INCREASING EFFICIENCY

New Zealand Times, Volume XLI, Issue 9257, 26 January 1916, Page 6

INCREASING EFFICIENCY

The Hon. J. A. Hanan, Minister for Education, referred yesterday to a suggestion that one of the Hducation Department’s inspectors in .each district should pay official visits to country schools in order to take classes and help teachers • whose work was weak. The Minister said that he ''lvaa quite alive to the importance ot the sort of work for which arrangements had been made some years- prcviously by . the Auckland and. Wanganui Education Boards, in the appointment of organising inspectors, whoso main duty it was to spend considerable time in small schools and try to put the teaching on a better footing. The inspecting staffs had not been strong enough to permit of a wide extension of the work, and in-late years it appeared to have been curtailed. , _ ‘ . The 1 Minister mentioned that the Education Act of 1914 had aimed at the improvement in the teaching in the small schools, but an a different way. It had made'provision for the recognition of observation or .model schools, and authorised in such cases additional payments to teachers employed in these schools. The matter had not.been lost sight of, but was held in-abeyance, .pending a return of favourable financial conditions. Educational authorities in war time had to cut their coat according to a limited measure of cloth. His own impression was that in a wollordered scheme, both methods—the 'appointment tof inspecting teachers and the establishment of model schools —would have their places. When the inspecting staff of the new districts was settled, the question might be further considered. “In the meantime.” added Mr Hanan, “I have asked the 'Director of Education to inquire how far the special work ot organising inspector was actually done in the Auckland and Wanganui districts.”