SCHOOLS AND UNIFORMS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25305, 16 August 1943, Page 2

SCHOOLS AND UNIFORMS

BOARD CHAIRMAN’S REMARKS STRONG EXCEPTION TAKEN (P.A.) AUCKLAND, Aug. 15. “ I cannot imagine that anyone would say this, as it is so entirely alien to the principles of child psychology,” said the Prime Minister, Mr P. Fraser, at the opening of the Manukau Intermediate School yesterday, referring to the reported statement by the chairman of the Auckland Grammar School Board, Mr J. Stanton, on the matter of school uniforms. Mr Stanton was reported as saying that those pupils who could not afford uniforms would not be debarred from secondary education, as district high schools were available to them. He would rather sacrifice those children than the principle of uniforms. A further reported remark was that children were not of the class that would benefit from a grammar school education. " I have never known a child that could not benefit," said the Prime Minister. If it could not, however, then grammar schools were obsolete. This could not be said of the fine grammar schools in Auckland. The whole purpose of modern education was to discover a child’s capabilities and give it the opportunity for development, Mr Fraser concluded. . ~ Mr C. H. Grainger, chairman of the School Committee, said he took strong exception to the remarks reported. He considered that the reference to the children of Onehunga was a slur on the citizens, and an insult to the residents of the borough. Any man who would put the uniform before the child, Mr Grainger said, was not a fit man .to be chairman of a board of governors. The Minister of Education, Mr H. G. R. Mason, said that, following the publication of Mr Stanton’s remarks, he had written to him, because he did not think Mr Stanton was the type of man who would think in that way of any child. He asked that judgment should therefore be suspended until it was known what Mr Stanton’s reply was. Personally, he had always understood that one of the main advantages of a uniform was that it was economical and therefore not an undue strain on parents.