SECTARIAN COLLEGES

Evening Post, Volume LXXXV, Issue 19, 23 January 1913, Page 2

SECTARIAN COLLEGES

AND EDUCATION BOARD SCHOLARSHIPS. DISCTJSSION~AT A BOARD MEETING. (l>Y TBLEGEAPH-^SPECIAL TO THE PORT.) NEW PLYMOUTH, This Day. The question whether Education Board scholarships should be tenable at sectarian colleges led to considerable difference of opinion at yesterday's meeting of the Taranaki Education Board. The subject was broached by the secretary of the Wellington Board, who drew attention to an application which had been received by that board for the approval of St. Patrick's College— a secondary Catholic ittstitution in Wellingtons—as a school at which junior board and juhior national scholarships might be held. The writer enclosed a notice of motion by the chairman of the Wellington Board, seeking to affirm that that body would not be justified /n allowing scholarship holders to attend a sectarian college. Questioned by the chairman, tho secretary stated that the board had allowed ah Inglewood boy to transfer his scholarship to St. Patrick's College, Wellington. Mr. A. M. Bradbury did not i>ee what harm there was in that. Such institutions were not State-subsidised, and saVed the country many thousands of pounds. Mr. W. L. Kennedy remarked that that was just the point. How was the board to know the quality of tho instruction at these sectarian colleges, to which inspectors were denied entrance? Personally, . he was very much opposed to recognising thefso. institutions. Whi!c the State provided the means of education we should not take our- scholarshipa away from the public schools, and thus help to build up a sectarian syptem. Mr. Whotter, one of the board's inspectors, said that neither the board, the inspectors, nor any other applicant had the right to examine Roman Catholic folleges. Mr. Kennedy moved that the board "is fully in sympathy with the principles of tho resolution proposed by the chairman of the board, unless, the secondary school at which it is proposed to hold scholarships is subject to inspection by the Education Department's inspectors." Mr. H. Trimble (chairman of ■ the ' board) opposed the' motion, because there should be the greatest possible freedom. If any private school was established and parents wished that a child should receive instruction at that particular institution, then a scholarship should be tenable there, always ' provided that the instruction was efficient. t ' Mr. Masters stressed the point that there was danger also that othM denominational colleges would be estab* lished if scholarships were made tenable outside the State secondary institutions. Mr.' Bradbury : "I don t think there is any danger of that. There is ottly one Church that has sufficient faith in its religion to pay for it 5 and that is the Roman .Catholic Church." He added that a difficulty was to satisfy the In. specter-General that the education system at sectarian colleges was on a par with that of the public colleges. Under existing conditions, how could that official be satisfied? The motion was defeated on the casting Vote of the chairman.