VICTORIA COLLEGE

Otago Daily Times, Issue 23500, 14 May 1938, Page 19

VICTORIA COLLEGE

oCENTRE OF HIGHER EDUCATION RECORD NUMBER OF STUDENTS (Pm Utimm Pm ns Aahociationj WELLINGTON, May 13. . The rapid progress of Victoria University College, Wellington, which this year has a record number of students on its roll, was referred to by the chairman of the College Council, Mr P, Levi, who presided at the annual graduation ceremony in the Town Hall to-night. " Last year we touched the !)00 mark,” Mr Levi said, alluding to the number of students. “This year we have passed the 1000 mark, and there are some 30 students over that number attending the college at the present lime. The college is progressing rapidly in performing its functions of giving to the youth of this city the higher education it is intended to give “ With this increasing number of students,” Mr Levi said, “ the pressure on the facilities has made it necessary to increase the accommodation at the college by a grant from the Government. We arc now proceeding with important additions. We are erecting a very important building for the pur. pose of science, and that will give largely-increased accommodation in the main building. We are also erecting at the back of the college an administration block which will provide the accommodation for administrative functions.” Mr Levi added that the adminstrative block was expected to be ready by July next and the new science building, he understood, would be completed in plenty of time for the 1939 session. A haka party of students performed several times during the evening but the ceremony compared with those of recent years was a very quiet one. Reply to Criticism

Criticism of the college by some sections of the community, criticism which, he said, in its mildest form, took the form of calling the institution a night school and at the other extreme a hot-bed of sedition and irreligion, was replied to by Mr G. G. G. Watson, a graduate of the college, who delivered the main address.

Mr Watson paid a tribute to the work of the foundation professors and students of the college and said that more than half the judges on the Supreme Court to-day were graduates of Victoria College and that the majority of the King’s counsel received their education “in this alleged night,school of iniquity.”