AN EXPERIMENT

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 170, 21 July 1941, Page 5

AN EXPERIMENT

POOD TRADES SCHOOL

Education of apprentices

After two years' investigation the i Minister of Education of Victoria assisted in the establishment of a technical school to provide practical , and theoretical training to apprentices in baking, pastry, cooking and ! making, butchery, cooking and: , dining room service. j Ttmr e sc h°ol is probably unique. Sir William Angliss, a self-made million-! /the Swift of Australia), prort at a cost Of £20,000.1 an!? "°Y ernm ent contributed £8000,! ana various concerns, such as yeast | manufacturers, flourmillers, but-| employers' and employees'; iSS 0 J. ons > found money for a thoroughly modern plant._ var i°us industries affected "fought under the Apprentices .• in Part meant that every in th e trades had to e school, by law, so many venif weelc ove r a period of four thal' the time is provided by Ployed and half • y the 5a « the apprentice attended T>ln™s ? en £ the lectures the em-J "ie fees ounc * hy law to refund

Will Have 1000 Students hav»ir!nn 001 in its fourth year will ha<» «T u- stU(^ents - Each section u f instructor, who is tart tui y the requisite number of ST "jstructors. The principal of 1 rn££it e to a council made upi selected from the em'Of rfci ~~a • employees' associations fctho n ,OUs industries. Above all «XaminolP ai lnu nt Education. All except in lhe final year ceDWrJ? 0 ! 1 !? 0 '. is unique in that ex--8 'and instr uctor in English : been oh^ ema , tlcs ' no instructor has • but rathf eri f his academic ability! Peripnf°, r ,lis actual trade ex-i Election<f n his Personality. The S" Ss t ( T ere made b y com-l acting in conjunction with

the Department of Education. Fulltime instructors are paid by the Department of Education. The training is divided Into theory and practice. Just sufficient theory is given so as to enable the apprentice to understand and to appreciate what he is doing and why he does it in a certain way. The idea is to turn out tradesmen, not scientists. Feeding Hundreds of. Airmen Kitchens and dining rooms are ' being used to capacity in training . defence cooks, stewards, and in feedt ing several hundred airmen. There i are two groups of cooks, rookies and advanced. Each gets a course of ' three months. The stewards get I two weeks. In addition there have I : been trained all the caterers for one jof the essential services. To teach i a man in a few weeks how to order, I -1 receive, store, issue qpd keep a -| check on the 101 items which 50,000 - men will eat is a pretty big job. ■ The-apprenticeship system applies ': only to a 20-mile radius pivoted t about Melbourne. But special alli'day short courses are given country students as well as those from other 1 States. Even correspondence courses to New Zealand students who have i asked for them have been under--5 taken. r Mr. H.. E. West, who was for a J number of years engaged in scien- ? tific investigation of wheat and flour r in Canterbury, is the school's prinf cipal.