ATTACK ON GRADING SYSTEM

Otago Daily Times, Issue 21021, 9 May 1930, Page 8

ATTACK ON GRADING SYSTEM

OTAGO TEACHERS’ PRONOUNCEMENT. (Special to Daily Times.) TIM All U, May 8. “ It is one of the most extraordinary pronouncements dealing with educational affairs that has come under my notice,” declared Mr A. E, Lawrence (chairman of the lay members of the Primary School Syllabus Revision Committee, who presented the minority report), when asked if he cared to make any comment on the statement on the “ De-grading of Teachers” issued'by the Otago branch of the New Zealand Educational 'lnstitute. CONFLICT OF OPINION. “It is all the more extraordinary,” declared Mr Lawrence, “ bicause it- flatly contradicts the official view of the institute. For example, in the April number of National Education (the official organ of the institute) editorial opinion discussing attacks on the grading list declares: ‘lt is not surprising that the present system of appointment by grading should be unpopular with the boards and ’committees since it has deprived them of the powers of patronage they possessed—and abused—under the previous system. What is surprising, however, is that the system is being attacked by some members of the teaching profession.’ The editorial concludes: ‘At present the teachers have a feeling of security. There will be none if the list goes.’. The secretary of the New Zealand Educational- Institute, in a letter which recently appeared in the public press, admits that the grading system is always being attacked by some teachers, 1 but,’ he says, ‘ they are only a few., There are some teachers—fortunately only a few—who lament the fact that their church membership, or board relationship, or athletic reputation or other similar factors are now of no service in securing promotion. There will always be some who will lament the passing of the opportunity" to ‘‘work a point.” Obviously,” commented Mr Lawrence, “there is sharp conflict'd! opinion,- md more obvious still, the secretary of the institute has not heard of ‘ window-dress-ing' within the schools 1 The official voice of the Otago teachers refers to 1 the amount of heartache, resentment, andtiopelessness that de-grading produces as a wrong thing,’ and reference is made to the teachers’ 1 loss of self-respect, buoyancy, and confidence in the justice of me system of appraisement and appointment under which he works.’ And this state of affairs has existed for four years, .nd yet Mr Parkinson stated recently that the annual conference of 1929 unanimously decided to ( call on the institute to resist any attempt to weaken the authority of the grading list as the basis of promotion. The Otago teachers now say that ‘ so unsettling has this fear of being de-graded become that teachers are in danger of losing their self-respect and virility.’ MINORITY REPORT PRONOUNCE- •. MENT. “It all boils down to the conclusion arrived at years ago by keen observers who are not professionally and financially interested in the application of the grading system,” Mr Lawrence pointed out. ‘ and my considered views were eventually embodied in the minority report of the Primary School Syllabus Revision Committee issued two years ago, under the title ‘ Control of Education,’ which strongly opposes centralisation and advo.cates the restoration of local administrative control of education. The minority report says: / As an essential first step we recommend the abolition of the grading system for teachers, and the substitution Uf a grouping system in conformity with the grading of schools and positions, with possibly separate gradings for . male and female teachers and a clear definition of positions which may be filled by each sex or by either male or female in accordance with the exigencies of the occasion. 1 Such a system would afford boards and committees a choice of teachers, and would thus remove & ' cause of dissatisfaction. It would give to boardsa selection of applicants falling within a specified group, whiteboards could afford committees a j loice from a limited selected number. Teachers would also have a knowledge of the eligible group and so be restrained from making fruitless applications. From a knowledge of the. working of the present grading system we are ' confident that it is fundamentally bad and indefensible. It is founded on the fallacious assumption that- nine separate sets of inspectors, opeiat'Jg hundreds of miles apart (all the way from Auckland to Invercargill | will form exactly the same estimate U J the value of service by teachers and allot the same number of marks. it would' be the perfection of, folly to ciKcitain such a conception, for it is a' human impossibility, for it gives no heed to the mentality of man and is subversive to common sense and reason The present grading is the product of ' accident and not of a concrete system, under which