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Type of entity
Authorized form of name
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Description area
Dates of existence
History
Before 1889 there were very few facilities for technical education in Britain, apart from those found in selected grammar and elementary schools. The Technical Instruction Act of 1889 empowered County Councils to aid technical or manual instruction by means of the penny rate, further funding came from the Local Taxation (Customs and Excise) Act of the following year. A 35 man Technical Instruction Committee was set up in Essex in 1891, when a further Act was passed to regulate the administration of these funds. Known, from their origins, as 'Whisky Money', they amounted to about £22,000 per annum but gradually diminished. Following the Education Act of 1902 further funds came from the levy of a Higher Education rate in the areas served, to meet the cost of higher education. In 1930 the system of differential rating was abolished and a flat higher education rate was raised over the whole administrative county.
The first grants to fund laboratory equipment and organised, evening science schools in the region were made in 1895. The two largest projects were the technical institutes at Walthamstow (1897) and Leyton (1898). The schools were so successful that by 1910 there were calls for day classes to be introduced. The Day Classes were delayed by the outbreak of the First World War, but the first was opened at Walthamstow in 1917 with 75 pupils. Leyton followed in 1918 with 100 pupils.
By 1924 the demand for technical education in the area had become so pronounced that the District Sub-Committees recommended the establishment of larger technical colleges in extra-metropolitan Essex. In 1933 the Technical Instruction Committee decided to divide the County into four regions and to provide each with a technical college, supported by a ring of junior and senior evening institutes.
The last to be built was South West Essex Technical College - formed by the merger of Technical Colleges of Walthamstow and Leyton. It served the boroughs of Walthamstow, Leyton, Chingford, Wanstead and Woodford and the districts of Waltham Holy Cross, Epping and Ongar.