EDUCATION ENQUIRY

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 151, 26 June 1912, Page 3

EDUCATION ENQUIRY

COMMISSION IN CHRISTCHURCH. IBX XELEGBAPH — PKBSS ASSOCIATION.] CHRISTCHURCH, 25th June. The Education Commission continued its sittings here to-day. The Chairman announced that the time within which the report had to bo in had been extended to 4th July. The hon. secretary of the Gisborno branch of the Hawkes Bay District Educational Institute wrote that th© branch was of opinion— (l) That scholarships should be abolished, and boarding allowances to country schools Bhould be substituted; (2) that, wherever practicable, children, should be conveyed to central schools in place of the multiplication of small schools; (3) that teachers, especially in _ the lower grades, are inadequately paid. That the dearth of teachers is due to the absence of prospects; (4) that more clearness in the, syllabus for Standard VI. English is desirable; (5) that the scope of commercial geography could be extended, and that the requirements in physical geography should be correspondingly curtailed; (6) that all technical education should be shut out of the primary schools, and taken in continua- j tion and secondary schools; (7) that there should be a Dominion 6cale of salaries for inspectors, and that the lowest salary paid to an inspector should be at least, equal •to the highest salary paid to a headmaster (i.e., £400) ; (8) that _ a Dominion scheme for the * promotion of teachers i& an urgent necessity; (9) that it would bo a decidedly retrograde step to demilitarise the Junior Cadets of our primary schools. Mr. C. D. Hardie, inspector for North Canterbury, after giving evidence, stated, in reply to a question, that in many instances moving picture shows had a demoralising effoct. Mr. Piranif Too much "Deadwood Dick" . , The witness : Ysb ; too much of the cowboy of tne Wild West. Continuing, the witness, thought that representations on the subject, backed up by public opinion, might result in the matter being remedied. Mr. Kirk: Is there any economic con sideration that would be a justification for differentiation in the payment of men and women teachers? The witness: The man who has to lacs life's struggle has usually to look after the interests of a great many more than himself. A woman might have to do, so, but such cusos were exceptional. Usually a woman looks to marriage as the coufaummation of her life's work. Mr. Kirk : Ought instruction in sexual physiology to be given to tho pupils in certain classes? The witness : If I could be assured that such instruction could be given ,by tho right pereon, whom these pupils could look up to and res>pect and* then follow the lead of his own personal example and influence — if I could be assured ot that — I would say "Yes." But if at wero a departmental regulation that the instruc tion be given by toachern, then 1 would consider the experiment much too dangerous a one. I have in my mind quito a number of very worthy people in many ways to whom I certainly would not delegate the task of giving instruction on the subject. I consider that it is a matter bes>t left to parentb to impart to their children, and it is only bucaust most parents hay« a disinclination to do so that I approve of Bueh instruction being given in schools under tno couditiout, already detailed. To Mr. Davidson: The payment of touchers by capitation based largely on units of attendance was not tho most oflicient way of getting full vuluu for services rendered. Sums might have been l'uid in capitation and in. many instances the educational result* might not be what they ought to be. Tho money expended on school toxt books would be better spent in supplying stationery, paper, copybooks, and requisites to tho children, whoso parents did not object so much to paying for text books as they did to paying for the incidentals foi which tho children wore always coming to them. The Commission then adjourned.