individual conceptions would not find expression. It is impossible to set down with any sufficing degree of accuracy in progressive figures the relative merits of the service rendered by a local body of teachers operating under , widely different Circumstances and conditions, and that impossibility "is. set in a clear light when the task has to be performed by nine acts of judges denied the aid ot mutual consultation and interchange of views, VVe are conversant with the fact the system is productive of discontent' and dissatisfaction, and that it 'e-ui« to injustice, while it does nothing to on- , sure efficiency or stimulate personal interest in the work to be performed. The administration of the system aggravates its badness. Under a well devised grouping system no atomalies and no fruitful causes of injustice, no such discontent as prevails in cht profession would exist, for tduchets would befall placed in their proper group without distinctive members, and p-’o motion would not follow on a ruie-jf-thunb basis, but upon actual merit as discovered by the inspectors aud disclosed by them in their reports, which would naturally enter into consideration of boards when selecting applicants for vacancies. , . tor the reasons assigned we earnestly, urge the Minister to annul the present grading system, and replace it with one that will stand the test of critical examina- . tion. FUNDAMENTALLY UNBOUND. , “It is obvious,” commeutbd Mr Lawrence, “ that the teachers of Otago have come to the same conclusion by afa entirely different process. v ‘ It might bo pertinent to ask,’ say the Otago teachers, in their pronouncement. ‘ what man or body of men can, in the course of a brief visit to a school, so accurately assess a teacher’s work and worth and personality in comparison with those of his fellows, as to feel justified in subjecting any teacher—other than the obviously weak, lazy or negligent—to the humiliation of de-grading?’ This is precisely the objection that has always been offered by me to the present system, since the teachers themselves have hitherto resolutely and blindly supported the fundamental fallacy that any man or body .of men (in the person of inspectors) can in the course of a brief visit to a school, so, accurately assess the teacher’s work and worth and personality, in comparison with those of his fellows, as to reveal within the compass of a single mark the fitness or otherwise of a teacher for appointment, even to the highest positions on the staffs of primary/ schools. Now that the boomerang has hit some of them, they declare that such discrepancy from district to district tends to undermine the confidence of teachers in a scheme which was constituted primarily to secure uniformity of appraisement throughout the Dominion! Yours ago. it - may bo mentioned, the Auckland branch of the New Zealand Educational Institute (the district, by the way. which gave the system to New Zealand), yet showing more courage than the executive of the institute. eome to the conclusion that 1 a Dominion system of grading is geographically impracticable of equitable application ’ and their judgment is well founded.” THE HUMAN ELEMENT. “The pronouncement ot the Otago teachers is most extraordinary,” added Mr Lawrence, “ because it declares that down-grading is a terrible hardship to inflict on any teacher, but the mock heroics of a rather too hurriedly prepared pronouncement, are rather discounted by the fact that in four years only 148 teachers of a total of 0422 in the Dominion (only 47 last year) were regarded by inspectors as definitely falling behind in efficiency. Forty-seven of 0422—certainly not a very targe proportion in a service employing 0422 human beings! It

represents, spreading it out over the whole '! Dominion, just about one teacher de-graded last year by each of the 45 primary school ; inspectors; indeed, the proportion might i be very much higher without in any way menacing the future of the efficient elements of the teaching profession. Would it surprise the Otago teachers, to be told that in the harder world outside the school, men and women not only suffer J loss of status because of diminishing efii- i ciencyJ9but are actually ‘ sacked ’ because ! they have been found to be square pegs | in round holes. EFFECT OF INVASION. “ There was a time,” concluded Mr Lawrence, “ before the Dominion system of grading, with all its fundamental weaknesses, came into operation, when it could have been said that the teachers in the Otago Education district stood in the forefront of the profession; but since the invasion from other provinces, where grading marks may have been more generously awarded, it is. not safe to dogmatise on the uniform efficiency of the staffs employed in the schools of Otago, of whom, during my years as a member of the Otago Education Board up to 1923, 1 formed such a high opinion.”