UNIVERSITY DEGREES.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19929, 24 April 1928, Page 13

UNIVERSITY DEGREES.

EXTRA-MURAL STUDENTS. DISCUSSION BY GRADUATES. DISCRIMINATION OPPOSED. The proposal, broached in the New Zealand University Council in February, to differentiate between degrees granted to internal and external students, was discussed at a meeting of the Auckland District Court of Convocation at the Auckland University College last evening. The graduates participating carried by a large majority a motion suggesting that instead of a differentiation between degrees certain recommendations made by the University Commission in 1924 should be carried out.

Mr. A. K. Turner, to open the discussion, moved: "That this meeting approves the principle of making some distinction between degrees granted to students taking lectures and those granted to extramural students."

The mover sketched the aims of university education and the advantages obtained from personal instruction by a tutor, from intercourse with fellow students, and from participation in the social life of the university. If it were admitted that any substantial advantages were to be had from attendance at lectures, some distinction must logically be made. He was aware that equal opportunity should be given to all, and that not all could attend university lectures. However, a university had to reconcile this democratic idea! as best it could with the obvious duty of keeping up the standard of its degrees. Mr. W. A. Beattie :said the extra-mural student would undoubtedly be placed at a disadvantage if" any distinction were made. The personal contact between instructors and many classes of students in New Zealand colleges was growing less and less. The university in its present state —lacking funds and with meagre bursaries —was scarcely justified in discriminating against students who, for any valid reason, were unable to attend lectures.

The Rev. Dr. H. Ranston remarked that his own experience did not indicate that external students acquired any less genuine culture than the others. He opposed the distinction, but favoured a proposal by the University Commission that the university should require some sound reason for exompting a student from attendance at lectures, and that it should make a real effort to guide and help his studies. Mr. Noel Gibson, who also opposed the motion, said it would be difficult to prove that a full-time university course produced a result superior to that of external study carried on while the student was earning his living. The tutorial system was not in force in New Zealand, and it was possible to over-rate the value of attendance at lectures under the conditions prevailing.

The chairman, Mr. W. A. Gray, said that, rightly or wrongly, the average man placed a higher value on the degree obtained by unaided study than in that obtained by a student who had attended full courses of lectures. Dr. Ranston moved, as an amendment, that in the opinion of the meeting the solution of the problem was on the lines suggested by the University Commission. Mr. T. U. Wells, representative of the Court of Convocation on the New Zealand University Council, said the proposal had been brought unexpectedly before the February meeting by a recommendation from the Academic Board that unless a student had attended a certain proportion of lectures his degree should be endorsed "external." The council agreed the proportion named should be increased and then shelved the whole matter until the May meeting. Mr. Wells said he had come to the present meeting to learn, and he was fully in agreement with what was evidently the view of most of the members present—that no distinction should be made. Dr. Ranston's amendment was carried by 32 votes to 8.