LEAVING TOO SOON

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 102, 27 October 1938, Page 8

LEAVING TOO SOON

In a report to the Technical College Board of Governors the director (Mr. Ridling) expressed himself as being at a loss to understand why parents enrol students for postprimary work when they have no intention of permitting them to go on for a reasonable time in the day school. The implied complaint against parents has some justification. A period of training in a secondary school of less than twelve months cannot be said to have great value from an educational point of view, and, as the director suggests, amounts to little more than marking time until the school-leaving age is reached. The! Board of Governors decided to urge' the Minister of Education to enforce! the school-leaving age of 15, but another approach to the problem would! be to endeavour to convince parents of the advantages which follow a normal course of secondary school instruction. In some cases economic considerations force parents to send their children to work as soon as the school-leaving age is reached, but in the majority of cases parents allow other considerations to weigh in coming to a decision. There are, for instance, parents who yield to the desire of their children to escape the school discipline which, at that particular period in their life, may prove irksome. It is during that time of unseltlement that wise and friendly guidance is essential. If parents are educated in the advantages to be gained from a complete education the guidance which they give their children should be on (he right lines.