alarming number of cases of consumption has been
reported to the Benevolent Fund of the National Union of Teachers.
In addition to this, the strain (already referred to) under which
teachers in the Metropolitan and larger urban districts work, is
resulting in an increasing number of nervous breaksdown.

The conditions under which a teacher works in a school in a rural
district are so unsatisfactory that they deserve special mention.
There are 245 schools in Wales and 2,199 in England with an average
attendance of less than 40; such schools are staffed by a head
teacher, assisted, in all probability, only by a supplementary
teacher. Education suffers in these circumstances as a result of the
number and the manysidedness of the responsibilities which devolve
upon the head teacher; while the consciousness of her inability to
realise her ideals will re-act unfavourably upon her health. Another
factor that must be borne in mind is that these rural schools, being
small, should, to secure efficiency, be proportionately expensive for
up-keep. In order to keep the cost of maintenance as low as possible,
however, the remuneration offered to teachers in rural schools is so
small as to be a national disgrace. To this must be further added the
fact that many rural teachers are compelled to live 5, 10, and even 15
miles away from a railway station, so that the cost of living is much
more than it would be in town. Thus it is that rural schools which
should cost more for up-keep than large urban schools, work out at a
smaller figure per scholar.[7]