CATHOLIC RANGE

Evening Post, Volume CXV, Issue 108, 10 May 1933, Page 5

CATHOLIC RANGE

SECONDARY EDUCATION

PLENITUDE OF INTERESTS

I Touching on the question of "inter- j mediate" education, Mr. F. Milner (Wai-' taki) remarked during the course o£, his address yesterday to the Secondary, Schools' Association that, wherever it had. been decently instituted, a [ feature was the facility it provided for the diagnosis o£ . pupils' tastes and aptitudes. "Such exploration," he said, "must lead to the classification of pupils on differentiated lines with curricula offering pre-vocational subjects. Sucli post-primary education is diversified enough to offer a happy compromise between the academic and tile utilitarian. Pupils, are arranged in certain broad categories on specialised lines corresponding to their natural endowments. There is no antagonism between the cultural and the vocational. Surely nothing but good can come out 61 such a comprehensive synthesis so long as all specialised courses proceed from a basis of general education and retain alike a common nucleus of humanism in the form of literature and history, and perhaps music. "Such exploration is today a vital necessity, but neither intermedial diagnosis nor differentiation of courses is sufficient for ensuring a broad conception of education. They need to be supplemented by a generous provision of inter-curricular clubs and institutions. Then school societies make for true education. , They locate and foster interests." They develop many a cultural hobby a which becomes a perennial joy. They give opportunities of public-spirited service, and cultivate the full intimacies of friendship. I go so far as to say that the strength and/variety of such interests are a true criterion of the. liberal worth of a school. Their functioning demands continuity of' enthusiasm and sacrifice of time. But it is true service in a high cause. Such work is of course ancillary and supplementary to the classroom. But if spaciousness in education is aimed at, if education is rightly defined as an agency for developing full humanity, then this plenitude of interests finds impregnable justification, even though it may be irreconcilable with examinational window-dressing. UTILISE ALL AGENCIES. "In my opinion we teachers should utilise all developmental agencies in educating our pupils. What a farce it is to cay we teach them English when we do not teach them how to speak their native tongue, nor how to enjoy for life its unique literature; and what a sham is a secondary education which fails to revive interest in civic, national, Imperial, and international affairs, which sends out its senior pupils without any training for the exercise of the franchise, and without any desire to utilise good newspapers and magazines for keeping abreast of the multitudinous thrilling interests of" i this interdependent world! "Such an education does not imply a dissipation of energy, nor a flabby dilet-, tantism of mind. ' These interests are merely supplementary to the intensive work of the classroom. This organisation, enriches the school life. Its fruition is, seen not in examination results, but in ' enlightened citizenship, and in tastes and standards fortified against vulgar attractions. Education must be adaptive, and its objects must be increasingly liberal. I have therefore taken this opportunity of directing your attention to the wider functions" of secondary education.^ so that in catholic range, in quality of ideals, it may find increasing justification in our midsf."