Headmaster’s Comment On Secondary Enrolments

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29842, 7 June 1962, Page 15

Headmaster’s Comment On Secondary Enrolments

Many parents were concerted about the methods of selection and rejection of entry into secondary schools by their children, said the headmaster of Shirley Intermediate School (Mr G. S. Maloney) in a statement. Mr Maloney was commenting on a meeting of the Christchurch Post-primary Schools’ Council in which Shirley Intermediate Schoo] was connected with a reference to a school which had ceased to issue written reports.

“It is obvious from the report in your issue of May 30. that many people are quite unaware of the funct ons of the Christchurch Past-Primary Schools’ Council. said Mr Maloney. “I am. apparently, one of those Readers will recall that last year, just about this time. I wrote to the secretary of the council, asking him to convey to all the post-primary schools under the jurisdiction of the council my intention of dispensing with written reports to parents. My reason for doing so was a desire to see that no parent of a pupil from this school was penalised in any way for not having attached the report to the application for enrolment.

“I was somewhat taken aback this year, and very recently, to be advised by a prominent member of one high school board that I should have written to each board separately, except such schools for which the council was acting as an interim board of governors. In other words, any jurisdiction of the council ceases once the high school has its own board of governors.

“I would suggest a little publicity by the council itself on its functions, particularly m relation to the separate high school boards. After all. it issues application forms for enrolment on behalf on the schools. Does it also receive such forms when filled in on behalf of anv school from any parent? Further, is it not true that the Christchurch Technical College has no ties with the council? If not. why not? Or alternatively, in what relation does it stand to all the other high schools in Christchurch?

•’The name of my school was raised also in the course of the same meeting in discussion on the Form I reports. It is not my intention to traverse the reasons for this school’s discontinuing the issue of written reports That was done last year. But it is evident that some under-

standing has been arrived at, either among the schools themselves, or through the courtesies or liaison of the council, that all high schools should ask this year for Form I reports in order to eliminate the possibility of double enrolment. “Ignoring for the moment that two schools, apparently two of the single-sex schools, are not agreeable to the double-enrolment understanding. it is obvious that an alternative could be found to the situation created by the high schools or whoever was responsible. I realise only too well the dilemma that many parents of my own school find themselves in if I am not prepared to issue a written report which the boards insist must accompany the application for enrolment. but it does not take a report to eliminate the possibility of double enrolment. Here are two suggestions

“ (1) Let each primary school headmaster issue to every pupil desirous of enrolling at a secondary school this year, a small certificate indicating that the pupil is entitled to apply for enrolment this year; provided of course, that he or she pursues a satisfactory programme of work until the end of the year. If a headmaster issues only one such certificate to each pupil so eligible, it is quite evident that the certificate can be attached to only one enrolment application: and double enrolment becomes an impossibility. ”f2) I am prepared, and I have no doubt that if every headmaster were approached, he would be prepared, to offer to take in all applications for enrolment from his pupils and forward them to the school of the parents’ (pupil's) choice. We have done that for years for Avonside Girls’ High School. Shirley Boys’ High School, and this past year. Mairehau High School. I am prepared, notwithstanding the responsibility involved, to do the same for all schools to which our pupils wish to go. As a matter of interest. that method has some advantages I am sure post-primary principals could detect.

“There are many aspects of this post-primary enrolment matter which are still to be resolved. I would reaffirm my reasons for discontinuing written reports as being educational.

“But the whole issue has political implications which must come to the surface and

be handled adequately before this turbulence dies down and parents feel secure. I feel, from the awkward questions which parent* have put to me. but whieh professionally I should not have to answer, that parents are concerned about the methods of selection or rejection; or should I say. the bases of such. I have to reassure so many parents that it is the prerogative of the secondary schools’ boards to decide whom they shall and whom they shall not enrol; but they go away wondering what these prerogatives might be and who granted them. In an age when we are clinging as desperately as we can to all that is implicit in democracy, equal opportunities and such terms, parents must be taken into other people’s confidence and feel that the taxation which they pay is being used for the ends for which they were levied. “One very important aspect not yet touched upon by many is that among pupils themselves there is developing a feeling—an opinion—that some high schools are better than others, so much so that last year, for instance. one fond parent gave his child an expensive wristlet watch simply because that child happened to have its enrolment for a particular high school accepted. "My own feeling is that such a development is fraught with menace not merely for the children of any school but for the relationships which should, and do, exist among the postprimary schools. My greatest concern is that so few parents know quite where to go to get their difficulties resoloved and I rather fear the bogy of victimisation hangs heavily over them. •! feel too, that it is time that all our local members of Parliament looked into this in order to help where need be, the Department of Education in its search for any solution of the vexing and perplexing question.”