TECHNICAL EDUCATION.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 18896, 23 June 1923, Page 2

TECHNICAL EDUCATION.

IS IT EFFECTIVE? (From Oor Own Correspondent.) WELLINGTON, June 22. According to the Hon. J. G Garland, who addressed the Legislative Council this afternoon, enough is riot being done on the technical side of education. He wanted

to see boys so well qualified that when they left school after four years at a technical school they would be able to go straight to a mechanic’s shop, and that they should count ns second and not as first year apprentices entering the workshops, and earn the same money as boys who had been

there for years. In his opinion wo were not getting the right class'of men at the head of the schools, and if we got the right man he was sure wo could turn out in four years boys who would bo worth their second year’s salary. He had no quarrel with the Minister of Education in the matter, but wanted a change in the system to enable his suggestion to be put into effect. Touching on Mr Garland’s suggestions, the Hon. John Barr said that when a boy

applied at certain places for a job he was asked if he had been to a teclmical school, and if he said he had he was told ho was not wanted. The reason was that the

people at the head of the technical schools had not been at the trade for some time, and the boy was taught methods which Wore not in' line with present day requirements. The boy was not wanted because

he had to unlearn much of what he hadbeen taught. A boy who was working at a trade could do well by going to the technical school at night, and thus learning the theory in addition to the practical side of his trade.