Similar Problems In U.S. And N.Z. Schools

Press, Volume XCVII, Issue 28620, 24 June 1958, Page 2

Similar Problems In U.S. And N.Z. Schools

Collecting newspaper clippings about educational problems in Australia and New Zealand has become a hobby with Miss Debora Fishbein, a retired school teacher, now on a holiday tour of the two countries.

“If I didn’t know where these clippings came from I would believe they were reports of school problems in New York City,” she said in Christchurch last evening. “Your troubles are just like ours.” Zoning, overcrowding of classrooms, and the need to replace old buildings with modern schools are the same vital questions facing educational authorities in New York. Equal Pay But the idea of men teachers being paid higher salaries than women teachers in Australia and New Zealand appals her. In New York all teachers, whether men or women regardless of whether they taught in primary or secondary schools were on the same salary scale, she said. It was no argument that men needed higher wages because they had wives and families to keep; all women teachers had some financial responsibility. “It took years of fighting to achieve this equality and it is not working well,” she said. “Protests are now being made by secondary school teachers because they need more specialised training for their work than primary school teachers. High school teachers now want higher pay.” The only schools which are not zoned in New York are the technical high schools, which specialise in commercial training, music and the arts, food, aviation and drama and other fields of training. These are open to anv child in the city, but all academic high schools and elementary schools are zoned because of travelling districts and travelling facilities. Old Schools “Some of our schools are so old they go back to the Civil War era: others were built 75 to 80 years ago,” she said. "New schools are being built on the most modern lines. They are beautiful buildings, but there are not enough of them. W e don’t have enough textbooks either.” Before her retirement Miss Fishbein was on the staff of the Central Commercial High School.

New York. This is a show school of its kind where students from Columbia University, specialising in commercial teaching, go to observe. Three Sessions The school opens at 7.45 ajm. and the first batch of pupils finishes at 12.45 p.m. just as the second group goes into class for its session which lasts until 5.45 p.m. Evening classes begin at 6 p.m. and go on till 10 p.m. “In such a busy school there is never time for the place to be cleaned properly. Just as an experiment I once left a piece of paper under my desk to see how long it would be left there. It was removed three weeks later,” she said. Miss Fishbein graduated from Bryn Mawr and Columbia Universities then studied music overseas. She has travelled extensively and on her present tour she will visit Tahiti, Australia, New Zealand and Fiji.