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This book provides a detailed study of approved schools for girls, which operated in England and Wales between 1933-1973. Through original archival research, it traces shifting perceptions of, and policy responses to, girls'delinquency and vulnerability during a period of remarkable social change. It examines the transition of provision for girls and young women'in trouble'from the large-scale post-Victorian reformatories to the therapeutic Community Homes for Education, and the emergence of a'diagnostic shift'in the provision of care for children in the juvenile secure estate. Through examining the experiences of younger children, it provides a more nuanced understanding of the role approved schools played for girls in need of care, protection, or control during this period, evidencing the gendered use of care-or-protection orders throughout, and the policing of child and family behaviours under the guises of the Education Act.

This book examines the relatively unknown English late-Victorian educational pioneer, Constance Louisa Maynard (1849-1935), whose innovative London-based Westfield College produced the first female BAs in the mid-1880s. An atypical and powerful woman, Maynard is also notable for her unique knowledge of psychology and patriotic Evangelicalism, both of which profoundly shaped her ambitions and passions. In contrast to most history about an individual's life, this book builds a fascinating life story based upon evidence and clues from minutia. The focus is on nine enigmatic actions motivated by Maynard in her quests for educational leadership, global conversion, and same-sex love. Maynard's acts that she called “mistakes,” caused deep enmities with administrators and college women. Yet amid her trials and conflicts Maynard made key decisions about her public and private life. Moreover, her so-called mistakes reveal astonishing new insights into a past mindset and the rapidly changing world in which Maynard lived.