Sir (Edward) Graham Savage CB (born 31 August 1886 – 18 May 1981) was an English civil servant who largely invented the concept of

comprehensive school A comprehensive school typically describes a secondary school for pupils aged approximately 11–18, that does not select its intake on the basis of academic achievement or aptitude, in contrast to a selective school system where admission is res ...

s and originated the phrase.

Early life

Born

Erpingham Erpingham is a village and civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. Its area of had a population of 541 in 210 households at the United Kingdom Census 2001, 2001 Census. Including Ingworth it increased to 700 at the 2011 Census. Governanc ...

, Savage was the son of Edward Graham Savage and Mary Matilda Dewey, teachers at the Upper Sheringham elementary (primary) school. He was the eldest in the family and had two brothers and two sisters. He attended

Upper Sheringham Upper Sheringham is a village and a civil parish in the English county of Norfolk. The village is north-north-west of Norwich, west of Cromer and north-north-east of London. The village is from the town of Sheringham. The nearest railway sta ...

School, King Edward VI Middle School,

Norwich Norwich () is a cathedral city and district of Norfolk, England, of which it is the county town. Norwich is by the River Wensum, about north-east of London, north of Ipswich and east of Peterborough. As the seat of the See of Norwich, with ...

(merged with the Presbyterian School to become the

City of Norwich School The City of Norwich School, more commonly known as CNS, is a coeducational secondary school and sixth form with academy status in Norwich, England. History In 1910, the Education Committee decided to merge the King Edward VI Middle School in ...

) and

Downing College, Cambridge Downing College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge and currently has around 650 students. Founded in 1800, it was the only college to be added to Cambridge University between 1596 and 1869, and is often described as the olde ...

. He gained first in Part 1 of the

Natural Science Tripos The Natural Sciences Tripos (NST) is the framework within which most of the science at the University of Cambridge is taught. The tripos includes a wide range of Natural Sciences from physics, astronomy, and geoscience, to chemistry and biology, w ...

in 1905 and in Part 2 of the Historical Tripos in 1906.

Career

He became a schoolteacher and later an educational administrator. He became an education officer for

London County Council London County Council (LCC) was the principal local government body for the County of London throughout its existence from 1889 to 1965, and the first London-wide general municipal authority to be directly elected. It covered the area today kno ...

. He was a tutor at Bede College, Durham then assistant master at St. Andrews College,

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

and Tewfikieh School,

Cairo Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the largest urban agglomeration in Africa, the Arab world and the Middle East: The Greater Cairo metro ...

. He became a lecturer at Khedivial Training College, Egypt. From 1914 to 1919 he served in the

Royal West Kent Regiment The Queen's Own Royal West Kent Regiment was a line infantry regiment of the British Army based in the county of Kent in existence from 1881 to 1961. The regiment was created on 1 July 1881 as part of the Childers Reforms, originally as the Quee ...

Gallipoli The Gallipoli peninsula (; tr, Gelibolu Yarımadası; grc, Χερσόνησος της Καλλίπολης, ) is located in the southern part of East Thrace, the European part of Turkey, with the Aegean Sea to the west and the Dardanelles ...

, becoming a

captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police department, election precinct, e ...

then a

major Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...

. He was injured at

Ypres Ypres ( , ; nl, Ieper ; vls, Yper; german: Ypern ) is a Belgian city and municipality in the province of West Flanders. Though the Dutch name is the official one, the city's French name is most commonly used in English. The municipality co ...

. After the war he was assistant master at

Eton College Eton College () is a public school in Eton, Berkshire, England. It was founded in 1440 by Henry VI under the name ''Kynge's College of Our Ladye of Eton besyde Windesore'',Nevill, p. 3 ff. intended as a sister institution to King's College, C ...

. He became a District Inspector for the Board of Education from 1919 to 1927, then Chief Inspector of Technical Schools and Colleges in 1932. He was a Senior Chief Inspector from 1933 to 1940, then Education Officer to the LCC from 1940 to 1951. This was during

The Blitz The Blitz was a German bombing campaign against the United Kingdom in 1940 and 1941, during the Second World War. The term was first used by the British press and originated from the term , the German word meaning 'lightning war'. The Germa ...

. Labour had controlled London County Council since 1934.

Comprehensive schools

From 1925 to 1926 he visited America specifically the states of

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States New York may also refer to: Film and television * '' ...

and

Ohio Ohio () is a state in the Midwestern region of the United States. Of the fifty U.S. states, it is the 34th-largest by area, and with a population of nearly 11.8 million, is the seventh-most populous and tenth-most densely populated. The sta ...

, and was impressed by the ''democratic'' nature of the

high school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

s in terms of social diversity, although overall academic performance of such schools was less well-researched; it was of secondary interest. He noted that the system did not account for the different needs of the school population, but he nonetheless liked the general nature of the schools. The Labour Party had been a champion of

grammar school A grammar school is one of several different types of school in the history of education in the United Kingdom and other English-speaking countries, originally a school teaching Latin, but more recently an academically oriented secondary school ...

s in the 1940s, but by the 1950s had begun to look at Graham Savage's ideas instead which had been implemented partly in London. In 1947 he introduced the London School Plan of comprehensive schools, wholly driven by the wishes of the incumbent Labour council. Although largely responsible for their first introduction, he had some misgivings about the comprehensive system; he hoped these could be alleviated, specifically that although at the same school, pupils would study different courses in keeping with their abilities. In this his ideas were more for bi-lateral schools than comprehensives. He explicitly did not want all pupils of differing abilities studying the same courses. To achieve this, schools would have to be very large – up to 400 in each year. In many comprehensive schools this is simply not possible. He was knighted in 1947. He thought highly of

direct grant grammar school A direct grant grammar school was a type of selective secondary school in the United Kingdom that existed between 1945 and 1976. One quarter of the places in these schools were directly funded by central government, while the remainder attracted ...

s, saying in 1965 that they were ''the scaffolding on which a good state system of secondary education is slowly being built''. Most of London's fifty five state

s would stay until the 1970s. He retired in 1951.

Outcome of his work

In later life, despite his satisfaction with lending British national pedagogy a more democratic character, he thought that the educational standards of comprehensive schools might have declined more than the marginal amount he had predicted in 1928.

Personal life

He married May Thwaites, from

Southchurch Southchurch is an inner city area of the city of Southend-on-Sea, in the City of Southend-on-Sea, in the ceremonial county of Essex, England. England. In 1911 the parish had a population of 3954. History In 824 AD, a Saxon thegn, Leofstan pre ...

Essex Essex () is a county in the East of England. One of the home counties, it borders Suffolk and Cambridgeshire to the north, the North Sea to the east, Hertfordshire to the west, Kent across the estuary of the River Thames to the south, and G ...

, in 1911 in

Rochford Rochford is a town in Essex, England, north of Southend-on-Sea, from London and from Chelmsford, the county town. At the 2011 census, the Civil parishes in England, civil parish, which includes the town and London Southend Airport, had a popu ...

. They had two sons and a daughter.

References