After nearly a month of publishing a daily blog it has become clear to me that this is not sustainable. Moving forward, I will continue writing daily, but that effort will go into producing longer pieces, the first of which I am publishing here. I will aim to publish my longer pieces at least once a week. Todays post was inspired by a recent conversation with my partner, and the idea that I might challenge myself to write something interesting about what on the surface appears to be quite a mundane subject. I hope that I have succeeded... The History of the School Register In 1862, the government linked school attendance to school funding for the first time. This was known as 'payment by results' and no doubt served as the impetus for schools to encourage high attendance levels. Then in 1870 the Elementary Education Act made school attendance compulsory between the ages of 5 and 10, to address the issue of child labour. The age of compulsory education was extended to 11 in 1893...