SCHOOLS OF AGRICULTURE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 18949, 21 February 1925, Page 8

SCHOOLS OF AGRICULTURE.

The. 1 Diversity Senate's discussion on higher education in agriculture .suffered from the obsessions of the chief disputants. Professor Hunter's eagerness to get, for Victoria, College the status of a recognised school for the purposes of the degree, courses in agriculture— Lincoln College in Canterbury has hitherto been the only institution with recognition—narrowed the debate ovt rmuch. As a matter of parochial tactics, the move was excellent, and fully worthy of tin expert teacher of logic and fra,titer of resolutions. He has his reward. Hut thete were things, vital arid fundamental in New Zealand's need for better provision of instruction in agriculture, that for the notice were beyond his vision. Wellington first, Auckland second if it, wished to press its claim—so he contrived to have the issue seen. Others, op posing him or else, glad to use. his method as a means of getting their local advocacy a hearing, seemed also temporarily the victims of myopia. Wellington certainly, if Professor Hunter so insisted, but Auckland just as certainly, as soon as he should get his way. There is no call fo quarrel with their procedure, any more than with his : but, it is regrettable and a, little surprising that members of the governing; body of a, Dominion institution, chosen fo care for the country's university education as a, whole, should envisage things in so in tensely parochial a way. The Do minion's wide, and varied need first, afterwards the most practicable apportionment of recognition to the centres prepared to establish university schools of agriculture that were setting things in a truer perspective. H, is a, pity that the discussion degenerated into a rivalry of claims, to he set,tied by expediencies in tie bate. It need not have traversed so low a plane. The < Jovernnient has already sought, through the Hoard of Agriculture a general report, upon the whole question of the teaching of the subject with whose adequate handling if is primarily concerned. In conjunction with that effort fo find a way out of the present unsatisfactory position, the Department of Education must be prepared to act. Toward the solution the Senate has been expected to contribute some cold, clear light. Instead, there has been engendered the haze of heat. A great and urgent need, from which the whole Dominion suffers, should have had more sfatosmanly treatment: by the Fellows of the University of New Zealand. A big policy, with clear division of tasks to university colleges. agricultural farm-schools and experimental farms, is urgently needed. Agreement, upon that is the first step ; then will be welcome the eager co-operation, in their several capacities, of the bodies concerned. After the Chancellor's tine lead, this discussion, is disappointing.