IMPERIAL COLLEGE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY An important development of technical education was the founding in 1907 of the Imperial College of Science and Tech nology. A Royal Charter merged the Royal College of Science, the Royal School of Mines, and the City and Guilds (Engineering) College, institutions at South Kensington, which had been estab lished at different times during the nineteenth century, into a federation under the name of the Imperial College of Science and Technology, for the specific purpose of the highest education and research in science, especially in its application to industry. (See EDUCATION AND INDUSTRY, ENGINEERING EDUCATION.) Build ings of the Imperial College in 1928 numbered seven. The governing body is constituted from representatives appointed by the Crown, the Board of Education, the University of London, the London County Council, the City and Guilds of London Institute, of professional bodies and of the Dominions Overseas.
The College is mainly supported by grants from public authori ties and industrial organisations. For the period 1925-29 the London County Council granted £27,000 yearly, and this was voted on the assumption that the Treasury, through the University Grants Committee, would vote at least three times that amount. The Rubber Growers' Association raised a fund of £30,000 for development purposes in 1921, and the Air Ministry, and the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries pay contributions for re search carried out on their behalf. Other contributors to its financial resources include the Empire Cotton Growing Associa tion and the Goldsmiths' and Clothmakers' guilds. About thirty per cent of the students are now engaged in post-graduate work and research. In the north of England the Manchester College of Technology, an institution of university rank, provides facilities on somewhat similar lines, while the Shirley Institute conducts very important research for the textile industry. (See also UNI VERSITIES.) Modern technical education in Scotland had its origin in the founding of Anderson's University in Glasgow at the close of the eighteenth century. Dr. George Birkbeck founded the Mechanics'
Institution in 1823, and these two foundations have since become the Royal Technical College, Glasgow.
A Technical Schools Act was passed in 1887. In 1893, the first "Scotch Code of Regulations for Evening Schools" appeared, and this led to a consolidation of effort and the development of a homogeneous system of continuation class instruction. In 1897, the Education Department of Scotland was separated from that of England, and the administration of science and art grants was transferred to a Scottish education department.
Section 87 of the Code of 1901 constituted the technical col leges and schools of art in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee and Aberdeen, and certain other colleges as special institutions ("Cen tral Institutions"). These institutions were relieved of their more elementary teaching and received subsidies which enabled them to develop higher studies.
Some of the central institutions such as the Heriot-Watt College, Edinburgh, the Royal Technical College, Glasgow, and Robert Gordon's Technical College, Aberdeen, are of University rank, or co-operate closely with the corresponding universities in the provision of degree courses. In most of the districts the general continuation class system is linked up with the central institutions, subjects and courses are correlated, and bursaries are available to provide financial aid to the poor student.
The Education (Scotland) Act, 1908, provided that "it shall be the duty of a School Board to make suitable provision of continuation classes for the further instruction of young persons above the age of 14 years with reference to the craft and in dustries practised in the district. . . ." In 1923 and 1926, regula tions were introduced which strengthened the tie between day school and continuation class education, and adapted the latter to changes of industrial conditions and educational requirements.