Commemorating almost 500 years of education in Skidby, the
Mother & Child statue is located just outside the current village primary
school, which was built in 1964. The first reference to education in the
village, however, dates from 1575, when it is recorded that John Browne was
teaching children in the church.
Records are scant for the intervening years, but it seems in the late 1700s James Neville was teaching children in his home and that public bequests from at least 1803 – when John Marshall of Beverley left £150 for the education of the poor – until the mid-19th century funded schooling in the village. After, in 1822, Mary Coltish left £200 for education in Skidby, the Marshall and Coltish trusts ran in tandem, until they were amalgamated in 1923.
A new school (now a private residence) was built in 1849 and remained the primary educational establishment in the village until the current CofE school arrived.