EDUCATION CHANGES.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 174, 25 July 1930, Page 5

EDUCATION CHANGES.

REPORT CRITICISED.

GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOARD'S

REVIEW.

"FAULTY LOGIC AND HASTY

GENERALISATION."

An official statement concerning the changes in education, recommended in the report of the Parliamentary Recess Committee, has been prepared by the Auckland Grammar School Board, and copies have been sent to every secondary school board in! New Zealand and to members of both Houses of Parliament. The .statement is as follows: —

While the first section of the report contains several recommendations that are in harmony with modern educational thought, a careful reading .reveals examples of both faulty logic and hasty generalisation. For example, the report condemns the domination of the primary school syllabus by the needs of the proficiency cer : tificate examination; that or the secondary school syllabus by those of the matriculation examination, and avers in this connection that "this _ state of affairs, the separate organisation of the two stages under totally independent and differently situated local boards, served but to confirm." But in no casehave boards —either education boards or post-primary boards —been responsible for the syllabus. In the primary schools, the Education Department has been solely responsible; in the secondary schools the Department plus the University. At the door of these two bodies, therefore, must any defects in syllabus be laid. Yet, with supreme disregard of logic, the report assumes that the abolition of 'boards will remedy a state of.affairs for which the Department and the University are responsible. Another Inconsistency. Similarly, when recommending the establishment of intermediate schools, the report states that "in Standards V. and VI. the pupils are in every school taught by the best and most experienced teachers on the staff, all specially trained for their work," yet a few lines further on condemns the secondary schools for allegedly employing the best and most experienced teachers on the staff to teach the University Entrance Scholarship and the matriculation forms. The report here commends in the primary school what it condemns in the secondary school. Is this logical or even consistent? But the statement is r.ot correct as a generalisation for secondary schools. The needs of all pupils, and especially the slower pupils, receive equal consideration. If any particular school is neglecting any one section of its pupils, it is the business of the Department's inspectors to see that the wrong is righted. Social Distinctions Denied. Again, the committee states that under the new system "there will be made to disappear the last vestige of the objectionable social distinctions which hitherto have tended to divide those who have received a secondary education from those who have not." •But all, or practically all, the pupils in our secondary schools have passed through the primary schools, and from the same home there may be pupils attending primary, technical and secondary schools. Where then can any social distinction arise? Moreover, in our existing secondary schools the sons of Cabinet Ministers, ministers of religion, Civil servants, and professional men sit side by side with children who come from the humblest homes, and they learn there the great lesson of democracy, that what count for success in a democratic community are moral worth, industry and character. Scholarships and Bursaries.

The proposal of the committee to abolish, the existing system of scholarships, and to establish a bursary fund to be administered in the interests of country children is likely to inflict great hardship and great injustice upon the children going to our secondary schools from the poorer homes in the cities.

The majority of our pupils who have won distinction from the Auckland Grammar Schools have been assisted through their course by the junior and senior national and university entrance scholarships. Though' the grant has been small, it has been most useful to poor pupils. The abolition of the university national scholarships would inflict hardship on poor pupils, who -would often be debarred from the full advantages of a university career. Thus they would be placed at a serious disadvantage in competing with the children of richer parents, who, by devoting their whole time to university studies, would have a great advantage in competing for overseas scholarships and the higher prizes which the university offers. This hardship would be an injustice Which should not be tolerated in a democratic community. Moreover, the new system may lend itself to patronage that may have very unsatisfactory results.

Inequitable System

It is proposed that the bursaries should be awarded on the recommendation of the local superintendents. How are these superintendents to determine the attainments of pupils in different districts and their worthiness for the award of a bursary without a competitive examination? The tendency of such an inequitable eyetem of award would exclude worthy, promising and gifted children in the cities from sharing the highest advantages of secondary and university education, and would tend to reduce all our schools to a dull level of mediocrity,

It is proposed to abolish the national scholarships and to substitute therefor bursaries which, it is to be noted, are to be available for private schools. At present only pupils attending the State schools are eligible for edholarshipa. This ■would give the private schools the Opportunity for which they have b#en waiting of attracting tihe children of the well-to-do classes, and by the elimination of many clever pupils from poorer homes in the cities the richer classes would be enabled to obtain a 'larger proportion, of university, prizes.

Junior High Schools,

The recommendation of the committee requiring all:pupils to .pass 'through, the 'schools in the city is not in accordance with the best educational opinion. The Hadow report, which was drawn up 'by a committee of eminent English educationalist, . recommends that the children wlio are to proceed to the feecondary schools should be selected in what corresponds -to. our fourth standard at the age'-of 11' plus. They proceed directly to the secondary schools, where they remain, the majority of, them till they are sixteen and a smaller number of the most gifted till they are eighteen. This avoids unnecessary breaks in the secondary education, and enables them to be introduced to the spirit and traditions of their new school at as early an age as. possible. At the same time the Hadow Commission realises' that some children are slower in mental development and that these might be transferred from the intermediate school to the secondary school at the end of the first or the second year. A careful reading of the report leavee one with the feeling that the committee could obtain all desirable results _ at small cost by the gradual reorganisation and modiaoation of the existing system of schools and school control, without involving the country in the expense and unsettlement of an educational revolution, which may or may not prove successful. Accuracy of Figures Questioned. In the opinion of this board the section dealing with administration should be , further investigated. i.mbdied in the report is a table Rowing the comparative cost of education, in New Zealand and in three Australian States The accuracy of the .figures, as are proved inaccurate, the whole case is invalidated. The cost of local administration so far as the Auckland Grammar School tion per pupil is 8/I*. a* compared with 9/2 for the whole of New Zealand. A dispassionate reader of this section of the report is forced to the conclusion that the high cost in New Zealand is largely due to extravagance, which should have been checked long ago by the Department, on the part of some ot the smaller controlling bodies and possibly of the Department itself; out extravagance on the part of a few such bodies is hardly a logical argument for demolishing the whole system of local control.

No business man, having a number of undertakings, some of which are profitable, while others show a loss, would condemn the whole, as would seem to be proposed by the report, but would inquire iafc the management of those showing a loss, with a view to improvement. Local Control Problems. While the report states that the desire of the committee is to increase local control and increase the powers of the boards it proceeds to place the appointments of the secretary of the board and all teachers in the hands of the Education Department. It is, of course, obvious that the officers appointed by the Education Department will be the servants of the Department and not of the boards, arid will be beyond the real.control of the boardß. Moreover, the secretary to a board should be a business man, and not an educationist. It is rare to find business capacity united with a teacher's qualifications.

The board respectfully suggests that before proceeding to destroy the existing boards and denude local authorities of all real power, Parliament should give full consideration to the points here raised and inquire more fully whether the scheme proposed would either be less expensive or more efficient.

The board is of opinion that the efficiency of the great secondary schools of Auckland will inevitably be gravely impaired by the proposed changes in the education system. • The essence of the system will be a levelling-down and a complete centralisation of authority in Wellington. The board considers equality of opportunity for all classes and the resulting pre-eminence of the most intellectual pupils, irrespective of class, to be the essence of democray, and that the results of the Auckland Grammar Schools are the best tribute to the existing system of control.