SECONDARY SCHOOLS

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 84, 9 April 1938, Page 10

SECONDARY SCHOOLS

VALUE OF PRESENT SYSTEM

EVIDENCE OF BOARDS

An extension of local control and greater freedom in the school curriculum were the main reforms put forward for the improvement of : secondary education in New Zealand by Mr. C. W. Fell (Nelson), on behalf of the secondary school boards of the Dominion, in giving evidence on the Education Amendment Bill before the Education Committee yesterI day afternoon. After referring to the attainments, scholastic and otherwise, of the secondary schools, Mr. Fell said that in their curricula the secondaryschools had worked out, and were still evolving, a harmonious synthesis of the cultural and the practical. The old classical traditionalism had long since been jettisoned. Out of 15,000 secondary school pupils, only 5000 took two foreign languages, and 5000 one foreign language. The balance took progressively realistic courses such as commercial (3000 pupils), domestic science (1000 pupils), agriculture (600 pupils), etc. Those figures constituted a rebuttal of the accusation that the schools- were academic institutions, staffed by pedants, and hopelessly divorced from the. actualities of life. The truth was that, while realising their main objective of equipping their pupils with a broad cultural foundation, they were concurrently preparing them for vocational requirements, and holding the balance satisfactorily between culture and vocational efficiency. The business of the school should be to give not a trade-mark on utilitarian lines, but culture in the modern sense of the term. The onus, therefore, of proving that a drastic transformation of the system was necessary certainly rested with those who supported the Bill. REASONS FOR OPPOSITION. The secondary school boards stated that the Bill was opposed to the best interests of education for the following reasons:— That the comprehensive attempt at unification would defeat its own ends by diminishing local interest and blurring the individuality of secondary schools; that the Bill created division or dual control of secondary schools, and reducedvthe status of secondary school boards to that of school ; committees, to the, disadvantage of the secondary schools; that instead of any increase in local control there were dangers of intensified centralisation inherent in the vaguely denned powers of the district education officer; that no economy would be effected under the Bill, the number of school boards and school councils being increased; that the traditions and individuality of the secondary schools formed important parts of their educational value, and the Bill would seriously affect these, more especially in those schools with boarding departments. They urged, that secondary school boards be not abolished or their functions reduced to those of school committees, and expressed the opinion that an extension of local control and greater freedom in the school 'Curriculum were the reforms most urgently required for the impdvement of secondary education in New Zealand. There was. danger, under-the Bill, of increased centralised control. If unification were desired, there was no objection to, and! many advantages in, the combination of post-primary schools on the lines of the 1924 Amendment Act in centres outside Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch, and Dunedin. CORRESPONDENCE SCHOOLS. Eeplying to the suggestion that there should be four correspondence 'schools in place of one, as at present, Dr. A. G. 'Butchers, headmaster of the Education Department's Correspondence School, said1 that the establishment of four schools would lead to both a considerable increase in the average cost per pupil per year and to a definite decrease in the efficiency of the service rendered to remote and disabled children.

The Committee adjourned till Tuesday, i It is expected that the hearing of evidence will be completed on Wednesday.