THE CENTRAL SCHOOL PROPOSAL FROM A COUNTRY POINT OF VIEW.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 10035, 28 April 1894, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE CENTRAL SCHOOL PROPOSAL FROM A COUNTRY POINT OF VIEW.

TO THE EDITOR,

g IR) Xhe question of the establishment of some more adequate provision for the teaching of scholars who have passefl the Sixth Standard is now one of considerable importance, and has received at your hands two leaders, I hope therefore you will pardon me if I presume to Bay a word or two oa the matter. At the outset permit me to remark that I have never had tho banefit of a "black coat" education, that I left school when I passed the Fifth Standard, and that what little education I possess I owe very considerably to the practical training I got as a contributor to the columns of tho (Jtago Witness and other papers, and to the reading of such English authors as I could lay my hauds on in this inland mining village. I cannot therefore put my ideas in the same "pure and undefiled" Buglish which you, Sir, can use; but the very disadvantages under which I have had to labour have enabled me at anyrata to acquire enough practical education to at onca see that your objections to the Hon. J. MacGregor's Bcherje are entirely baseless, or if not baseless, then based entirely on a fear of danger to the High School, and not on a sense of justice to thoso who cannot attend the High School. If our system of education is to be made perfect, some provision such as Mr MacCtregor suggests must be made both for bojs and girld. Of what use is it for us to stuff our boys and girls till they pass the Sixth j Standard, and then leave them, as our system i professes to do, "educated." Many years ago I recognised, this defect in our system, and in an address to the Macraes Mutual Improvement Society, delivered before I became a member of the Ocago Education Board, pointed it out, and when Mr MacGregor came forward with a proposal to in some degree remedy it he had my hearty support, as he shall have till he carries his proposal into effect. Let me point out, Sir, that the high schools do not in any way provide for the wants of the majority of our boya an£ girls. What is the cry we hear continually ? "That too many aro going in for the learned professions." And why is this so ? Is it not greatly due to the "black coat" and "white hand" idea suggested by Mr MacGregor ? And with that cry we hear the other raised, that our public Rchool system turns out boys aud girls totally unable to apply what they have been taught. la this, Sir, to be then the ecd and aim of our education system ? What provision, for instance, ia made in our country schools for fitting country boys for country life ? Two classes of boys (I refer to boys specially, because, as Mr MacGregor says, their training is les3 practical than that of girls) grow up side by side—the boyß whoso parents can afford to send them to town to stock an overloaded medical or legal profession, and the boys who hava to go out rabbiting, flax - milling, farming, and so forth. And what ia tho result? Any boy of talent aS once trys to bo with class number one because class number two is reckoned no class. Well, Sir, Mr MacGregor's proposal once established in our largest centre, I can easily foresee that iJ would send out branches, and that come provision would be made, first in connection with our district high sohoota ar.d afterwards in our larger centres where a snfficient number of tcholars could congregate, whereby a good commercial and practical training could be given to our country boya, no matter what trade they mean to fallow, and where, as Mr MacGregor points out, they could be induced to "steep thenisolvcs to tho lips in literature." I hold, Sir, that our country bays, aud in fact all boys, need a commercial training. What moro necessary on a well-worked farm than a kaosledge of bookkeeping and a commercial training ? Wo would have fewer mistakes, and more succssiifu! men, if that; knowledge wero mora widely diffused. Ami to whom is a love of literature more nncsssary than to him who has to spend hii time "away from the busy haunts of. nien,:! and who must bo to a large extent dependent on books cud to his lave of reading for his intellectual recreation ?

I may add, Sir, ttiafc if Mr MaoGregor's proposal is carried out it is my intention to propose that the board take steps to consider the advisability of having the curriculum of our district high schools revised as indicated by Mr MacGregor. That those of your readers who give this subject cireful consideration will Bgree with the proposal I have no doubt; but, like all reforms and innovations, this ouo murt expect to encounter opposition. Nor should the friends of the scheme bo surprised if tho opposition comes from a quarter from which better thiugs might be expected. All I can say in conclusion is that if we had even the ceutral school which Mr Sligo and others imagine we intond to establish an accomplished fact, it would bo a loss expensive luxury than the ridicnlonßly overdone department of inspection, for which the Otago Education Board annually pays to the tune of £2200, and for which we reoeive the examination of 199 schools —or, to put it more plainly, for which wq pay at the rate of £11 for each school. All this is to fiad out how much of other people's knowledge has been stuffed into our children's headj, and yet this hubbub when some provision is proposed by which we will be able to ascertain of how much service such knowledge is after it has been stuffed in. Apologising for trospassiug at such leugth,— I am, &c,

SpriugOeld, Aptit 25.

J. J. R IMS AY