South Canterbury Times, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 13, 1880.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2363, 13 October 1880, Page 2

South Canterbury Times, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 13, 1880.

The storm in a tea-pot which has lately been excited in educational circles has come to a very suitable end. The Timaru School Committee, who panted for the blood of a head mistress, have not had their appetite appeased, and Miss Forbes, who has been severely lacerating the feelings of the Committeemen, has been mildly admonished. We sincerely trust that the oil which the Education Board have thrown on the troubled waters will be allowed to take effect. Of course we cannot expect that there will be no dissatisfaction. The Committee, having been virtually defeated, will probably feel aggrieved, and Miss Forbes, despite her experience and tact as a disciplinarian, is almost sure to feel slightly vexed. The Board, however, has done probably the best thing that could be done under the circumstances. To have complied with the demands of the Committee might, or might not, have been an arbitrary sketch of authority, but it would certainly have been an impolitic step. It is undoubtedly to be regretted that in circles of an educational and scholastic character, which, on account of their having to teach “ the young idea how to shoot,” ought to be circumspect and exemplary, disturbances should arise. In the present instance, had a little mutual forbearance been shown had the Committee-men, new to their duties, displayed a smaller amount of youthful impulsiveness, and the lady concerned a little less irascabilty—there would have been no need of an appeal to the penal clauses of the Education Act, or a judge and jury trial before the Board. The most unsatisfactory circumstance in connection with the proceedings is that the investigation has been conducted on the star chamber principle, and neither the public nor the persons chiefly interested have been placed in possession of the evidence on which the Board arrived at their verdict. In justice to all parties, a little light should have been shed on the mystery. Doubtless the evidence was conflicting, for did not the difficulty from the first grow out of a conflict of testimony between the fair girl graduate and the head mistress of the school ? Up to the time when the Board was called in, many of the material allegations were simply ex parte statements and consequently of little or no value. It would have been but a graceful act towards the parents if those points had been cleared up in their presence. Why an investigation of this kind should be secretly conducted, we arc at a loss to understand. The system of burking investigations that should be public, gagging the press, and excluding the community, is a most pernicious one. Committee work—on the silent system —is gaining in Timaru a dangerous ascendancy. As this matter rests at present, neither the Committee nor the head master can feel satisfied. They do not know what kind of evidence or special pleading 'his weighed with the Board in coming to their decision —they only know the result. They may be indebted to the generous interference of secret friends, or they may have received stealthy stabs in the back from vindictive foes. They can arrive at no just conclusion as to the estimation in which they arc respectively held by the members of the Education Board, or the Board’s influential officers. This is very hard on the parties to the suit, and very unsatisfactory for the public. We sincerely hope that for the future a little more light will be shed on public business, and that the disagreeable habit, becoming so general on the part of local bodies, of moving themselves into committee and locking the door whenever anything of particular interest is about to be discussed, will be abandoned. As regards the battle between committee and teacher just concluded, let us hope that the storm will be succeeded by the calm, and that peace and quietness will take the place of scholastic differences. The episode will not be without its good results if it leads the belligerents on both sides to exercise for the future a little mutual forbearance, and teaches them the practical value of the memorable lines: — Dear children you should never let Your angry passions rise, Your little hands were never meant To tear each other’s eyes.