SCHOOL-LEAVING CERTIFICATE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 22294, 21 June 1934, Page 12

SCHOOL-LEAVING CERTIFICATE

CRITICISM OF EXAMINATION RESEMBLANCE TO MATRICULATION. j Interesting comment was\made by the rector of the Otago Boys’ ‘ High School (Mr H. P. Kidson) on the subject of the school-leaving certificate examination to the meeting of the board of governors yesterday. The examination, which is to be held for the first time this year, has already been the subject of some contraversy, and in his reference the rector expressed the opinion that it had been made too closely akin to the university entrance examination.

The section of his monthly report on the subject was as follows: The school-leaving certificate examination was being held for the first time this year. It gave a wider Choice of subjects than the university entrance examination. While the new examination would be of great value as an alternative to the university entrance in schools with widely diversified courses he was afraid that the effect of the new examination on a school of their type would not be great. Bookkeeping would not be a subject available for boys in the Modern Forms, otherwise the choice of subjects would be much the same as for university entrance. It was important for the board and for the community to know, however, that the standard of the school-leaving certificate examination was the same as that of university entrance (or matriculation). He felt that the department, in its desire to make the new examination as important in the eyes of parents and employers as the university entrance, had made the new examination too closely akin f o it. It had made no provision, for example, for any consultation with the schools in regard to the candidates’ school records.