EDUCATIONIST FROM U.S.

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30110, 19 April 1963, Page 11

EDUCATIONIST FROM U.S.

N.Z. And California

Compared

There are “striking similarities” between the education systems of California and New Zealand) according to Dr. R. W. Coombes, director of special education services for. Ventura, California, who has arrived in Christchurch for study while on sabbatical leave.

Philosophers of education were akin, while he had noted the same emphasis on special classes for backward or handicapped children rather than residential schools, he said. Similarities between the two education systems might be carried further with the possible passage of President Kennedy’s Aid to Education bill, reflecting the tendency towards State and Federal control of education in the United States, rather than city and county control. This bill, said Dr. Coombes, aimed at improving the quality of American education by Federal grants, especially to the poorer States. “It’s been defeated twice, but I think it will keep coming up until it succeeds," he said.

Among educational developments in special classes in his hometown. Ventura (north of Los Angeles' were enriched programmes for gifted children—there being special classes tor these children as well as retarded pupils, said Dr. Coombes. Bright children, for instance. followed highly-indi-vidual reading courses, in which they dealt with such material as adult-type magazines. far above the level of the average child's magazine or comic.

In Christchurch, Dr Coombes has seen such special education classes as those at the School for the Deaf, the Canterbury Education Board's speech clinics, and the Burwood Girls’ Training Centre.

Before coming to New Zealand from Australia. Dr. Coombes spent six months in Europe investigating work in his special field, and will spend next week in Wellington. and the rest of his stay in Auckland before returning to California.