SOCIAL CENTRES IN BULLER

Press, Volume LXXXIX, Issue 27038, 13 May 1953, Page 7

SOCIAL CENTRES IN BULLER

Organisers To Study Overseas UNUSUAL COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT The Buller Mining Community Centres are unique and probably the most successful effort of their kind in New Zealand. Ev£ry resident in the nine areas contributed funds by levy. Besides supporting the many classes common in adult education, the people have co-operated ,to make major improvements in their public amenities, such as the water supply, electrical reticulation, and roading. Mr Thomas Muir, tutor-organiser in adult education for the Buller centres, and his wife have been accepted as research scholars by Columbia University. New York. They will leave in August for the United States, to undertake a programme suggested by Professor Paul Essert. They will then visit Britain at the invitation of the British Council, and will return in about a year to New Zealand. Mr Muir spent most of his early life in the Buller district, and knows the country and the problems of its people intimately. He trained as a teacher. Later, in England, he took a three-year course at Loughborough College for the diploma of physical education. He studied adult education, physical recreation. ahd youth club work in Britain. France and Sweden, and after war

service, from 1939 helped to organise activities in prisoner-of-war camps from 1942 to 1945. Mr Muir was appointed by the Canterbury University College Council in 1948 to take charge of the Buller Mining Community Centres, which had not long been organised, although the people had already begun good work themselves. Under the direction of their organiser. the nine Buller Mining Community Centres at Denniston. Granity, Millerton. Waimangaroa, Stockton, Ngakawau. Birchfield, Mokininui. and Seddonville. have developed their local activities and formed a central executive which co-ordinates work and fixes priorities.

Improvement of Amenities The communities, who are mostly miners, arranged a general levy on wages, and this provides substantial funds for local amenities. With this finance, sometimes subsidised, and sometimes with the assistance of local authorities, and with much voluntary labour, the people have acquired property. established or renovated community centre buildings, prepared Children’s playgrounds, improved domains, floodlit sports grounds, heated a swimming pool cleared a swamp, arranged some supplies of water and electricity, and the erection of flood stopbanks, and generally have taken a lively interest in public welfare. This improvement of living conditions in some grim country has helped to foster interest in a wide field of adult education. Dressmaking, draughting. crafts, welding, woodwork, motor mechanics, and other practical subjects had an immediate appeal, as did such recreations as film shows, indoor bowls and basketball, archery, and square dancing. There,has been solid work in drama and choral work, and in organised discussions. Tutorial classes alone last year numbered many more than 1000.