EDUCATION IDEALS

Hokitika Guardian, 16 May 1933, Page 8

EDUCATION IDEALS

N.Z.’S CULTURAL STANDARDS.!;,

DANGER OF A DECLINE,

WELLINGTON, May>T2

“In the matter of culture I do hold that we are in danger ill New Zealand of departing from sound said the Rev. H. 'K. Arehdall, headmaster of .King’s College, Auckland,, in his retiring presidential address yesterday ,at the annual confer&hce l of, the Registered Secondary Schools’ As-' 3'Ociation. “I have been told by many experienced teachers that the primary,' school training in New Zealand is not so thorough as it used to. he arid the state of arithmetic and' English grain‘mer at the proficiency! Standard is-nd--In cod as a good example of 'this de» ; tension, • • . ■*'• ' • :

■“The fact is that unless we can persuade the gfeat mass of the public to oe more sincere and honest ill 'their thinking/ the splendid educational traditions of tlie Old Land will gradually id lest and an. inferior educational ideal and method will come to ft pesi.ion of dominance. We are supposed to be the 'most British of all parts of 'the Empire, but I sea far too little honest endeavour to apply the ! full principles of the educational traditions of the Old Country to the circumstances of New Zealand'. 'a# )'

: “It is net so many. year 5 s,ig^g distinguished Manchester.jdholat;, ‘Pro-; "eSsor R. S. Conway, told tbe Uhiyei 1 - siby of Otago that a generation which knew practically nothing of the classics and classical antiquity and was hot P light the religion of their fathers was being brought up in the gutter educationally. That is strong language, but it is certain that no great' national cnL L urc will ever be created by a genera'ion whose roots in the past have been •o largely cut, whose knowledge of' Greece, Rome and Judea is a dimmish-. ; ng quantity.-, It is well to he reminded that the old educational tradition Tom which we have sprung believed in the twin aristocracies’cf character and intellect,.-and tlvnt it has always laid great stress on knowledge for its own sake," although*-it-lias never been keen the intellect from other ftisrects ,bf the “All the schools represented .in this association, hole} X§jig,ipn -to < he-the basis' of all sound education; they' have religious worship and religious teaching imbedded in, l their . -'life* .: It is y-qllite obvious .to us that New Zealand cannot claim to bP; carrying on .-the.. British; tradition of education while rcligilfn receives its present. treatment iif tlie' Government schools, and-in the university. :. I- ' i

“The Vest English idea of . discipline ; 'is to establish; ah order -that. .creates freedom and a' freedom that create® order , in a growing. communHv. liberty that is-, really i/license will nevlftcreate social-freedom.?’<t>. b-.-n • v/Vjtlt:. •’ V.