SCHOOL COMMITTEES

Southland Times, Issue 19294, 12 July 1924, Page 6

SCHOOL COMMITTEES

CONFERENCE AT TIMARU. JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOLS CONDEMNED. (Per United Press Association.) TIMARU, July 11. Following a full discussion of the question of Junior High Schools, at the South Island School Committees’ Association today, the following motion was passed unanimously: This representative gathering of delegates of the School Committees of the South Island strongly protests against the scheme of Junior High Schools, especially as projected for Oamaru, as calculated to wreck the primary school system of the Dominion, reducing the grades of teachers, robbing the primary schools of the tradition created by senior scholars in all sports and other interests, and making the extreme age of primary pupils not more than 11 years; and further, because it will reduce the primary system to the equivalent of a glorified kindergarten. A deputation was appointed to wait on the Minister in connection with the matter. The Association also decided to ask the Department to expedite the training of dental nurses and the establishment of dental clinics at suitable centres; that all transfers of teachers take place at the end of the year; that the former status of school committees be restored, and that their tenure of office be two years.