AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.

Otago Witness, Issue 3098, 30 July 1913, Page 16

AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.

WHAT AUSTRALIA IS DOING? MR G. D BR AIK’S REPORT. Mr G. D. Braik, Director of Agricultural Education to the Wanganui Education Hoard, and well known throughout Otago, has just completed an investigation into the systems in operation in Australia. Ho lias pro pa red a comprehensive report, which the Wanganui Board has decided to bring under the notice of the Government. Mr Braik in his report detailed what is being done in Australia in tiio primary schools, secondary schools, and agricultural colleges, and then described the agricultural training at the nniveisitics He then outlines the work which is being carried on in tho schools of the Dominion. We give the coneluding portion of his addressTHE GENERAL OUTLOOK. What are tho factors operating in tiio work of agricultural education? 0 hey are, firstly, tlie strictly educational lines—tho primary school, secondary school, technical school, the- agricultural college (presently), and the university; secondly, the Department of Agriculture, with its State farms, its .research laboratories, its local officers, and its visiting instructors; thirdly, the Agricultural and Pastoral Associations, tho Farmers’ Unions, and ;he farmers who, by tho excellence of their methods and results, set the pace to their neighbours. The great problem now is how to co-ordinate these factors with a view to tho greatest possible efficiency and the least possible educational and material waste. Three principles may he suggested—-specialisation, co-operation, and singleness of aim. The Agricultural Department naturally specialises along its own lines, but that is no reason why it should not co-operate with the schools and universities where co-operation is possible and desirable. Already the department has shown its readiness to infer the needs of our secondary schoo.s bj allowing those pupils to visit and study the f irm and its operations, and the time, I hope, is not far off when short classes • ganised by tho Itoard’s supervisors will be taught by the department’s instructors. It is d flieolt to see why tlie department's laboratories should not be open to university stud ins of agrieu'ture, who would be aba- to study agricultural problems such as soil composition and animal and plant d seas s when they are submitted to the d< pm tin. nt l;v the people immediately interested. '! should also be possible for these. st 'd i.is t G follow the researches of the department’s officers conducted with a view to the discovery of new facts and principles whl an agricultural bearing. Loose views on t -ns subject cannot fail to load to serious na i-mal loss. R INFLECTIONS. What impressed mo most in Australia was tho fullness of the cities and (lie emptiness of the country A busy city is no doubt an inspiring sight, but when one reflects that in the Australian States nearly half tho population is aggregated in l ho capital towns, there is some room for misgiving. Numberless hurrying feet, the illimitable brick and mortar, throw a shadow across the imagination, for, though wealth and progress are their necessary accompaniment, there lurk in them the seeds of discontent, misery, vice, and crime. In Sydney there stand," check by iowl with tho purest forms of architecture, tno hideous sky-scraper, and In journeying northwards or southwards one sees little but the interminable gum tree with an occasional house, if house it may be called. There are, of course, many beau* tiful and contented spots in Australia; bufc I speak oi what I saw. How much more fortunate is New Zealand, where the popula-

tion is evenly distributed, not merely in the large towns, but throughout the country. This even distribution should be encouraged at all costs, and agricultural education of the right kind will make a vast contribution towards jt. It is not hard to imagine the time when each country school will have its social hull, its library, its laboratory, its pictures, and its music. Then the feet of the dwellers in the country will no longer turn towards the cities for lack of employment, society refinement, rational pleasure or intellectual life. As time and occasion permit I shall place before the board brief reports dealing with the following:—Kindergarten teaching and the Montessori system, the primary school education, secondary education, technical education, and other matters not readily classifiable.