DELUSION OF DEGREES.

Huntly Press and District Gazette, Volume XXII, 5 August 1932, Page 1

DELUSION OF DEGREES.

“One of the most touching beliefs of modern democracy is the value of degrees. If you can accumulate an alphabet behind your name you are regarded as sufficiently authenticated, as a combination of Solon, Socrates, and St. Francis,” said the Bishop of Durham (Dr Hensley Henson), speaking at the conference of National Association of schoolmasters at Sunderlant,” reports the Yorkshire Post. “Large numbers of people in this country and still more in America, think that if by hook or by crook they can get some magic letters behind their name they have solved the problem of pedagogic efficiency. There are four great conditions of educational science—good material, favourable conditions, the employment of the right method, and competent teaching. These two personal conditions affecting material and teachers are by far the most important. You are greatly effected, therefore, by the social hinterland of the school, and that is why school teachers ought to be in the forefront of every socially reforming movement.” Said Smithy: Times is bad. I’m a four-day relief man but I work five. On Friday we always move. Of course there’s the carter to pay, but it’s cheaper than rent. I’ve shifted so many times that every time a cart stops outside the house the fowls lie on their backs and put their legs up to be tied. i