The Hawera Star. MONDAY. APRIL 30, 1928. SCHOOL COMMITTEES’ ELECTIONS

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 30 April 1928, Page 4

The Hawera Star.

MONDAY. APRIL 30, 1928. SCHOOL COMMITTEES’ ELECTIONS

Delivered every evening by (> o'olook in Hawera. Manair.. Normanby, Gkaiawa, Eltham. Mangatoki. Kaponga, Alton ) HurleyviUe Patea. Waverley. Mokoia, Whakamara. Ohangai, Meremere. Fraser Road, and Ararata.

The annual meetings of householders to ho held in Taranaki to-night will provide parents and others with an opportunity to demonstrate their interest in their local schools and in the primary education system in vogue in the Dominion, but unfortunately there are no good reasons for presuming that the story to be told to-morrow in regard to parental interest will differ very much from that which has been told so often in the past. There will be districts .where the public interest and pride in the local school will be reflected in a representative attendance and the election of an enthusiastic committee, but there will be many others where the attendance of those who should be interested will be so small as to bo negligible. It has often been recorded before, and doubtless will be again, that the retiring committee has had practically to re-elect itself with the assistance of one or two outsiders; and it has happened that the members of the committee, themselves enthusiastic, have refused to allow, themselves to be reelected as a protest against the apathy of the householders. It is unfortunate that this position should so often obtain, for the success of a school, and particularly of a country school, depends largely on the support of the community it serves. It ■has 'been complained in some quarters that public interest in the primary schools' would be more alive if committees were granted wider powers, but those who make this an excuse for their failure to lend their support forget that they are, by standing aloof, making it more difficult for themselves and the active workers to withstand the arguments of those who advocate centralisation of administration of the education system. It is less than a year ago that it was freely rumoured that the Department was 'going to abolish education boards, and though that rumour was not substantiated by subsequent events, it will be remembered that the Minister never gave an unqualified denial to that report of the Department’s intentions. Enough has appeared in the newspapers since to warrant the public in the belief that there exists an opinion im official quartors in 'favour of tlio abolition of boards. - It lias been suggested that abolition would 7 bring in its train an increase in the powers of committees, but committeemen and ex-committeemen, who know something of the attitude of the departmental authorities towards ■local control, are not likely to take much comfort from that suggestion. There is a move in educational circles towards greater freedom from stereotyped methods of imparting knowledge to the young. This recognition of the beneficial effects which may follow the granting of fuller play to the individuality of the teacher and the pupil has penetrated into the primary school system, with the results that justify the hope that greater things may be expected of it in the future, but, on the other hand, there are many among those who would do away with the old methods of teaching who would also do away with local control. There appears to be a strange contradiction in the method's of those wlm think along these lin'es. On the one hand they would have freedom from a hard and fast system and on the other they would make that system more rigid by vesting responsibility for its application and control in a central authority, divorced by distance and differences in outlook from knowledge of, and sympathy with, local conditions. Experience in other countries has shown that the schools which have succeeded are those which have been given an opportunity to develop individuality which reflects their immediate environment. This is a principle which intelligent parents should support, and theoretically they do support it, but it is not enough that they should raise their voices in protest when it is too late. They should make the authorities aware, through their support of the local school, that there exists a firm opinion against standardisation and. centralisation.