Physician and educationist, born in Rochdale, Greater Manchester, NW England, UK. He studied and practised medicine, married the heiress of the Shuttleworths of Gawthorpe, and assumed her surname (1842). As secretary to the committee of the Privy Council on Education he was instrumental in establishing a system of government school inspection. The pupil-teacher system originated with him, and he founded his own teacher-training college (1840), which later became St John's College, Battersea.
Sir James Phillips Kay-Shuttleworth, 1st Baronet (July 20, 1804–May 26, 1877), English politician and educationalist, was born at Rochdale, Lancashire, the son of Robert Kay.
At first engaged in a Rochdale bank, in 1824 he became a medical student at the University of Edinburgh. The experience which he thus gained of the conditions of the poor in the Lancashire factory districts, together with his interest in economic science, led to his appointment in 1835 as poor law commissioner in Norfolk and Suffolk and later in the London districts. and the system of national school education of the present day, with its public inspection, trained teachers and its support by state as well as local funds, is largely due to his initiative. A breakdown in his health led him to resign his post on the committee in 1849, but subsequent recovery enabled him to take an active part in the working of the central relief committee instituted under Lord Derby, during the Lancashire cotton famine of 1861-1865. Until the end of his life he interested himself in the movements of the Liberal party in Lancashire, and the progress of education. His Physiology, Pathology and Treatment of Asphyxia became a standard textbook, and he also wrote numerous papers on public education.
His son, Sir Ughtred James Kay-Shuttleworth (1844-1939), became a well-known Liberal politician, sitting in parliament for Hastings from 1869 to 1880 and for the Clitheroe division of Lancashire from 1885 till 1902, when he was created Baron Shuttleworth.
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