UNIVERSITY REFORM.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 13744, 27 May 1910, Page 8

UNIVERSITY REFORM.

THE NEW ZEALAND UNIVKRSI.Y AND ITS METHODS. No. 11. THE DIVORCE OF TEACHING FROM EXAMINING. (By Professor Hc.vter, Victor'a College.)

It is rather unfortunate that minor mental defects are not as apparent as .physical ones. The evils that follow a di.torted educational system, though not so obvious io the public, are probably more injurious than minor physical detects that everyone is anxious to remove. To maim the body is a criminal offence; to maim the mind a mere incident of educational procedure. The phase of our system that we are couhidering—tbo divorco oi teaching from examining—has evil influences in three directions, which, however, are not independent of one another: — 1. On the teacher. 2. On the student. 3. In the value and .status of the University. Tho pernicious influences on tho teacher and student alike are summed up in one very significant sentence Irom the finding of the Melbourne Commission: Had examination and bad teaching are inseparably connected. Tho space- available and my brief period of leisure both prevent mc from, detailing all the instances in New Zea"iand University education that illustrate this general statement, but a few TKiints must be noted for tho sake of those who have accepted, and continue to accept, tho present system "on sight." 1. The system tends to make a coach of the teacher. The professor or lecturer, whatever ho may l>e, is not intended to be other than a .person who diligently and carefully prepares his students for au examination. The evidence tendered by experts at Melbourne agrees with this view. Professor Laurie says:— I have not the slightest objection to the appointment of co-examiners with the teachers of the University. That system was introduced into tho University and only departed from for financial reasons, but there would bo tho strongest possible reasons against discarding tho teachers of the University from the office of examiners and leaving the examinations in tho hands of outside pcc.vle. That would at once degrade the teachers of the University to the position of coaches. Professor Lyle is just as emphatic, aud clearly shows our status in the eyes of others when ho says:

To allow tho teaching to be done by tho colleges and make the University merely an examining body would destroy any good tho community can get from tho University. You might as well have the New Zealand system, where tho papers are sent out from the Old Country.

2. From the students' point of view this obviously means "cram" in its very worst form. Instead of a student soriously entoring upon tho study of a subject with the object of getting the advantages of past investigations (a) as to methods, (b) as to results, he asks, "Who is the examiner? What books has ho written? What are his predilections?" One does not need to look far to sec the obvious symbols of this spirit. Correspondence Colleges and coaches aro-prepared to do, and do far better too, what many professors but half-heartedly and with bad grace would attempt, viz., cram men for examination. Ask students who have the option whether, on the whole, they prefer to trust to University lectures or to tho assistance of a coach, and the reply almost ulways favours the latter. It is only the compulsory attendance at lectures and the torm examination that keep within the University tho majority of . those students who have tho option. The University teacher is thus placed in this position: ho must cither toach his subject as he thinks-proper, regardless of the examination results, or cram for the examination. In many subjects, if he does the former, his students are liable to suffer at the degree examinations, and if the latter, tho students are permanently injured and tho value of University training lost. The report, before referretlto, says:—

It is quite a different th ing to teach students so that they may pass certain examinations and to teach them according to what the 1 professor believes to be, tho best system to equip them with knowledge of a subject. We know that coaching or cramming is an art in passing a man with a minimum amount of knowledge, and a maximum amount of credit to the professional coach who practises the

3., Tho'system decreases tho initiative of pupil and teacher alike. The whole tendency of. tho system is to make pupil and teacher work within narrowly prescribed limits, follow closely defined method's, and lose grasp and iperspective. Thus, in elescribing the German student, Sir William Ramsay says:— The kind of work which he carries on moreover differs radically from that expected from our English students. After one, or it may be two years, preliminary training, ho virtually acts as an assistant to his professor, and carries out some research, literary or scientific, in which the aim is tlie extension of old or the creation of new knowledge. Tn this way he learns to exercise judgment, to develop ingenuity, -and iv many caws ho evinces considerable originality, to begin with, in small matters, and, if ho has the power, later on, in things more important. In fact, he is taught to think.

The narrow outlook that, on tho contrary, our system engenders is shown in three rather startling ways:— (a) The overwhelming importance attached to the mere lecture system. Tlie lecture system, in its day—which, howover, is a long time oast—was a very good thing. It had Its origin in tho scarcity and cost of books. Under such circumstances only a professor could be exptvted to provide himself with these, and ho formed a useful medium by which the information might be conveyed to the students, with such modification as his own thinking made him deem desirable. But to continue the same system now is to try to enter into a very unequal competition with the printing press. The professor's work, of necessity, must now bo chiefly explanatory and critical whero it is not original. (I*) The conception of mere examination as a test of efficiency has so forced itself on the New Zealand mind that we reach the peculiar result that, in sonic cases, practical examinations in science hare demanded no practical work—the examination being merely written and taking the form of description of methods and apparatus. Fancy a practical examination that does not icquiro any powers of manipulation of apparatus, etc.! (c) The University, worshipping the examination idol, has turned its back ou those workers (degreeless) who have been carrying ou valuable investigations outside'its parochial view. If the University had not had its vision thus restricted it surely tvould have availed itself of the services of theso investigators in tho work of cultivating s-moiig the students of tho University Uieir powers of enthusiasm for independent thought. 4. It tends to destroy the interest of all students—te*aehers and pupils alike. The former arc allowed no leal freedom in their werk. They have no power to change the syllabus in their

subjects or get them adapted to modern requirements. Both they and their pupils, if the Intentions of the University were carried out in their entirety, would bo merely grinding out or in a set ot formula; to be served as occasion required. The Melbourne report says: — The whc-le principle of University work is ior the master and pupil to work together; this is the only principle on which sound knowledge, mental training, and the faculty of original application, can be procured and developed; and these ideals are contradicted by a system which will destroy teaching and substitute an examination system for it: and we must strenuously preserve the ideal it we are to have a real University. 5. It lowers the whole status of the University. Instead of being an institution ' that leads tbe way in th? matter ot educational ideals an-1 methods, the University acts as a drag on the aspirations and endeavours ot thoifc who wish for more than a mere degree. The University becomes little iiuu-e than a commercial institution that for fees paid and examinations passed is pleased, to put its stamp of approval upon "lie. . . The Sco Hi University Conin**>*-Moiiers of 1900 sum th..- whole matter up thus: — Tlie highest authorities in education are at one in their sense of what is described by the late learned Rector of Lined--*, as the uncertainty and unsoundness ot all that teai-hing ar.d learning which is done in preparation tor examination. The result is the extinction of the severer studies the cnfeeblentent of the spirit ot research the banishment of scientific habit-; of thought. Wherever the teaching and examining are dissociated this result is likely to ensue. No better evidence can bo found than in the history oi the University of London. The agitation for a teaching University for London bos been largely a protest against a system under which, tho examination for degrees being hi the hands of one body and tne teaching in tho "hands of . other bodies the examinations tended not so much to toot tho efficiency ot the candidates in what they havo learned as to divert their attention from the- instruction given in tho Colleges to whatever may be discoverable as to the views cl the examiners. This, as Professor Tiu-kcrwell said, is a most important point. Surely the second decade i*f the twentieth eenturv is not too early for tlie ruler;- of University matters in New Zealand to make themselves conversant with the facts and either to take -he necessary steps to put nt iters on a proper footing or to nioko way for those who aro prepared to do so. In my next article I proposo to deal with the reasons that liV e been suggested for the retention of tho present pernicious system.