LIGHT ON EDUCATION

Dominion, Volume 27, Issue 59, 2 December 1933, Page 7

LIGHT ON EDUCATION

Object of Carnegie Grant

to New Zealand

FIELDS FOR RESEARCH

The underlying object in the establishment in New Zealand by the Carnegie Corporation of New’ York of a council for Educational Research, said Professor T. A. Hunter, Victoria University College, in an interview’ yesterday, was to help to throw light on the different aspects of the Dominion’s educational system, and bring before the educational authorities its strong points and its weak points. The organisation, Professor Hunter prophesied, would be on lines similar to that in Australia, where valuable results had been attained. It would investigate any educational question at all that might be decided upon. Brandies would be established in the four main centres, he thought, and the policy to be followed and the distribution of the money would be decided upon by the council: Grants would be made to enable research work that had been approved to be carried out, although that would be done largely through the Department of Education and tiie university colleges. The seven members who had been invited to constitute the codicil would give the movement a start: later, he anticipated the various branches would elect their own representatives, and ultimately the organisation would run itself. All-round Co-operation. Professor Hunter wished to emphasise that the movement had the co-oper-ation of all tiie educational bodies in the Dominion. The Minister of Education, the Department of Education, and the boards and teachers of all the various schools were in sympathy with it, and there was a general desire to see something done, particularly as New Zealand bad had to suffer on account of her isolation. In Australia, Mr. F. Tait, formerly Director of Education in Victoria, and well known among educational authorities in New Zealand for his work on commissions, was president of the Australian Research Council, said Professor Hunter. Dr. Cunningham, the executive officer on the council, did research work himself, as well as keeping in touch with aud co-ordinating the work. In Professor Hunter’s opinion, it would be necessary to have a man in a similar capacity in New Zealand. The Carnegie Corporation of New York was well known for the excellent work it had done in the Dominion. It included extension work in home science, etc., in Otago and Canterbury, and W.E.A. library grants, in addition to a liberal emergency grant to the W.E.A. two years ago, and generous assistance to the university libraries. The corporation had decided to provide the Research Council with an annual grant of 17,500 dollars for five years. The money would be paid in dollars and would receive the advantage of the 25 per cent, exchange. Representative Group. The first council which the corporation has chosen is a most representative one, consisting as it does of Professor T. A. Hunter, Vice-Chancellor of the University of New Zealand and professor of psychology at Victoria University College; Professor W. H. Gould, chairman of the Victoria University College Professorial Board and professor of education; Professor James Shelley, Canterbury University College, professor of education: Mr. C. C. Gilray. headmaster of McGlashan College, Dun edin, a member of the Otago University Council, and a 1907 Rhodes Scholar: Mr. F. Milner, rector of Waitaki Boys’ High School, who was largely responsible for the establishment of the summer school movement for teachers; Mr. D. M. Rae. principal of the Teachers’ Training College at Auckland; Mr. T. U. Wells, a member of the Auckland University College Council, and one who has played a prominent part iu edueatidh in the Dominion. This personnel is conditional upon the acceptance of the persons named.