The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1897. EDUCATION BILLS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVIII, Issue 253, 1 November 1897, Page 4

The Evening Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News, and Echo.

MONDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 1897. EDUCATION BILLS.

For tho cause that lac&s asßifltanos, For tho -wrong that neods reaistanco, For the futnro in the dlatance, And the sood that -we can do.

The scholastic profession will be interested in the Public School Teachers Incorporation and Court<of Appeal Act Amendment Bill which "lias just been introduced into Parliament. It provides for the registration of the New Zealand Educational Institute, and also enacts that a teacher. shall be deemed to be dismissed where his engagement is determined by notice. The Board provided as a Court of Appeal under the Act of 1895 must be satisfied that the determination of the engagement was reasonable having regard to any of the following circumstances. 1. Efficient and economical administration of the Board's affairs. 2. Fitness of the teacher. 3. His conduct. 4. Any other special circumstances irrespective of the Boardmere legal right to determine the engagement by notice.

We do not think that as a body teachers have been unfairly or harshly treated by Boards of Education, and various objections may be urged against giving public servants something like a claim to life tenure of. their offices. There is this difference, however, between a body of men like teachers and persons following other occupations, that there is now practically a monopoly created by the State. A teacher who loses his employment under any Board of Education must either change his business or leave the district. The jjenalty involved in dismissal is therefore more

severe than if there were a multiplicity of employers, and, provided that tbe Board of Appeal is properly constituted, no harm can come from the right of appeal to it. A teacher who has merited dismissal will hardly appeal ; whereas if he has been treated with undue harshness a spirit of justice demands that lie shall be able, to bring forward evidence to prove that he had done nothing worthy of the severe sentence imposed upon him.

Another Bill of some* importance with respect to our education system has been brought down by the Minister at the head of the Department. It amends the Act .aider which Boards of Education are elected, by providing for all ordinary elections taking place on the fourth Monday in May, and in the case of an extraordinary vacancy an election is to be held not sooner than the 2Sth nor later than 30th day after the vacancy occurs. Candidates must be nominated in writing by two members of School Committees at least fourteen days before the date of the election. Members of the Board retiring on March 31st next are to be continued in office till the second Monday in June, when those elected in May next take office.