THE HAWERA SCHOOL.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 18 December 1926, Page 6

THE HAWERA SCHOOL.

an insanitary BUILDING,

HEALTH OFFICER’S REPORT,

THE COMMITTEE'S REPORT,

The insanitary condition. of th e Hawera School, and its retrograde effec, upon the health of the children <of the town added to the continued and fiuit less 2 efforts of the committee to secure early provision by the Government foil new school, had the effect upom the school committee at last night s monthly meeting of determining it to endeavour to awaken the residents of the town to a strong reaction against tinexisting conditions at the school The following letter, endorsed by the committee as a whole, has been forwarded to the press for publication:— LETTER FROM COMMITTEE. (To the Editor).

Sir —The Hawera School Committee is seriously concerned at the treatment accorded to Hawera needs in primary education by the Education Department. The position is briefly as follows. The main school is admittedly insanitary and should be renewed. this renewal was entirely r ejected by the department. -A-S a first step the com mittee asked for the provision of an open air infant department. this also was rejected by the department until the success' or otherwise of an open-ai--sehools to be erected at Turuturu was GV pians for an open-air school at Turuturu prepared by the board’s architect wefe sympathetically received by the department’s architects, but fitter rejected them, obviously at the instigation of higher officials. 24 b From independent arcnit-cts we know that the department’s architects aro sympathetic to open-air schools. , , . , . ■ Lastly renewal of the boys’* latrine was admitted by the Minister, when here, to be urgent work. It was re fused by the department on the grounds that when a new infant department was built, new latrines woula bo these requests made through the Taranaki Education Board, the committee has had the most full and complete support from the board. But eveif the board can get nothing further from th 3 department than that renewal of the Hawera school will b(* considered as hrst on the list cf urgent works after the end of the financial year, i.e., next April. The urgency of the position is clearly shown at the last meeting of the board. A normal average attendance at a healthy school is about 93 per cent,.; during the last year that ■percentage ha,s only once been leached at Hawera School; Tawhiti and Ncnmanby, both modern buildings, show an infinitely better average attendance during the epidemics. The school is to lose three teachers, and the health of the scholars and of the whole community has suffered severely. The department admits urgency, but turns aside our demands with mere political quibbles. Ve feel it is high time that public atention should be directed to the position, and we trust that you, sir, will iu he future, as in the past, give us all the weighty help that the Press can exercise.—Yours faithfully, J. W. Harding, on behalf of the Hawera School Committee. A £f DAMNING” REPORT.

The foregoing letter -was the direct outcome of the following report, submitted to the meeting, and drawn up by Dr. J. Boyd, medical health officer of Wellington: — “I have recently inspected the above (Hawera) school,'and have to advise as follows: — “Aspect.—The school appears to have been built at various periods, with little regard to this matter. Booms D, F, G and the infants get practically no sunlight. Booms G and E get very little, and rooms K and L get that of the late afternoon only. ! “Ventilation. —Owing to the growth of the school as above, and the fact that It is built round a central hall, this also appears deficient. Booms A and I have only one external wall each, and through ventilation can only be obtained through the central hall. Other rooms have ventilation in two adjacent walls, with the result that parts of the rooms are not properly flushed with air. The ventilation of other rooms is interfered with by the building of other parts of the school in close proximity to the existing windows. “Lighting.—This in most cases appears adeepmte, except that in room A there is a total of one-tenth of the floor space in glass, and approximately onequarter of this is in skylight; and in room eight the proportions are 1 to 6.3 ('standard, one-quarter for rooms facing south, and one-sixth for a northerly aspect). Light from a skylight is not of the- same value as wall light. “Floor space per child. —I understand that the standard laid down for this . district is 12 square feet per child. I propose to give the floor space per child in each room 'below this standard. It must be understood that all measure mentis are not absolutely exact, but are near enough for all practicable purposes. Nothing has been deducted for furniture, etc., in this list: B, 11.2 sq. ft; C, 10.6 sq ft; E, 8.4 sq ft; F, 10.8 sq ft; I, 10 sq ft; K, 10.5 sq ft. “Sanitation. —The basins, except for three, are of galvanised iron of the tipup type. The tip-up trough type is unsanitary owing to the splashing that takes place, and further, the basins are . rusting and the paint is scaling off the inside, and one of the waste pipes is • rotten. They are also situated in the passage ways where they would probably block the traffic. ' “ Conveniences.—Boys: A ten holeplastered trough convenience with sloping scats. The seats are rotten and worm-eaten, and unless provision is made for each compartment to be water-sealed off from other compartments the trough pattern is not recommended. “Urinal.—This is a 30ft plastered wall of about three feet high flushed by an automatic flushing cistern. There is a very perceptible smell, and the end of this latrine being only 27ft from the| rooms where standard one and primer three arc taught, when the wind is in a favourable quarter (as it usually is in the summer) it means that the windows of those classes are often closed at the time when they are most needed to be open. Girls' privy.—Same objection. Infants.—These are provider: for with a modern set of pedestal pans, each separated, and each separately flushed. A reasonable standard of number of pans is 7 j'or cent, for girls and infants and 5 per cent, for boys. “Headmaster's room.—This is approximately Bft x 6ft in the clear, and would appear to have adequate light and ventilation, except that., unfortunately, it is boxed in by the growth of the building, with the result that ttie window at the top is at least five feet below where any air is circulating, and is 20ft back, in an opening about six feet wide, from the external wall. “Heating.—With . the exception of room L, each room has a fireplace, but it is open to question whether these

would efficiently heat the rooms in winter time.’’ THE DISCUSSION. Dr. Thomson: That’s a very “damning’’ report. The chairman made a special request that the* press publish the report in full. He said he also proposed to have copies made of it for despatch to the Education Board. and then to the educational authorities in Wellington, to the member for the uistricr and to the Minister of Education himself. Dr. Thomson said he had drafted a letter, which he read to the committee. It was resolved thar the draft letter tabled by Dr. Thomson, and reproduced at th(' opening of this report, be forwarded for publication in the Hawera Sta r.