‘Community First’

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31584, 23 January 1968, Page 2

‘Community First’

When the women of a developing country (or of any other country) begin to show a readiness to take “a modern outlook” on life and a willingness to share community and national responsibility, the men are very proud of them, says Miss Freda Gwilliam, an education adviser in the Ministry of Overseas Development, London.

Miss Gwilliam is in Christchurch for the science congress. “But when men find out exactly how serious women can be, how sustained their interest can be, their willingness to educate themselves, and how they can share what have been exclusively male preserves, then there is a danger of a slight recession,” Miss Gwilliam said in Christchurch last evening. It was the same all over the world—in the islands of the South Pacific or in Germany. Men’s attitudes changed when women began to show their ability and to ask awkward questions. “At this stage there is a need for greater understanding of the changing role of society,” she said. “Everything depends on men and women finding ways of interpreting to each other what these changes involve, and putting the good of the community before the vested interests of one group.” Miss Gwilliam’s job as an education adviser in British overseas development schemes, particularly in Commonwealth countries and selfgoverning colonies, has brought her to the Pacific several times. She made her first visit in 1949. Nine years later she attended, as a consultant, the South Pacific Commission’s conference, at which a project for the advancement of women was considered, and she has been closely associated with this work ever since. She took part in a seminar at Apia in 1961 and attended a workshop on education in Noumea in 1964. The commission’s project for the advancement of women covered the fields of education, community development, health, economics and agricultural development, she said. “The pace of development has been determined by the generous and friendly way in which women’s voluntary organisations in Australia and New Zealand have helped,” she said. “They have supported the women of the Pacific Islands in many ways, such as organising seminars and making it possible for them to come to conferences.” Miss Gwilliam mentioned in particular the Associated Country Women of the World the Pan-Pacific and SouthEast Asia Women’s Association and the Y.W.C.A. as the organisations which have helped Pacific women go forward. TRAINING IN N.Z. Women from islands communities had been granted scholarships to train as leaders and to return to teach their own women home science and home economics. Some of them had trained at

the University of Otago, she said. “The dynamic force behind this scheme to help women advance has been Miss Marjorie Stewart, a woman of vast experience in welfare work,” Miss Gwilliam said. “Since 1959 she has been round all the South Pacific Islands and her name has become a household word. Men who came to scoff stayed to admire.” Miss Gwilliam is in Christchurch to give a paper on inservice education of teachers at the Australia and New Zealand Association for the Advancement of Science congress. She was president of the education section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science last year.

She describes herself as “a teacher by training and trainer of teachers by choice.” She is a former principal of the Brighton College of Education, a teachers’ training college. Before returning to Britain Miss Gwilliam will attend a seminar on adult education to be held by the South Pacific Commission at Noumea, and she will make an extensive tour of other island territories in the South Pacific to discuss new developments.