“BIAS” IN EDUCATION.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVIII, 30 March 1929, Page 5

“BIAS” IN EDUCATION.

THE TOWNWARD DRIFT. STATEMENT BY HIGH SCHOOL CHAIRMAN. When approached by a representative of the “Hawera. Star” regarding til© .subject of ‘bias” in education, which was touched upon at a public meeting addressed by the Secretary for Labour in Hawera on Tuesday night, Mr R. .S. Sage, cahirman of the Hawera Technical High School Board of Governors/ said that .so far as encouragement of pupils to take an agricultural course mas concerned, lie could only repeat what he hadi already said publicly. The High School made an agricultural! course . available, and if the people would not enter their children for that course it was not the school’s fault. His personal opinion was that the trend of education throughout New Zealand wa<s towards the academic side, but technical courses were available in practically every town, and, so far as he cou'!,d see, were having practical results. If boys were not going on the land in sufficient numbers it was not the fault of the education system afone, and he believedi that the reason more pupils gravitated; towards academic studies was that there was insufficient inducement offering in rural occupations' to intelligent boys who had no financial backing to enable' them to 'look forward to obtaining land of their own. “I have been looking into this -question, land I have come to the court a- ( sion that the so-called drift of boys to the cities and non-productive occupations is not so marked as may be supposed,” said Mr Sage, who. quoted the following figures taken from the returns of the Taranaki Education Board, showing the numbers of boys who went to secondary .schools and the numbers who went direct from 1 primary school .into rural occupation's:— Taranaki, 1927. Boys, Per cent. Post primlary 316 45 Agriculture 231 33 Other- occupations and not. known 146 22 Totai l 693 ' 100 1 1928. , Post primary 302 45 Agriculture 214 31 Ot her occupations and not known 161 24 Total 677 100 The returns for the whole of the Dominion for the year 1927 showed that 19 per cent, of ail boys who went to secondary .schools took up agriculture as a vocation. ‘‘Therefore,” said Mr Sage, “taking the percentage who go direct from primary schools to agriculture plus the percentage of boys who go on to' the. land from the secondary schools, it would appear that 50 per cent, of our school boys finally reach agricultural pursuits'—and that is arrived at without considering the possibility of a certain proportion of those who appear in the 'returns as ‘not known’ also finding their way to. farming. It is thus fair to assume, that the education system does not ■swing boys away from the landi, but that the land, far various erasons, cannot retain them, resulting in adrift of population towards the cities.” Mr Sage added that tlie scheme, which had been tentatively outlined by the Department of Labour and. the Farmers’ Union for the settling of boys under the group, sysftem, with a suggestion of assistance in placing them on sections of their own, appealed to him as -being very attractive and worthy of further investigation.