FLIRTATION CENSORSHIP

New Zealand Times, Volume LIV, Issue 12652, 12 January 1927, Page 3

FLIRTATION CENSORSHIP

LETTERS TO SCHOOLGIRLS A number of London head teachers have been perturbed as to what they should do with correspondence addressed to their pupils at school. They have appealed to the London County Council, and have been officially informed that they should forward such letters unopened to the parents or guardians. Nowadays boy 6 and girls remain at school until a more advanced age than did their parents or grandparents, and some of the elder scholars like to correspond with their friends. The schoolgirl of to-day is often a shingled or bobbed-haired young miss, in some cases carrying on a mild flirtation with her “boy,” which she does not desire her parents to hear of. What mole easy than that letters should be addressed to her school? While it is not suggested that the beau teachers of the L.C.C. desire to act ns “wet blankets,” the problem has arisen whether it is advisable that letters addressed to boys and girls at school should be handed to them without their parents' knowledge. , "Obviously,*' said an official of the London County Council, “some safeguard is necessary. Legally such letters are the property of the boys or' girls to whom they nro addressed, but to relieve head teachers of any embarrassment wo have isrtuod an instruction that they should he forwarded to the parents unopened. Our action has been taken because of two or three isolated cases, which have been brought to our notice.”

The official added that there were not many cases where scholars had sought to use the school as n poete rcstonte, and in the past no uniform practice had been adopted by head teachers. Now a genera? rule would govern all cases.