EDUCATION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 26659, 3 January 1948, Page 2

EDUCATION

FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW

By Mentor

1948! Mentor takes this opportunity of wishing all his readers a bright and prosperous New Year. Early this year we complete our first hundred years of settlement in Otago, and we intend to celebrate in right royal style the progress we have made. But our year should not, we would hope, be given solely to celebrations, and to patting ourselves on the back, and telling ourselves what good fellows we have been. The position we find ourselves m to-day, our progress and our prosperity we owe to a large extent to the courage, the endurance, and the foresight of those pioneers we intend to honour. In the midst of our rejoicings and our self-congratula-tions, it would be fitting that we indulge for a time in a little stocktaking, and ask ourselves whether we are measuring up to the standards set by our forebears. The past is theirs, but the future is our responsibility.

Educationalists will welcome the celebrations that are planned, for in them they will find probably the best opportunity they have ever had of impressing on the young people under their care the value ot the heritage they shall so soon attain. One of the main purposes of the Centennial Executive in arranging the Cavalcade of Progress has been to present to the children of Otago, in a visual form, something of the history of Olago, and of the progress that has been made during the hundred years just completed. Full opportunity will undoubtedly be taken by all teachers to make the most of the opportunity afforded. The Education Committee, too,' has seen that the children will play a full part in the actual celebrations. We all hope that the shadow of the' infantile paralysis epidemic will pass, and that their part in the proceedings will not have to be curtailed.

The part played by Otago in the development of our education system has been an important one. Otago led New Zealand in many phases of edu-

cational development, and has provided many first-rate educational leaders and administrators. The list of those products of its secondary schools and its University who have gained world eminence in their own particular field would be much too long for a column such as this. In the last 100 years proud traditions have been built up by our schools and colleges. Tradition is an excellent thing; it is for us of today, and for those who follow us, to see that such traditions do not become translated into traditionalism—a very different thing. This is ..always a danger as educational institutions become older, and one that requires constant and conscious effort to avoid. The wise educationist is he who avoids traditionalism on the one hand, and faddism on the other, wisely selecting as his guide all that is best from the past, and ingrafting on to that sure foundation only what is tried and proved of the new ideas that for ever flood the educational market. Frequently the charge is laid that we have discarded too much that was _ found worth while in the past. In this centennial year we might well make, as our New Year resolution, an effort to review our position educationally, without bias or prejudice, so that our future progress may be sure and on sound lines.

Press reports from our Otago representative to the recent UNESCO conference remind us that such a meetin'g took place. We wonder why there was so little publicity during the conference itself. The space given to our returning delegates shows that the fault was not the fault of our local press. Mr Forsyth, on being questioned, assures us that there was at all times, at the conference, a full press bench, and that he himself saw copies of ample daily press releases from the conference press room. Somewhere between there was an obvious lack of interest. This seems a tragedy, as the work UNESCO is trying to do is of vital world importance, and the decisions of its conferences should be of first importance to everyone.