TECHNICAL COLLEGE NEEDS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVII, Issue 238, 8 October 1936, Page 6

TECHNICAL COLLEGE NEEDS.

SUBURBAN INSTITUTIONS

(To the Editor.) Under this heading in your issue of October G appears an interview with the .principal of the Seddon Memorial Technical College, Mr, G. J. Park, in whicli it is stressed that the normal expansion of the Technical College will require that further areas of land are needed, even to the extent of closing Wllesley Street. While it is agreed that technical education will expand rapidly, may I suggest that to expand the present Seddon Memorial Technical College is fundamentally unsound policy. Viewing the technical educational requirements of the Auckland metropolitan and suburban area as the basis, then in a country such as ours surely it is, and will be, unsound policy to bring pupils citywards. It would surely be of lasting benefit to the community for the Education Board to enunciate a policy by which several technical schools will be immediately established in suburban, if not rural, areas, so that pupils are taken away from the city to rural surroundings and to where ample playing fields of 20 acres or more are available. This policy of bringing young boys and girls citywards is a blot on the escutcheon of ou" State educational policy. It would appear that the vision of the principal of the Seddon Memorial Technical College is circumscribed by the four walls of the college buildings and tiiat his enthusiasm for the expansion of thia institution overrides the broader view of the establishment of educational facilities in rural surroundings. P. HENRY.