EDUCATION

Southland Times, Issue 20773, 14 May 1929, Page 5

EDUCATION

NEED FOR CHANGE IN SYSTEM. MINISTER’S VIEWS. (Per United Press Association.) Wellington, May 13. An important statement was made today by the Minister of Education before the New Zealand Educational Institute. He was not, he said, in favour of an expert being given administrative power while he had capable advisers round him. It did not mean he would follow their advice on every occasion. He had not the slightest hesitation in inditing the education system or the grounds that it was too academic. There was no doubt the system was a survival of the times when education was a thing for the sons and daughters of the wealthy. There was the fact to-day that while 95 per cent, of our annual production comes from the land, 95 per cent, of our educational effort goes in the direction of fitting the boys and girls for town employment. Unemployment in New Zealand was to-day largely the result of our education system. We were taking the brightest brains from the country into the cities. He had come to the conclusion that an alteration must be made. He considered the two portfolios of education and agriculture should be the two most intimately connected. His hopes therefore were that there would be a strong agricultural bias in the new system of education. The social status of the farmer must be raised. The education system would have to be more practical than in the past. Part of his programme of reorganization would be a unification of the local administrative bodies in the various districts and unification also of the sectional teaching bodies employed in the primary, secondary and technical schools. There is not the slightest intention of hurting any of the teachers.