William Edward Forster

Forster's Elementary Education Act of 1870 did not abolish church schools; it filled the gaps between them. Elected school boards could build and run schools wherever voluntary provision fell short, paid for from local rates, and within a decade thousands of board schools had been built. It was a pragmatic compromise that angered both Anglicans and Nonconformists, but it created the framework for compulsory, and later free, elementary education in England and Wales.