Call For Abolition Of Accrediting

Press, Volume CVII, Issue 31378, 25 May 1967, Page 11

Call For Abolition Of Accrediting

The Canterbury-West-land Division of the National Party wants accrediting of the University Entrance examination abolished.

A remit to this effect was carried unanimously at the annual conference of the party in Christchurch. It was moved by a Sydenham branch delegate who claimed that there would be 20 to 25 per cent fewer candidates if everyone had to sit for the examination. This would lead to a corresponding reduction in the number of candidates for admission to the universities.

Another delegate said that in other Commonwealth countries those who wanted to get into universities were required to sit for the appropriate examination. Outside of New Zealand an accredited pass would not gain admission to a university. Other delegates claimed that accrediting applied to the schools where it should not be needed. Students who did their lessons by correspondence were more entitled to the benefits of the system than those who went to “the best schools.” There were further claims that the system was unjust in that many students who excelled in sport or other activities outside the classroom were automatic choices for accrediting. On school libraries, the conference agreed that the

Government be asked to divert some of the money made available to building school assembly halls to subsidising the cost of erecting libraries. The conference was told that the Government subsidised assembly halls up to £4OOO, subsidised the cost of buying library books but would not give a penny towards housing the books.