Arthur John Pressland FRSE (1865–1934) was a British educational theorist, linguist, schoolmaster and writer. He was for most of his life a mathematician but after Cambridge spent time in Germany and became a committed linguist and educational theorist, the author of a Royal Commission Report on Physical Training in Switzerland in 1902, the translator of Kerchensteiner’s Education for Citizenship in 1911 and the author of Education and Social Welfare in Switzerland in 1927. Pressland’s obituary written by Sir Michael Sadler in The Times in 1934 stated that ‘Few men in England knew so much as he did about the educational experience of Switzerland, which has had repercussions in this country from the days of Pestalozzi and Emmanuel von Fellenberg to the publication in 1898 of Sir Robert Morant's Special Report on "The National Organization of Education of all grades as practised in Switzerland"’.
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Early life
Arthur John Pressland was born in 1865. He was educated at Bedford Modern School where he was a senior exhibitioner in 1881 and made Head of School in 1882. He later won an open exhibition to St John’s College, Cambridge where he won two more open exhibitions and graduated as Twelfth Wrangler in 1886 at the same time as gaining a Foundation Scholarship.
Career
After Cambridge, Pressland went to Germany spending some time as a teacher in Heidelberg. He then taught in Brecon before joining the staff of Edinburgh Academy where he taught mathematics for thirty five years. Aside from mathematics, Pressland mastered several modern languages and was a researcher of different methods of education he observed on the Continent.
As a committed linguist and educational theorist, Pressland was the author of a Royal Commission Report on Physical Training in Switzerland in 1902, the translator of Kerchensteiner’s Education for Citizenship in 1911 and the author of Education and Social Welfare in Switzerland in 1927. Pressland’s obituary written by Sir Michael Sadler in The Times in 1934 stated that ‘Few men in England knew so much as he did about the educational experience of Switzerland, which has had repercussions in this country from the days of Pestalozzi and Emmanuel von Fellenberg to the publication in 1898 of Sir Robert Morant's Special Report on "The National Organization of Education of all grades as practised in Switzerland"’.
In 1890, Pressland was elected a Fellow of the Mathematical Society of Edinburgh and in 1892 a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
Later years
In 1925 Pressland retired to Cambridge where he died on 8 October 1934. He left a legacy to St John’s College, Cambridge in which he requested that ‘no monument be erected to his memory and that no photograph of himself should be kept’.
Sir Michael Sadler wrote in The Times that ‘The comparative study of systems and atmospheres of education has lost an ardent and purposeful worker. From his long experience as a schoolmaster, Pressland had drawn up a plan for a staff college for English teachers in higher schools-a rough sketch to which administrators are not unlikely to turn in future’.
Following the obituary by Sir Michael Sadler, Mr M.R. McLarty wrote to The Times on 15 October 1934 stating that ‘who can appreciate the amount of invaluable 'work which he quietly and unassumingly accomplished in their interests… Mr. Pressland guided those who had been his pupils throughout their entire academic career. His assistance did not stop there, and there are many to-day who owe him not only their vocations but also the inspiration which guides them.