MONEY WANTED

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 38, 13 August 1921, Page 9

MONEY WANTED

FOR NEW TECHNICAL

COLLEGE

SIDELIGHTS ON THE PUBLIC

APPEAL

PRESENT CONDITIONS DESCRIBED,

According to educationists, the unconscious development of a sense of beauty should be the aim of schools and colleges in all grades. The good effect of'cheery surroundings upon the imr presumable minds of boys and girls has often been emphasised. The evil effect of any other sort of surroundings can be taken for granted. Under existing circumstances, then, there is being developed among the students of the Wellington Technical College, a majority of. them at any rate, a sense of the hideous. The students themselves must be fully con-, , scious of this. In addition, the work of the college is greatly handicapped through lack of accommodation, and Wellington is far behind the other, centres in the development of the industrial side of technical education in all its branches. The threatened stoppage through shortage of money of work on the new Technical College at Mount Cook has focussed attention on the disgraceful state of affairs which has existed in Wellington for so many years.. How long has this to continue? The answer depends upon the measure :of response to the appeal to the public for funds sufficient to ensure the completion of one wing of the new building. The Technical Education Board, realising, to the full the present financial position, is not making an extravagant appeal. It, needs £12,000. If the people will sub-, scribe half that amount the Government; will do the rest by way of a £ for £ subsidy. The board is waiting for the 1! public to make up its mind. Will it] decide in favour of a continuation of I conditions, damaging to the city and toi the, health and progress of the student? Or will it make a small sacrifice which; will mean so much to technical education in Wellington? , •', LIKE A "SWEAT-SHOP." It ia felt that, if the public only, knew the actual conditions, the money would be forthcoming. A visit to the two. flats in Lower -Cuba-street, rented to accommodate the overflow from the existing college should he-, sufficient Tuese conditions have already been explained in The Post, • and bad as they were then they are worse now. It is very unlikely that the Labour Department would issue a factory, pemrit for the dressmaking classroom. 16 is about on a par < with a , third-rate New York "sweat-shop," such as those described in American films. < What light there ia comes through the roof, and the ventilation somehow filtere through a, whitewashed partition, from which several boards' have been knocked out. Alongside this room "there is an ordinary classroom, in which dilapidated forms are crowded together, and there is scarcely room for a teacher to walk up and down in front of the class. The walls and the floors were by no means clean whan a, Post reporter visited the rooms, nor was the atmosphere sweet. The lavatory accommodation, immediately off the second classroom, is totally inadequate. Tho other flat in Cuba-street, ocoupied; by the Technical Education Board, is Uninspiring, dirty, badly lighted, inconvenient, and, in these winter days, -very cold. Of course, the roar of traffic in the street below does not facilitate the work of the students and the teachers. There is not a picture oil the wall. There are two rooms. In one there are absolutely no heating arrangements; the other is blessed with an electric radiator, and at least three of the hoys—those Beatei alongside the, radiator-rare able to keep warm. In the larger room it is not possible ( to see the blackboard from many of tie old forms whfyh constitute the furniture, and it is under these conditions that lessons in mechanical drawing are given. "The,conditions are so bad," said one authority em education, "that the public should demand that the board vacates the Cuba-street flits at once." That is all very well, but lh"e students cannot be accommodated, anywhere else. This is the third year that classes have been carried on in the miserable surroundings described, and, unless the efforts made iby the committee, which has been set up to collect funds for the new "building, meet with a liberal response, this discreditable state of affairs must continue. AN ART SCHOOL TRANSFORMED. What of the conditions in the main building in Mercer-street ? These, if is stated authoritatively, are altogether unsuitable for ordinary school purposes. The rooms used for the commercial classes were originally intended for use as an art school. But, while the lighting and ventilation are not unsuitable for email art classes,. ;where students can select their poßiijHjns, they are distinctly bad when between; thirty and forty students have to be accommodated in them. In one room formerly used exclusively for art students, a Post reporter saw about thirty students, seated at desks, puzzling over the problems of algebra. Only one window in this room opens, and the air was certainly not fresh. How ,cau students achieve success in their, study when working under such dreary, drab surroundings? There was no longer anything artistic about the room. It was of a type which malws boys and girls regret their school days—a prison more than a class room. COOKING IN AN IRON SIIED. Now take the home science department. First of ail consider what it should be—a place where girls, the women of to-morrow, can be taught how to keep a home. To teach a girl all she should know about the intricacies of housewifery is surely no 1 simple matter. Can it be done in a small, dilapidated, galvanised-iron shed? The answer is an emphatic No, and the board recognises that it must not attempt the impossible. At the Wellington Technical College home science is confined to cookery, a very small, but still an important, branch of the subject. The shed is far too small, badly lit, and badly ventilated,, and; as it is situated at the rear of the Oity Council's motor yard, it is difficult to reach the door of an evening, when the motor vehicles are yarded. There is no provision for laundry work, while needlework, dressmaking, and mil-, Jittery classes are carried on in the small, dusty room, already described, at the top of the Cnba^street building. !, CROWDED WORKSHOPS. The purely technical side of the work of the- college is greatly hampered through lack of accommodation, which means, of course, a lack of facilities as well <os an uncomfortable crowding of the students and of the machines used in the course of their instruction. On the mechanical engineering side, the fitting and turning workshop, though well equipped, is badly lit and altogether too small. It is barely possible to pass between the rows of machines. Owing to the present conditions it is impossible to give instruction in forge work, in pattern making, and in moulding, as is done in the other centres. _ Motor-car eneineerint; cannot be provided for at

