TECHNICAL EDUCATION

Otago Witness, Issue 2104, 21 June 1894, Page 35

TECHNICAL EDUCATION

THE ADVANCE IN ADELAIDE.

(From Oub Own Correspondent.) Auckland, June 14.

The Rev. W. Williams, principal of Three Kings Wesleyan College, who had an informal mission from the Auckland University to inquire into the methods and working of technical education in the Australian colonies during his attendance at the Australasian Wesleyan Conference at Adelaide, is publishing his observations and experiences in a series of articles in the New .JZealand Herald. He says : — " Bafore leaving Auckland for Australia I was assured that I should find Adelaide specially fruitful as a field for investigation with regard to technical educition, and such proved to be the case. There at anyrate a - brave attempt is being made to solve the problem of how to make education most directly contributory to all- the varied requirements of a colonial community. Among the pleasures of memory will live a . lengthy visit I was privileged to pay to the Way Cjliego. Looking on its various scenes of industry, I was nob surprised to learn that the boys, to whom an ordinary school life wibh*its monotony of books and figures was intolerable drudgery, woke up into fresh intellectual vigour at the discovery that education may be made to include the training of the eye and the hand and healthy practical instruction in the arts of everyday life. That Way College has succeeded to an almost unprecedented extent in attracting pupils I, for one, am not surprised at, after having seen the manner in which the work is carried on. A college conducted on such methods and in, such a spirit merits the widest possible success, as it tends to minister in no small degree to the healthy progress of the State. Another interesting visit was one I paid to Prince Alfred College. Enough was seen and heard, however, to satisfy me that while technical education is nob by any means so prominent a feature as at Way College, it is, certainly not lo3t sight of. Way College is not yefc-toree years old, Prince Alfred has been established 25 years, and it is only natural to expect a certain conservatism of method in the older college as compared with its youthful rival., The fact, that 51 boys from Prince Alfred College attended the carpentry classes at the School of Mines, and that within the college grounds there are plots set apart for the use of boys who wish to study agriculture, shows that the authorities of Prince Alfred are becoming alive to. the importance of education of tha most practical type. The mention of the School of Mines and Industries leads me to what is the moat striking object lesson in technical education that I saw during my stay in Adelaide. In the colleges to which I have referred the boys are to, a greater or lesser extent fitted to take hold at once of the practical business of life almost as soon as their school days are over, in my judgment our secondary schools must ba more and more modelled on these lines if their existence is to be justified on the ground of a. many-sided utility. The Sohool of Mines and Industries is a large and flourishing institution which no one can visit without delight, and which no New 2ealander can vißit without very cordially wishing that a similar jesti-. tation were set on foot in each of the chief cities in his own colony. Adelaide is a small city compared with either Sydney or Melbourne. It has a smaller population even than Auckland ; and the fact that no less 6.60 persons last year availed themselves of the educational facilities afforded by the Sohool of Mine 3 shows that it is a movement that is practically appreciated."