EDUCATION COMMISSION.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CVI, Issue 12571, 5 August 1901, Page 6

EDUCATION COMMISSION.

TO THE EDITOR. -Sir, —Many teachers have to thank you for drawing attention in this morning's "Times" to the.great difference in l salary between the first and second assistant masters under the colonial scale. ... You say you see no reason why a first assistant should receive £BO more than a second assistant master. Have you not made a slight error in the figures?; For example, I cull the. following from the scale;— Avatage. I'd A.M. 2nd' AjU. Difference 420-430 £m £llO £lls 480-510 £-210 £lls ' £125 Thus, first assistant masters receive, more .than double as much as second assistant masters. Why such a vast difference is made is a great mystery. Ask the first assistants and see what they say. Ask the head-masters, and all will admit the injustice. There is practically no difference in the work done by tho two classes; in many schools, indeed, first and second masters take the same class in alternate years; yet the one is valued at less than naif the other.—l am, etc., X. Christ church, August 2, 1901. (We did not take the worst cases for our illustration,- but cur correspondent hats given the proposed salaries of the first and third assistants instead of the first and second. The figures in the cases''he selects are:—Schools 420 to 480, first assistant. £225, second £125, third £110; schools 480 to 510, first assistant £240, second £l3O, third £lls.—Ed "L.T.")