The New Zealand Times. FRIDAY, MAY 24, 1912. VICTORIA COLLEGE

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXVI, Issue 8129, 24 May 1912, Page 4

The New Zealand Times. FRIDAY, MAY 24, 1912. VICTORIA COLLEGE

The Victoria College Council has again been driven to ask for sufficient funds to carry on the work of the institution.

Most people, we imagine,' who read in our news columns this morning the report of the deputation which' waited upon the Minister for Education in regard to the finances of Victoria College, will agree with ' the statement made by Mr Hanan that “ something would have to be done, and done soon.” It is singularly undignified that a Council of a University should be continually under the necessity of beseeching the Government for funds in this way, and it is pathetic that a college maintained by public funds should be continually on the verge of bankruptcy. That, practically, is the position of Victoria College. The plight in which the college finds itself is desperate. Its present income amounts to £9974 and its annual expenditure to £11,134, the apparent deficiency for the current year being £ll6O. The Council seems to have been driven in the past to keep afloat by treating its original reserve of £6OOO as revenue, but that having disappeared it is now at ,the end of its tether, and .unless Parliament comes to the rescue will have to resort to,

steps which few members of the Council would care to be associated with. There are twenty professors and teachers at the college and 540 students, 150 more than at any other University college in the Dominion, and though this is the case, and steady growth in the number must be looked for from year to year the institution has been allowed to drag along, living from hand to mouth, and to labour under difficulties which impose a very definite barrier to efficiency. This is really very disgraceful, and we hope to hear of the Government being prepared to immediately remove t cause for such just resentment as must be felt by everyone connected with the College or interested in the general question of University education. Some scheme can surely be evolved by which the income of the college will automatically adjust itself to requirements. We don’t know whether the Minister found any comfort from the reflection that, “ after all, the first necessity was a sound primary education.” Another point has to be considered at the moment, and that is whether there is any justification for starving one of the University colleges? The University is as much a part of’ the education system as the infant school, and there is no reason why the development of one or the other should be hindered.