UNIVERSITY REFORM.

Auckland Star, Volume XLIII, Issue 205, 27 August 1912, Page 4

UNIVERSITY REFORM.

"Whatever we may think of -the i c pinions advanced by the heads of the (University Reform Association, -we have •r ever been inclined ito deny their induei j-y or their enthusiasm. And as recent "political changes have advanced one of |<She leaders of the movement to Ministerial office, we can hardly be surp;-ised to find the, Association pressing its claims once more upon the attention of ■Government. The University Befoi-mers sttill maintain that -they have made out a. good "prima facie" case for investiga- j ition, and that they arc supported by a large 'body of influential expert opinionAnd though, as we have already explain-1 ed at length, the value of these outside opinions ie immensely depreciated by the means taken to secure them, we may fairly grant that .th» New Zealand University, like all other human institutions, is defective in certain points, and is therefore capable of baing improved. But what we hare always principally objected to in it>hi» Reform movement, and what we chiefly object to now is the extremely dogmatic and dictatorial tone assumed by its leaders, and the gross exaggerations in which they see fit to indulge; and the latest evidence available seems to show that in these respects they arc getting steadily worse rather than better. At the inauguration of this crnsade. some two years ago, certain professors of Victoria College assnred a Jorge public meeting in Wellington that education in any true sense of tihe term is impossible tinder our university system, and they declared that they -would no longer . be mart/ies to "practising a fraud" on the 1 community. To-day we find another professor oi-Wictoria- CoHegc informing.

the Prime Minister that students Jeave our universvty colleges "worse in 'body, mind, and soul than when they entered H." Now. we hardly require to labour the point thart these quotations represent a palpably distorted and unfair view of the position. For it is obvious that no conceivable system of intellectual training could produce such effects as the Tefonners allege againet the New Zealand university system unless the teachers were quite hopelessly and irreclaimably bad—an alternative which we presume the Victoria College professors «re hardly prepared to accept. To consider the meaning of such violent and reckless attacks upon our University system as have been made by the Reformers during the past two years is to recognise at once the highly unreasonable and prejudiced character of the whole crusade. We do not propose to enter into any detailed discussion of the Reform Association's propaganda just now; but we can see no reason why a movement which has emanated entirely from one University College, which" baa been directed by one small section of our University teachers without support or sympathy from the others, and wliich has been marked throughout by the use of grotesque exaggeration and misrepresentation on the part of its promoters, should be expected to engage the serious' attention of Parliament or the country.