HEALTH CAMP

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23218, 12 December 1938, Page 13

HEALTH CAMP

PERMANENT FACILITIES PROVISION FOR 200 BEDS SITE NEAR BUCKLAND'S BEACH Preparations for a permanent health camp of 200 beds, 100 of which will be used throughout the year and the remainder during the sumjner, will be begun immediately by the Auckland central council of the national children's health camp organisation. The site will bo between Buckland's Beach and Eastern Beach, 14 miles from Auckland. Mrs. B. J. McKendrick, secretary of the council, said on Saturday that this decision had been made at a meeting of the council attended by representatives of the Whangarei, Hamilton, Rotorua, Thames and Taumarunui district executives, representatives of tho Auckland Education Board, tho Health Department and the Post and Telegraph Department, and representatives of the Port Waikato, Motuihi and Campbell's Bay health camp organisations. The cost of the camp building, Mrs. McKendrick continued, would be met out of the King George V. Memorial Fund, but the maintenance expenses would bo borne t by public subscriptions. The building will be designed on the lines of an open-air type of school, with a maximum of window space and provision for opening the walls on the northern side in suitable weather. A hospital bay will be included. A portion of the dormitory space containing <SO cots will be a memorial to the late Sir George Richardson, one of the pioneers of the health camp movement in Auckland. The council has already been promised a considerable number of cots for this section. Radio equipment for the dormitories has also been promised to the council. Mrs. McKendrick said that to meet the requirements of the North Auckland district a summer camp would be established, and sites at Whangarei and Dargaville were being investigated. This camp would enable children from Wellsford to the Far North to receive treatment in their own area. Thin season, however, they -would be accommodated at Motuihi and Campbell's Bay.

OVERSEAS EXAMPLE SUMMER GATHERINGS GOOD EFFECT ON CHILDREN ESTABLISHMENT ADVOCATED \ ■ [by telegbaph—own correspondent] WELLINGTON. Sunday The establishment in New Zealand of summer camps for school children, similar to those held on a large scale in America and England, was advocated by Mr. G. It. Ashbridge, secretary of the New Zealand Educational Institute, in an interview in Palmerston North. Mr. Ashbridge, who recently returned from an extensive tour abroad, referred to the value of such camps and their influence for good on the physical and mental development of the child. There were many fine boarding establishments attached to secondary schools, he said, and no doubt the boards of governors would be just as well pleased to extend those facilities to children's camps as they were to summer schools for adults. Parents would be quite prepared to pay a nominal fee to defray the cost of . the camps. In America, in order to make the camps available to children of the poorer classes, splendid work was done by the Y.M.C.A., Scout organisation and similar bodies. A field of employment was also provided for unemployed teachers and for trainees in teacher training colleges. One of the values of camp life, apart altogether from getting children out of the cities into the country, was the discipline. There were certain tasks the children had to perform, and children did. not hesitate to apply sanctions to the loafer. That atmosphere was good for the chjld, both psychologically and educationally. In New Zealand, said Mr. Ashbridge, he considered there were a good many students in training colleges, and also many teachers, not to mention Y.M.C.A. and Toe H workers, who would be quite prepared to supervise the camps for a month during the Christmas holidays. In that way students would not only be getting firsthand knowledge of children, but would be supplementing their training college allowances.

WHANGAREI CHILDREN COUNTY COUNCIL DONATION [from our own correspondent] WHANGAREI, Saturday The Whangarei County Council is donating the sum of £lO to the funds for children's health camps. The money is to be used for the benefit of local children.