Besides this public work, the Commission had to take cognisance of the enormous changes in the education of girls, due to the wide diffusion of High Schools and the admission of women to the Universities. ‘There has probably been more change in the condition of the secondary education of girls than in any other department of education,’[19] say the Commissioners, and they also note that ‘the idea that a girl, like a boy, may be fitted by education to earn a livelihood, or, at any rate, to be a more useful member of society, has become more widely diffused.’ Various other changes came under their cognisance: the gradual rise of Higher Grade schools, evolving themselves through inherent necessity with no impulse and little encouragement from without; the many attempts at what has been called Continuative education by means of evening classes; the help afforded to large numbers by University Extension; the improved status of the teachers; the various colleges established for their training, and the many educational societies which have grown into powerful forces during the last twenty years. After taking due note of all this, they declare that the time has come to weld these various organisms into one consistent whole. They anticipate no easy task. ‘The ground of secondary education is already almost covered with buildings so substantial that the loss to be incurred in clearing it for the erection of a new and symmetrical pile cannot be contemplated. Yet these existing buildings are so ill-arranged, so ill-connected, and so inconvenient, that some scheme of reconstruction seems unavoidable.’[20] This touches the key of the situation. The reconstruction must at any rate begin with adaptation, then the gaps may be filled with new and convenient edifices. However much such a plan offends our notions of order and logic, we do well to remember that every one of these structures, jerry-built though they may be, has grown up out of some real need; and before we propose to fit all their tenants into neat little model dwellings, it behoves us to be quite sure that such a plan would be as satisfactory in the working as it looks on paper. The mere fact that of the girls receiving secondary education in England seventy per cent., and of the boys thirty-eight per cent., are in private schools, often in towns where there are grammar and high schools with plenty of empty places, should make the advocates of ruthless innovation pause and stay their hand. The public must in the last resort determine what it wants, and though demand sometimes follows supply, the opposite process is a constant one. However much theorists may inveigh, according to their special prejudices, against higher grade or ‘private adventure’ or any other kind of school, the fact of their successful existence, even in the face of rivals, shows that they do supply a want; and the only prudent course is to find them a place in our system.