all. Even such a centre as Wanganui has a workshop specially built and equipped fo* the'purpose.

ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING

NEGLECTED,

With the development of water-power much has been said concerning the importance of electrical engineering. At the Wellington Technical College nothing but the theory and the most elementary practical work can be attempted, because of the lack of accommodation—always because of the one thing. Even electrical wiring—an important feature of the instructions given—has to be carried out in the fitting shop. For electrical theory and engineering proper only one room is available, and this also serves as an. ordinary class room (when not otherwise ; engaged), and as a laboratory for physics and mechanics. There is still another drawback. This particular room is situated immediately above the plumbingroom. The continuous banging of lead arid the penetration through the floor of the various odours connected with plumbing does not help to rivet the attention of students on their tasks. BEHIND THE OTHER CENTRES. The woodwork shop in Wellington would not do credit to such a small centre as Paraparaumu. There is one simple machine —a circular saw. The benches are crowded, and there is no storage room. Before commencing their instriicI tion, students have quite an interesting time sorting out their nnfinißhed articles. Of course, under these conditions, instruction in wood^work machinery and cabinet work is out of ,the question. Other large centres can have two woodwork shops fitted with the latest machinery, but Wellington, while rightly ' regarding such conditions as ideal, has to rest content with viewing them as something to be achieved in the far distant future. In addition to the trades already mentioned, the following are not taught in Wellington, but ample provision is made' for them in other centres: —Typography, sheet-metal and tinsmiths' work, and 'house-painting and decorating. Instruction is given in signwriting—in the antique room. NO MONEY IN SIGHT BUT SUBSCRIPTIONS It is merely to alleviate these conditions, and not to achieve the ideal, which is only possible when the whole of the new building is complete, that the appeal to the public is now being made. First and foremost, the board desires to vacate the wholly unsatisfactory Cubastreet flats, and this cannot be done without the closing of several very necessary departments until accommodation is found elsewhere. By utilising only one wing of the new building the board's purpose will be achieved, and the annual handicaD of £300 paid away in rent will be removed. When work was commenced on the eastern and north-eastern wingß of ths new building there was reasonable hope that the money for their completion would ,be available. But the Government grant of £15,000 liae been spent, and commitments to date total £7000. The City Council has decided to pay over immediately one-third of it« contribution of £15,000, but beyosd that nothing is in sight except private contributions and the Government subsidy which they will cany. Therefore it is clear that if the public does not heed the appeal made to. it, the. work will stop &nd the lialf-fiuished wings will remain exposed to the weathers, deteriorating all the time. Thousands of bricks have been sunk in the foundations, and much remains to be done before the north-east wing is ready for occupation. A MODEST APPEAL. The board feels that its desire to complete only one wing will be regarded by the public as very modest. It is not asking for more than is absolutely necessary. It is proposed to accommodate at Mount Cook, as soon as the one wing is completed, t,he elementary electrical laboratory, the chemistry and elementary science lab oratory^-; ant! the physics and mechanical drawing classes, and two ordinaify classrooms -practically all the engineering section. This will greatly relieve the position at Mercer-street, and, as already pointed" out,' will enable the board to transfer to the main buildings the classes now carried on to great disadvantage in Cuba-street. As is only to be expected, the Mount Cook College is designed in accordance with modem ideas. Special attention ha« been paid to the lighting arrangements, and the system of cross-ventilation and wide corridors are features conducive to better health and closer attention to studies. After inspecting the progress already made, it seems that the board would be failing in its duty if it did not make every reasonable attempt to ensure a completion of the building already so far advanced. The board, it would appear, is more than ■justified in making its appeal to the public—an appeal which would never have been made in normal times. The board does rjot anticipate that it will be able, to complete the northwestern wing until the financial situation eases, but in order \r, protect from the weather the work already done, it is deemed advisable to roof the half-com-pleted portion. If the £6000 is subscribed by the public, a few months should see the completion of the eastern wing; The sooner the .money is found; the quicker will be the' progress of the work.