Worker training ‘more than skills’

Press, Volume CXII, Issue 33065, 4 November 1972, Page 17

Worker training ‘more than skills’

On-the-job worker education should be far more than a mere training in skills, the dean of the School of Forestry at the University of Canterbury (Professor P. J. McKelvey) said this week.

Professor McKelvey was commenting on his return from the world forestry congress held last month in Argentina.

“The opinion is growing that when you train workers there is an important need to make the target a bit wider than just training in

various skills. We must as educators think of the social and economic well-being of workers, and this is a matter for the employers and the unions.”

Professor McKelvey, who was chairman of a working party on education during the forestry congress, emphasised the need for greater co-operation between unions and employers on worker education. Public education on the place of forestry in a country’s economic growth also, needed some changes, Professor McKelvey said. At present there were the two extremes—the preservationists (who “won’t touch anything”) and the exploiters.

“The forester as a land manager has to reconcile these two points of view and he can only do this when there is an enlightened public to deal with,” said Professor McKelvey. If people generally did not understand the place of forestry in the community public reaction usually took an extreme form when changes were suggested.