TECHNICAL SCHOOLS

Evening Post, Volume 50, Issue 50, 27 August 1926, Page 11

TECHNICAL SCHOOLS

A VARIETY OF SERVICE.

"As at present constituted the technical schools attempt to perform a considerable variety of educational services to students of all ages and of very varied attainments. The main object of the schools is to establish consecutive courses of a more or less directly vocational character in order to prepare young persons for more intelligent and efficient service as members of a trade or profession, and thereby for more complete discharge of their duties as citizens," states the annual report of the Superintendent of Technical Education (Mr. W. S. La Trobe). "For this purpose the schools have established both day and evening . courses for the main branches of industry in which training is in demand; the full-day courses being pre-voea-« tional, intended mainly to prepare the I pupil for apprenticeship, but consisting partly of general cultural subjects and taken usually by first and secondyear pupils of post-primary rank; -while the evening courses are set to supplement the training of the workshop or ': office and provide the scientific basis on which the practice of workshop or office may be most satisfactorily built. "Students coming to evening classes have often only a primary school Standard IV. qualification, and have rarely reached a higher standard than that of the Matriculation examination or the lower leaving-certificate. Few students attend evening classes for more than five years, even when they come at the age of fourteen years with a low primary school qualification; and the average length of attendance is much less than five years. "In these circumstances the schools cannot be expected to do more than deal with the elements of the scientific and mathematical principles underlying a particular trade or calling, and more attention is paid to the illustration of these principles in actual practice si> as to utilise as directly as possible the real knowledge which the student obtains in the daily practice of his trade or profession."

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