LEAVING AGE

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31330, 29 March 1967, Page 2

LEAVING AGE

Problems Seen (Special Crspdt. N.Z.P.A.) LONDON. Mar. 28. Raising of the school leaving age to 16 would lead to more classroom courtships according to a report produced by a working party of the Education Welfare Officers’ Association. The report, published in Britain yesterday, said there would also be an inciease in sexual experience among school children. A member of the party, Miss May Brough, of Doncaster, Yorkshire, said yesterday many boys and girls were going steady when they were 14. “When the leaving age is raised to 16 in 1970 thousands of children who would have left school will still be in the classroom. Many children will be able to get married while still at school.”

The report said serious consideration should be given to raising the minimum age of marriage from 16. “If this were done the possibility of more illegitimate babies would have to be faced. “But we feel that the extra year at school, with proper sex education and wise advice, would reduce this danger.”

Miss Bush, who is a graduate of the University of Canterbury, was born in Christchurch and educated in Taranaki. Her parents live in Nelson. She is thrilled that her first short stories have appeared in such an “auspicious” publication, but she light-heartedly referred to a possible drawback. “It is for potential writers. What if I have no more potential,” she said.

But this does not seem to be the case. Miss Bush has several works in varied stages of completion that she has set aside for revision at a later date.