CONTROL OF EDUCATION.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13702, 19 March 1908, Page 6

CONTROL OF EDUCATION.

[BY TELEGRAM!. — PRESS ASSOCIATION.]

DCNEIUN, Wednesday. ! At a meeting of the Education Board today the question of the overcrowding at Forbury school again came up. The chairman (Mr. McKenzie, M.P.) said the final development of nine months" communication with the Education Department on the subject was a letter stating that the lu-speutor-Geiieral was coming to Duneuin, and would enter into a conference with the Board's inspector, and see whether there was any scheme by which the overcrowding might be mitigated. The Department understood thai there were a number ol vacant rooms at Musselburgh and Macandrew Bond schools, and thought that therein lay the solution of the difficulty. Mr. Israel said he wished the Board to understand that the action of the Department was not the result of the Board's efforts, but was due to the committee themselves. The secretary of the committee had been in Wellington, and he went to the Inspector-General, and made plain to him th•'. urgency of the case, with the result as stated. It was plain that the representations of the Board had no weight with the Department. Mr. Mitchell said a growing question was whether the education of the Dominion was to be controlled by hirelings of the Dominion, or by independent representatives of the people: lie moved, "That the Board expresses its profound surprise at the Department's letter, and enters an emphatic protest against the needs of the Otago education district, being subjected to the will and dictum of a. salaried official as at; encroachment upon the authority of the Board as the representative ot the people of the province."

The motion was seconded by Mr. Israel, and carried unanimously.