To Market, to Market: An Historic Account of How Schools Have Marketed Themselves Over the Past 150 Years

Abstract

This article provides a historical account of how fee-charging Victorian schools have marketed themselves over the past 150 years (via the use of advertisements, brochures, and prospectuses) in order to promote those aspects of schooling believed to be of most importance to potential customers (parents). While some of the features — most notably the success of pupils at examinations held at the completion of schooling — have always been emphasised in promotional material, others deemed worthy of attention in the nineteenth century, have now been replaced by quite different features in contemporary advertisements.