Emile, or On Education Updated +Created
Figure 1.
Front cover of the first edition of Emile, or On Education.
Source.
Good summary on the defunct Encyclopedia Britannica: www.britannica.com/topic/Emile-or-On-Education
it is not specifically about schooling but about the upbringing of a rich man’s son, Émile, by a tutor who is given unlimited authority over him. Rousseau’s aim throughout Émile is to show how a natural education, unlike the artificial and formal education of society, enables Émile to become social, moral, and rational while remaining true to his original nature
Also:
He learns a trade, among other things. He studies science, not by receiving instruction in its facts but by making the instruments necessary to solve scientific problems of a practical sort.
Book 1:
I do not consider these laughable establishments called Colleges as a public institution.
There are in several schools, and especially in the University of Paris, Professors whom I like, whom I esteem very much, and whom I believe very capable of instructing young people well, if they were not forced to follow established usage. I urge one of them to publish the reform project he designed. We will perhaps finally be tempted to cure the illness by seeing that it is not without a remedy.
Source:
Je n’envisage pas comme une institution publique ces risibles établissements qu’on appelle Colleges
Il y a dans plusieurs écoles, & surtout dans l’Université de Paris, des Professeurs que j’aime, que j’estime beaucoup, & que je crois très capables de bien instruire la jeunesse, s’ils n’étoient forcés de suivre l’usage établi. J’exhorte l’un d’entre eux à publier le projet de réforme qu’il a conçu. L’on sera peut-être enfin tenté de guérir le mal en voyant qu’il n’est pas sans remède.
History of the University of Oxford Updated +Created
This book series appears to be the one: global.oup.com/academic/content/series/h/history-of-the-university-of-oxford-huo/. A mere 250 pounds+ each.
Video 1.
History of Oxford University by Chris Day (2018)
Source. A large part of the video talks about how the insane system of colleges of the University of Oxford came about organically.
  • youtu.be/uol4V1Wa8B0?t=343 at the University of Bologna, the original system was for students to decide what they would learn, and hire and fire teachers as they decided. This is opposed to the system of the university of Paris, in which teachers make the final decisions. He mentions that this is the system that the University of Oxford and the University of Cambridge use: the "congregation". He mentions that Oxbridge are one of the few universities that maintained this structure (as opposed to having funding sources select the final decision makers)
  • youtu.be/uol4V1Wa8B0?t=1327 mentions the quadrangle architecture which served as the basis of the Colleges: make a closed square with everything students need: Chapel, Hall to eat, classes and accommodation. This is based of course on monastic cloisters.