THE NATION AND THE YOUNG

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume LXIX, Issue LXIX, 1 June 1915, Page 4

THE NATION AND THE YOUNG

Indirectly, and without any intention to do so, Mr Arthur Mcc pays a fine compliment to New Zealand and those other countries that have for some years now recognised in practice that the nation does not complete its duty to the young unless, in addition to educating them, it fits them for, and as far as it can places them in vocations in which they can do well for themselves and well for their country. Mr Mcc pays this compliment when he says that the immediate problem for England is to provide for the training of its boys and girls • when they leave the elementary schools, so that they may be skilful, useful citizens, able to earn a good living, keep a comfoi-table home, and so be manly and independent. To this he adds that the nation will solve .this problem of training its young for usefulness as soon as it sees the greatness of the need for such training, and it is likely to be convinced of that

%oj "JDjfe } Freeman, large.innteb«ra v of the bbya of-Bir^niugbam leave school at the age of 'fourteen without *nZ *el? in ****•$! oß'toeir education from school (to "" practical life. f he std^is ,|err|&ly sad^and it is as true of other cities -as of Birmingham. L,ad« wlip>ke 'up,, wort that, teaches them nothing for the " future forget nearly all they were taught at school, become less intelligent, lose their good character, and sink into the class from which criminals and vicious people are recruited, so that the early work of education is wasted. Mr Freeman's book shows us that every boy should thihk of these things while he is still at school, and*idetermine to grow up into a skilfulman, master of some craft or business. But all the people of the country should also think bf the difficulty of making the best .of the nation's boyhood, and determine to do its duty in completing the practical education of its young people, as well as the school education ! of younger children, and in placing ! them out, suitably in life. The nation needs this universal training for work quite as much as it needs health, for ■ such training would bring health to the spirit as' ; well as the body. And though this is said of England, it is just as applicable to New Zealand, and what Mr Mcc says should strengthen and steady our young, nation in its determinatipn to expand the work whicli it has begun in this" connection.