CARRYING ON.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 155, 4 July 1927, Page 7

CARRYING ON.

I . THE NORMAL SCHOOL. CHEQUERED HISTORY RECALLED. TRAINING OF TEACHERS. Although hurried arrangements had to be made to carry on the classes of the Normal School at the assembly this morning, the ordinary work was in full swing by the beginning of the afternoon. Many of the children, when they arrived at the school this morning and saw the state of the partly-burned building, had mild anticipations of a holiday, but the upper classes were quickly transferred by the headmaster (Mr. K. V. Hudson) to the old Newton East School, in Belgium Street, a building that has been unoccupied since March. The lower classes began school as usual in the undamaged classrooms. "We were fortunate in having the vacant Newton East School," said Mr. A. Burns (chairman of the Auckland Education Board) to-day. Mr. Burns considered that the temporary arrangements for the disposal of the children, who numbered 470 on the total roll, would suffice until the end of the year. A new normal school was being built in the grounds of the Training College at Epsom, and would be ready for the assembly after the Christmas vacation. Fifty-four Years Old. When the new normal school is opened the present building will probably be carried on as an ordinary school. It is fifty-four years since it was built. Some remarkable stories are told about the early days of education in Auckland, when there were no inspectors, and broken-down university men often settled themselves in a billet where they vainly tried to bring up "muckle adolescents" in a knowledge of the three "R's." When it was decided to establish a training college to improve the tone of the teaching profession of the time, the Welleslev Street School was chosen, as the most central and convenient. lii the building of the school a few years previously, the contour of the land had not been taken into account by the education authorities, and the deep gully that ran down towards Quen Street had to be filled in for playgrounds. The small boys viewed with apprehension the progress of the work, for, not far » from this gully, was one of the gates of i the old Albert barracks. Many a band of youthful desperadoes set out on some 1 exciting raid and returned at night, dirty end bedraggled, to the safety of the barracks.