MORE EFFECTIVE USE OF EDUCATION URGED

Press, Volume CIX, Issue 31946, 25 March 1969, Page 26

MORE EFFECTIVE USE OF EDUCATION URGED

(New Zealand Press Association)

WELLINGTON, March 24.

The education, training and research committee of the National Development Conference considers that a conscious and comprehensive programme of publicity is vital in education to ensure that more skills are used to their best effect and that the public is well informed of career opportunities.

In its report to the conference the committee says that, in general, the present methods of informing the public about education and training courses, employment prospects and career opportunities, are inadequate.

“The availability of necessary and desirable courses of education and training does not ensure that they will be undertaken by persons who would benefit by them.

“Furthermore, those who complete the courses may not find their way into the employment for which they are best suited and for which they have the most appropriate skills,” said the committee.

The 16-man committee was under the chairmanship of Professor G. J. Schmitt, professor of management accounting at Victoria University, Wellington.

Educational institutions should be authorised and encouraged to conduct positive and comprehensive publicity programmes to:

Inform students and parents, and persons about to enter or re-enter the workforce. of the courses of education and training available and the career prospects open to them. Promote proper understanding by students, parents and the public generally of courses and programmes of study which should be pursued at secondary school as a basis for later vocational education and training. Promote among employers a clear understanding of the courses available at educational institutions and of the contributions they may expect from persons who have completed such courses.

Similarly the committee recommended that the Vocational Guidance Service be increased considerably and extended to cover a greater number of provincial centres. All Levels The service should also increase its responsibility for advising adults, students, and trainees at all levels on employment prospects, career opportunities and possibilities for education, training and re-training.

Closer liaison between the service and the Labour Department should also be established in order to gain information about employment trends and needs.

The number of guidance counsellors to secondary schools should also be increased and provision for their training should be arranged.

Dealing with secondary schools, the committee said that sixth form courses should be broadened to meet more adequately the needs of industry, agriculture and commerce and the community at large, and at the same time to provide a basis for fur-j ther study. Recent Trends It approved recent trends in secondary schooling which placed more and more emphasis on a broad education than on pre-vocational training.

“The increasing appreciation by the public that a sound general education is of paramount importance as a basis for technical and commercial training today, is welcomed.”

“Experience has shown that pupils with a good grounding in subjects such

as English, mathematics, science and social studies, can be further educated to master the demanding requirements of our modern complex and technological society. “The best interests of pupils and the community will be served by pupils continuing a general education at secondary school before entering a technical institute for specialisation in a particular vocation,” said the committee.

The report did not recommend that the school leaving age should be increased.

Diploma Awards

In recommending that the fullest possible use be made of technical institutes, the committee said provision should be made for the award of national diplomas following the successful completion of approved courses of study at technical institutes.

The national diplomas, said the committee, would lead to high-level noh-university qualifications of national standing.

A council for national dip-

lomas should be established to be responsible for the approval of courses, the setting and maintenance of academic standards and the issue of the diplomas. The committee noted that care should be taken to avoid unwarranted upgrading of education requirements, leading to unnecessary increases in expenditure on education and the waste of skill and ability by requiring high qualifications for work of modest skill and responsibility. Better Liaison It therefore recommended that no changes in educational requirements for registration in any trade or profession should be made without consultation with the appropriate examining authorities.

Liaison between the technical institutes and the universities should be extended to ensure positive counselling of students to transfer from one institution to the other where this was clearly in the interest of the student. The committee said a comprehensive scheme of fulltime pre-apprentice training was urgently required.