The essential features of Wood's Dispatch:

(i) It declared the aim of education in India to be diffusion of European knowledge.

(ii) For higher education, English would be the preferred medium of instruction while the vernacular languages would be the medium through which European knowledge could filter to the masses.

(iii) It proposed a hierarchy of schools, i.e. vernacular primary schools at the village level, followed by Anglo-Vernacular high schools and an affiliated college at the district level.

(iv) This Dispatch recommended grants-in- aid for the first time to encourage private efforts in the field of education.

(v) It proposed to set-up a Department of Public Instruction to be headed by a Director, one in each of the five provinces under British rule. This Department would review the progress of education in the particular province. The Department of Public Instruction was established in 1855 and replaced the Committee of Public Instruction and Council of Education.

(vi) It proposed to set-up universities at Calcutta, Bombay and Madras on the model of London University which would hold examinations and confer degrees. The universities of Calcutta, Bombay and Madras were established in 1857.

(vii) Apart from the formal education, the Dispatch underlined the importance of vocational education and emphasised the need to set-up technical schools and colleges.

(viii) It also recommended setting up training institutes for prospective teachers.

(ix) It also supported education for women. Many modern girls' schools were set-up subsequently and also received government grants-in-aid.