The debates surrounding the reform of national education in Britain and Ireland in the mid-nineteenth century were often framed as a binary struggle between the religious establishment, which sought to retain control of the national schools, and dissenters who viewed education reform as an important step towards dismantling the state churches'…

Background/Context: Educational historians have given a great deal of attention to the early-twentieth-century growth, development, and implementation of liberal progressive educational theories and techniques. However, with the exception of a few scholars, they have devoted far less attention to the religious dimensions of liberal progressive…