The Dominion MONDAY, MAY 7, 1928. EDUCATION WEEK

Dominion, Volume 21, Issue 184, 7 May 1928, Page 8

The Dominion MONDAY, MAY 7, 1928. EDUCATION WEEK

The first week of the May term school holidays has become an annual occasion for conferences of teachers representing the various departments of the education system. In Wellington this week there will be held the annual meetings of the New Zealand Educational Institute, the New Zealand Women's Teachers’ Association, the New Zealand Headmasters’ Association, and the Assistant Masters’ Association, all representative of the primary schools. The secondary department—grammar schools and technical schools—will be represented by conferences of principals and assistants. It may be doubted whether the public will be able to assimilate the bountiful fare which a week of educational discussion may be expected to provide. Much of it, of course, will deal with professional detail of a purely technical kind, but there are certain questions of general public importance, discussions of which will no doubt be followed with keen interest by those actively concerned in the welfare of the schools and colleges. Some educationists will tell us that it is extraordinarily difficult to interest the general public in their work, and this is more or less true. Education is what some people would call a “dry” subject. Further/it is not easy, in fact it is impossible exactly to measure its results. Again, people are very much inclined to take the benefits of free education for granted, without thinking very much about where the money comes from, and where and how.it goes. This attitude of what might be described as indulgent indifference is the more surprising since it is the interests and welfare of the public’s own children which are at stake. People who send their children to private schools manifest, as a rule, very keen interest in the progress and welfare of the particular institution to which they give their patronage. Not only that, but they are quick to note any fall in its efficiency, and to remove their children to another. The reason for that, of course, is that the money spent on their children’s education is a direct payment, from which they expect definite results in comfortable buildings, satisfactory board and lodging, efficient teaching, and a good school tone. The money for the public schools is an indirect payment, if one excepts the small fraction spent in school books and other class -material Hence, unless the state of public education becomes very bad indeed, the average citizen is quite content to entrust its welfare to the State, the education boards, and the mere handfuls of people who can be induced to attend the annual meetings of the school committees, who, by the way, elect the boards. If the boards were elected on a population franchise greater public interest might be created. The foregoing’ considerations prompt the hope that this week’s conferences of teachers will attract the interest and attention they deserve. There are a number of standing problems upon which educationists for years have been endeavouring to focus public attention. There is the state of our school buildings, many of which are old, out of date, and unhygienic. The size of the school classes, still in many instances too large for the powers of the teachers and the welfare of the children, is still a burning topic. The difficult question of evolving a system which will direct children completing their primary school course into secondary courses suitable to their capacity and natural inclination still remains to be determined. The new syllabus and the stated intention of the Minister (the Hon. R. A. Wright) to restore the old Seventh Standard to the principal primary schools as a workable alternative to the expensive junior high school system promises practical results in that direction. These are but a few of the questions in which the public ought to be keenly interested. They will find ample material of an informative and interesting kind in the discussions of this week’s educational conferences.