AGRICULTURAL COLLEGES

Press, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 25085, 17 January 1947, Page 3

AGRICULTURAL COLLEGES

RELATIONSHIP TO UNIVERSITY The status of Massey Agricultural College and Canterbury Agricultural College was mentioned by the Chancellor of the University of New Zealand (Mr Justice Smith), addressing the Senate yesterday. The two colleges comprised the School of Agriculture, and in the statutes constituting the colleges and the school each body was described not as a college or school of the. university; but as a college or school established “in connexion with” the university. This phrase had raised doubts about the precise relationship of the agricultural colleges to the university, he said. “I do not think that out of these words can be spelled any sort of power of control over the agricultural colleges or the School of Agriculture. The university may prescribe courses and conditions for the B.Agr.Sc. degree and the agricultural colleges may feel constrained to comply with the university’s requirements in order that their students may qualify for the degree,” the Chancellor said, commenting on a legal opinion he had obtained. “Clearly the agricultural colleges are intended to be colleges of university standard,” continued the Chancellor, after referring to other acts. “Their degrees are awarded by the university. In my view, their teaching and research resources should be co-ordinated as far as possible with the teaching and research resources of the university. The agricultural colleges would not, I think, disagree with these views. The question is whether the proper assessment of their needs would not be best done by* some impartial and competent tribunal which could inquire into the needs of all the colleges of the university at the one time.” e