This chapter analyzes the story and the historic roots of the parallel school system in Sweden in the early nineteenth century. It illustrates how educational changes and the conflicts over the organization of schools also shaped the changing understanding of the meaning of childhood. The chapter explores how the poor-relief authorities claimed access to the schools to solve their problems with the poor at the same time as educational reforms aimed to improve education for the middle classes. The education system outlined in the poor-relief plan for Stockholm meant not just economic sacrifices for the prosperous classes who financed it; it was also an attempt to limit the voluntary nature of the school and to create a compulsory institution. The school system and the poor-relief institutions were to be supported by rules about the policing of the poor relief.