COST OF EDUCATION.

Marlborough Press, Volume XXI, Issue 1252, 10 December 1880, Page 3

COST OF EDUCATION.

It ia becoming very patent to moat porsona that vve are paying too dear for our education “ whistle,” and that the result doea not warrant the expense that ia being incurred. A correspondent to the Wellington Evening Post Ims taken some trouble to go into the whole matter, and has supplied a few statistics from the Education Report of 1879. During the last quarter of iijiiv year, lie Dips ' me numtier receiving in* instruction in the public schools was 40,382. Of these 11,292 were set down as too young to be preparing for standard work, in other words, were infants between 5 and seven years ; 9,252 were preparing for standard i ; 8,229 for standard ii ; 7.405 for standard iii ; 5,640 for standard iv ; 3,181 for standard v.; 1,170 for standard vi ; 213 passed standard vi. Reducing these to per centages, we have infants 25 per cent. ; standard i., 20 ; ii., 18 ; iii., 16 ; iv., 12 ; v., 7 ; vi. 2; passed vi., 5. If the standards are uniform, as the authors would have ua believe, thore must be something radically wrong in these figures, as than the per centages would be uniform or nearly so. But the above table shows that less than 10 per cent, ever reach the fourth standard, and the question naturally arises to what class does these belong ? Tho writer’s impression is that they belong to the “ upper ton,” tho children of the working classes leaving school before they go further than the threo R’o, so that all this extra science is simply meant for those who could well afford to pay for it, without taxiug the poor man’s beer and tobacco. State education means heavy taxation for the people without tho desired result being achieved. In New Zealand, with a population of 414,000, there was an average attendance last year of 50,639 •, California, with 560,000, shows an average of 27.082 ; New South Wales with a population of nearly 300,000, has only an average attendance in the primary schools of 8000 ; the average in Victoria was about equal to that of Now Zealand, the numbers being, population 887,434, and the average attendance 116,608. The cost of education in Victoria umounted to £547,931 ; New Zealand, £306,679 ; and in California £187,500 ; while the cost per head was—California, £5 4s ; New Zealand, £4 6s 3d ; Victoria, £2 7s. The amount expended on teachers’ salaries was : Victoria, £349,661 ; New Zealand, £107,821 ; and California, £45,300. The figures given above may be briefly summarised, that the education system is being carried on, not for the benefit of those for whom it was.intended, but. as the writer in the Post observes, “ in order to give a high class education to the rich at the public expense.”