MATRICULATION.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20481, 5 February 1930, Page 14

MATRICULATION.

Sir, —Although Mr. Schmidt gives his emphatic assurance to the contrary, it appears to ine that after all the professional bodies have some little right to exclude those whose services they do not require, namely, the unmatriculated. I agree with him that anyone—even a potato-grower —can, with the help of the kitchen door and a length of thread, be a successful tooth-puller, but I quite fail to see how a potato-grower —or even a good cook for that matter—could do anything else concerning dentistry without passing matric. I wonder if it has ever occurred to him that "teeth-pullers" and "drug-mixers" are compelled to undergo an intensive university training, necessitating the passing of stiff examinations, before which they have to pass the matriculation ? As emphasised by the recent change of name from "matriculation" to "university entrance examination," matriculation is not the goal on the attainment of which people may be considered to have finished their education, but is purely an entrance examination, and, as such, has existed in some form or other as long as there have been universities or colleges. Surely the universities are not to blame if professional bodies- have adopted it as their standard. Matriculated.

Sir, —Your correspondent Mr. Harold Sclwnidt seems to labour under the impression that matriculation is a recent innovation. As a matter of academic history entrance examinations were held in 1600. Burke has left us an account of the entrance examination of Dublin University in 1743, and it is certain that few boys nowadays would survive the questions in classics and English that the Fellows of Trinity inflicted on the future statesman. That a profession is a "cushy job" is Hntrue. Few graduates earn the wages of artisans during the first few years of their careers, while their expenses are much greater. A glance at a dictionary of biography would show that nearly everyone who made "discoveries" from Newton to the present day, ere entering on purely scientific studies passed an examination in general educationThere is nothing iri the nature of a monopoly in any profession. All are open to students with brains, but examining bodies have every right to insist for their' own protection , and that of the public that the education of entrants should be subjected to a test: Were matriculation abolished the unintelligent would be no better off. An agitation would then be commenced for the abolition of "terms" and sections of th& degrees. Finally, we would arrive at the era of no examinations, which a section of the Labour Party is believed to be pressing on the Minister of Education as tlin ideal university education. A.U.C.