SCHOOL FACILITIES

Evening Post, Volume CVI, Issue 56, 4 September 1923, Page 4

SCHOOL FACILITIES

TO THE BDIIOR.

Sir, —It was with feelings of indignation I read Mr. Parr's letter to the people of Silve.Mtream.. last week informing them that their school still looms" in the dim and distant future; other urgent claims at present, engage .the attention of the Education Department. The Department continues to/harp on the splendid facilities.-our children have of reaching Upee;: Butt. May I, through the medium of your paper, enlarge on these "splendid, facilities" V-'

Our children are away, .eight hours a day for five hours' tuition; no carriage is reserved on the train for them; '40 or 50 children scramble, on the train with no adult in charge, and go where they like. -• tJn'de'r the present 1 arrangement, our children- arrive at..tipper Hutt. forty minutes before school commences. Is", that healthy morally for pur children ? I say to the' Department that their "splendid 'facilities"- are-: /demoralising our children, and the, women of this district will stand it no' longer: Our husbands have fought- on behalf of the bairns; we mothers will now arm for the fight. Our children are herded in with all and sundry 6n the traitis, race days especially, .listening to language which at times is positively lurid. 1 snjv it is a disgrace that, such conditions ej-ist. Since te have urged our claim foi' a school, thousands, of pounds were spent, on .additional grounds for the Terrace • School. Last night's paper stated that £300 had been granted. for the grounds of a city school in Auckland. Will Mr. Parr and his Department dare tell the mothers of Silverscream, in face of the,, facts I have revealed, that .those were more urgent claimß than, ourg?

We have at least sixty .o r seventy children in this cistrict, '• sufficient for' a two-teacher school. Upper Hutt is overcrowded, yet no hope is held out of our school being established shortly. Well, if we cannot have our school, we demand moral protection for our children. At 8.30 a.m. the mail train passeß througl/Silverstream; many of the teachers travel by this train. Is it too much to ask the Government that our children be allowed to travel in charge of their teachers? Is the speed of that train of greater importance than the wolfare of dozens of the future men arid women of our country? If that is im-" possible, then let the Department, arrange a motor service to convey our children to^ Upper Hutt in time for'school. Men and women of Wellington, who have chilcl welfare, .at heart, I plead with you to raise your.voices with ours in in-, dignant . protest that such conditions exist within a few miles of your own city. In God's Own Country we want our bairns to have a sporting chance to become noble men and women.—l am, etc.,.' 1.

AN INDIGNANT MOTHER,