The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo. WEDNESDAY, JULY, 5, 1916. EDUCATIONAL REFORM.

Auckland Star, Volume XLVII, Issue 159, 5 July 1916, Page 4

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

WEDNESDAY, JULY, 5, 1916. EDUCATIONAL REFORM.

For the cause that lacks assUtmnee, For the wrong that needs resistance, For the future in the distance, And the good that w earn. do.

■ The Minister for Education has taken the unusual step of presenting to Parliament a special memorandum on educational reform. It is a wise stop, because if remarks on the subject are made in the annual report of the Department, they are liable to be blurred by a mass of facts and figures. Mr. Hanan presents in rough outline proposals for the reform of primary and secondary education, but he is ehieflv

concerned with the secondary system. He thinks that "our weakness in educational, as in national affairs, has been an over-reliance on our resources, without appreciating the real need for system and control; an extreme deference to individual and local considerations; and the entrusting of expert and professional: matters too much to lay administration. We could surely intro-

duce more ■ co-ordination and economy of effort, dependent on a wholesome amount of social and national discipline, without approaching the type of regimentation 'and autocracy against which we are fighting." Mr. Hanan rightly says that with all ite faults primary education is "more progressive, more in harmony with the best educational thought and with the nature and powers of children, better organised, better controlled by inspection, . more valued, and more heartily supported by public opinion than is higher education." It is. popular education, and to the mass of the people it is all that their children will ever need. One reason why secondary education has lagged behind primary education is that it has been regarded as a luxury, whereas if we are to hold our own as a people it must be regarded as a necessity. We use the term secondary education in its widest sense, including all kinds of continuation education beyond the legal limit of school age. If Mr. Hanan can bring about greater co-ordination between primary schools and secondary schools, and between secondary schools and the university, and make secondary education more progressive, he will deserve the gratitude of the country.

To -onr mind the great fault ot secondary education in New Zealand has been that it has placed too much value on examinations, and the fetish of' examinations has prevented it from keeping up - with educational progress. Many of the schools arc controlled by endowed bodies, and in education endowed bodies tend to.be conservative. Besides, the Department has no- very effective control over the schools. Inspection is not nearly so thorough as it is in many of the secondary schools in the Old Country, and there is no insistence on the training of teachers. The Minister complains that the curriculum of secondary schools is set according to university requirements, whereas only a very small proportion of the pupils go on to the university. He proposes, therefore, to divide secondary education into four divisions; the university course leading to the skilled professions ; the general secondary or general vocational course on modern lines; the continuation or special vocational Course; the country secondary course. The classification is a little unfortunate in that It may lead people to believe that university- education should be confined to people who want to be doctors and lawyers, and to ignore the general cultural value of such a course. But generally he is working on sound lines.

We are glad to see that Mr, Hanan recognises that while the system should provide different paths for different pupil?, the general basis of education should he the' same. "A considerable portion of the course in all groups should be of much the same nature, because all the pupils arc to be future citizens, and have certain common human possibilities and needs." He wisely says in his

interesting remarks on rural education that "too .much, stress should not be laid on the purely vocational aspect of the work."' A "rural bias" should be <>iven to the work, but the aim of the school should not be to turn out farmere. Indeed it.might be. argued that general education is more necessary for the futUTe farmer than for the towndweller, because the latter" will have so many more facilities for culture. 'in spite,- however, of the Minister's re | cognition of the necessity for general education, and his denial that hi? standard is utilitarian, it seems to us that the weakness of the memorandum is that it may encourage the people who proclaim that education should be "practical." The type is well known. Brown wants his son to be a clerk or a plumber, and is impatient of subjects which have not the remotest practical bearing on keeping books or mending pipes. In the Minister's statement there is perhaps a little 'too modi emphasis on "readities." "When a subject ceases to be studied for use it .ceases to.be of value for culture," says Mr. Hanan, but this docs not convey much until we know what he means by "use." Mr. Hanan evidently regards

Latin as not useful, but, to take a small example, it has been represented to us that it would be very useful to farmers stedymg It » aud &a£ jarmerj

attending lectures by Government instructors are considerably handicapped by their ignorance, of Latin in dealing with the botanical names of plants and scientific terms. This, of course, is a purely utilitarian example; the case 'for the classics rests on far stronger foundations than such considerations: as this. We are 6ure Mr. Hanan does not mean to be utilitarian or materialistic, but he should avoid every appearance of being so. Generally speaking, education is training of the mind; It should-:not-aim only at turning out an efficient doctor/ lawyer, clerk, or farmer, but also at producing a good citizen.

The memorandum is disappointingly - i brief about continuation education for pupils who' leave school for some trade -' or occupation. The question of compul- ■'. spry attendance at such classes may not seem-urgent in a country such as this, but the experience of Britain should be ! a-warning to .us. There industrial de"velopment preceded educational development; and the result is-that -any - pro- '• posal to make instruction of young employees compulsory is met by a great iinass of vested interests and industrial : arrangements. In one recent, year over • 200,000 children below the legal age for - leaving school were allowed to work in • factories. The early age at which the i majority of English children finish their •' education is one of the nation's gravest industrial weaknesses. . The evil is fully realised in official circles, but so many interests are involved that the Govern ment hesitated to legislate against it. In New Zealand educational progress has gone hand in hand with industrial development, and it would therefore be much easier to introduce such a measure. Every year that it is postponed it will be more difficult to introduce. -Posterity i will wonder that we allowed children to ' cease .'earning as such an early age. : i