EDUCATION DEPARTMENT

New Zealand Times, Volume XLVI, Issue 10688, 7 September 1920, Page 5

EDUCATION DEPARTMENT

APPOINTMENT OF ARCHITECT.

The ' Minister • for ' Education (the Hon. C. J. Parr) in conversation with a "Times" representative _ yesterday, referred to the recent appointment of Mr J. T. Mair as architect to the Education Department. , "This," said the Minister, "is an important appointment, and one-winch in my opinion should have been made before. The department spends annually hundreds of thousands' of'pounds on the building of new schools throughout the Dominion, and hitherto it has been without expert advice on matters of construction and design, although the present officers are skilled as to the educational requirements of a building and as to matters of light and ve/itilation, or ornamentation. The main function of the architect will be to advise me as to the architecture of s'chool buildings, and as to cost qf construction, which is a serious factor nowadays. "Further, there are some hundreds of old schools throughout New Zealand which, though old-fashioned, are .still sound, and the problem of modernising these old buildings is one requiring expert guidance." Mr Mair, who was recently with the Defence Department, took a two years' course, / including special lectures on school,, architecture, at the Pennsylvania University.