BOYS AND FARM WORK

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22066, 23 September 1933, Page 10

BOYS AND FARM WORK

Apparently the Vocational Guidance Committee is finding its experience somewhat disappointing in the matter of placing boys in employment on farms. It is not that there is a lack of openings for boys. Actually more positions on farms are available than there are boys to fill them, but it is difficult to induce boys to take up farm work. In the great majority of cases the boys themselves will probably not have much freedom of choice in the matter, the decision resting with their parents. It seems there is a strong tendency on the part of parents to regard a secondary school education as wasted on fanning. It is a little hard to understand why such an idea should persist, for farming has become to a large extent a scientific calling, and will continue, as time goes on, to demand brains and education in an increasing measure for its successful pursuit. Parents are evidently swayed also, somewhat short-sightedly, by the view that the prospects for farming are not such as to justify them in sending their boys to the country. It might not be easy to single out any industry as offering a more than usually bright outlook for those who enter it as recruits at the present time. Confidence as regards the future must begin with the primary industries, and there is no reason why the experience which the Dominion has had of the effect of an undue inflation of land values, coupled with a drop in the prices of farm products, should cause farming to be viewed askance as a suitable calling for the rising generation, or engender pessimism respecting the outlook for those who are given an opportunity of acquiring a practical knowledge of it. Only a minority of the boys who pass through the secondary schools can, after all, hope to enter the professions —in many eases their parents cannot afford to assist them in that direction —and where a profession is already ovei-crowded it cannot offer any alluring prospects. Another reason why parents are not anxious that their boys should accept the openings found for them on farms by the Vocational Guidance Committee

is that they are apprehensive lest they should suffer discomfort. But since the committee exercises every care in the selection of suitable homes, in which the lads would have hospitable and considerate treatment, there should be no serious ground for anxiety on this score. Admittedly, however, the position is one of some difficulty, and the solicitude of parents is understandable, even if their decisions may not be always based on the best of judgment. Certainly it seems a pity that the eagerness which, according to the vocational officer’s testimony, many boys are showing to go to the country should be subject to discouragement, but clearly there is wisdom in the view expressed by him that only the suitable type of boy should be sent there.