EDUCATION CONTROL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIX, Issue 21167, 27 April 1932, Page 13

EDUCATION CONTROL.

BOARDS' CASE STATED. COSTLY CENTRALISATION. DUPLICATION OF WORK. That the huge increase in the cost of education is due almost entirely to the fact that one officer lias gradually been allowed to assume control of the whole system is the opinion expressed by the conference of education boards in detailed observations on the report of the National Expenditure Commission as it concerns the Education Department. Tho comments of the conference, which was held in "Wellington, were released yesterday. The steps toward centralisation of control are traced in t ie conference's report, which says that in 1915 the staff of the head office consisted of about 70 officers and has sinco practically doubled. In 1930, in addition to the director, there were eight officers doing administrative work receiving salaries ranging from £715 to £9OO per annum. "It is significant in this connection that the department was able last year to retire a number of these highly-paid officers, who have not since been replaced," the report says. "If such substantial economies were possible, does not the department lay itself open to a definite charge of extravagant administration ? Over-supply of Teachers. "The boards, w:th no increase in the rate of their administrative grant sinco 1914, have had, o! necessity, to practise the strictest economy. No such necessity apparently has beun required in the administration of the department's head office, where the cost has increased from £13,036 in 1915 to £42,284 in 1930—an increase of 224 per cent. In that period the boards' expenses of administration increased from £28,392 to £46,082, an increase of only 58 per cent. 'lfc is clear therefore that, thei director must accept the responsibility for the lavish expenditure on education, which could have been avoided without affecting the efficiency of the system.' " The report also says that a substantial item of waste is cue to miscalculation by the department of the number of teacher trainees required. In 1925, the department outlined a scheme for controlling the number of entrants to the service and tho output of students from the training colleges. It is stated that the department calculated that in 1926 there would be 150 teachers unemployed; in 1927, 111; in 1928, 102; in 1929, two; and in 1930 and 1931, none.

A Loss ol £IOO,OOO. "The department's estimate proved to be disastrously inaccurate," the conference comments. "Each year the number of unemployed teachers increased, until at the present time (here are over 700 teachers without permanent employment. As each of these teachers costs, on a conservative estimate, £3OO for training, the loss to the countiy is well over £IOO,OOO. No mention has seen made of this gross miscalculation on the part of the department. The huge sum of money thus wasted would have been very useful at the present time. The young people unemployed are dissatisfied, some of them becoming potential agitators, and their efficiency is deteriorating at a very rapid rate. Should not the department responsible for this loss be called to account?" Considerable attention is devoted to the part played by the boards in developing the education system over half a century. The claim made by the department that £50,000 can be saved by the abolition of the boards is dismissed as valueless unless the department can supply details on which the claim is made.

" A Checking Institution." The statement of the commission that "the present system is one of the most cumbrous and costly that could be devised" is admitted as correct up to a certain point, "but,'' says the report, "this is due to the fact that the department has, within itself, built up an unnecessary and wasteful system of duplication and overlapping of tho statutory functions of boards. The department, sought always the substance of real authority and endeavoured to leave tho boards only the shadow. "The department has gradually introduced a system of administration which requires practica ly every function of a local board to be subservient to its authority. For example, it requires from tho boards an excessive number of detailed returns, showing particulars of practically every activity and of all expenditure, resulting in voluminous correspondence on most trivial matters of detail and causing unnecessary work and unwarrantable deJay. Tho department has, in fact, developed mainly into a checking institution. There should be no need for the central department to assume responsibility for, and control of, matters which are entirely of local concern." New System Proposed.

The conference suggests that the control of education should be decentralised and many of this original powers of the boards restored. The principal officers of the department .'should be an administrator to control the business side, and a director of the educational policy of the Dominion whose duties would be confined to tho professional side. Hie functions of the department should include the preparation of legislation and regulations, classification and grading of teachers, control of examinations, determination of school staffs and teachers' salary scales, prescription of fyllabus of instruction, control of child welfare branch, preparation of estimates of expenditure for submission to Parliament. The powers and duties of boards should include the establishment, maintenance, and control of public primary, secondary, technical and native schools, the appointment of thenown officers and teaching staffs, eontro of the inspectorate, conveyance and board of pupils, the establishment of school districts and school libraries, the control of teachers' training colleges, the administration of funds provided by Parliament and all other funds that may become the property of the boards.