The Dominion. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1944. A REPORT ON EDUCATION

Dominion, Volume 37, Issue 117, 12 February 1944, Page 6

The Dominion. SATURDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 1944. A REPORT ON EDUCATION

Without detracting from the general merits of.what is undoubtedly a valuable report on the Post-Primary School Curriculum prepared by the Consultative Committee appointed by the Minister of Education in November, 1942, and which bears evidence of painstaking study and compilation, it must be said in comment at the outset that whoever was responsible for framing the order of reference and deciding the range of -the personnel of the Committee failed to realize the farreaching implications of the task. This task was. to design a suggested programme of education for .adolescent citizens that would prepare them for the problems, ethical and material, of adult life Such a preparation must necessarily take into consideration present-day social conditions, and the ethical problems raised by these conditions. It must be inspired by the consciousness that Western Civilization in the concepts of the Nineteenth Century and early Twentieth is politically, materially, and morally passing through changes likely to influence profoundly the lives of human beings and their social attitudes In the process there will be not only difficulties to be surmounted, but also, inevitably, perils to be encountered and overcome. For a future of this kind the younger generation of citizens must not only be prepared. It must also lie morally armed. The framing of a post-primary school curriculum based on considerations of such profound importance could not possibly have been accomplished within the limits of the order of reference prescribed for the Committee. Attention, in fact, is drawn in the report to these limitations to explain “what otherwise might appear to be serious omissions.” This arbitrary circumscribing of the Committee’s horizon of views and recommendations is one of the fundamental weaknesses of the result. Another weakness, also fundamental, is that the task was allotted to a body composed almost entirely of educationists, and that this body, on its own admission, drew “upon the knowledge and experience of several hundred men and women, mainly, but not exclusively, working teachers in one or other of the branches of the post-primary service.” Such a narrow field of inquiry would be understandable bad the Committee’s task been concerned more or less with the technique and mechanics of applying a new curriculum based on fundamental changes in the approach to the subjects of instruction. But the report is concerned with something of far wider import, something in which the people as a whole are vitally concerned. The aims of education are not confined to the imparting of knowledge and instruction in thinking and expression. They must also, of necessity, take into consideration the state of society as a whole, and the preparation of youthful minds for resisting such evil tendencies as may have become visible in various aspects of their social environment. In short, the fundamental question is not what the educationist, alone considers should be required of the schools’ curriculum, but what society in general, the people, as a whole, may consider essential. For that reason, the personnel of the Committee should,' in the community sense, have been more representative, its field of inquiry extended over a greater variety of points of view, and in the broad daylight of full publicity instead of in camera. The people have a right to insist that the schools, as community institutions, should meet the requirements of the times, and the estimated possibilities of the future. Upon the manner in which these requirements are met, and these possibilities provided for, must depend the welfare of the nation, social, material, and moral., Much of • what the Committee has to say of pertinence in this connexion is expressed in general terms. The tendency throughout the report, in fact, is to state and recommend principles and ideas, leaving it to the general body of teachers to apply these iff their own way. This presupposes a very high calibre of initiative and zeal in actual perfotmance, and emphasizes the risk of extending so much freedom unless, the quality of the teaching material is equal to the responsibility.! Finally, it is to be regretted that the Committee has failed, despite the] emphasis it has placed on character training, to give a lead on the vital question of religious instruction. It pleads in extenuation that the question of religious teaching in State schools “involves large and complicated issues on which there are sharp differences of opinion .within the community and within the teaching service”; that it would have been justified in making a pronouncement on these issues “only if we had been specially charged to consider them.” For this omission from the order of reference the Minister, of Education is himself responsible to Parliament and the public.