NEW EDUCATION BILL

Press, Volume LXXXII, Issue 24986, 21 September 1946, Page 2

NEW EDUCATION BILL

CANTERBURY BOARD’S ADVOCACY A resolution advocating the reorganisation of the education system was adopted yesterday by the Canterbury Education Board, on the motion of Mr A. McNeil. . , It was held in the resolution that the Education Act, 1914, should be superseded by a new act, and that the Government ahould introduce next year an Education Bill to incorporate in one measure all the amendments to the act of 1914 that it is intended to retain. • “The education system of New Zealand lagged far behind the needs of a society that prided itself on its modernity.” said Mr McNeil in a comprehensive report on the question, which the board heard before carrying the resolution. “The reason for the apparent indifference of Parliament to the obvious needs for reform and to public opinion is found in the fact that for 32 years the 80 elected members of the Legislature have had no adequate opportunity erf reviewing the education system. The last comprehensive review was made when the Education Act of 1914 was, passed. Since that date many important amendments have been enacted, but all are described as amendments to some part of the 1914 act, or are tacked on as an afterthought to other measures.”

After two generations of progress, the education system retained vestiges of temporary expedients adopted in 1877, Mr McNeil Said. Some of these vestiges were:—(l) large classes; (2) cramped accommodation: (3) obsolete buildings: (4) an organisation still suited mainly to a population mainly rural arid isolated in remote localities. Adequate staffing and accommodation for primary schools must be considered together in any reformative programme, Mr McNeil continued. Although it was impossible in the near future to reduce every class to the ideal number of 30, it should be possible to get them down to 40 within five years. There should be a room for every teacher, and a spare room in large schools—school buildings should be next in priority to dwellings. The provision of intermediate Schools should be speeded up, because these institutions provided third—and perhaps fourth—year courses of instruction for pupils who would leave at 15, or who would not spend at least two years at a post-primary school. Mr McNeil added that the £ for £ subsidy on money raised locally for improvement of school environment and equipment should be restored. Frequent changes in staff had a markedly detrimental effect on efficiency of instruction. In the interests of health and physical development, children aged five should be admitted as new pupils only in the first and third terms, and not, at any rate in the South Island. during the winter term.

It was decided to send copies of the resolution to the Minister of Education (the Hon. H. G. R. Mason), the Prime Minister (the Rt. Hon. P. Fraser), other education boards, the executive of the Education Boards’ Association. and the School Committees’ Association.